FO difficulty settings

[Hath]

I just started playing and modding FO after a long dry spell. I was never any good at FO, but man I just got my butt handed to me by a merciless dominion (I was fed). In the end game stats I noticed that I out spent the computer by almost 2 to 1 and it still build way more ships then me. That got me to thinking about the difficulty settings.
Can some one explain the difference between the Normal, Hard, and Merciless settings in FO. Is the AI changed at all? Does the computer players get a cost break on hard and merciless? Anything else too. Thanks for any insights and help.

 

[Rifraf]

Yes, the AI can cheat in that it gets more resources, shorter build times, does more damage, etc. If you look in the RTC_cfg file you'll see settings for cost, build speed, mining, and damage modifiers. I don't recall what FO has theirs set at, but if you set them to 1.0 they will be more/less on an equal level as you. Have a look at the FO guide for settings here: http://guide.fleetops.net/guide/modding/units/rts-cfg-elements#EASY_SPECIAL_WEAPON_FIRE_MODIFIER-

Modifying the AI personality files can help the AI to play "smarter" in the limited capacity it can however, the tried and true method is to give it more resources, etc to make it more challenging to you.

 

[Chiletrek]

Hello:
That is a good answer RifRaf! I do remember that stock A2's version of that file has similar codes for some AI behaviors, one I always wanted to alter was the us of cloaking devices for some races, because in easy they use it less so that means they have more ships firing at you, hehehe.

As for FO, for me it has always been like: normal = hard , hard = more hard , merciless = absurdly hard! ... so good luck at looking at those values!

 

[Hath]

Thanks Rifraf! I don't think I'll mod the RTC file at least not just yet, but I'm going back to hard difficulty. As an aside do you know which way the AI Build Time Modifier should be set to increase the value in the advance settings section of the start menu. Does 1.05 or -1.05 increase the AI's build time?

 

[Rifraf]

I made a typo before, sorry. It's the RTS_cfg file. As to the build time setting from what I see it's either hard or easy? I don't see decimal values? I would think 1.05 adds time to the AI for easy and -1.05 lowers the time for hard??

 

[Hath]

No worries about the typo I found the right file. I just copied and pasted your typo into my post. lol double typo. As for the AI build time I thought that was the way it worked but wanted to be sure. Thanks for your time.