You are right Remco,
But this is only a schematic under discussion and to give you understand the new concept.
During the next weeks we will have to get in the heads of the players and after a lot of analysis we could see how these 3 difficulty margins will evolve…
For example, when I play a campaign, I don’t use at all, AUX units (provided by the designer) because I don’t want that my core army lose experience by potential killings.
I also always try to kill enemy units than to complete mission objectives for the same reason… by killing I (my core army) earn experience. In the end I win every battle with a decisive victory… and the campaign becomes not challenging (at all) after a certain point (elite units).
With the new concept… arrogant players like myself will lose half of their army in the BONUS mission and from that point and for a couple of mission (until the adjustable difficulty gets to the lower level) they will have a really hard time. The point is that we have to achieve a dynamic equilibrium and we have to take as a point of reference that the player in a 1:1 battle will try hard to achieve a draw (score/result).
Remco, think… the player will know that the AI will kick his *** (!) and won’t be so aggressive to achieve decisive victories! If you add to this the fact of uncertainty (due to low % hostile reinforcement along the edges of the map – simulation of hostile patrols) the game will become very interesting!
For sure, this is something totally new in the industry and we are going to be the pioneers!
As for the 3 level of difficulty I like the idea to use special terms but we should investigate more for these special margins… For example I assume that no player (no matter how rookie he is) will ever lose a battle in a campaign, so the first group could be from Decisive Loss to Marginal Loss.
Now, instead of going to the second margin, I will go to the third one…
If some one wins all the time and each battle with a decisive victory… then this guy should deserve a level by his own (I mean that a marginal victory is something close to the minor victory or even draw, BUT on the other hand a decisive victory is something that we can’t determine how far it is from the marginal victory… I am afraid that from this point someone may not understand my thoughts…LOL For example, If some drops an atomic bomb he will gain a decisive victory but what is the distance from the player with the atomic bomb and the player who won a marginal. In other words… the decisive is an upper limit, meaning that you can’t define this limit. On the other hand, the marginal victory is defined in relation with the Draw result…So for the third difficulty level I think we could use, just the Decisive victory result and for the second level of difficulty the Draw to Marginal victory result.
So, the paths to the 3 levels of difficulty could be defined as:
1. Decisive & Marginal Loss Path Green
2. Draw & Marginal Victory Path Blue
3. Decisive Victory Path Red
cheers,