A critique of the current sword difficulty ratings (based on hard difficulty)

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
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Hey everyone,

Having completed another recent full campaign playthrough, making some notes on what I found difficult and easy throughout the experience, I wanted to give my thoughts on the way the campaigns and battles are currently rated within the 1-3 swords system.

First, some general problems with the system:

  1. What do with campaigns that are mostly easy, but have one single very difficult scenario? A typical example would be the Alaric campaign. It has four super easy missions, and a very tough finale; Currently, it’s rated as 3 swords, despite the fact that the vast majority of the campaign just doesn’t match that designation at all. So, with this example in mind, you would expect that the rating is based on the most difficult challenges present within a campaign - but campaigns like Joan of Arc, which has 2-3 very difficult missions mixed in with 2 very easy ones, or Tariq, which has one of the hardest finales with three very simple opening missions, or Bari, which arguably has two very difficult missions at the end that would easily justify a 3 sword rating, don’t get three swords. This seems confusing and inconsistent.
  2. Difficulty is sometimes subjective and depending on playstyle, but also tends to vary a bit due to some RNG elements. As an additional factor, player decisions that seem entirely reasonable can make a map much harder from playthrough to playthrough (or much easier). That said, after multiple playthroughs on hard for most missions (and at least 2 for every single one of them - including legendary for 3k), here are the campaigns and battles that, in my opinion, could use an update or change to their sword ratings - the ones that I’m not mentioning here are, in my opinion, accurately rated.

Campaigns that should get fewer swords:

a) Sforza: This campaign is currently one of the easiest in the game. There are no difficulty spikes, all of the missions can be done at a relaxed pace. It should be reduced from 2 swords to 1 sword.
b) York: This historical battle is currently at 3 swords, but I don’t quite see how that’s justified: No early pressure to deal with, lots of space and resources, and while the sheer amount of enemies can lead to some problems if you get into conflict with many of them, this feels more like a 2 sword mission for me.
c) Kurikara: Currently one of the easiest one-shot battles. Weak pressure and lots of time to deal with your enemies. Very relaxing, and should be changed from 2 to 1 sword.
d) Bapheus: In its current version, this one is surprisingly easy. The enemies just aren’t all that active and threatening. Could easily be put down from 2 to 1 sword.
e) Lepanto: Not quite sure why this one earned a second sword, as it is not all that difficult to stop every single transport, turning this into a cakewalk. Though, if there is a landing, it can be fairly troublesome, so this one isn’t a priority imo. Still, could be changed to 1 sword.
f) Yodit: Feels a bit overrated at 3 swords and could go down to 2.
g) Bayinnaung: Honestly not THAT difficult anymore, I could see it at 2, though 3 is fine.
h) Ismail: Most of this campaign is very easy and straightforward, I think 1 sword is more appropriate instead of 2.
i) Tamar: This one is clearly overrated at 3 - even after all the nerfs to Georgians, it’s not a difficult campaign (though I enjoy it a lot, aside from the current bug in Tamar 4). Could see it at either 2 or1 sword, both would be appropriate.
j) Shimazu: Especially with the additon of rams, this one’s fairly easy and should be moved down to 2 swords, considering that your starting castle by itself mostly keeps you safe from pretty much everything.
k) Cao Cao: The final mission offers some challenge, but I could honestly see this at 1 sword, as you can just spam cavalry and win almost every time (and it’s, on average, easier than Liu Bei).
l) Sun Clan: Seems overrated at 3 swords, even on legendary. I would put it at 2.

Aside from that, I’m going to mention Alaric again. Personally, I think with 4 super easy missions, 3 swords just feels like a weird rating, and I would propably put it at 2.

Campaigns that should get more swords:
a) Bari deserves 3 swords for missions 4+5.
b) Joan of Arc: Currently surprisingly difficult, with potentially substantial challenges in missions 3, 5 and 6. 2 swords at least, though I would prefer to just make these missions a bit easier instead since a lot of new/returning players would want to play this campaign.
c) Noryang Point: The opening of this one is honestly quite challenging, and though the endgame is very easy, I can see this at 2 swords instead of just 1.
d) Suryavarman I.: Mission 4 alone would imo be enough to put this at 2 swords instead of 1 - if we put Alaric higher due to one hard mission, the same should be true here.
e) Babur: Honestly not as easy as I remembered, you’re facing a lot of early aggression, so this could be put to 2 swords instead of 1.
f) Sargon of Akkad: One of the most clear-cut examples of a baffling sword rating. This has only 1 sword, but Sargon 4 is currently the hardest mission in the entire RoR campaigns. 2 or 3 just for that mission, or a nerf to the mission.
g) Thoros: Another clear-cut example. This is marked as the easiest Mountain Royals campaign. It’s actually the hardest one, and it’s not close. Mission 4 is the hardest mission of that expansion. Propably in its current state more of a 3 sword campaign.
h) Nobunaga: This is a bit of a strange one, because the only reason I’m not comfortable with 1 sword here is the timer on hard difficulty - while it has been made easier to achieve, with one fewer enemy needing to be dealt with, depending on faction choice, this timer can still be quite a challenge, beyond what 1 sword missions usually offer. My preferred solution here, though, would to keep it at 1 sword and just remove the timer. It feels artificial and arbitrary.
i) Finally, Liu Bei - imo, the first two missions here on legendary are harder than anything you face in the other two 3k campaigns, maybe outside of the finales. Compared to the general difficulty of the expansion, I see this more at 2 swords instead of 1.

I would love to read your thoughts. Do you agree or disagree with my list? Do you think changes to some campaigns or the system as a whole are needed? It would be nice if there are some campaigns/battles that we can find universal agreement on, which would make the list far less subjective.

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Well, I think you prove your thought that difficulty can be subjective. It seems actually true from your post. So, I’m going to write how I feel about some of the campaigns.

  1. Tamar is definitely not a one-sword campaign. I clearly felt this is a three-sword campaign. Aside from the current bug on the scenario 4, I definitely must follow specific ways to win the scenario. Merely with my own physical ability, I literally get overwhelmed by the Turks. Definitely a VEEEERY difficult campaign. To me, this is already at least three-sword. I personally want to give it four-sword. Much harder than the Bari campaign. I feel the Tamar campaign is as tough as the Le Loi campaign which also requires me to follow certain ways to get victorious. Without memorizing how to do in those campaigns, I lose.

  2. Noryang Point should keep its difficulty rating as a one-sword campaign. The initial part is only for achievement, not winning the scenario. Achievements should not be considered when we rate difficulty. Think how it would be if we consider the 30-minute achievement on Alaric 4. 5-sword, maybe? Haha.

  3. The Thoros campaigns is actually the easiest one among the Mountain Royals campaigns. To me, the hardest one in the Thoros campaign was its scenario 4. It was 2-sword.

Again, the most challenging campaign was the Tamar campaign, especially the scenario 3 and 4. I seriously cannot defeat the enemies without memorizing certain strategies. I already forgot how to do it now… Especially the Tamar 4 is a super-crazy mission to me. 5 was not difficult though.

FYI, I nearly only play Single Player games. So, my pure ability is below 700 on Ranked game, maybe.

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I fully agree on this one. It’s even more baffling considering it was originally released as a 2 swords campaign yet was reduced to 1 sword as a “fix”.

I also had difficulties with the Thoros campaign, but it might be due in big part to my playstyle. I tend to rely on cavalry a lot, and Armenians have no good mounted units at all (which is quite baffling from a historical perspective) yet the scenario expects you to be very reactive on the map.

Another one whom I think should have more sword is Prithviraj, especially with scenario 4.

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Maybe.
ngl I kinda liked when the devs troll us a little bit with the difficulty ratings (but only a little bit, as long as most are accurate).

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Sometimes the sword rating was used to suggest a playing order (Dawn of the Dukes before updating it), and at other times it also takes complexity into account

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I can buy the complexity argument for a few of the higher rated campaigns that aren’t actually all that difficult (Francisco de Almeida comes to mind, lots of gimmicky maps); However, the rating system isn’t exactly consistent with that.

Though that does show another problem: There is really no indicator in game regarding what the sword ratings actually mean, so a new player might just have no idea what they’re supposed to signify.

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I’ve always found that the difficulty level in AoE2 campaigns is just all over the place. Unlike other RTS games I’ve played, there’s almost never an upward difficulty curve. There are difficulty spikes in random places, and early scenarios can be much harder than later ones. The difficulty can vary a lot between different playthroughs of the same scenario, because the AI doesn’t always behave consistently. Sometimes two different reasonable approaches to the same scenario can change the difficulty considerably, e.g. Lepanto is much easier if you play aggressively rather than defensively as you’re supposed to.

Generally I agree with the suggestions here. Personally, I would reduce the rating for The Hautevilles. It’s currently three swords – I think two might be justifiable for the first two scenarios, but the last three scenarios are very easy. The third one in particular seems to be impossible to fail unless you delete your own buildings.

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They try to fix that in some newer scenarios, for example in Longshanks 2 if you attack the enemy port they get a swarm of ships, to make an offensive impossible and quickly put you back on the defensive.

And while the advisor suggests a defensive strat at Lepanto, being aggressive is historically accurate. Advisors can be wrong or outright deceptive (imagine trusting Ricimer as the WRE…)

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I can’t remember any examples (and maybe I’m thinking of AoE1 here), but there are some scenarios where the hints make terrible suggestions that really don’t work.

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