Hello fellow humans,

I wonder what difficulty settings you think are the most challenging? And why?

I. What is your way to create maximum possible difficulty using only game options?

For me, that would be: 

1) maximum expert players on the Pangaea map

2) minimum land percentage for the map

3) minimum resources

4) humankind difficulty

5) endless game speed 

II. Can you increase the challenge by adding self-imposed restrictions?

Yeah, I usually do:

1) "iron men" e.g. no loading

2) no France (due to fusion reactor rush opportunities)

3) no scientific last era cultures

4) no Topkapi Palace

5) no Machu Picchu

Thanks in advance for your answers and ideas. I'm looking forward to try out more challenging scenarios.

Cure_off wrote:
Might be the way I play but I find the endless game speed easier than the standard one.

I had the same impression, but then I compered graths at the end of sessions and find out, that production and science outputs cope and then overcame AI earlier at the fast time. 

I guess, main impression is that early advantage feels even stronger on faster speed, but you can overcame it faster as well. 

I will give your settings a try.

I've noticed some basic gameplay problems with the AI recently, things like:

- not conquering/capturing independent peoples (wanting to try a mod to remove them)

- not building outposts on open territory adjacent to their existing cities over long periods of time

Also, have the difficulty levels changed or are they bugged?  I'm currently playing on Humankind and the enemy units don't have the usual +2 combat strength.

Actually I think it's much harder if you put 2-3 continents, max player number and max difficulty. This is because AI on other continents can snowball faster and you can't attack them nearly as easily to slow them down.

@MrKudzu AI bonus were overhauled in the Bolivar update, and the additional combat strength is gone. It's not a bug, it was announced somewhere that the devs think it's not necessary anymore (stream, discord?).

Use a mod to make it more difficult

Or play multiplayer

komodowaran wrote:

Use a mod to make it more difficult

Or play multiplayer

What kind of mod? I'm trying to find at least  4 to 6 players with strong skills who can play at the same time. Competing task =) 

What would you call „strong skills“?

I don't really get the importance of the years of X4 gaming if someone is getting your other requirements right.
I'm surprised that you're not able to find players, half of the forum members seem to meet your requirements. Maybe you should make a separate post ? There's also most probably a discord server where you could also offer to play a game.

Good luck with your endeavour!

Cure_off wrote:

I don't really get the importance of the years of X4 gaming if someone is getting your other requirements right.
I'm surprised that you're not able to find players, half of the forum members seem to meet your requirements. Maybe you should make a separate post ? There's also most probably a discord server where you could also offer to play a game.

Good luck with your endeavour!

Sure! It is mostly about time and been gable to constantly gather to keep playing one game. Thanks!