how is difficulty scaled here?

[failsafe]

Im just going on my third mission. Right after leaving city I got attacked by 2xVeteran... won, but it was a very difficult battle. Day or two later, still en-route, got attacked by 4xBerserk and 4xDire Wolf. In best attempt so far I managed to kill half of them before loosing battle. I really feel that enemies are way beyond my league. I have basic everything, few nice spells and that is it. It is not that Im barely loosing... I feel like my characters are just children and they are fighting with adults. Normal difficulty. What am I doing wrong? Im no newbie in RPGs, I dont mind playing bit more difficult ones, but difficulty in this game is all over the place. I had maybe one or two relatively easy battles, several relatively difficult, but most recent ones are few levels too hard.

[MaGicBush]

I stopped playing a while ago because the difficulty is ridiculous. It's definitely all over the place and not balanced well at all. I'm not sure if it gets much better, but I got slightly past where you are.

[Frostfeather]

If you're new to these types of games, then yes, it's possible that some early random world map fights can feel a bit difficult. But you can always adjust the difficulty settings, even temporarily. Or use the fights to learn more about early 5e combat and improve for the future.

Outside of your situation, the difficulty curve is actually very smooth in Solasta compared to most other cRPGs. It's very hard to die in 5e and combat is simplified compared to previous editions. And it gets easier as you go with more gear and spells. Basically, any decently synergistic group should have very few difficult fights over the course of the game.

It's impossible to say what you're doing "wrong" without more info, but it could just be an unlucky encounter. If you can push through to level 5, things really start to take off. If you still having issues then, I'd try to improve your strategy a bit.

[Baked.Bread]

I have only had one tpk and it was to a random fight with a warlord and 2 veterans at lvl3 or 4. It came down to the warlord high rolling saves against hold person.

[Soteria]

Random encounters are frequently some of the hardest fights.

[Knight Hospitaller]

The 5e ruleset is both a blessing and a curse. It have a really low floor where bad character creation can totally underpower the PC, and vice-versa.

For old grognards lika myself, The only battle where I had a TPK was the one where you get the Crown of the Magister, but because I didn't played correctly and didn't focused to geek the mage first.

[failsafe]

Well, okay.

To be honest, playing on medium level (that is 3/5 if I remember correct) I was very happy with how scripted fights looked like. Those Soraks did put bit of a challenge, but in the same time I could offset their numbers or powers with bit of the tactics, positioning ect. Some other fights (with cultists for example) were even way too easy - almost boring. Avarage difficulty on medium seems okay'ish at the end of the day, at least when campaign itself is considered. Random fights, however, are like totally different sht to me. Lol, it took me three attempts to deal with those two veterans before...

I had two attempts on those 4 berserks and 4 dire wolves, and so far I see no tactical way how to solve this. In second turn they are around me, each of my guys has 2 enemies against him/her. The only thing I managed to find out so far was teleporting my caster on the pillar, so she was out of the danger and could pour some magic from there. But it didnt help much - I mean I just have way too low power level to hurt 8 strong enemies in quick fight. Not to mention that RNG may sometimes be another enemy.

But my biggest problem with the game is that this difficulty wall came too fast. I havent even learn about any sensible synergy between my people - most of the things I do is still random, because this is freaking early game.

Im not a cry baby. I enjoyed playing Battle Brothers - very frustrating, yet also very honest in terms of difficulty. This game feels honest... for a while, and then you hit the wall.

Also... if I change difficulty for this fight, it will be still 8 strong enemies against my early squad. Dont tell me that on easy it doesnt matter any more ;-P.

Sorry for my cries... just I feel hungry and want to play this game and Im reluctant to just reduce level of difficulty, because I feel that normal should be my level.

[Frostfeather]

I get what you're saying.

Though if this were tabletop, your DM either wouldn't have put you up against that so early, or would give you some kind of a way out of the fight. Sometimes you have to "act as your own DM" and either reload or adjust the difficulty or something. Not ideal, but I try to imagine what a reasonable DM might allow for the sake of continuing fun in the campaign.

Just the way I see it.

[Frostfeather]

And honestly it's also one reason why many of the player made campaigns are so nice: they usually don't have random battles because the world map wasn't added to the dungeon maker until recently.

[failsafe]

You might be right about this. Though general idea of random battles is very fun. It works like - for example - in Battle Brothers where you have open world and even while on the mission you still encounter various enemies and may fight with them or not. I guess random battles should not be more difficult than campaign itself, or at least not much more difficult. I think some difficulty spikes are okay when properly introduced.

I think I need to reroll my former save, but it will mean need to fight against Veterans again, since I dont have anything between those fights ;-P. Well, still better than starting fresh campaign.

[tazman1]

Originally posted by failsafe:

Im just going on my third mission. Right after leaving city I got attacked by 2xVeteran... won, but it was a very difficult battle. Day or two later, still en-route, got attacked by 4xBerserk and 4xDire Wolf. In best attempt so far I managed to kill half of them before loosing battle. I really feel that enemies are way beyond my league. I have basic everything, few nice spells and that is it. It is not that Im barely loosing... I feel like my characters are just children and they are fighting with adults. Normal difficulty. What am I doing wrong? Im no newbie in RPGs, I dont mind playing bit more difficult ones, but difficulty in this game is all over the place. I had maybe one or two relatively easy battles, several relatively difficult, but most recent ones are few levels too hard.

if your refering to the random encounters then seriously its 100% based on luck

level seems to have zero impact on it.

the first mission you can travel the overhead map to random encounter was instant death.

and not saying that it was just luck not on my side or my tatics were bad.

No the encounter could not be won the enemies if they hit would 1 shot you in the damage dealt and you could not do the damage needed.

That is based on max rolls for damage to enemies

[failsafe]

Yeah, but this is bad. I mean everything else in this game seems okay or acceptable - game is overall good, though it has some flaws, but this single thing is the worst idea I ever had in RPG games.

I've played games that are considered more difficult than Solasta - and they are, like DOS2 or Battle Brothers, but in none of these game we had such an important RNG factor - not just rolls for certain hits, but rolls for certain battles? Strange. Really.

[Soteria]

Originally posted by failsafe:

Yeah, but this is bad. I mean everything else in this game seems okay or acceptable - game is overall good, though it has some flaws, but this single thing is the worst idea I ever had in RPG games.

I've played games that are considered more difficult than Solasta - and they are, like DOS2 or Battle Brothers, but in none of these game we had such an important RNG factor - not just rolls for certain hits, but rolls for certain battles? Strange. Really.

I've certainly had a Battle Brothers game end unceremoniously when an escort mission gets attacked by a pack of Nachzehrers early on. The original XCOM had some similar RNG, though it was rare. Early Snakeman terror missions could wreck you.

But I'll grant that the inability to retreat from battle makes it worse in Solasta. You're not alone: https://www.reddit.com/r/CrownOfTheMagister/comments/vwxhh4/unwinnable_fights_when_traveling/ But it does get easier.

[failsafe]

Battle Brothers was very doable with bit of save scumming. It is a single game that I would never play on ironman ;-P. It should be doable, but I dont think it is worth it. And good thing was that I could run away when enemy was too strong.

I guess in Solasta we can teleport later on? Just got some hints on using some sort of gates, so maybe at some point there are no random battles. Oh, by the way: after reloading game instead of fighting 4 dire wolves and 4 berserks (not doable for me at current level, on particular map ect) I got battle with 6 goblins... it was so easy that I considered using only half of my squad to have some fun. It is not good as well. I mean game should not jump from boring-easy battles to non-doable-hard battles.

Original Xcom... you mean the one from 90's? It was very difficult and as far as I remember it really asked player to stay on toes for most of the time. Even when it got easier, one had to use time to prepare for next difficulty spike.

[Pantagruel]

The hardest fights in the game are when you get ambushed by random encounters (non-ambush wandering monsters are rarely a problem, other than on the trip to the dark castle where the wandering monsters seem to be tuned for tier 2 parties and you're likely level 4).

[failsafe]

I played this game a little now and I must say that Im still confused. Playing on medium difficulty I had battles ranging from boring-easy to non-doable. Some battles are doable only after - I guess - learning a lot in the game and knowing from the start what characters we need and what progress has to be done to face certain enemies.

So far I believe that difficulty of the game is worse than in DOS2 (for example), which is a difficult game, but much more logical and challenge settings make actually much more sense. Also, in DOS enemies dont scale, which means that not dealing with certain enemy now allows us to kill him later and only several battles have to done as hard since they kind of gatekeep the progress, while most of others can be done when we feel strong enough. In this game, as I said, some battles are just boring, some are frustrating and non-doable for a person that plays this game for first time (of course I assume that watching gameplay vids before could help). Anyway, while I dont want to rant this game, I just cant see a comfort zone for me. I dont want to reduce difficulty level and I dont want to play overly easy battles on my difficulty and I dont want to throw my computer thru the window after facing some ultra difficult battles.