Being the cowardly, er I mean cautious player I am [img]tongue.gif[/img] , I've never tried any difficulty level other than novice. So how do the other difficulty levels affect the game exactly?

They hit more, you hit less--including magic. PP & L&T also roll higher. More frequent respawns. Unfortunately, you don't get double bosses on Expert, like in W-7...

aside from that, you also get less hints and clues (according to p.17 of manual). If you've already played the game, I guess that doesn't matter and even if not, they practically beat you over the head with hints anyway.

I had thought it has an effect on the quality of items you get, but I guess not.

It all depends on what you find the most fun. I've played novice and that was fun for a few games, you get to know the game pretty well. I play on normal difficulty, non-ironman usually, and beef up the challange by using new unconventional combinations of characters.

I tried expert, but I really didn't have much fun playing on that level. I found it too frustrating that I could hardly hit anything, and anything could hit me. I like it fair.

Ironman, not much of an option for me, my computer crashes too frequently. I tried it a couple of times, and quit both times before getting very far.

Stay on novice until you're not having as much fun, that's what this game is about... fun. Anyone can play expert, but those that are better at the game will get through it quicker. IMO

Once you play on normal, you'll probably not go back to novice though, it's not fair on the monsters then. [img]smile.gif[/img]

I've tried normal, expert, then novice, then IronMan novice, and they have all been fun in their own ways. In the novice novice/IM games, it has been because I wanted to try funky theme parties that I wasn't sure I was competent enough to try on harder levels. But now I've built up enough experience playing that the novice IMs (I finished the plain old novice weeks ago) are seeming stale. The normal parties were my first: where I tried out the classes I felt safest with or wanted to see what was new(Fig, Sam, Lord, Bis, Bard, and Gad). The second party was where I tried out some other classes I was interested in (Ran, Mon, Nin, Pri, Mag, but I just had to have another Fig). The 3rd party was where I tried out the rest of the classes and the class/race combos that had special items (Alc, Psi, Rog, Val, Faerie Nin, and Moo Sam (for the Giant's Sword), and I decide to try expert. It was frustrating at first, but it really payed off.
So I would say, try Normal, you're sure to like it. And even try Expert. Remember, as long as it's not IM, you can have lots of saved games, so you can go back if you make some aggregious error, which I don't think happens very often. I think people restart more often because they feel unhappy with the way things are going than because the game has gotten to an unwinnable point.

expert can definately be frustrating, which is why most of us smell like cheese.

Another thing the difficulty level changes is how often you get skill increases. I once started a party on normal by accident (after my very first game). I realized it in the swamp when most of my important skills already aproached 100.

I don't think 'expert' without ironman is hard for experienced players. Except the start, mainly arnika road, if you don't have pure spellcasters (since your melee guys - especially hybrids- are still very weak at this point)

From my own experience let me tell you : On expert the "special" monsters a lot tougher. Made my bad experience with Brekek, which is usually a victim on normal difficulty.
On expert, he killed my Lvl 11/13 party in a way, I've never seen before.

[img]graemlins/monster5.gif[/img]

[ 03-01-2004, 08:06 AM: Message edited by: Loudhy ]

I think you should definitely give normal a try.

After beating the game on normal, and doing it again on normal with a smaller party, I found that after about level 11 or 12 the excitement (or fear) of wondering what's around the corner goes down pretty fast.

For that reason I only play on expert now. I like that my melee characters don't always hit - I have to be more careful about character development to make them effective. I also like it that tough monsters are really tough and that I have to think about how to handle the 5 unicorns (choose your favorite type based on your characer level) that are between me and where I want to go (one time I had to kill them one at a time, run away, heal/unturncoat my party, rest, repeat until all five were dead).

But of course, do what you like best, but certainly give normal, and eventually expert a good try so you can see for yourself.

I kind of like the experience of fear you get from