Difficulty level

[artemonster]

With the upcoming endgame content it would be wise to introduce some interestint difficulty concept, because every one of us likes to build different sized factories (from small tiny compact ones, to crazy big laggy ones) - and this should be an equally rewarding experience for everyone.
My suggestion is following:
3 Difficuly levels of Easy, Normal and Hard which will scale the amount of resources required for an endgame building (rocket launching, platform building, etc). So people that like it small, will be able to launch many rockets with their small-scale factories. People that like it hard, will require a lot more resources to fuel one launch. Also, this should be a game option, not a map option, so it can be adjusted any time (if you ever feel bored and need a reason to expand and scale up).
Every other recipe should remain same, so that game wouldn't be out of balance.
What do you think?

[ssilk]

What is difficult in this game? What is easy?

My opinion: makes no sense. Or makes only sense, if you can say "difficult compared to ..." or "difficult terrain", or "difficult because low of resources", or "not difficult, because not much aliens".

What I mean is: Difficulty in Factorio is multidimensional. It cannot be brought into just one simple level-meter. It depends on so many factors. For example: you can have an easy map, but do not find coal in it (the first coal is 340 tiles away!). Is this difficult?

My idea about this problem is this: https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... ion#p70243

But it depends on much more, than just the maps.

[artemonster]

In my opinion, building and maintaining large scale factories is difficult. If (as a prerequisite) you will need a lot MORE (in comparison to a baseline, for instance) of resources to advance in the endgame, it will force you to build big and maintain big, thus increasing difficulty of the game. And about your argument in regard of "map difficulty": yes, long distance resources is also a step up in difficulty, and for that I thing RSO needs to be integrated into the game

[ssilk]

Ah, now I understood.You mean to change the endgame-recipes.

Hm. Might be an option. But I recommend to make you the afford and calculate it through for some recipes. Use the tools https://forums.factorio.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=69
and calculate it through, for example for the blue modules.

[artemonster]

Ah, now I understood.You mean to change the endgame-recipes.

Hm. Might be an option. But I recommend to make you the afford and calculate it through for some recipes. Use the tools https://forums.factorio.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=69
and calculate it through, for example for the blue modules.

Well yes, it takes a lot even now. But imagine if a rocket defense required not 50+50 L3 modules , but 100+100. Just by altering 1 end-game recipe you would need to drastically scale-up your factory. And given the fact, that we would need to "launch a rocket into space many times" then the need for resources will be constant, not once-per-game (e.g. like trying to achieve 1 RD/hr.)
TL,DR: change 1 end-game recipe to force an upscale of the factory

[Koub]

I would prefer such a thing be in the map option, and not an ingame option. I don't feel like starting the game in easy mode, and once fully automated, switch to "Hard", and then BAM, shortages everywhere.
I'd rather have from the start the adjustment in the needed ressources of some key items (just add 1 copper to build a green circuit, and you'll see the scaling effect XD).

I'd imagine :
for normal difficulty : as vanilla for everything
for easy difficulty : all items need 25% less ressources to be crafted (if more than 4 of one type are needed
for hard difficulty : all red science recipes need as vanilla, all green science recipes need 25% more ressources, blue science need 50% more, and purple science recipes need 75% more.

[artemonster]

I'd imagine :
for normal difficulty : as vanilla for everything
for easy difficulty : all items need 25% less ressources to be crafted (if more than 4 of one type are needed
for hard difficulty : all red science recipes need as vanilla, all green science recipes need 25% more ressources, blue science need 50% more, and purple science recipes need 75% more.

This looks also very good. And makes even more sense
I guess this can be very easily implemented as a mod, but still would be nice to have that in-game.

[Koub]

And if you want total awesomeness in difficulty options, replace the fixed hardcoded values by 4 slider bars (for red, green, blue and purple science), with 3 presets (easy, vanilla, hard), and let the user the ability to customize if he wants.

[orzelek]

I was thinking about mod that would provide something like this - it would be similar to Marathon but configurable in some way (cost multipliers selection probably).
Haven't had time yet to try and see how it will work with automated recipe modification (and what kind of hilarious errors it can make ).

[artemonster]

And if you want total awesomeness in difficulty options, replace the fixed hardcoded values by 4 slider bars (for red, green, blue and purple science), with 3 presets (easy, vanilla, hard), and let the user the ability to customize if he wants.

Holy cow! I am voting for you to become president of everything. this is an awesome idea