A difficulty level between normal and nightmare

[noboruwatanabe]

I, like a lot of people, have been through the game several times. I find the default difficulty too easy, and would like to see more options. Nightmare is close to what is needed, but enemy skills can scale way too high, making the possibility of being one-shotted far too real. If there is a way to add some kind of "hard" difficulty between normal and nightmare, I would play the pants off of it.

[SageAcrin]

I've been kicking around the idea of an inbetween difficulty that also boosts the player, while not being much weaker than Nightmare on base.

Here's my thoughts on it;

Intense: All enemy levels are boosted by 33%+2. All enemy talent levels are boosted by 33%(Or possibly 25%.).

The player gains an additional Class Point every three levels and an additional Generic point every five(For kicks, apply this to a Golem too. It's more entertaining that way.). Additionally, you obtain one extra category point at 46, and one extra Prodigy at 50.

The concept is basically that, while it makes enemies much more competent(only marginally below Nightmare), you have much better options to work at it with-if you make build mistakes, you have extra resources to compensate, it's easier to get complex builds off the ground in the earlygame, and it gives a setting on which you can do builds you can never do any other time.

Basically, it's what it says on the tin-less "Hard" and more "Intense". Certainly won't keep enemies from killing you if you don't know what you're doing-there's no intrinsic bonuses, only what you can get from your skills. Sound interesting to anyone else?

(Another interesting thing would be to allow it to partially relax talent caps-say, allow L6 talents instead of 5-but that is a little more questionable. Still could be neat.)

[King Gainer]

I like the idea.

[Crim, The Red Thunder]

Interesting. Push an addon and get it tested for balance?

[fuzzynord]

Intense: All enemy levels are boosted by 33%+2. All enemy talent levels are boosted by 33%(Or possibly 25%.).

The player gains an additional Class Point every three levels and an additional Generic point every five(For kicks, apply this to a Golem too. It's more entertaining that way.). Additionally, you obtain one extra category point at 46, and one extra Prodigy at 50.

(Another interesting thing would be to allow it to partially relax talent caps-say, allow L6 talents instead of 5-but that is a little more questionable. Still could be neat.)

I think that sounds really cool. It would also allow a smoother transition to nightmare by facing nearly the same difficulty enemies, but with a slightly boosted character.

If your doing all that with talents, you might consider a small boost to stats as well. Maybe give an extra stat point every 3-5 levels? And/or the stat cap could be raised from 60 to 65.


And the title "intense" fits very well. It's more intense in most (all?) respects. Not just harder, but beefier as well.

[Crim, The Red Thunder]

Is it worth generating a similar 'intense+' build between nightmare and insane as well? (something with insane level enemies, but that 'smoother' transition that gives players a better chance?)

[SageAcrin]

If your doing all that with talents, you might consider a small boost to stats as well. Maybe give an extra stat point every 3-5 levels? And/or the stat cap could be raised from 60 to 65.

Raising the cap seems kinda dull-making it possible to have linearly better characters makes it less interesting, it seems like it ought to be more about strategic choices rather than straight up bonuses.

(The reason I am on the fence about suggesting a skill level bonus is because post-5 choices are actually unusual, as many skills have poor rewards by L6, while some others gain linearly and have much better payoff. Stat caps is more "Build this important stat more.".)

More stat points, however, isn't linearly better, without a cap expansion. An extra stat point every three levels mostly is faster earlygame stats and more interesting lategame decisions(Which of these three stats that I haven't been building is the best one?). I like that about the big stat bonus at the end of the game-you've usually long built up your important stats, and deciding where to put your less important points is interesting.

So yeah, that could be an idea.

Is it worth generating a similar 'intense+' build between nightmare and insane as well? (something with insane level enemies, but that 'smoother' transition that gives players a better chance?)

Really, it wouldn't be a terrible idea to make an Easy(that just gives the bonuses but nothing else), an Easiest(That gives the bonuses *and* Easier's bonuses), and an Insane version.

The question is if anyone is going to do it. I don't really know much about that area of the code, and I've been feeling sick lately so coding has been hard. We'll see if I can manage to make the idea at all.

Still, I figured I'd suggest it rather than sitting on the idea.