Make Half-Life 2 Easy Again!

Have you ever tried to host a server just to play through Half-Life 2 and it's episodes with a friend or two but found yourselves dying to the Combine more often than actually making progress? Well look no further than this simple CFG edit that makes Synergy's difficulties more akin to Half Life 2's easy, normal, and hard difficulties!

"Isn't this what vintage mode is for?"

According to what I've read, vintage mode might not be working right now, so until that gets fixed, you can use this mod to make Synergy more playable for you and your friend(s).

Editing 'skill_mod.cfg'

Go to the 'Steam/steamapps/common/Synergy/synergy/cfg' directory and open up the 'skill_mod' CFG file with any text editor and replace it's contents with this:

// skill_mod.cfg
// - overrides skill.cfg settings
// - add mod specific settings
// Synergy's settings

// Misc
mp_transition_time "45"
mp_transition_percent "68"
mp_reset "1"	// Set the value of this command to "0" if you don't want the game to fade to black and reset the map and players back to the last checkpoint when everyone dies

// Damage Scaling
sk_dmg_take_scale1 "0.50"
sk_dmg_take_scale2 "1.00"
sk_dmg_take_scale3 "2.0"
sk_dmg_inflict_scale1 "1.50"
sk_dmg_inflict_scale2 "1.00"
sk_dmg_inflict_scale3 "0.75"

// Ammo Scaling
sk_ammo_qty_scale1 "1.20"
sk_ammo_qty_scale2 "1.00"
sk_ammo_qty_scale3 "0.60"

// Max Ammo
sk_max_ar2 "60"
sk_max_ar2_altfire "2"
sk_max_pistol "90"
sk_max_smg1 "180"
sk_max_buckshot "24"
sk_max_grenade "3"
sk_max_smg1_grenade "2"
sk_max_357 "12"
sk_max_crossbow "8"
sk_max_slam "3"

// Vote Settings
sv_vote_enable "1"
sv_vote_interval "10"
sv_vote_percent_map "67"
sv_vote_percent_difficulty "67"
sv_vote_percent_kick "67"
sv_vote_percent_restore "67"

// Hitbox Values
sk_npc_head "2"
sk_npc_chest "1"
sk_npc_stomach "1"
sk_npc_arm "1"
sk_npc_leg "1"

sk_player_head "2"
sk_player_chest "1"
sk_player_stomach "1"
sk_player_arm "1"
sk_player_leg "1"

// Weapon Stunstick
sk_plr_dmg_stunstick	"20"

// Weapon Pipe
sk_plr_dmg_pipe		"25"
sk_npc_dmg_pipe		"20"

// Gargantua
sk_gargantua_health	"600"
sk_gargantua_dmg_slash	"23"
sk_gargantua_dmg_fire	"20"
sk_gargantua_dmg_stomp	"16"

// Strider
sk_strider_num_missiles1 "5"
sk_strider_num_missiles2 "7"
sk_strider_num_missiles3 "7"

// Helicopter
sk_helicopter_grenadedamage "25.0"

sk_helicopter_num_bombs1 "3"
sk_helicopter_num_bombs2 "5"
sk_helicopter_num_bombs3 "5"

// Dropship
sk_npc_dmg_dropship "5"

// Rollermine
sk_rollermine_stun_delay "1"

// Combine Ball
sk_combineball_guidefactor "0.5"

// APC Missile
sk_apc_missile_damage "15"

NOTE:

This does NOT remove any extra enemies that Synergy adds to the Half Life 2 maps, this is just a CFG edit to make them less difficult. You will still encounter multiple helicopters, metrocops, combine soldiers, and so on, but they will be easier to take down.

WARNING:

THESE SETTINGS APPLY TO ANY AND ALL MAPS YOU HOST IN SYNERGY. IT IS NOT SPECIFIC TO THE HALF-LIFE 2, EPISODE ONE, AND EPISODE TWO MAPS.

If you want to revert Synergy's difficulty settings, overwrite the contents of the CFG with this:

// skill_mod.cfg
// - overrides skill.cfg settings
// - add mod specific settings
// Synergy's settings

// Misc
mp_transition_time "45"
mp_transition_percent "68"

// Damage Scaling
sk_dmg_take_scale1 "1.0"
sk_dmg_take_scale2 "1.75"
sk_dmg_take_scale3 "2.5"
sk_dmg_inflict_scale1 "1.0"
sk_dmg_inflict_scale2 "0.875"
sk_dmg_inflict_scale3 "0.75"

// Ammo Scaling
sk_ammo_qty_scale1 "1"
sk_ammo_qty_scale2 "1"
sk_ammo_qty_scale3 "1"

// Max Ammo
sk_max_ar2 "60"
sk_max_ar2_altfire "2"
sk_max_pistol "90"
sk_max_smg1 "180"
sk_max_buckshot "24"
sk_max_grenade "3"
sk_max_smg1_grenade "2"
sk_max_357 "12"
sk_max_crossbow "8"
sk_max_slam "3"

// Vote Settings
sv_vote_enable "1"
sv_vote_interval "10"
sv_vote_percent_map "67"
sv_vote_percent_difficulty "67"
sv_vote_percent_kick "67"
sv_vote_percent_restore "67"

// Hitbox Values
sk_npc_head "3"
sk_npc_chest "0.9"
sk_npc_stomach "1"
sk_npc_arm "0.6"
sk_npc_leg "0.8"
sk_player_head "3"
sk_player_chest "0.9"
sk_player_stomach "1"
sk_player_arm "0.6"
sk_player_leg "0.8"

// Weapon Stunstick
sk_plr_dmg_stunstick	"20"

// Weapon Pipe
sk_plr_dmg_pipe		"25"
sk_npc_dmg_pipe		"20"

// Gargantua
sk_gargantua_health	"600"
sk_gargantua_dmg_slash	"23"
sk_gargantua_dmg_fire	"20"
sk_gargantua_dmg_stomp	"16"

// Strider
sk_strider_num_missiles1 "6"
sk_strider_num_missiles2 "9"
sk_strider_num_missiles3 "12"

// Helicopter
sk_helicopter_num_bombs1 "6"
sk_helicopter_num_bombs2 "9"
sk_helicopter_num_bombs3 "12"

[BOT Tux]

I can only change max ammo to be the HL2 default but not my own values

What am I missing?

[Misterlegodude]

Vintage Mode does seem to work, but it just removes the additional NPCs that Synergy adds to the Half-Life 2 maps, such as the extra chopper boss before Black Mesa East

The actual difficulty settings are not affected by Vintage Mode, which is probably intentional

[Teal Master]

Did they fix vintage mode?

[МаЯоLа® (✌ﾟ∀ﾟ)☞]

Thank you very much for the excellent explanation.

[Misterlegodude]

It's a scalar for how much damage you take on 'hard' difficulty, where a value of '1.0' is the normal amount of damage, a value like '2.0' is double the amount, and '0.5' would be half

So for reference, by default, you take almost double the amount of damage playing Synergy on 'normal' difficulty than you would playing standard Half Life 2 on 'normal' difficulty

While the command ending in 'scale3' is for 'hard' difficulty, the ones with 'scale2' and 'scale1' are for 'normal' and 'easy' difficulty

[МаЯоLа® (✌ﾟ∀ﾟ)☞]

Could you tell me what the command "sk_dmg_take_scale3" changes in the game? What would happen if I increase or decrease the value of this command? Thank you.

[Immolator772]

i honestly dunno why they had to make it more difficult. I want to play the original game with friends, not tryhard. Least make the game spawn more enemies when it has more players than turning them into aimbotters.

[Human]

// Max Ammo Original
sk_max_ar2 "60"
sk_max_ar2_altfire "3"
sk_max_pistol "150"
sk_max_smg1 "225"
sk_max_buckshot "30"
sk_max_grenade "5"
sk_max_smg1_grenade "3"
sk_max_357 "18"
sk_max_crossbow "10"
sk_max_slam "3"

[Naraku]

is this STILL necessary or they fixed vintage mode ??

[originalname]

to Baz, are you kidding me!?!?!? skill_mod.cfg's description in synergy is, and i QUOTE:
// skill_mod.cfg
// - overrides skill.cfg settings
// - add mod specific settings
// Synergy's settings
IT ADDS SETTINGS, LIKE THE MP5K DAMAGE AMOUNTS!
TURNING SKILL_MOD.CFG INTO HL2'S SKILL.CFG WOULD MAKE THOSE WEAPONS WORK I N C O R R E C T L Y