25 réponses à ce sujet

[Corrozus]

I've played the game completely through twice on easy.  I've tried a number of times to play it on normal at least and always end up having difficulties that I don't think I should be having.  Now I know part of my difficulties come from not wanting to micro-manage every single party member and while I am comfortable with tactics (having played ff12 completely) I don't know if I'm using them effectively.  I'm wondering what difficulty does everyone here normally play on, and any tips for someone who keeps dying horribly on anything harder then easy besides the simple beginner stuff?

[hexaligned]

Just to put my views in context : I played through for about 2 hours on normal before pumping up to Nightmare, and Ive done 2 complete playthroughs on nightmare since then.

You are right, I mostly micromanage, the only tactics I really use are for my healer (because I find manually healing boring) and I use a pickpocket gambit on my rogue.



Honestly if you are having trouble it probably has more to do with your character builds than your tactics. anything other than healing isn't really needed, you can auto attack your way through Nightmare as long as you have a healer at your back.



If you really really want to cheese it though, make a ton of health potions and set up a tactic to just drink your strongest one at 75% health, you should never have anyone die again.

[dkjestrup]

To be honest, Nightmare isn't much more difficult than normal. The difference between easy and normal is greater than the difference between NM and Normal.



Build you characters right, get the good gear early, and get your target priorities straight, and you're set.

[Lambert_Feyzel]

I made a thread about that ( check here ), here is an extract, I hope it'll help you on how to play the various difficulty levels:


1) You can play "easy" if you just want to enjoy the story, and don't care too much about the fighting/gear upgrading part. You'll hardly have to use the Tactical Pause and won't be damaged by Friendly Fire (so cast area damaging spells a lot) . While choosing your characters' Talents, just select those you like more, without any worries.


2) Select "normal" if you never played any Bioware RPG and need to practice. You'll have to use the TP more often, will have some trouble with FF, and will need to throw a healing now & then... but in general you won't have to be too much afraid of your enemies, except some encounters against spellcasters/archers and the bosses. Remember to save when in dungeons once in a while for precaution, and feel forced to buy new weapons and armor only if they are a good upgrade to yours, because you'll find enough gear during your errands (from quest rewards, chests, ecc).
A wiser Talent and Skill selection is suggested, but it's not imperative.


3) Switch to "hard" only if (or when) you find "normal" still too easy or boring: in this mode, you'll need to save quite often when in dungeons -expecially before opening room doors- and upgrade your gear regularly, buying new weapons/armor in shops, when necessary.
In combat, use TP frequently to check how the battle is going, heal (so always keep healing/mana pots in your inventory and/or bring in battle someone able to cast healing spells: Wynne is the best choice) and rejuvenate often, put someone to tank stronger enemies (to tank = to keep an opponent busy by someone heavily armored and specialized in Weapon and Shield while your other characters damage him) and always use Crowd Control abilities (stuns, fears, ecc.) on your opponents in addition to pure damage dealing (DPS), since they hit too hard to be left uncontrolled and just be killed one by one.
You'll also need to choose the proper Skills & Talents for you characters, so if you started Alistair to be a tank, go on that way: don't spread too much of your points, except maybe for Morrigan: some of her points spent on healing spells will help a lot, expecially if you aren't going to keep Wynne in your main team all the time.


4) Finally, switch to "nightmare" if you want to taste (and test) your tactical skills at their best, because every fight could be ...the last one.
First of all, keep in mind you'll have to save before entering any dungeon rooms as well as upgrading and optimizing constantly your gear and being sure your backpack has lots of healing/mana pots.
When in battle: use the TP every few seconds to check the situation, heal and rejuvenate a lot (so, Wynne is almost an imperative in your group), use properly your tank, set traps when possible, use Crowd Control abilities all the time, and also.... you'll need some luck when enemy's mages cast CC/area damage spells
The game is not impossible to conquer at this level, but you'll need to take great care preparing and managing your battles. You'll also have to spend wisely your Skills & Talent points, don't spread them and keep in mind that to progress, you'll need good DPS as well as a strong tank and someone deeply specialized in the arts of healing.

Modifié par Lambert_Feyzel, 11 mars 2010 - 01:33 .

[Kaynos1972]

I dunno for me nightmare playing seems to be really boring cause it involved pausing the game constantly and micro manage all your party action, i prefer a lesser difficulty so i can "PLAY" the game and not "WORK" it.

[Shador5529]

Lambert_Feyzel wrote...

I made a thread about that ( check here ), here is an extract, I hope it'll help you on how to play the various difficulty levels:


1) You can play "easy" if you just want to enjoy the story, and don't care too much about the fighting/gear upgrading part. You'll hardly have to use the Tactical Pause and won't be damaged by Friendly Fire (so cast area damaging spells a lot) . While choosing your characters' Talents, just select those you like more, without any worries.

My easy mode must be ****ing broke, then.  If, for instance, I have Wynne cast a fireball (yes, I respec), my melee fighters get blown up just like the bad guys.  Thrown all over the floor, lit on fire, etc.

[dkjestrup]

Lambert, to be honest, that isn't what the difficulties are like. There is easy, then there is easier.

[Corrozus]

After switching back and forth between easy and normal, I can definitly see a difference on a number of levels. My characters do more damage on easy, mobs die faster, friendly fire knocks my characters down but doesn't actually do any damage that I can see. I enjoy easy, as I play mostly for the story, but decided I could use a challenge as I'm more comfortable with the general game play now.



On my first play through I was a dps mage with Wynne healing, 2nd play through I was an archery rogue with Morrigan dpsing and occasionally throwing a heal. I've tried playing a warrior, but have found I'm not very good at it, so am playing a dual-wield rogue now on normal (most of the time). I have gotten more used to actually working on always having health pots, and find that I definitly aquire more gold in normal mode which allows for more health pots. I haven't noticed that much of a difference in drops from mobs, but I'm not necessarily very gear focused in any game I play. I guess I just feel like I'm missing something by only playing on easy.

[Lambert_Feyzel]

Kaynos1972 wrote...

I dunno for me nightmare playing seems to be really boring cause it involved pausing the game constantly and micro manage all your party action, i prefer a lesser difficulty so i can "PLAY" the game and not "WORK" it.

Well mate, it depends on how you like to play: for example, I like to micromanage every move during fights, like a match  of chess... for me pausing game every few seconds to counterattack the enemy's moves is fun

[Lambert_Feyzel]

Shador5529 wrote...


My easy mode must be ****ing broke, then.  If, for instance, I have Wynne cast a fireball (yes, I respec), my melee fighters get blown up just like the bad guys.  Thrown all over the floor, lit on fire, etc.

Mhh, strange indeed

[Lambert_Feyzel]

dkjestrup wrote...

Lambert, to be honest, that isn't what the difficulties are like. There is easy, then there is easier.

Oh, did I mistake something? Mhh well I play the Italian version, there are "easy", "normal", "hard" and "nightmare"

...Or maybe you meant that nighmare is alredy easy to play, and the lower difficulty levels are even easier? :happy:

Modifié par Lambert_Feyzel, 11 mars 2010 - 10:17 .

[Ozzlok]

Play on whatever difficulty you enjoy. That’s what it’s all about. I almost never play games on easy but this one I do and it is because there is a big disadvantage in the game combat playing it on the console and I am playing on a XBOX360. On the PC version of this game you have an overhead view just like in most other RPGs where you can see the whole battlefield from above. You can pause the game, click a character, click a location or target, do the same for all the other characters, then hit go and they all do what they were told. The console version doesn’t have that view or mechanics. Your view is always a 3rd person view from right above and behind the character you are controlling. Then even when you have control you can’t click a location for them to move to when the pause comes off. You have to take control of them, unpause the game, and actually move them to the location you want them to attack from or cast from.  So while you’re moving  one, the other characters are moving about as they wish.  Very hard to place all your characters where you want for proper strategy.


***if someone knows a better way to do this on console than let me know. I would really love it!!!  But even the online reviews I have read on the game talk about the same PC vs Console combat view and control so I don’t think there is***


If I could control the NPCs better during battle I would play on a higher difficulty. But without being able to implement the strategy I wanted in an easy fashion it got a bit frustrating, so I kicked it to easy. Still absolutely love the game tho!!!   

Modifié par Ozzlok, 12 mars 2010 - 03:57 .

[100xp]

I generally always start with one up from the normal difficulty setting or one under the hardest, sometimes for achievements sometimes for the extra challenge but I've played through most of the Baldur's Gates and NWN's. With DA:O it never felt right that your AoE spells wouldn't hurt your own guys and AoE spam w/out consequence seems kinda cheesy imo...but that's just me. Besides, seeing how much friendly fire damage I've accumulated from day one amuses me.

[Zeleen]

Ozzlok wrote...

Play on whatever difficulty you enjoy. That’s what it’s all about. I almost never play games on easy but this one I do and it is because there is a big disadvantage in the game combat playing it on the console and I am playing on a XBOX360. On the PC version of this game you have an overhead view just like in most other RPGs where you can see the whole battlefield from above. You can pause the game, click a character, click a location or target, do the same for all the other characters, then hit go and they all do what they were told. The console version doesn’t have that view or mechanics. Your view is always a 3rd person view from right above and behind the character you are controlling. Then even when you have control you can’t click a location for them to move to when the pause comes off. You have to take control of them, unpause the game, and actually move them to the location you want them to attack from or cast from.  So while you’re moving  one, the other characters are moving about as they wish.  Very hard to place all your characters where you want for proper strategy.


***if someone knows a better way to do this on console than let me know. I would really love it!!!  But even the online reviews I have read on the game talk about the same PC vs Console combat view and control so I don’t think there is***


If I could control the NPCs better during battle I would play on a higher difficulty. But without being able to implement the strategy I wanted in an easy fashion it got a bit frustrating, so I kicked it to easy. Still absolutely love the game tho!!!   

Yep! I agree it's much easier in the easy mode to do the battles - if you could keep the pause up while re-stationing your npc's and assigning tasks -it would make it much easier

[Ozzlok]

Yea...the PC version has a big advantage in that regard...unless we are both missing something but I doubt it. Don;t know why they couldn't have built the ability to assign, switch, assign, switch, assign, switch, then remove pause into the consoles. Oh well, still an awesome game but that takes a bunch of the battle strategy out of the for me.

[whodawhanow]

Shador5529 wrote...

Lambert_Feyzel wrote...

I made a thread about that ( check here ), here is an extract, I hope it'll help you on how to play the various difficulty levels:


1) You can play "easy" if you just want to enjoy the story, and don't care too much about the fighting/gear upgrading part. You'll hardly have to use the Tactical Pause and won't be damaged by Friendly Fire (so cast area damaging spells a lot) . While choosing your characters' Talents, just select those you like more, without any worries.

My easy mode must be ****ing broke, then.  If, for instance, I have Wynne cast a fireball (yes, I respec), my melee fighters get blown up just like the bad guys.  Thrown all over the floor, lit on fire, etc.

The reactions for easy mode are the same.  You just take no damage from them.  A fireball will still throw you around, but you won't take damage (or, more correctly, you will take 0 damage).  Same with CoC and Tempest, you will get damaged for 0.  This goes for normal as well.  Hard is half damage, nightmare is full.

I haven't played easy yet, went straight to normal.  I play on the PS3 and require little pausing (I throw grenades from the radial menu, but I don't count this as pausing), everything else is a tactic.

[nYshak]

Kaynos1972 wrote...

I dunno for me nightmare playing seems to be really boring cause it involved pausing the game constantly and micro manage all your party action, i prefer a lesser difficulty so i can "PLAY" the game and not "WORK" it.

For me that IS playing the game. And still too easy compared to an old school classic like Baldurs Gate, but I might remember that one a bit too difficult

Fights are much more rewarding if they are hard. There would be no sense of accomplishment if I could rush through anybody and anything.

[krylo]

whodawhanow wrote...
 This goes for normal as well.  Hard is half damage, nightmare is full.

Only on the consoles.

On the consoles all the difficulties are turned down in regards to FF.   Normal for you guys is easy for us, Hard for you is normal for us, etc.  This is probably to make up for how much easier it is to control things on the PC, however, but you probably shouldn't tell people that normal has 0 FF unless you're going to qualify that it is only that way on the consoles.

Modifié par krylo, 14 mars 2010 - 07:03 .

[nYshak]

I think this is so, because you cannot use the top down view on consoles. That makes the game a lot harder in and of itself.

[Gliese]

My last play was on nightmare after completing the game on hard for my first run. I'm a bit dissapointed because I feel this is a very easy game. I'm looking for mods to increase the difficulty and I'm thinking about trying out nightmare plus. What I really want though is better AI, bc most of the lack of challenge stems from how easy you can exploit it. I've played the BG games for hundreds of hours and you have to put on alot of limitations on your play there in order to not exploit weak AI, I'm hoping to avoid that in DAO somehow.

As for tips: Simply get lots and lots of healing potions and use them liberally whenever you feel the need, this wasn't supposed to be possible in DAO but there you have it.

Try to lure enemies to you 1 by 1 by using an archer at maximum range and then moving back a bit, you can pick apart big groups with little resistance this way.

There are tons of other stuff you can try, for example using stealth on a rogue and tossing bombs, wont break it so essentially you can do as much damage as your bomb supply will allow.

Modifié par Gliese, 15 mars 2010 - 09:15 .

[mosspit]

Well my last nm playthru was a solo 2Her. After Lothering, I placed another "no health poutlice" restriction. It became challenging after that.
The other BG-styled game I played was IWD2 and DAO's nm was a farcry from IWD2's hof mode. Personally, I attribute this to the bad game mechanics like the linearity of def vs atk, stats vs combat performance, etc.

Modifié par mosspit, 15 mars 2010 - 09:45 .

[Gliese]

I think it has more to do with combat design being affected by the desire to reach a broader audience. Pause and play for pc only became pause whenever you want to IF you want, for pc and consoles.

Now in order to let other playstyles be effective (i.e. no or little pausing) they unfortunately nerfed the challenge for experienced people playing the game in a more turn-based fashion similar to that of the BG series. It wasn't inevitable but it's what I think happened. That they've had to lower the easy and normal difficulties with patching due to popular demand at the same time as many are complaining the highest difficulty level is too easy seems to give weight to this theory.



Hopefully the effects of this will carry over to DA2 and they will get the difficulties, both easy and hard tweaked to satisfy all players. I think easy should be playtested with little or no pausing at all using little tactics or overall strategy and nightmare should be playtested with meticulous pausing and micromanagement with good party composition and builds and using all tools available to overcome challenges. Normal and Hard will then have to fall in between the two extremes.

[mosspit]

I agree with the suggested reasons why a decision to nerf console version is made. But that does not justify why nightmare version is the way it is on pc (I play pc version). When you compare in difficulty between nightmare and normal, the difference isn't really huge. You couple that with bad game mechanics and a party-based nightmare playthru just does not cut it.



For marketing reasons, they can just set aside normal for casual gamers and anything beyond for people seeking for that kind of challenge. Right now, the difficulty curve is not as steep as I would like it to be. I am speaking for myself anyways.

[Gliese]

mosspit wrote...

I agree with the suggested reasons why a decision to nerf console version is made. But that does not justify why nightmare version is the way it is on pc (I play pc version). When you compare in difficulty between nightmare and normal, the difference isn't really huge. You couple that with bad game mechanics and a party-based nightmare playthru just does not cut it.

For marketing reasons, they can just set aside normal for casual gamers and anything beyond for people seeking for that kind of challenge. Right now, the difficulty curve is not as steep as I would like it to be. I am speaking for myself anyways.

I agree with you, the differences are barely noticeable. Unfortunately it does take quite a bit of time of playtesting to get it just right but it should have been done. I usually feel this way about RPGs, it might say more about how much of a gaming nerd I am than the general level of difficulty but it feels like the games of today are not as challenging as the games of yesterday. It seems partly tied to genre though, I've played several fiendishly difficult shooters that's come out in recent years, but then again I guess FPSs are not my forte.

Modifié par Gliese, 17 mars 2010 - 10:55 .