Standard Difficulty is rough

[Dielone]

Perhaps things will get easier with time but SD makes the AI go crazy and make insane goals. What difficulty has everyone been playing on so far?

[Crucified Donkey]

I can't seem to win the second game in the campaign on standard. I suck.

[Dielone]

Definitely needs some re balancing with the difficulties since right now standard feels way off.

[Shen]

I also could not beat the second team on standard. I went down to casual mode and had a better time. I still lost in the second act though. Seems as if the AI against you is way better then the AI they give you.

[B- Proggy]

Yeah their AI is waiting for a stretch pass directly in front of my goalie while my dude is closer to the redline than blueline.

[DeadlyMustard]

I can get through most of the levels fine but the boss is just stupid. If you're up going into the 3rd the AI scores like 4 goals on 4 shots in the 3rd.

[Sickoxide]

I feel like the whole idea behind this is to take a few runs at Act 1, each time progressing a little further to build up your Rubber and unlock some different abilities. It's also partially RNG in getting a few good artefacts and talents that synergize with how you've built your team and how you like to play! We've been having a great time with Standard so far, just made it to Act 2!

[KyRoS]

Goalie AI on your team is awful. AI had 5 shots and 5 goals on the 3rd match. AI teammates never poke away. Opponent AI pokes it every time. Team AI overall sucks and are never in position. The delay after you swap a character too really makes it tough. Difficulty tuning is pretty bad. Haven't tried on easy yet, but normal seems pretty unfair. It's as though the game expect the player to do it all and switch constantly to have any chance of defending, but the AI is so good to react and constantly contesting and poking. Would really help if there was a dedicate speed burst to close the gap and be able to get closer to the opponent. I'm sure a lot is lack of skill, but the normal difficulty feels over tuned. Maybe make a 4th difficulty somewhere between easy and normal.

Edit: So I played a while longer and wanted to give an update. After playing a while and getting more in to the flow, I got better overall. As you get the hang of it, teammate AI on defense is not as bad as it felt at first. You have to learn when to switch and careful not to take yourself out of position when you do. On offense, seems they are falling back sometimes instead of pushing forward, but they do a decent job of spacing and moving the rink. Goalie AI is not terrible at all, but seems a lot of shots your opponent takes bounce right back at them for an easy putback goal. Could be they have the talent that gives that though, not sure, but seemed to happen quite a lot. As you play more, it becomes easier to limit opponent opportunities for easy shots like 2 on 1 goals. I was down one game 4 to 1 and came back to win 5 to 4 and after that, game felt like it started clicking better. Beat the ref team on normal the first time, once I got there. I got slapped at the first Elite team quite a few times before finally winning, so there definitely is a learning curve.

Overall, the gameplay itself is very fun and movement and such are fluid. Be nice if the check button gave a little more of a speed burst, but overall it's a fun game. Really look forward to a season mode without all the shenanigans. I haven't really used abilities much either so I'm probably costing myself by not making full use. I must say, this is probably about as good a hockey as we'll see for a while unless EA brings the NHL series to PC.

[Hastan]

Very fair points you guys! We hear you guys and we love hearing the feedback. I can agree the AI can feel unfair at times and we're all ears to improve it. All opinions are considered and talked about with the dev team!

[Reapercussion]

Team AI pokecheck never happens for me, I wish there was a manual pokecheck but once I get used to this it'll get better. Games a blast though, good stuff Hastan

[Erohw]

On standard, I got to the first boss, got 1-1 overtime 2 and then lost.. playin on casual with a friend... we got to the golfers.

[Hastan]

Originally posted by Erohw:

On standard, I got to the first boss, got 1-1 overtime 2 and then lost.. playin on casual with a friend... we got to the golfers.

How was the casual playthrough?

[Goffdog]

Playing with a friend on standard, we lost the first match several times. We didn't even get to the boss until like run 12. We finally beat the first boss after run like 15-20. Definitely just get some upgrades and start learning the mechanics and you will start to win easily.

[Solidus Sandwich]

I had to kick it down to casual to play solo. The enemy Ai is wicked and the roguelite elements don't seem to make a huge difference in the gameplay in the early stages. It's difficult to get going, but the arcade hockey is very fun

[Kozzy]

Its pretty good difficulty imo. I am in my 40's, my nephew 10 and we did the campaign together today. We lost at the start but we started to get better and better, made it to the 4th elite match one go. Few games early where a little tough but not to overboard imo.

At first we thought this was a little hard compared to play now where we can pick difficulty but we both enjoyed as our team and players got better, getting better bonuses,etc.. and we later got revenge against teams that beat us on previous runs. We got better, our team and players got better the more we played, keep at it!

A little fine tuning perhaps but overall I am pretty stoked with how difficulty is from my 3 hours with the game so far.

[Captain Canuck]

I got up to the Cultists on Standard... But only once, and they killed me 6-1. Most runs, I get up to the Refs at least, but they tend to slaughter me.
My buddy hopped in and we did some runs and had a hard time just getting past the 1st and 2nd sets of Elites, though... Greasy Lettuce in particular kept whooping us. We swapped over to Casual, and it felt like too much of a walk in the park. We mercied the first two elites, and beat the Refs something like 4-1 whereas on Standard, the elites would be killing us 3 to 1 on goals. We ran all the way through the game on casual in one go. I feel as if there needs to be a middle ground, almost. Like, Standard be reclassified as Intermediate or something, and then a middle ground between Casual and the current standard.