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Let me warn you right off the bat, though: simply modifying stats is not going to be NEARLY enough if you want to make a satisfactory difficulty mod. Most of the difficulty issues in the stock game stem from balance problems inherent in the combat system and the enemy AI; to make a truly comprehensive difficulty mod, both of these would need to be addressed.
The question is: can modders do that. Very often the thing you'd want to change can't be changed (at least with the tools currently available) and compromises have to be made. And that's where the difficulty in designing a good mod comes into full force.
X-2 I suppose is in a bit of a better position, because its combat system is more complex than X's - however, it's also not without its pitfalls. Right now, for example, optimal strategies almost completely revolve around using Mascot on YRP, or using fiends with multi-hit attacks or attacks that ignore defense (Almighty Shinra and the Impale machinas being the most egregious examples). Ideally, a difficulty mod would INCREASE diversity in order to challenge players to come up with new strategies - but what a flat stat increase would most likely result in is simply a widening of the existing gap, making already top-end strategies even better compared to alternatives.
I don't see how a truly comprehensive difficulty mod would be possible without a massive overhaul of - at the very least - fiend and dress sphere abilities and garment grid setups. Your idea of simply adding BHPL and BDL to all spheres is more of a bandaid fix, but perhaps it's a step in the right direction (certainly it would help make YRP at least a little more competitive compared to fiends). Going from there, a lot more would need to be done, though.
I'd be glad to assist you in design aspects or gameplay advice.
Yea you are right!
You says simple increase stats is no enough. Yes i have to agree with you. I have thought about that too but, i didnt find abilities files or garmament grid or effects of magics and skills. So i cant promise something incertain. But i promise i me doing my best for find them.
About mod tools, there are currently, a tool named VBFbrowser, that tool let you inject files from a extract game data. Eveyone who want to install this mod will need it.
About skills that are too OP or ignores defense, i want to increase its mp costs for YRP and increase delay for fiends.
Instead add BHPL and BDL for YRP, i think its better add them to iron duke acessory.(Today that i have this thought)
Well thank you for your reply Hinnyuu. I would like to ask you about what should be modded to make a good 2nd run for this game. There is already a dificulty mod for FFX, but i really likes X-2. I apreciate your help.
You may want to talk to the FFXII modders in the modding Discord and see what they have come up with so far.
Do you have a invite for their discord server?
I have finished my mod and will be posting soon.
https://www.nexusmods.com/finalfantasyxx2hdremaster/mods/95/?tab=description
It started out okay, until the Creature Creator kicked into gear. It makes it so easy to break the game's difficulty wide open it's not even funny. Without even getting Mascot right away, the sheer level advantage you can grind out via the CC makes you absolutely SHRED through the supposed difficulty of the mod.
None of the story bosses were even REMOTELY challenging. For most I didn't even need a strategy, and just held down X as a triple-Thief team stabbed them to death.
I guess the problem is simply X-2's level scaling, as it's just way too easy to outlevel the challenge and absolutely crush - something you can't do that way in X because of AP restrictions (it would take way too long to grind; at least in the early/mid game, it starts breaking down later, too) or in XII (gear is far more important than levels there, and you can gate gear).
The enemies are definitely meatier and some can be a considerable offensive threat as well - however you simply have way too many tools to handle that, even at the early game. Psychic Telekinesis for example just invalidates so many HP increases because it instant-kills (and also seems to scale with level, so all the more reason to grind), and hard cc like Songstress' sleep or silence negates offense entirely so any increase isn't even felt (same with Blind + Matador Song, to a degree).
Furthermore, the unchanged enemy AI means you're still seeing enemies engage in very softball tactics, like casting redundant buffs/debuffs.
At the current stage of the game I oneshot most regular encounters right off the bat, so they don't even get a turn. That's not exactly what I expect hardcore modded enemies to be. The only wipes I've had really are to endgame CC bosses (the usual suspects like Mega Tonberry, Mushroom Cloud, Youth League bosses etc). Story bosses haven't even come close.
I get that it's hard to balance with the CC in mind. I suppose that's the danger when trying to mod this game. Regular enemies would need something like x10 HP and x3-4 damage right now to be dangerous - and if they had that, I'd just grind MORE levels in the CC and outlevel them again.
I don't really see a good solution for this, other than purposely not using the CC until Chapter 5 or something. But even then, you could just grind in the outside world instead, which would have the same result just slower. There's also some enemies there that allow you to grind much more efficiently than normal, if you know where to find them.
As I suspected, what this game would need are some fundamental changes to enemy AI, as well as to the mechanics of the CC - gating Cup unlocks in some way, for example (especially Chocobo Cup, which is way too easily accessible for what amazing gear it provides). Fiends also scale way better than YRP, which would ideally be addressed by modifying YRP at some basic level. Adding some new passives to certain dress spheres could be a way, or allowing stat growth via item consumptions like with fiends. However, much of that is probably impossible to mod as of now - or perhaps ever.
I will keep playing this mod, though. Once I get to endgame and progressions starts to cap, I'm hoping that scaling can pick up again and balancing becomes easier. There were some promises made of extremely buffed superbosses, so I'm looking forward to that.
And in any case - ANY progress in modding this game is good for the community. I'm very grateful someone has undertaken this project, and I'll be happy to support it with my feedback as best I can. Keep up the good work!
You feedback is great Hinnyuu. Yea balance the game with CC is kind dificulty. Would take much time --''. Well, i will think about new changes and release next version even harder. It will take some time.
Thankk you again.
Instead of difficulty, 99% of what you get is Tedium with a capital T.
Instead of exploring new strategies to meet new challenges, the established degenerate strategies are even MORE degenerate, and alternatives become even LESS viable.
Some of the fights become almost unbearable, such as e.g. Dark Magus Sisters. With the increased agility values, their wait-mode animations can chain several times - I've literally sat there for OVER A MINUTE without taking a turn, watching pointless attacks nip at my health. In the end I did something I've never done before: I physically jammed the button on my controller and went to do something else while the fight played out pretty much deterministically - i.e. I knew I could never lose, and it was just a matter of sitting through 25 minutes of animation locks.
The same is true for the CC endbosses. You thought fighting Trema for 15 minutes with Almighty Shinra in the unmodded game is bad? WELL THEN, prepare for the same useless fight except 30 minutes. He still deals no damage to speak of, and you just whittle down an even massiver HP pool. Same with Concherer and Azi Dahaka, both of which take upwards of 5 minutes of AFKing until they finally die; and both of which can never kill you in a million years.
The solution to this? Use the OP defense-ignoring teams like Impale Machina. They slaughter the beefy high-DEF enemies much more efficiently; but they're ridiculously OP still, and as a result they make the already much weaker other fights even more trivial.
I get the feeling the endgame in particular wasn't or was only barely tested for this. Nothing changes except that you do the same thing as before for longer. Think of finally dusting off those dress spheres you never got to use, or recruit some new exciting fiends? Nope. They're still bad for the same reasons, only even MORE so. Heck, even Dark Knight Darkness spam becomes less viable because you can only get the damage so high and who wants to sit there for an hour killing one enemy when an Impale team can do it in 10 seconds.
What this needs is some serious manual rebalancing. I get that more sweeping changes are probably not possible (YET!) but there is still a lot that can be done with the tools available. Here's some major gripes.
1. The disparity between special/boss enemies and regular enemies is way too great. Trash mobs are absolutely IRRELEVANT. Even buffed, you oneshot/twoshot most of them, and they deal damage you can literally ignore. Then a boss comes around and suddenly you're fighting for 20 minutes; or worse, it's a non-boss enemy but one of the bigger ones (e.g. Tonberry, Shell Shocker, etc.) and they're so meaty they're not even worth the time. Why waste 15 minutes killing them when you could just kill something else and get more EXP, items, etc. in the same time frame? Regular enemies need to be actual threats again, not something you can punch over blindfolded with an autoattack team.
2. Enemies need to be buffed in ways that make them more difficult but not more tedious. Instead of increasing their HP and DEF, increase their offensive power more. Some enemies are better balanced here than others; many need a serious readjustment. If an enemy hits you for 5% of your HP at most, but takes 30 minutes to kill, that's not a challenge - that's just wasting your time.
3. DEF in general needs to be de-emphasized if there's ever a hope of not degenerating everything into using DEF-ignoring attacks and nothing else. Dark Knight and Mascot (Paine) are already way too strong because of that in the original, and it only gets worse with the mod; same goes for fiends like Impale-based machina. It's easier to balance with less DEF and more HP to create similar fight lengths, but broaden player options to include more than just the same two DEF-ignoring attacks. (Careful with balancing multi-hit attacks at the same time, though, or everything just switches over to that instead).
4. AGI needs to be toned down for some enemies. Giving them more turns is good; locking you in wait mode is not. Rather increase the damage for enemies with heavy animations, and keep their turn count low.
5. Many bosses still need more tuning. The Dark Aeons as you descend to the Farplane at the end of the game are all very powerful (which is good, with some exceptions) - but then a big dungeon boss like Anything Eater is just slaughtered in 3 attacks after five seconds? Meanwhile the Jumbo Cactuar in Cactuar Hollow takes about 10 minutes to kill and doesn't do anything. And so on. That's just out of whack.
The mod is certainly an improvement over the original difficulty, don't get me wrong. But I expect more from a hardcore experience. Much more.
EDIT: Decided to give Major Numerus a try. Big mistake. After a while, I decided I'd cook dinner while the battle went on. Then I ate dinner. Then I cleaned my room. Then I wrote on my dissertation. Then I got some ice cream. Then I took out the the trash. By that point, the first head had died. Two failed marriages and a home in the countryside later, I actually managed to kill MN.
I'm done with the mod for now. Looking forward to serious changes.
1. Viewing the CommSphere at the Chocobo Ranch in Chapter 4 suddenly teleported me into the Ranch itself - at the point where you're in the mission for Clasko there, killing the final boss occupying the Ranch. After defeating it you leave the Ranch, and when you zone you're back at the airship CommSphere screen - aside from getting an extra copy of the Alchemist dress sphere, this didn't seem to affect anything else.
2. O'aka suddenly reappears in the airship cabin in Chapter 5, with his debt at 0 gil. Visiting his shop triggers the cutscene again where he leaves the ship, including the message on the ship's destination select screen the next time you visit it. This seems to have broken the scene with O'aka and Wantz at the Macalania Travel Agency - it never occurred. O'aka is in the TA, but nothing happens, and you don't get Episode Concluded for O'aka (probably missing out on some completion % in the process).