How does the difficulty alter the game?

[Timberwolftrass]

Hey there, just out of curiousity... How does the difficulty alter the game exactly? I noticed already that the difficulty has a major impact on your rewards for accomplished missions, with hard rewarding you with just about 1/4 of the credits you would have gotten on easy.

My question is... Are there any other changes? I mean, when I play on hard, are the enemies going to use more fighter, better fighters, better equipment?

So far I have only played on easy, for the simple reason of the highest reward, and I'd like to know if the other difficulty settings are worthwhile playing for other reasons than keeping you relatively poor.

[Ruinous]

You get far less xp, cash and loot drops. Enemies are tougher (more veterans & aces around) and seem to hit more often. It might be subjective, but I don't think the loot from caches is anywhere near as good as on normal vs hard setting either... I may have just got unlucky hehe.

[BuilderX]

I don't know about other difficulties as i directly went with "hard" mode.

Xp is really slow to get, but it's the pleasure of challenge i like.

Some missions were a pain in the ass at the very beginning.

About the money i already got a lot of money in some missions like 200.000 and more recently 750.000, but perhraps you got more in easy mode i don't know ?

Anyway Salvaging is a great way to earn money, i scout systems sometimes
after conflicts between 2 factions and i happen to find a lot of things i am reselling, as for the escape pods turning them into money and XP.

All i know is with what i get in "hard" mode with the challenges i had to overcome, i feel pretty good about the rewards in "hard" mode. I even feel powerful some times even if i am still in 3rd generation fighters :cool:

[Nanaki]

Going through the game files, here is what I found so far...

1: Cash rewards from missions are less
2: Shops give you less money for sold equipment, everythings more expensive
3: Enemies are tougher
4: You get less experiance from each kill

[ryuujin]

me i'm playing on easy mode because i want easy kill and finished the quest fast so that random bugs wont hit me as often as it is. I had a very bad experience in Star Wolves 2 where random bugs hit me quite often in every mission I did. its really frustrating keep doing the same mission evertime bugs hits not to mentioned restart the whole game.. omg.. that time Star Wolves 2 was my worst buggiest game ever played in my life.

[Nanaki]

As long as you avoid the Inoco mission line, Star Wolves 3 is quite bug free.

[tsavo]

Just cleared XB-19 after I changed mothership to Astarte
Only 3 pilots with me, It looks the AI is pretty much the same,
I was hoping with harder game, u have better AI

Is there any way to change that?

[Nanaki]

Is there any way to change that?


AI is pretty much the same though and though, although its pretty smart as is, they will work as teams if in the same squad. Becides, Star Wolves is an RPG, so in reality the AI does not have to do much, everythings handled by the pilot stats and the ship stats.

[tsavo]

AI is pretty much the same though and though, although its pretty smart as is, they will work as teams if in the same squad. Becides, Star Wolves is an RPG, so in reality the AI does not have to do much, everythings handled by the pilot stats and the ship stats.

No, disagree.
I use Astarte(600 shield, +5 repair) + 1 G4(decent equipments, but not the best) + 1 G3
cleared XB-19 without lost anything.
And I never group fighters together, and my pilot(greyhair) is just able to fly the G4

and now, I just finished Alex convoy mission, but got 1.5m cash + loads of junks worth another 1.5m(excluding the 4 G5 fighters from hidden locations)

during encounters, my mothership even does not need to change course.

[tsavo]

and one of my play mates even found a way to make money and gain exp automatically, without touch the keyboard, without change any game setting.

[ViralHatred]

Yeah, he used a mouse to turn on a trainer! Haha!

[Nanaki]

cleared XB-19 without lost anything.


Pirates are generally not very well-equipped or very well trained, mind you. Even the game states that their strategy and tactics pretty much boils down to 'Zerg rush the enemy' and that they do not have much in the way of teamwork or strategy.

[tsavo]

Yeah, he used a mouse to turn on a trainer! Haha!

tell u what, it is a build-in trainer:rolleyes:

[tsavo]

Pirates are generally not very well-equipped or very well trained, mind you. Even the game states that their strategy and tactics pretty much boils down to 'Zerg rush the enemy' and that they do not have much in the way of teamwork or strategy.

just got stuck with sam bug in Inoco mission, noticed I need to upgrade my fighter, will see what happens later:cool:

[Nanaki]

just got stuck with sam bug in Inoco mission, noticed I need to upgrade my fighter, will see what happens later:cool:

Although I am suprised, if you are playing on the hardest difficulty, XB-19 has the occasional squad of Hrimthurs that are armed with some pretty nasty MIRVs, nasty enough to rip even Wyverns equipped with the best Flares a new one.

[tsavo]

Although I am suprised, if you are playing on the hardest difficulty, XB-19 has the occasional squad of Hrimthurs that are armed with some pretty nasty MIRVs, nasty enough to rip even Wyverns equipped with the best Flares a new one.

I play hard, do we have hardest difficulty?
never use flare, laser defence only(it is a green one picked-up from other fights), and keep good distance always.
just noticed Greyhair is 25% better in anit-missile, lucky me;)

[Killer]

I have just started my fourth playthrough and chosed hard. So far the biggest difference is XP. It seems really hard to get XP from killing NPC. I just spent all my points to antimissile defense for me and Ternie, ten killed about 40 pirates and I am at 3.8 XP points... Bye, bye 5th generation fighters :(

[Nanaki]

I have just started my fourth playthrough and chosed hard. So far the biggest difference is XP. It seems really hard to get XP from killing NPC. I just spent all my points to antimissile defense for me and Ternie, ten killed about 40 pirates and I am at 3.8 XP points... Bye, bye 5th generation fighters :(

You can fix that, you know.


I play hard, do we have hardest difficulty?


Hmm, that is the hardest difficulty. Maybe it is just that active ECM is a lot better than passive ECM...

[tsavo]

I have just started my fourth playthrough and chosed hard. So far the biggest difference is XP. It seems really hard to get XP from killing NPC. I just spent all my points to antimissile defense for me and Ternie, ten killed about 40 pirates and I am at 3.8 XP points... Bye, bye 5th generation fighters :(

Greyhair got the antimissile perk at the begining, so, why waste your point?

My understanding for how to start a Hard game is:
1 try to go faster and avoid combact in the begining,
2 salvage as much as possible, use fast fighter as decoy,
3 focuse on upgrade mother ship firepower and fighter maneuverability when u got some money
4 looking for trouble when Greyhair jions
5 Keep mothership manned during combat, unless it is necessary

[tsavo]

Hmm, that is the hardest difficulty. Maybe it is just that active ECM is a lot better than passive ECM...

Just run through the Alien mission lastnight, Laser defence is usless against Alien missile, but Flare works fine. My decoy fighter never survive first wave of missiles when equiped with Laser defence.

May be the Laser is able to destroy multi-warhead missiles afar, when it is still in one-piece?

[Killer]

You can fix that, you know. I know, I have read it in a different topic, but I am affraid not to make the game too easy. But maybe I will try it.