Difficulty in user-made modules

[Legacy_MayCaesar]

               

Hey everyone,

 

I am a relatively new player, having only completed 3 official campaigns and now starting to play custom modules. Currently playing The Aielund Saga and having a lot of fun with it.

 

I played all the official campaigns, and playing Aielund now, on Very Difficult difficulty, and I struggled most of the time. I am not the best player, but at times it felt just way too difficult. In Aielund Saga, playing as a pure Sorcerer, I had to restart some fights over 10 times because of how hard the enemies hit. And in Hordes of the Underdark, I had to turn difficulty down for the Grimgnaw battle, as on Very Difficult it was just completely impossible; after dying for 50 times, I gave up.

 

So, my question is this: are custom modules usually balanced around Hardcore Rules difficulty, or maybe Normal difficulty? What do most people play? Is Very Difficult considered a funky setting for those who want more challenge in easy modules, or is it something strong players normally have on?

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_MrZork]

               I tend to have the most fun playing at the hardcore setting. Certainly, I think that's the best setting for Bioware's campaigns. For community modules, I would look at the notes for the module, as some have been balanced specifically for a particular setting. For the most part, there is a "season to taste" aspect of this, where you can usually take the difficulty up or down a notch, depending on what provides you with the most fun and/or challenge.

I will say that, even in modules that I think are never or only rarely difficult (like the OC, SoU, and HotU), I pretty much never play in Very Difficult mode. As I recall, the only significant difference between that and Hardcore is that opponents do double damage. To me, that is more likely to lead to annoyance as I am unexpectedly critted for 150+ HP than it is to make the game more challenging in a fun way (meaning, mostly, challenging in a way that I can reasonably overcome with better playing skills that aren't just an overabundance of boring caution).
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Proleric]

               

A rule-of-thumb is to start at Normal difficulty, turning up the heat if it gets boring.

 

I suspect that few module builders have time to test their work at more than one setting. Certainly, my own are tested at Normal.

 

I find that even the very best fan modules often have some "near impossible" battles. I'm happy to turn combat down, or resort to spam resting, in those circumstances.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_MagicalMaster]

               

Very Difficult doesn't even do what you think it does.  First of all, it only affects ranged/melee hits from enemies (so things like spell damage aren't affected).  Second, it only affects base damage of the weapon.  So a enemy Barbarian Warlord with 40 strength using a Battleaxe +5 would do 21-28 damage on Hardcore or lower...and 22-36 damage on Very Difficult.  Which, on average, is 24.5 damage vs 29 damage.

 

So it basically makes low level fights obscenely hard in many cases and barely changes anything at higher levels.  In short, never bother with it.  People design modules for either "Hardcore" (which really just means the player has less advantages than on Normal) or sometimes Normal.  Basically should assume Hardcore is the default difficulty unless explicitly stated otherwise.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Tchos]

               

I always play at Very Difficult, and test my modules' fights at that level.  Thus I can expect that others can complete the fights at lower difficulties.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_MayCaesar]

               

Okay, I see there are as many opinions as there are people.  '> I guess I will play on Very Difficult normally, switching to Hardcore/Normal if something seems really impossible to beat on that difficulty. And you are right MagicalMaster, I noticed that in most cases the damage increase is far from 100%. Also, since the most dangerous things that can quickly kill you are death magic, all kinds of stuns and disables and so on, making the sheer received damage secondary in most cases, Very Difficult should not be too hard, compared to Hardcore.

 

Normal with immunity to crit hits and shorter negative effect duration seems a bit too cozy to me. I remember when, in the mentioned Grimgnaw battle in HotU I switched to Normal, it was a completely different game: if before the majority of time I spent disabled by some spell, then after that stuns barely affected my damage output.

 

Which brings me to another question: do mod makers usually assume the player to use a very effective build? When they test the modules, do they test them only with popular strong builds, or do they assume the player to have an average built character? I know how to build some classes well, but I am afraid of experimenting with more classes and multiclass combinations since I might get stuck in the middle of a custom mod with underpowered character. 

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Tchos]

               

Which brings me to another question: do mod makers usually assume the player to use a very effective build? When they test the modules, do they test them only with popular strong builds, or do they assume the player to have an average built character?

 

As before I can only speak for myself on this, but I generally test with decent but not optimal builds.  I generally use automatic leveling for my playtests, and reasonable (not optimal) equipment for the level.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_werelynx]

               

No one here mentioned that most modules faction-wise are not properly scripted for Hardcore difficulty. Unless author tests them for such.

Reason: Area of Effect spells/abilities can harm friendly/neutrals making them hostile in some cases.

You can withhold your own spells, to some extent control hirelings, but you can't make NPCs cast spells without friendly fire.

 

I myself tend to play on Normal most of the time. If module suggests hardcore then I play on hardcore.

 

I wish there was hardcore difficulty without faction issues.

 

Disclaimer: such issues won't be in every module. Some faction isssues will be due to other reasons. ..but when you face a faction issue it usually means reloading a save or quitting module/quest. Debugging is hard.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Shadooow]

               

No one here mentioned that most modules faction-wise are not properly scripted for Hardcore difficulty. Unless author tests them for such.

Reason: Area of Effect spells/abilities can harm friendly/neutrals making them hostile in some cases.

You can withhold your own spells, to some extent control hirelings, but you can't make NPCs cast spells without friendly fire.

Actually, you are wrong.

 

NPCs generally casts spells without hurting others, Exception is only the caster hurting self bug (fixed in CPP) and associates (fam/sum/hen etc.) hurting PC. They will however not hurt other associates unless you set up module switch to do so and there is a big warning not to do this.

 

Anyway, I remember that on some PWs using a hostile AOE spell like cloud of bewilderment turned my familiar against me. I either fixes this in CPP and dont remember or it was bug from some other AI these PWs downloaded and used. Because I havent seen this behavior for a very long time.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_MagicalMaster]

               

I always play at Very Difficult, and test my modules' fights at that level.  Thus I can expect that others can complete the fights at lower difficulties.

 

What levels are your modules usually?

 

Just rather concerned because that level 1 Barbarian with 10 strength and a Greatsword doing 14 average damage vs 7 damage is a massive difference...but a level 12 Barbarian with 26 strength and a +3 Fire Greatsword doing 29.5 damage versus 22.5 damage is a much smaller difference...and the gap between Very Difficult and Hardcore will keep shrinking.

 

Meanwhile, the damage from things like mage spells are going to be the same in both difficulties -- so if you find it difficult on Very Difficult then you couldn't expect others to do it on Hardcore.

 

Also, since the most dangerous things that can quickly kill you are death magic, all kinds of stuns and disables and so on, making the sheer received damage secondary in most cases, Very Difficult should not be too hard, compared to Hardcore.

 

It completely depends on the module and your party.  A fighter with 10 strength who hits your Ghostly Visaged Wizard with a Shortsword will do 0 damage 83%ish of the time and 1 damage 17%ish of the time on Hardcore.  On Very Difficult he'll hit you for potentially up to 7 damage with an average of 2 (2-12 damage minus 5).  That is a massive massive shift.  But an enemy mage won't be any more threatening.

 

But at higher levels then it often makes little to no difference, yes.

 

Normal with immunity to crit hits and shorter negative effect duration seems a bit too cozy to me. I remember when, in the mentioned Grimgnaw battle in HotU I switched to Normal, it was a completely different game: if before the majority of time I spent disabled by some spell, then after that stuns barely affected my damage output.

 

Not just that -- ranged attacks don't provoke AoOs, potions don't provoke AoOs, AoEs don't hit friendlies, and petrification isn't permanent.

 

Which brings me to another question: do mod makers usually assume the player to use a very effective build? When they test the modules, do they test them only with popular strong builds, or do they assume the player to have an average built character? I know how to build some classes well, but I am afraid of experimenting with more classes and multiclass combinations since I might get stuck in the middle of a custom mod with underpowered character. 

 

I generally assume a default built Fighter (it's surprisingly good when compared to default characters of other classes).  I don't think it's reasonable to tune most modules assuming everyone is a Fighter/Rogue/Weapon Master or something -- but I could if I thought it necessary or was trying to make a particularly challenging module/encounter.

 

And I'm on the high end of the spectrum in terms of NWN knowledge/"hardcoreness."  I designed a final boss for Aielund and Savant thought it was insane and went to "swing the nerf bat like crazy."  Why?  I had hundreds of Heal potions per character with infinitely more available (note that in Aielund they only heal 110 HP and the party is level 35+ at that point) while Savant only expected people to use 2-3 potions per character at most.  I figure we had all those potions for a reason!  Different perspectives.

 

My point is that most module makers aren't even very aware of what an effective build is and aren't trying to make stuff very difficult.  They build because they have characters/story/environments to bring to life while not knowing/caring as much about the game's combat.

 

No one here mentioned that most modules faction-wise are not properly scripted for Hardcore difficulty. Unless author tests them for such.

Reason: Area of Effect spells/abilities can harm friendly/neutrals making them hostile in some cases.

You can withhold your own spells, to some extent control hirelings, but you can't make NPCs cast spells without friendly fire.

 

What Shadow said regarding NPCs.  In fact, this was something that severely annoyed me in some cases -- enemy mages could throw Fireballs and so forth into melee battles with both friends and enemies while me doing so would hit my friends.  Somewhat understandable given how terrible the AI is in the first place at spell casting but...I thought Hardcore meant "everyone's on an equal playing field!"

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Tchos]

               

What levels are your modules usually?

Just rather concerned because that level 1 Barbarian with 10 strength and a Greatsword doing 14 average damage vs 7 damage is a massive difference...but a level 12 Barbarian with 26 strength and a +3 Fire Greatsword doing 29.5 damage versus 22.5 damage is a much smaller difference

 

Meanwhile, the damage from things like mage spells are going to be the same in both difficulties -- so if you find it difficult on Very Difficult then you couldn't expect others to do it on Hardcore.

My point is that most module makers aren't even very aware of what an effective build is and aren't trying to make stuff very difficult.  They build because they have characters/story/environments to bring to life while not knowing/caring as much about the game's combat.

 

Mine starts at level 10.  You say 12 is not a significant difference, so I'm assuming 10 is slightly more significant than that.

 

At any rate, I find most of the battles challenging, but not overly difficult, because the areas can be done without resting after each battle, and using consumables instead to heal up.  Others disagree, though, but I'm one of the few that don't fit your "most module makers" mold there.  To me, the encounter design is just as important as the environments and characters, because I think gameplay is somewhat more important than story for a game.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_MagicalMaster]

               

You say 12 is not a significant difference, so I'm assuming 10 is slightly more significant than that.

 

It really depends on how you design your enemies because it literally just doubles the *base* damage on weapons.  Someone casting spells does 0 more damage per spell.  Someone using a dagger does 2.5 more damage per hit.  Someone using a longsword or longbow does 4.5 more damage per hit.  Someone using a greatsword does 7 more damage per hit.  If the greatsword user has no strength modifier and a mundane greatsword that literally doubles his damage (7 to 14).  If he has enough strength and a magical greatsword to the point where he does 35 damage per swing then it's 20% more damage (35 to 42).  If it's a level 15 rogue with 8d6 Sneak Attack using a +3 dagger then you're going from 33.5 to 36 damage -- less than an 8% difference.

 

This is why "Very Difficult" fails at being remotely useful.  While I think most people would agree that games that go "Harder means enemies have 50% more health and do 50% more damage" is less ideal than making enemies smarter or trickier to deal with...at least it's a consistent increase in difficulty at all points from all enemies.

 

To me, the encounter design is just as important as the environments and characters, because I think gameplay is somewhat more important than story for a game.

 

While I generally agree, I'm a lot more willing (personally) to forgive easy combat than stupid combat.  The HeX Coda, for example, was an amazing module with faceroll combat.  I could name several others that I thoroughly enjoyed despite them intentionally being jokes combat wise.  On the flip side, the thought of replaying Dragon Age: Origins again made me want to gouge my eyes out just because the combat was so...terrible.  I'm pretty sure it wasn't as noticeable on easier difficulties...but if you're going to include harder difficulties then make sure it's actually harder and not just stupid.  Ditto for the first Mass Effect (compare the combat of Mass Effect 2 and 3 to 1...I mean, holy cow) -- though it at least was less headache inducing compared to Dragon Age.

 

And this isn't just a matter of personal style -- Siege of the Heavens and A Peremptory Summons are NWN modules of mine with significantly more difficult combat than most modules in NWN (and I could have easily made them harder)...but I also am a huge fan of the Swordflight series by RogueKnight which has radically different combat (but still much more difficult than typical modules).

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Grani]

               

I think that the Very Difficult setting should be accompanied with a note informing the player that it's a setting which makes a difference only on lower levels, makes the game unbalanced and should only be turned on if Hardcore is really not good enough for you.

 

A question has been asked how builders deal with difficulty level.

Well, I might not be a typical builder, since my module (in the making) is something between a single-player adventure and a PW, but I myself decided to expand difficulty customization for players. I did this by introducing the "world difficulty" settings (to differentiate them from the original game difficulty settings). The player (a host or an admin in multiplayer) simply needs to talk to an NPC and choose the difficulty of any aspect of the module. This includes enemy difficulty (handled by buffing/debuffing enemies on spawning), death consequences severity, loot chances, etc. Every aspect has 5 possible settings to choose from, with the default one being the second easiest setting.

 

I named these world difficulty settings COMMONER, ADVENTURER, HERO, LEGEND and DEMIGOD. Oh, and the default game difficulty I'm building my module around is Hardcore, but lower settings can be successfully used along with world difficulty variations to tailor the difficulty exactly in the way you want.

 

Some people prefer optimal builds, some others prefer to take it more casually. Some like to feel the danger of losing much by dying, while others prefer a more secure approach, etc. It's my personal opinion that such a custom difficulty system is a way to make the module more player-friendly.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_MayCaesar]

               

Thanks for the opinions. I see there is no general consensus on how modules should be built, so one should read READMEs and follow the guidelines there. I think I also understand that Very Difficult isn't what it seems and mostly changes the difficulty curve, rather than the overall difficulty of the game. Interestingly, in the modules I've played, I didn't notice low level gameplay being particularly hard. But then, I don't think I've ever played modules aimed at very experienced in combat players.

 

Regarding story vs combat balance, I myself am mostly interested in the story. The reason I am working hard on learning the toolset currently is that I have a few plots in my head I would like to "digitalize", and those plots are mostly focused on character interaction and combat-less exploration. However, it is clear that there are different players out there, and if my modules contain very little combat, then many of them may lose the interest. So I will need to introduce, at least, some encounters to keep everyone interested, and those encounters better be well tuned, so "story-based" players wouldn't see them as obstacles to enjoying the story, while D&D masters could enjoy the challenge. I like your system Grani, I think I might employ something like this in my modules, as long as I learn enough about the combat by that time to be able to balance such difficulties well.

 

While I generally agree, I'm a lot more willing (personally) to forgive easy combat than stupid combat.  The HeX Coda, for example, was an amazing module with faceroll combat.  I could name several others that I thoroughly enjoyed despite them intentionally being jokes combat wise.  On the flip side, the thought of replaying Dragon Age: Origins again made me want to gouge my eyes out just because the combat was so...terrible.  I'm pretty sure it wasn't as noticeable on easier difficulties...but if you're going to include harder difficulties then make sure it's actually harder and not just stupid.  Ditto for the first Mass Effect (compare the combat of Mass Effect 2 and 3 to 1...I mean, holy cow) -- though it at least was less headache inducing compared to Dragon Age.

 

Hmm, I understand it is a matter of taste, but honestly Dragon Age: Origins combat is one of my favorite RPG combats (I played on Nightmare). By it being stupid, you probably mean incredibly high HP pools and enemy damage to create a challenge instead of the enemies being clever and resourceful? If so, I agree, it indeed was a rather poor design. Then, I saw the same picture in all official modules in Neverwinter Nights 1/2, where only a handful of enemies required some thinking, instead of constant reloading hoping for the rolls to come in right. In Aielund, it was a bit different: maybe I am just not very good at D&D yet, but in some fights it was more about using cheese (running away and shooting from where enemies cannot see me, running around while my companions work on the target, leaving through zone exits and fighting enemies one by one as they come through, excessive resting, etc.) than actual strategy. The dragon in Act II was very hard to beat, I resorted to attacking it from the distance before actually talking to it, so I could deal a lot of damage before it approached me and disabled my entire group with Fear. Of course, I am playing pure Sorcerer, which is made of glass, so perhaps I indeed am supposed to run around and use all those tricks to survive...

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Tchos]

               

It really depends on how you design your enemies because it literally just doubles the *base* damage on weapons.  Someone casting spells does 0 more damage per spell.  Someone using a dagger does 2.5 more damage per hit.  Someone using a longsword or longbow does 4.5 more damage per hit.  Someone using a greatsword does 7 more damage per hit.  If the greatsword user has no strength modifier and a mundane greatsword that literally doubles his damage (7 to 14).  If he has enough strength and a magical greatsword to the point where he does 35 damage per swing then it's 20% more damage (35 to 42).  If it's a level 15 rogue with 8d6 Sneak Attack using a +3 dagger then you're going from 33.5 to 36 damage -- less than an 8% difference.

 

This is why "Very Difficult" fails at being remotely useful.  While I think most people would agree that games that go "Harder means enemies have 50% more health and do 50% more damage" is less ideal than making enemies smarter or trickier to deal with...at least it's a consistent increase in difficulty at all points from all enemies.

 

I don't think it needs to be a consistent increase in difficulty at all points from all enemies to be remotely useful.  I think it's fine for it to be, on average, between all classes and enemy types, somewhat more difficult than the lower settings.  If it gets easier as levels increase, what's so bad about that?  The point is, I'm not a power gamer, and I don't use optimised builds or equipment when I do my tests, so playing and succeeding at even a slight handicap should mean that most players should be able to get through my content.  And if they can't, they should be able to do it by choosing to use a lower difficulty setting.

 

...stupid combat. 

...faceroll combat. 

...jokes combat wise. 

...combat was so...terrible. 

...just stupid. 

...headache inducing

 

I'm sorry, but I can't understand your terminology here.  I can't tell if you mean that the combat uses poor AI or if you're using these words to mean "difficult".  In any case, it seems quite subjective, so I don't think there's much to discuss here.  (Note: I played DA:O on the hardest difficulty the whole time, and intentionally refused the patches that kept making the combat easier.)

 

Personally, I prefer if people tune combat on the hard side, because it's much easier for the player to make a hard game easier than to make an easy game harder.