how does difficulty work in this game?

[sonicdart]

how does difficulty work in this game?

I know the game has leveling and the monsters have levels unlike the previous witcher game or atleast they make it more obvious in this game.

I heard from reviews that the game gets relatively easy and you should pick the difficulty above the one you normally pick to make for a challenging experience..

well I played the witcher 2 on hard and i'm wondering if I should go for dark difficulty for this game?

does the game get easy if you overlevel the main quest you guys think? I hear you get less exp on the harder difficulties so this might be rectified by this. I also hear that the A.I gets better with each difficulty going from attacking you one at a time to basically group mentality mobbing you which sounds cool over the usual way game get more difficult which in by they just buff the enemies stats and make the game feel cheaper.

and last of all you all think they fixed the hit boxes from the witcher 2? Because I remember some of the enemies especially the final boss had horrible hit boxes which made for a slightly frustrating time.

 

[armitom]

It would be nice to know the difficulty details.

I would also like to know if we can change the difficulty mid-game? Not a big deal if we cant, but i want to start from the hardest difficulty and then go down a bit if things get too hectic, otherwise i will start on normal.

 

[sonicdart]

It would be nice to know the difficulty details.

I would also like to know if we can change the difficulty mid-game? Not a big deal if we cant, but i want to start from the hardest difficulty and then go down a bit if things get too hectic, otherwise i will start on normal.

I would assume yes the last 2 witcher games allowing you to change it mid game.

 

[armitom]

They did? I never changed it, but that's good to know, thanks

 

[Fred-Sanity]

Enemies hit you harder; you don't get vitality restoration with meditation; and you get only skill points while leveling up you won't get any additional stat points, eg. when you level up, you won't get additional DPS, armor, vitality, etc, you'll only be granted with skill point; you'll find less loot,
well that's all I am aware of.

Plus, I remember in the IGN Live video, they said that enemies don't have different attack patterns in higher difficulties.

 

[NoBlackThunder]

well i hope we can change it in game =) would be nice becouse when its getting to easy i can always turn it up a notch.. that said i feel like some one actuly in a review video has said somthing like that .. he mentiont that with allot of exploring some enemys become fast a bit to easy so just turn the difficulty up one notch he said .. but he dit not mention that you needed to restart the game .. therfor i guess its possible to do it ingame =)

 

[sonicdart]

you get only skill points while leveling up,

is this true because this sounds really stupid then what do you get for going to those skill point areas then?

is this only on dark or hard difficulty?

 

[HellKnightX88]

and you get only skill points while leveling up, you'll find less loot,

So I can't get skill points from other places and I get less loot. The skill point thing I don't mind that much (it's still kinda silly though). The less loot thing sounds disappointing though since I'm a bit of a loot whore. Now I'm not sure I want to play on hard anymore :-\

 

[Jinal]

on "blood and bones" and "Deathmarch" you don't regenerate health while meditating. enemies hit you harder and they might have more HP. you can - from what i have seen so far - gain skillpoints from places of power.
Devs told us a while ago, that you will get less xp on harder difficulties for slaying monsters (you won't get much xp from this anyway, because questing is much more rewarding).

however we don't know if other aspects are influenced by harder difficulties. for example the minigames (horse racing, gwent), the item-durability, the duration of buffs and potions and such.

 

[Fred-Sanity]

So I can't get skill points from other places and I get less loot. The skill point thing I don't mind that much (it's still kinda silly though). The less loot thing sounds disappointing though since I'm a bit of a loot whore. Now I'm not sure I want to play on hard anymore :-\

is this true because this sounds really stupid then what do you get for going to those skill point areas then?

is this only on dark or hard difficulty?

Apologies for my English, what I meant was:
you won't get any additional stat points, eg. when you level up, you won't get additional DPS, armor, vitality, etc, you'll only be granted with skill point.

 

[HellKnightX88]

Oh... I like the sound of that. Now if loot drop amount weren't nerfed that'd be perfect.

 

[Talabriga]

Getting less loot is not a problem if it is better loot, I really hope that is the case. It is pointless to have more difficult challenges without some rewards.

 

[Maydawn]

I read on some reviews that the difficulty curve is a bit messed up, and the game can get too easy later on with better gear and higher levels. I players on Dark in The Witcher 2, and I'm hoping for the same challenge. Essentially, I'd be playing on the hardest difficulty that has no perma-death. Just hoping either the difficulty stays really difficult throughout the entire game and the reviews were wrong, or they would fix it

 

[sonicdart]

I read on some reviews that the difficulty curve is a bit messed up, and the game can get too easy later on with better gear and higher levels. I players on Dark in The Witcher 2, and I'm hoping for the same challenge. Essentially, I'd be playing on the hardest difficulty that has no perma-death. Just hoping either the difficulty stays really difficult throughout the entire game and the reviews were wrong, or they would fix it

well this is exactly how the witcher 2 worked by far the hardest part of the game was the prologue in that room where you had to fight 4 dudes one of which had a shield and the other a 2 handed sword.

the game got slightly easier in act 1 albeit still had some really troubling spots (nekkers if you didn't spam bombs, and that quest where you had to protect that women)

after that act 2 and onwards the game became smooth sailing and even on Hard difficulty I rarely died and only had issues on the final boss ( mainly due to it being cheap and having crappy hitboxes more then anything)

---------- Updated at 03:05 PM ----------

Getting less loot is not a problem if it is better loot, I really hope that is the case. It is pointless to have more difficult challenges without some rewards.

yeah I would much rather do a quest and get a sword that will last me a couple hours then get a sweet looking sword from a quest then not even an hour later find something better that dropped off a random dude..

I hope the loot isn't that crazy I enjoyed the semi D&D rules that the old witcher games had where enemies only had stuff on them that made sense you wouldn't find a silver sword on say a nekker because that would be pretty dumb lol

 

[Talabriga]

well this is exactly how the witcher 2 worked by far the hardest part of the game was the prologue in that room where you had to fight 4 dudes one of which had a shield and the other a 2 handed sword.

the game got slightly easier in act 1 albeit still had some really troubling spots (nekkers if you didn't spam bombs, and that quest where you had to protect that women)

after that act 2 and onwards the game became smooth sailing and even on Hard difficulty I rarely died and only had issues on the final boss ( mainly due to it being cheap and having crappy hitboxes more then anything)

---------- Updated at 03:05 PM ----------



yeah I would much rather do a quest and get a sword that will last me a couple hours then get a sweet looking sword from a quest then not even an hour later find something better that dropped off a random dude..

I hope the loot isn't that crazy I enjoyed the semi D&D rules that the old witcher games had where enemies only had stuff on them that made sense you wouldn't find a silver sword on say a nekker because that would be pretty dumb lol

I really hope it not RNG loot, I hate it outside MMOs. The loot in a game like this should make sense.

 

[Jinal]

I really hope it not RNG loot, I hate it outside MMOs. The loot in a game like this should make sense.

it is, but not always.

so there are for example hidden treasures or chests you can access after you completed a quest. here the loot is set. in random chest though it seems loot is taken randomly from a specific loot table (imagine there is a loot table for "random peasant junk items", and if you loot things in peasant huts, you might find different stuff in every new playtrough). random loot can be done really good those times. i don't expect geralt to find epic loot in random sacks in the streets of a city. They might have set some containers that are designed to contain loot from specific loot tables, but what you get is randomized (such as "food" , "junk" or "crafting materials")

 

[Talabriga]

it is, but not always.

so there are for example hidden treasures or chests you can access after you completed a quest. here the loot is set. in random chest though it seems loot is taken randomly from a specific loot table (imagine there is a loot table for "random peasant junk items", and if you loot things in peasant huts, you might find different stuff in every new playtrough). random loot can be done really good those times. i don't expect geralt to find epic loot in random sacks in the streets of a city. They might have set some containers that are designed to contain loot from specific loot tables, but what you get is randomized (such as "food" , "junk" or "crafting materials")

Yes that is normal but for specific thing, like high tier armor and weapons I really hope not. I really disliked it in DA:I.