How does the difficulty alter the game?

[tsavo]

Originally Posted by 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

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