Game Difficulty settings

[Kasa]

I was just wondering now, the original "normal" mode for Rimworld IIRC was strive to survive but does that still hold true to the core rimworld experience with the new DLCs?

How have other players felt with the difficulty setting with the DLCs adding some new challenges and reducing others.

Would you consider Strive to survival still the normal mode or did you start turning up or down the difficulty to compensate?

*Edit: Fixing spelling mistakes

[Thaxlsyssilyaan]

According to the wiki, strive to survive does not give any plus or minus to : Mood, raid size, event occurence, ressource production etc... All have a 1.0 modifier, thus this is the default difficulty.

[Kasa]

Originally posted by Thaxlsyssilyaan:

According to the wiki, strive to survive does not give any plus or minus to : Mood, raid size, event occurence, ressource production etc... All have a 1.0 modifier, thus this is the default difficulty.

I mean... ya? That's why I said strive to survive was the normal mode. Not sure what your point was >.>

For clarity I'm talking about how you interact with rimworld with the DLC's since they add new things and change how you interact with the game.

For example with ideologies you can make a ideology that basically gets ride of most of the negative thoughts you would get commonly in the game, so strive to survive would be much easier then what was originally intended.

[jerrypocalypse]

The difficulty settings are still pretty accurate in my mind in regard to the descriptions that are included for them. Strive feels like it's still the "default".

Things like Ideology are more in the player's hands as far as how much more or less difficult the player wants to make it. The "default" difficulty can't really account for that since the player is free to adjust how they are fit. It's not different really than using mods that increase or decrease difficulty of the game.

[jerrypocalypse]

Originally posted by Kasa:

Originally posted by Thaxlsyssilyaan:

According to the wiki, strive to survive does not give any plus or minus to : Mood, raid size, event occurence, ressource production etc... All have a 1.0 modifier, thus this is the default difficulty.

I mean... ya? That's why I said strive to survive was the normal mode. Not sure what your point was >.>

You asked if people thought it was the default, and the poster answered and explained why they thought it was. Pretty sure that's what the point was...

[Kasa]

Originally posted by jerrypocalypse:

Originally posted by Kasa:

I mean... ya? That's why I said strive to survive was the normal mode. Not sure what your point was >.>

You asked if people thought it was the default, and the poster answered and explained why they thought it was. Pretty sure that's what the point was...

But I didn't ask if strive to survive was the default.
No where in my original post did I say "Is strive to survive the default difficulty?".

The closes I got to saying that was "the original "normal" mode for Rimworld IIRRC was strive to survive".

But that only made sense if you didn't read the first part of my sentence, ignored the " , " read the middle part of my sentence ignoring the IIRC ([If I recall correctly] I typed the acronym wrong so that's on me) added a "is" in front of "the original" added a ? at the end of difficulty and ignored the rest of the post.

I'm not asking if the DLC's changed the values of the difficulty settings, I'm asking if people feel like those settings still FEEL accurate with the DLCs added.

For another example, the 1.3 update changed how animals work in a large way so now the handle animal work type is much less intensive as now pawns don't need to feed animals with a proper fenced in area for them to graze in. Thus freeing that pawn up to do other tasks making your base more efficient and reducing difficulty.

Ideologies added in dryads and Gauranlen tree which require a pawn to prune but adds multiple helpers / defenders / resource providers to the base that can effect efficiency.

[jerrypocalypse]

Normal and default are practically interchangable, particularly the way you're using it when referring to the "normal" mode of play.

Both the other poster and myself have said we think Strive is the default ("normal") difficulty still, answering your question asking for what people think.

[Kasa]

What your post reads as to me is: " I think the default / normal difficulty is the default / normal difficulty."

What I think you're trying to say is that even with the DLC's you feel like strive to survive feels as difficult as intended as the normal difficulty mode.

Just clarifying because I feel like we are losing something in our communication.

[jerrypocalypse]

Originally posted by Kasa:

What your post reads as to me is: " I think the default / normal difficulty is the default / normal difficulty."

What I think you're trying to say is that even with the DLC's you feel like strive to survive feels as difficult as intended as the normal difficulty mode.

Just clarifying because I feel like we are losing something in our communication.

Read my first post again. I said I feel like Strive is *still* the default and that the in-game descriptions for the difficulties still feel accurate.

I also followed it up with a response to your comments about Ideology and how the player can make it so they have easy mood boosts. You can't really factor that in easily since the player has sommuch freedom with it, and it goes both ways: they can make mood boosts easy to come by, but also can easily make a colony that's on the verge of mental breaks constantly unless carefully managed.

Originally posted by jerrypocalypse:

The difficulty settings are still pretty accurate in my mind in regard to the descriptions that are included for them. Strive feels like it's still the "default".

Things like Ideology are more in the player's hands as far as how much more or less difficult the player wants to make it. The "default" difficulty can't really account for that since the player is free to adjust how they are fit. It's not different really than using mods that increase or decrease difficulty of the game.

Edit: Regarding this piece specifically

Originally posted by Kasa:

What your post reads as to me is: " I think the default / normal difficulty is the default / normal difficulty."

It reads as "I think the Strive is still the default because it still feels like the default, to me."

[Astasia]

I don't feel like the balance has really changed much. There are more easily accessible mood bonuses if you design your ideology that way, but they also tend to come with some downside, and aren't functionally "better" than say a selective all cannibal/bloodlust colony from previous versions, other than that you don't have to wait ages for new recruits (or manipulate the trait commonality in the scenario).

There are some combat bonuses if you pick certain ideologies, most playthroughs you aren't going to have these, the memes have downsides to them, and I think they balance out a bit because ideology requires additional wealth in your base.

The difference between strive and blood and dust is 55% more enemies. Ideology certainly doesn't make the game that much easier. Royalty, maybe an argument could be made, but the bonuses from that DLC are usually late game when you've basically already won.

If vanilla strive is a barely maintainable challenge for you, installing both DLCs and starting a game on blood and dust will probably get you wrecked pretty quickly. Maybe late in the game when colonists have cataphract armor and persona weapons you might want to kick the difficulty up a notch though. Or not, you may just want to bask in the rewards of your efforts.

I haven't really changed my settings anyway.