Difficulty Levels

[Balthagor]

Recent discussions of the 2010 WWIII scenario have got me thinking about difficulty levels. We've already had many different discussions among the team about the affects of "Very Hard" on the diplomacy in the game. When we play MP test games we'd like the AI to be at its toughest but we want to test the diplomacy without the penalties applied to diplomatic stats. The current solution we came up with is to offer two different difficulty settings for SR2020, one for military and one for diplomacy. Assuming this idea sticks, what to alter on the military side seems fairly straight forward, but I thought the diplomatic difficulty effects might be worth discussing.

So the question becomes, If you buy a game and set a "diplomatic difficulty" level to "very hard" what do you expect it to do differently? Is a "hate all humans" approach really harder? And don't feel limited by what you played in SR2010 when thinking about this, well be doing more brainstorming and evaluating ourselves, I'd just like to have some notes for when we sit down for the discussion...

[BigStone]

I wanna add another thing in the difficulty discussion and that is -economy - level.
Think about something if you don't have money you can't maintain your plants = sever drop in efficiency/ production and a change at collaps (mines, nuke plants goes BOOM etc...)

For the military i would like to see -wear - in the game.

These sort of things should be implemented in the diff level.I've doubt
if diplo should be affected by difficulty.... have to think about that a little more....

[Il Duce]

...Assuming that you have made some set of improvements - whatever they might be - to the diplomacy processes, I think that basing difficulty on a 'hate human players' puts an arbitrary constraint on the AI's diplomacy tactics and strategy. At any given moment, a friendly posture towards a human-run region might be an advantage to one or the other AI regions. I think that the AI should take its best shot strategically.

Adjusting global difficulty levels for the AI should probably modify the depth and complexity of its long term planning, or more simplistically, increase its 'skepticism' or resistance to diplo overtures based on the existing dip- and civrelate, CB and treaty integrity values of the solicitor.

I suppose that overall you would have to review the ultimate endgame conditions - for instance, if you could develop and lead a grand treaty alliance and run it peacefully for a year, would that be a victory? Will we be able to coerce surrender without these endless duel-to-the-death-leave-no-hex-uncaptured battles [that the miltary Ai's never seem to be able to conclude]? Capitulations? Client and satellite states? As well as the unification votes that we already have? If such terminations are more prominently featured as victory conditions, then the AI's whole approach to diplomacy becomes much more coherent and vital.

Not that I want to replay the cold war necessarily, but it would be a real challenge if I could set up a Warsaw Pact or NATO arrangement to aggregate regions AND if the AI's were capable of doing the same thing - this is what makes the cold war such an interesting study - not much warfare, lots of hard-edge diplo. And ya just gotta love the whole domino effect of pacts that drove the world into WWI to everyone's great surprise and dismay.

We haven't really considered neo-colonialism and empire-building. And the AI's should participate in these things too. I'd love to see Japan [for instance] revive its desire to own asia for economic security and prosperity. This provides some basis for developing a military and diplomatic strategy that isn't simply a matter of assembling numeric and logistical superiority and letting fly. Suppose for instance that you choose to play Indomalaysia under those kinds of circumstances. Or what if the United Kingdom really reunited as a great cartel? What would the US do with Canada then? And what would this mean for Brazil?

Maybe rubber should replace timber as a commodity? In this way, there would be two vital strategic commodities - such that owing petro would not be such an easy path to world dominance. This would give a lot of the third world a shot at achieving prominence and would make much more see-saw leverage and maneuvering necessary.

No surprises here.

[red]

I also would like to see an economic difficulty level. Besides that, I just want to have the human no longer be penalized. This makes it impossible to play a reasonably sane game at the highest level--it becomes gamey/unrealistic. It should instead affect AI competence and complexity.

[nghtmre15]

I also would like to see an economic difficulty level. Besides that, I just want to have the human no longer be penalized. This makes it impossible to play a reasonably sane game at the highest level--it becomes gamey/unrealistic. It should instead affect AI competence and complexity.

This sums up my viewpoint perfectly. To handicap a player at higher difficulty levels is more frustrating than it's worth. Do whatever you want within reason to the CPUs, but leave me at the standard level every time.

[BigStone]

I don't know how the diplo is going to be in SR2020... but i'm guessing that it will become more active...

This means that you also have to become more active.So depending on the difflvl you HAVE to fullfill your allies requests and do no dumb things that hurt your relations ( something like become friends whit your ally enemy etc.)
(A thing that always bothers me is when a ally is requesting for something and you do nothing it won't hurt the relation... )
So breaking treaties should be related to the difflvl

And i think three difflvl's are enough : easy/normal/hard
(and maybe a expertlvl but that one has to be a standalone lvl .... )

The stance of the WM is now completly ridicuul at the highest lvl... so there is no doubt that this has to be tweaked alot....

[Feltan]

Indeed. Any improvement would be welcome. Right now, no matter what you do as the human player, it seems eventually everyone will DOW on you. No alliances, no treaties, no trades .... just gang up on the human player. Any diversity of results would be a great improvement.

Regards,
Feltan

[Balthagor]

I wanna add another thing in the difficulty discussion and that is -economy - level…

I suppose I should have anticipated that Once we cover the diplomatic stuff we can explore what an economic “hard” setting would do. Perhaps a slower rate of GDP/c growth and credit rating improvement? Or a stronger DAR penalty for high taxes? But I’m still most interested in the diplomatic difficulty changes for now.

… For the military i would like to see -wear - in the game…

That’s another subject entirely. It should be discussed in its own thread if you’d like it to be considered. Rate of wear could be affected by difficulty but a wear model is another discussion.

... Adjusting global difficulty levels for the AI should probably modify the depth and complexity of its long term planning, or more simplistically, increase its 'skepticism' or resistance to diplo overtures based on the existing dip- and civrelate, CB and treaty integrity values of the solicitor…

I like the sounds of that. So from this I was thinking as an example requiring a higher threshold of dip/civ for an AI to be willing to sign alliance at higher difficulty. That’s the soft of thing you’re thinking of?

I liked your other comments as well, however some of them get into questions of how the AI will function and less of what should change according to difficulty levels. Although you’re NATO comments do bring up the idea of getting the AI to limit it’s total number of allies. At higher difficulty levels it could gather more allies (build bigger coalitions).

... Maybe rubber should replace timber as a commodity…

Certainly a question for a different thread…

… depending on the difflvl you HAVE to fullfill your allies requests and do no dumb things that hurt your relations...

That’s an idea I like, so that at higher difficulty levels you have to deal with more demanding AI opponents always bothering you to keep them happy. We’ll explore this one further on our side…

… breaking treaties should be related to the difflvl...

Another good one, the penalties could certainly be adjusted according to difficulty.

… Right now, no matter what you do as the human player, it seems eventually everyone will DOW on you…

While it may not be overly original, constant attacks from every front and boycotts from all regions does make it more “difficult”. We’re just exploring here if there are ways to affect difficulty without feeling quite so artificial. I like the suggestions I’ve got, if anyone else has more, toss ‘em in.

[dust off]

Adjusting global difficulty levels for the AI should probably modify the depth and complexity of its long term planning, or more simplistically, increase its 'skepticism' or resistance to diplo overtures based on the existing dip- and civrelate, CB and treaty integrity values of the solicitor

This sound much better than AI regions set to the exreme of hate human.

While it may not be overly original, constant attacks from every front and boycotts from all regions does make it more “difficult”. We’re just exploring here if there are ways to affect difficulty without feeling quite so artificial. I like the suggestions I’ve got, if anyone else has more, toss ‘em in

I was thinking along the lines of events, game driven and/or random that a President (player) would have to respond to. For example, Russia declares war on ukrane the player is asked at a press conference (UN etc) whether he condems the action. Condeming the action may boost diplo with democracies but lower it with others. A random event could be something like whether to send aid to a disaster. The thing is on higher difficulty settings the benefits to answering a certain way could be smaller, while the negative imapct could be more. Also if developed on higher difficulty levels there could some or more of catch 22 nasty options that hurt you either way in some way.

[Il Duce]

Quoting Balthagor:

"...the idea of getting the AI to limit it’s total number of allies. At higher difficulty levels it could gather more allies (build bigger coalitions)."


I would ask - more or better allies? An alliance between, say Israel and Brazil in the ww3 scenario is basically meaningless, except under some very specific conditions which are hard to imagine, although announcement of a trade agreement between them would be interesting [to me], or at least being able to see that information should I choose.

The number and types of existing alliances (and the union of such alliances) might actually be a quanititative way for AIs to assess diplo strategy, yours and their own. Basically subtract the number of common alliances that a soliciting party has and increment resistance to overtures based on the remaining number/type of alliances. You might have trade agreements with lots of regions, but your alliances should be few. For both AI's and human players, your existing alliances should focus more closely on the development of diplo networks that are meaningful.


Quoting dust off:

"...along the lines of events, game driven and/or random that a President (player) would have to respond to. For example, Russia declares war on ukrane the player is asked at a press conference (UN etc) whether he condems the action. Condeming the action may boost diplo with democracies but lower it with others. A random event could be something like whether to send aid to a disaster. The thing is on higher difficulty settings the benefits to answering a certain way could be smaller, while the negative imapct could be more."


An awesome idea. Sort of implies that we have negotiation sessions too, rather than just sending off diplomatic shots in the dark. Don't forget that we also need to be able to bring diplo pressure to bear [and this means that alliances and treaties should be easier to break for cause. You should also be able to gently pressure an ally or trade partner when they do something unacceptable, like forecast a poor agriculture yield or a drought or indicate that labor issues may cause a slowdown in production [of the specific goods that are the basis for interdependence]. And such mechanisms will be even more important when trying to coordinate the activities of a cartel.

Following dust off's line of reasoning, how about joint research projects as an article of diplo trade [like the US lending the Mayo clinic to develop a cure for aids under the auspices of an African Federation]? Other items in this category might include prestige developmental assistance [like the USSR helping Egypt build and fund the Aswan High Dam] or Tech Transfers [like when both the US and the Soviets started sending astronauts from allied nations along on their space missions]? Thinking in SR2010 terms, these kinds of events would play hell with all kinds of dip and civ, CB and Treaty integrity values. Great fun.

As far as my previous comments being more about how the AI operates rather than just to the point of difficulty levels, I think that it will be necessary to to do some work there generally, so maybe I was getting ahead of things. But difficulty is relative - if diplo solutions could lead to victory, then the notion of what is difficult in diplo changes entirely.

I think that except for a few players, most of the comments over time on this forum suggest that many people find the present diplo a bit tedious and daunting [so much so that many players just ignore it entirely], so perhaps the idea of offering a more difficult level might also include the idea of offering an easier level. Ministerial support [advice, or automation of the identification of a diplo opportunity or threat] would be very useful here. Likewise, making the objectives and advantages of diplo play a bit less nebulous might help. I have to admit that I have spent way more time than I ever expected thinking about diplo in this game - and while the elements are basically there, it seems like most players really don't appreciate it or understand it [and they are missing a lot of fun].

As far as adding another strategic commodity - I hope there's a goat out there that wants to discuss it [hint, hint].

[Balthagor]

...Following dust off's line of reasoning, how about joint research projects as an article of diplo trade...

we seem to be drifting heavily off topic... be sure this gets mentioned elsewhere.

...idea of offering a more difficult level might also include the idea of offering an easier level...

Agreed, and I'll take suggestions on what that should look like as well.

...I hope there's a goat out there that wants to discuss it [hint, hint].

:waves hand/uses the force: This is not the goat you're looking for. Move along now...

[Il Duce]

Draft for Press Release from Battlegoat


BG Studios today suggested that a new technology will be added to SR2020 - Animal communications, known colloquially as TGT, or Talking Goat Technology. TGT apparently facilitates insurrections via wandering herds of innocuous farm animals, and works especially well in mountainous regions. Several new unit types are anticipated to support the use of this tech.

[dust off]

How about an increasing chance of allies, frindlies and neutrals having a coup or some other drastic political shift that made them antagonistic.

[Balthagor]

Draft for Press Release from Battlegoat

LOL you have too much time on your hands

How about an increasing chance of allies, frindlies and neutrals having a coup or some other drastic political shift that made them antagonistic.

This of course gets into the whole question of random events, but would be particularly if we go with what we've already discussed amongst the team that AIs should re-evaluate all treaties when the gov. changes due to an election loss or other such radical shift...

[dust off]

This of course gets into the whole question of random events, but would be particularly if we go with what we've already discussed amongst the team that AIs should re-evaluate all treaties when the gov. changes due to an election loss or other such radical shift...

Very cool hint of how the diplo might be developed