Re: Playing Rebels on Hard, too easy?

[xiriod]

I kind of enjoy playing Empire, but I decided to play Rebel on Hard. Now most people know that Empire AI have a problem teching up, but that is not an issue for this post. Rather the Rebel's possibility to do Raids are.

 

With two T2-B tank squads and one squad of rebel solders pr. Raid team, I captured so many Empire plantes so fast that they never had time to recover. The game was over so fast I didn't have the feeling I had started yet.

 

I wonder, maybe the Raid ability should be just that. A raid. And not have the possibility of taking the planet. Playing Rebels on Hard, was just too easy

[Davynelord_pff]

That's funny because I found playing the empire easier than the alliance.....well, credits was my main issue with the rebels, but still I can take a whole planet with vader, a At-St and a squad of ST's.  If the natives are on my side, I can send in vader by himself and win since you can just use the natives as meatshields or decoys and vader is badass mofo who seems to brush off damage, Plus he heals over time. 

 

When it comes to taking control of a planet I think that it's too easy for both sides really, but I think it's more about taking control and keeping control because if you notice, whenever you take an empire planet, they immediately retaliate and try to retake the planet from you and may try multiple times before giving up or until you set up considerable defenses. 

 

However, a few things that I think really contribute to the A.I. being so easy in "ALL" RTS games is the fact that the A.I. in RTS games don't seem to adapt to the situations or to things that you've done before.

 

For example, in sports games, you can't just keep running the same play against the A.I. and expect to be successful each time.  It will work the first time, the second will work also but will be slightly harder, but the third time you will be completely shutdown.  The fourth time, you won't even be able to start the play.  The fifth time, you won't even be able to get your players into position to even attempt the play.  This is all because the A.I. keeps track of what you have done in the past and adjust to it.  Well, in RTS games, they never really adjust or even use anything that may resemble a anticipation factor.  Instead, they just seem to have one goal in mind and follows a certain path to reach that goal no matter what the player is doing to the A.I. at the time.    There will be a few random things thrown in to make it seem as if the A.I. is actually thinking, but it's still too predictable and therefore isn't really surprising or difficult.  One example is when you take control of a planet in enemy territory.  Instead of the enemy strengthening their surrounding planets or being prepared for an attack from you (logical thing that may happen since you've fortified a planet in their territory), they instead send a small fleet to try and take the planet back.  Now you fend them off and when you start to attack their nearby planets, they have them so lightly defended that you can nearly land on the planet, plop down a lawn chair with a beer in the armchair holder with a reb/imp flag in the ground next to you and claim the planet as yours

 

I don't know about anyone else, but If I'm gonna send in a fleet to retake a planet, I'm sending them in a large force unless I know the exact number of units I'm gonna face.  Otherwise, I will reinforce any nearby planets in anticipation of attack all the while I'll be keeping tabs on that enemy planet.  I would want to know every unit that moves on that planet.....however, the A.I. does none of this at all it seems.  They just keep sending small fleet after small fleet and you just keep destorying them over and over again until you either run out of credits, pop cap or have built up defenses.

 

So to me, no RTS game to this day has presented an A.I. that is really any more difficult on hard than it is on easy.    The major difference that I see on the hard modes in RTS games is that the A.I. produces units faster and has more units than you and things like that.  When it comes to actual strategy or battle, the A.I. is no different on hard than it is on easy.    One thing I've found that probably makes the biggest difference between difficulty settings on RTS games is the same ole "boost the HP of the A.I. units" or reduce the effectiveness of human controlled units (or all units) verse each other.    Somehow, that is thought to make the game more difficult but instead it just makes it last longer than usual.  The difficulty in any game is forcing the human player to think about how to do things, how to attack the enemy, how to defend against an enemy and how to learn what the enemy is trying to do, wants to do or will do.  Also, the A.I. must change what it's doing frequently.  A.l of that should force the player to have to evaluate what they want to do or should do each time, not just at the beginning of the game and then forget about it and just go full speed ahead with that one plan.  If a game is truely difficult, it should at any given point and time, make you completely change what your doing or how you are thinking.

 

So anyway, if you've played any other types of games where the difficulty between levels makes you have to become better at what your doing in those games, then any RTS game will be easy for you because they never adjust any harder than how they were scripted to work.  I think this is due to the storylines in RTS games.  Other game's stories (if they have them) are simply there in support of the gameplay to make it interesting but has nothing to do with the actual difficulty in playing the game.  A RTS game's story usually directly affects the actual game play and difficulty of the game because you typically aren't allowed to access certain units until the story progresses.  However, it's supposed to allow you to unlock or use units that are inferior to the A.I. units, but in EAW, all the units are completely equal and thus during no time during the game is anything very difficult.    So with the attempt to capture the visuals and fast action of star wars and the fact that petroglyph wanted to take out the stuff that's meant for a RTS strategy game, they've also effectively taken out some of the difficulty.    For a Real Time Strategy game, the main difficulty is supposed to be in the "STRATEGY" as there is no way besides boosting the A.I. units stats higher than the Human controlled units or outnumber your units to actually create difficulty in EAW since it's more reliant on fast action, head on battle and brute force.  Since both sides are practically equal in everything, the game is not difficult at all.  AT least in other RTS games, you were able to maybe beat your opponent to the next tech level and get some much better units a while before them and that could push things in your favor.  You could also, take the reverse approach and sabotage things that made them lose the ability to take advantage of their current tech level (like destroying their research facility, make them lose a building facility that's producing their higher tech level units, attack their resources to limit there ability to build anything, cut-off routes from one of their bases to another, etc.)    So not only did you have to worry about the normal stuff, you had to worry about what your enemy was doing against you, how fast they were progressing and where their important building facilities were as well as preparing to attack and be attacked at any given time.  IN EAW, you don't need to know anything about the enemy at all, just build up as large of a fleet as you can afford, invade, win the battle.  Then move on to the next planet doing the exact same thing and the A.I. never adjust to it. 

 

So my opinion is that anyone who plays EAW for it's difficulty simply picked the wrong game.  Play this game for it's action, it's nice cinematic view etc. but not for it's difficulty.  This game is too simplified to present any true RTS game player with any difficulty at all.

[kingdark]

i agree but there are plenty of fans who can turn op the difficulty to get aside this problem

[wherryj]

i agree but there are plenty of fans who can turn op the difficulty to get aside this problem

 

Perhaps those are the fans who also have difficulty adapting to the AI's tactics.

 

I haven't noticed that adjusting the difficulty level makes much difference aside from how fast I start seeing attacks.  Does it do more than give credit advantages and such, or is there just not a lot of difference between medium and hard?

 

The only true difference that I've seen on the Rebel GC so far is that the Empire builds up it's ground defenses much more quickly on hard.  I took Corruscant by day 300 or so in medium, and I'm currently at approximately day 200 on hard with the Empire controlling only 7 planets (should be about the same day to capture Corruscant I'd say). 

 

The difference seems to me that when I was taking planets on medium, I'd face only one building of each type per planet (occasionally with a second random type thrown in), often with only half of the available slots used.  On hard, I'm facing planetary defenses of two or more of each type (with the corresponding garrison units) and maxed out building slots.  While more difficult to take down, with the AI's predictable responses I have found that it's still just a matter of time before I conquer the planet.  It merely means a few more lost units.

[xiriod]

Thing is, I am not talking about beating the Empire in 2-300 days. I'm talking about beating the Empire in less than 31 days. And it is only 31 days because  I let the days run to get some more money for buildings some time. I could've easily done it in 20. But maybe some patch later on will adress it all.

[malric]

I give you a hint try not to build heavy factories/ion cannons/turbolasers and build only lvl 2 starbases except on mon calamari cruisers build sites...and see what is challenging

[NOT Hadoken13]

AI needs to be harder...this is true but is it really is bugging you play a mp game...talk about challenging you have to change the way you approach the game completely

[malric]

Yeah i know...but this is better then nothing

[wherryj]

I give you a hint try not to build heavy factories/ion cannons/turbolasers and build only lvl 2 starbases except on mon calamari cruisers build sites...and see what is challenging

 

Well, I guess THAT is why I don't see the ridiculous ease.  I was trying to complete the GC campaign with very minimal losses (meaning I was upgrading defenses as far as possible after taking a planet before moving on).  I might try this suggestion and see how fast it goes.