Reference notes on difficulty level effects

[Tingyun]

There is no idea or suggestion here from me, but I was curious about what exactly difficulty level affects in the current build, and I made some notes while searching through all the getdifficulty uses in the files.

I have made a few underlined Notes of interesting things, but all make sense, I'm not suggesting any changes.

These may be useful if someone else wants to look at difficulty level effects in the future. (note, does not include minor difficulty level effects, like most hints or small changes in side quests)



As difficulty goes up, the following occurs:

LAi_boarding
HP boost to enemies (may be overwritten by leveling system);
hp cap on insanely high enemy hp for below swashbuckler
Reduce surrender chance

quests_common
Reduces money gained from cargo and fetch quests
makes the potion fetch quest a little harder
Here is the cargo delivery quest payment formula:
iTradeMoney = pow((0.5*Goods[iTradeGoods].Cost + iCargoType)*(1.0+(5.0-GetDifficulty())/5.0),0.5) * 0.05 * pow(irank ,0.5) * pow(distancedestination,1.2);

Leveling
gives more xp to persistent npcs on daily update
slows down all xp gain for player
Increases HP of non-friendly
Decreases HP of friendly (ie, officers)

Note: in-game effects indicate the player gets more HP as difficulty level increases, the opposite of his officers

LAi_Fightparams
Slows down xp gain from combat
Landlubber only gets some combat bonuses
Enemies idle less often in combat

Note: combined with Leveling reduction, is a double effect on combat XP, more dramatic than other skills

characterutilite
Increase salary costs player needs to pay
Increase player share of money (divide the plunder I think)
Reduce amount of gold carried by random characters
Increase player fame rating

Note: it appears then easier to become more famous on higher dificulty levels, you get a higher share, and your score is increased by a multiple

Note: the old formula in the seperate Salary file did also increase player salary for higher difficulty levels, but the current one does not

CreateCaptain
Increases captain level

CreateOfficer
Increase not friendly level
Decrease friendly level

skills_util
item boost bonus divided by level

Lenc monsters
makes bandits more likely in towns

AI ship
starting hull and sail damage larger for lower difficulty levels
hulldmg *= (1.5 - 0.2 * makefloat(GetDifficulty()));
saildmg *= (1.5 - 0.2 * makefloat(GetDifficulty()));

Smuggling.c
Lots of smuggling effects

Towntable.c
increases troops in town
decreases crew for hire

Encwalker
no notifications for pickpocketed at higher levels

nations.c
Increase chance of false flag being detected

Summary observations:
- In general, difficulty level makes you face slightly higher level enemies, with slightly higher HP (more if that boarding effect isn't overwritten, not sure), and reduces your own team's HP a little bit.
- Difficulty level makes you earn a bit less from looting random enemies and from doing cargo or fetch quests, but you earn as much from other sources, including normal trading
- Difficulty level increase crew costs a little bit, but they still aren't much of a major burden
- Higher difficulty levels should have a much easier time building fame, because they get higher personal shares and a multiple to score

Anyway, no suggestions for changes from me, just sharing the above reference notes in case anyone else is working on anything that involves difficulty level balance.

 

[Redbeard]

This is pretty good to know just because. I play on the second difficulty, so I've been thinking about a higher difficulty for my next campaign. One thing I despise in games is that alot of games are similar to the elder scrolls/fallout in that as difficulty goes up, enemies have much more hp, and you do less damage. Instead of making the fight more difficult, it just prolongs the encounters. Personally, I like how POTC is doing things, because it affects more than just hp, you have alot of other factors involved with crew pay, fame, etc.

What is daily update on persistant NPCS? Like your officers? Or does this refer to enemy captains and unhired officers?

 

[Levis]

Smuggling.c
Lots of smuggling effects

 

[Tingyun]

@Redbeard I think (not completely certain) the daily crew update npc xp is for shopkeepers and such. It might work on certain civilians too, but you wouldn't notice it have any effect. It wouldn't effect almost any enemy or captain, because those are generated at the moment you encounter them. There aren't many persistent characters where their level matters for the player, I think just shopkeepers.

I don't think it affects your officers.

As for the difficulty effects you dislike, HP is still somewhat determined by difficulty (but a very reasonable amount), but in the last patch we got rid of the difficulty effects on the damage you and enemies do. It used to be the system you say you despise, where the player mysteriously does less damage...so you'll be happy to know we got rid of those effects in the latest patch (which is why they aren't on the list).