No, loot should not change with difficulty. It is in the name “difficulty“, you choose it if you want to challenge yourself.
Yes, droprates for Ember are absolutely unacceptable. I will go so far and say they are dogshit! When I clear a plagued area and open the chests again afterwards, if I find 1 Essence/Radiant Ember I may considder myself lucky.
The worst part is, you will get more loot by farming vendors in diffirent realms than by clearing maps. This is such a moronic design.
*looks at the clock* It is time to start the game, check Finley in my 3 realms, and then log out.
So, despite him being factually correct, you disagree with him and instead take issue with his behavior. That hardly reflects a mature or goal-oriented approach to discussion.
This only applies to Early Access, and even then, anything prior to the Endgame should also be considered. You have not addressed his question as to why he should be penalized for playing on higher difficulty modes. I actually agree with his point, even if you choose to criticize his professionalism—which, frankly, your own conduct does not fully reflect either. Furthermore, your argument is not accurate in version 1.0, as clearly stated by CEO Thomas Mahler. As a result, your response has not substantively addressed the issue.
This is a strong stance to take, especially considering that adjustments such as sliders were previously introduced in response to your feedback. I would also suggest taking a step back from the discussion, as some of your assumptions appear to be disproportionate to what was actually said.
He explicitly asked not to be placed at a disadvantage, not for additional rewards or preferential treatment. That is a reasonable request and does not indicate any sense of superiority. Are these so-called ‘elites’ actually present in this discussion, or do you simply harbor resentment toward more skilled players?
Based on your own statements in the other thread regarding casual players ruining teh game, that does appear to be the case- You mentioned along the lines to hate them with a passion, to refresh your deluded memory
That is incorrect. It was clearly stated that higher difficulty levels would only increase enemy and boss strength, without reducing loot, altering systems, or imposing additional penalties. As it stands, the current implementation effectively places players at a significant disadvantage in ways that were neither communicated nor justified, which contradicts named game design principles.
His position is entirely valid, whereas your claims are not supported by the stated facts. What is particularly concerning is the level of certainty and dismissiveness in your responses, which comes across as unprofessional and unnecessarily confrontational
As it stands, his position is entirely correct, while yours is not supported by the facts. Furthermore, your argument contradicts the clearly stated information regarding the endgame in version 1.0, as confirmed by CEO Thomas Mahler himself.
I do not currently have a firm opinion on embers. However, I agree with Juuteki’s position regarding loot. I believe part of the issue is that English is not his first language, which may have led to misunderstandings. His core point was simply that players should not be penalized for choosing higher difficulty levels. I felt the same way, which is why I came to this forum—perhaps we were both influenced by the same YouTubers or Discord communities that raised these concerns.
He already provided a good example with the Crucible, but the principle applies to any combat-related activity, including general world farming. Non-combat systems, such as gathering, do not necessarily need adjustment. However, when it comes to combat, the additional time and effort required due to increased enemy strength should be reflected appropriately. Even without granting extra rewards beyond baseline expectations, the system should at least offset the additional time investment so that average loot acquisition remains consistent.
Some argue that this would incentivise players to choose higher difficulty, but the solution is not to introduce exclusive loot tables or excessive bonuses. Rather, the goal should be to ensure that players are not placed at a disadvantage. Currently, the opposite appears to be true,players receive less loot efficiency on higher difficulties due to increased clear times, which unintentionally incentivizes lower difficulty farming.
I believe his point is reasonable. Even if his tone was perceived as harsh, the underlying argument itself is valid and deserves fair consideration. I even actually agree 100% with that.
Could you please provide a link to where he directly called someone a “noob” directly as an attack or used the other terms you mentioned? So far, I have not seen him use those specific insults. However, I have observed him being compared to a dog, described as a social loser seeking validation through a game, and labeled with other derogatory terms such as ass troll.. by you. Your narcissism and self denial should be a medical study-
Silas-Inservio-Pax , I noticed that you warned Juuteki and Kevin for using terms like ‘champ’ and ‘troll.’ However, this other individual has called people ‘ass trolls,’ fabricated claims about them, and compared them to dogs and social losers. Is this the kind of forum debate environment you were referring to?
If respectful discussion is the goal, moderation should be applied consistently to all participants. Otherwise, it creates the impression of unequal enforcement and undermines constructive dialogue
I think the framing of the argument plays a role. This is what I understand as the spirit of it all:
Loot acquisition rates should be consistent across difficulties. That would mean a base rate determined from normal difficulty, where easy difficulty would need to drop loot less frequently and hard difficulty would need to drop loot more frequently, so that both match the same rate as normal. That makes sense to me and I have no issue with it.
Guess you had enough time to stalk through my posts in another thread to call me deluded and worth medical study, but searching through his post history was just too much effort. You even seem to be a mindreader, maliciously divining my feeling about people more “skilled” than me. Good for them, don’t really care how skilled you are at a leisure activity. What I do care is their efforts to get preferential reward schemes.
You also don’t seem to understand how difficulty itself is a penalty on the player. When you raise difficulty, mob poise increases, their aggression increases, and mob count increases, so it’s not just enemy strength, but the tax on your health for misplay, causing greater consumption of resources to either heal up the damage, or requiring more investment on gear optimization to overcome difficult parts of an Unspoken playthrough.
Raising rewards flattens that difficulty. If you get more gear or materials, your power spike comes online earlier, and this has nothing to do with early access or 1.0. Thomas himself has stated that a way to nerf the content naturally is through farming levels and gear upgrades. Increased rewards do just that, just as the previous increased experience did.
Moreover, you are only approaching this question from the perspective of an Unspoken player that has the alternative of playing and clearing quicker on easier difficulty. What you don’t grasp is that the player who actually needs medium or easy difficulty does not clear the content quicker than the skilled player who plays on Unspoken.
Skilled/Hardcore players regardless of difficulty clear content faster than medium/easy difficulty players, for the simple reason that people who play these modes are more experienced, optimize more, and play longer to develop strategies that get them time gains.
This is replicated regardless of game type. Grab a Mythic + or mythic raid WoW player or Savage difficulty FFXIV raider, or a Challenger LoL player or WoW arena player. They all clear higher difficulty raids, M+ keys and climb pvp ladders quicker at higher difficulties than the time it takes mediocre players to do considerably less difficult content within the game.
So what you’re asking is that players who already have an efficiency advantage be given an even larger advantage as compensation for their self inflicted efficiency handicap (difficulty choice given their skill level).
You simply disregard the way the average medium and easy difficulty player clears content, and are introducing a wrong benchmark for why the gap between Unspoken and other difficulties in reward should be widened.
This is even worse when coop comes into the mix, because now the incentive for bigger rewards introduces into the group dynamic a tension toward pulling members of a group toward higher difficulties to compensate for the coop loot limitations.
Historically in most games, introducing different reward schemes opens a pandora’s box for neverending demands for those gaps to be addressed one way or another by the affected groups. Setting the standard of one reward scheme across the game sidesteps that and makes the choice of difficulty an opt-in instead of a pressure. They took the right approach.
Yes, you articulated it extremely well—that is exactly how I understood his point, and it is precisely the position I support. I firmly believe this is how the system should function. I have personally experienced what feels like a penalty in loot acquisition, and there is no compelling justification for players to be disadvantaged in loot rewards simply for choosing higher difficulties. Increased difficulty inherently demands greater effort, skill, and risk; it should never result in diminished rewards. On the contrary, it should be properly incentivized, not discouraged
I actually even want to add, looking ahead to the 1.0 release, I believe it should no longer be possible to switch freely between predefined difficulty modes. At that point, the system would be far more coherent if it consisted of only two categories: Normal and Custom. Since the Custom mode already contains the full range of adjustable parameters, players who want the standard experience can simply set all Custom sliders to their default values. This makes separate rigid modes largely redundant.
At the same time, races, challenge runs, and other specialized playstyles have a dedicated and passionate community. There must be a legitimate and transparent way to verify their authenticity,one that does not rely solely on internal developer validation. A consistent, unified Custom framework would provide that legitimacy.
Most importantly, there would be no practical reason to switch from Custom back to Standard anyway, because the Standard difficulty is already fully reproducible within the Custom settings. Maintaining separate systems only introduces unnecessary complexity, inconsistency, and potential exploitation. A single, transparent, and flexible Custom-based system would be both more logical and more fair.
Literally just checked 2 Topics regarding difficulty, you are in both of them spreading your deluded fantasiy about non existing elites and hating on them. I apologize for taking your own words at face value, should have known better regarding your record of lies and self created non existing situations . So do not worry, nobody is able to read your mind, neither wants too.
I have been a developer at FromSoftware since October 2013 and have worked on every major title since, excluding Armored Core—so I find your lecture on design intent and balance deeply misplaced, kinda hurted my feeling to be honest. I do not say this to sound arrogant, but it raises a fair and necessary question: are your conclusions based on actual development experience, or solely on personal opinion? Because, to be completely honest, your position reads as fundamentally biased rather than grounded in objective analysis.
And to be absolutely clear: the very reason I choose to play on higher difficulty is for the challenge itself—not to have my loot acquisition silently reduced to a level that is objectively worse than easier difficulty. Challenge is the intentional trade-off. Reduced reward efficiency was never part of that contract.
You also appear to have overlooked or ignored my earlier point. It was explicitly and unambiguously stated by Thomas that increased difficulty would not result in lower average loot acquisition. That was a clear expectation, not an interpretation. The current outcome directly contradicts that statement, which is precisely why this issue deserves serious attention.
Furthermore, this situation is not comparable to the EXP modifiers that were introduced and nobody really asked for. EXP scaling affects leveling pace, which is already a secondary and easily adjustable progression vector. Loot acquisition, on the other hand, is the primary driver of long-term progression, build completion, and endgame viability. Conflating the two is a categorical mistake. The EXP change was already questionable and widely unnecessary. But reducing loot efficiency on higher difficulty is far more consequential and fundamentally undermines the integrity of the difficulty system itself.
That is absolutely unacceptable in this type of game. Even a 100% increase or decrease would not come close to offsetting the massive impact of randomness. A player who gets lucky with legendary boss drops will still be overwhelmingly ahead of someone who does not, regardless of any artificial adjustments. Luck alone can create disparities far greater than any modifier ever could.
This is, fundamentally, a randomized loot system. Outcomes are dictated primarily by chance, not by controlled or predictable progression. Attempting to “balance” player outcomes through punitive loot scaling based on difficulty does not create fairness,it only introduces arbitrary disadvantages on top of an already luck-dependent system.
You cannot meaningfully equalize randomness by reducing rewards. All it accomplishes is punishing players for choosing higher difficulty, without solving the underlying variance that defines randomized loot.
Frankly, I would not even object if the bonus were implemented exclusively in the endgame. The story phase is relatively inconsequential in the long term. However, by any objective standard of logic and sound game design, it is unacceptable for higher difficulty to result in worse rewards in the 1.0 endgame.
Endgame is where progression, optimization, and long-term player investment truly matter. It is the definitive benchmark of effort, skill, and commitment. If players who choose higher difficulty,thereby accepting greater risk, stricter constraints, and increased challenge—are met with reduced or penalized loot outcomes, it fundamentally violates the core principle of risk-versus-reward balance, espacially if it even rewrds teh easiest the most. Absolutly BAD game design, backwards even-
Higher difficulty must never be associated with inferior rewards. At minimum, it should provide equivalent outcomes; ideally, it should offer proportionally greater incentives. Anything less creates a perverse incentive structure, where players are effectively discouraged from engaging with the game’s most challenging and demanding content.
In the context of a randomized loot system, where chance already introduces significant variance, adding systemic penalties to higher difficulty only compounds unfairness. For the integrity, credibility, and longevity of the endgame, higher difficulty must be respected and rewarded—not undermined.
What kind of argument is that? The issue of players being able to farm significantly faster on lower difficulty compared to higher difficulty is a fundamental balance problem. It has nothing to do with other players, competition, or anyone being “worse” or “better.” It is a structural flaw in progression design. When the most efficient way to acquire loot is to reduce the challenge, the entire difficulty system becomes meaningless.
Difficulty is supposed to represent a meaningful trade-off: greater challenge in exchange for appropriate reward. If higher difficulty results in slower progression and worse efficiency, then it ceases to be a viable or rational choice for players who value optimization. That is not a matter of ego or skill—it is a matter of objective incentives. Players will naturally gravitate toward whatever yields the best results for their time investment.
Framing this as hostility toward skilled players is a misrepresentation of the actual issue. On the contrary, penalizing higher difficulty disproportionately harms skilled and dedicated players, because they are the ones most willing to engage with challenging content. A system that makes their choice objectively inefficient discourages mastery rather than rewarding it.
It is also reasonable to point out the inconsistency in design direction. If the original expectation was a fixed, standardized difficulty structure without sliders, then introducing systems that both fragment difficulty and undermine its incentive structure raises legitimate concerns. Difficulty options should enhance player agency without invalidating the purpose of challenge itself.
Ultimately, this is not about what players “need.” It is about internal consistency, fairness of incentives, and coherent game design. A difficulty system that makes easier modes objectively superior for farming undermines its own purpose and diminishes the value of challenge entirely.
nobody needs anything. And in the beginning let me remind you it was advertised as NO diffiluty sliders and promised. But missing teh point once more. you are good in this.
That still completely misses the point. This has absolutely nothing to do with other players, skill comparisons, or anyone being “worse” or “better.” The issue is much simpler and purely rooted in objective game design.
If I can farm faster on an easier difficulty while receiving the exact same amount of loot, then the harder difficulty is inherently inefficient. That is not an opinion—it is a direct consequence of how time, difficulty, and rewards interact. When two difficulties provide equal rewards, but one can be completed significantly faster, the harder difficulty becomes strictly inferior from an efficiency standpoint.
This completely undermines the purpose of having difficulty options in the first place. Difficulty is supposed to represent a meaningful trade-off. If higher difficulty increases time investment without increasing rewards, then it effectively punishes players for choosing challenge. Rational players will always gravitate toward the most efficient option, which in this case is the easier difficulty.
This has nothing to do with other players’ performance, balance between players, or subjective perceptions of skill. It is a structural flaw in the incentive system. As long as easier difficulty provides equal rewards at a faster completion rate, it will always be the objectively optimal farming strategy. That outcome directly contradicts the fundamental principle that increased challenge should be respected, not made inefficient
You advocating for a system that effectively punishes skilled players in order to accommodate less skilled ones. His argument implies that higher difficulty should not provide better efficiency, even though it requires greater ability, effort, and time investment. The practical result of that philosophy is that players who are capable of handling more challenging content are placed at a disadvantage compared to those who choose easier settings.
That is the core issue. When harder difficulty offers no efficiency advantage—or worse, in this case becomes less efficient,it removes any rational incentive for skilled players to engage with it. Instead of rewarding mastery, the system indirectly favors lower difficulty by making it the optimal path for progression.
This is not about elitism or exclusion. It is about preserving the integrity of difficulty as a meaningful gameplay choice. Difficulty should reflect a deliberate trade-off: greater challenge in exchange for appropriate reward or efficiency. If that relationship is broken, then higher difficulty becomes purely cosmetic, rather than a legitimate and respected progression path.
In effect, such a system shifts the burden onto skilled players, asking them to accept objectively worse outcomes simply because they are capable of more. That is neither fair nor logically consistent within a progression-driven, randomized loot game.
It is even worse for players and groups who actively choose Unspoken difficulty. They are not merely unaffected by this system—they are directly disadvantaged by it.
You are also repeating arguments that have already been addressed. My previous response already demonstrated why your position fails to engage with the actual issue. Instead of confronting the objective imbalance, you continue to deflect away from the core problem: that higher difficulty results in worse efficiency despite requiring greater effort, consistency, and skill.
More importantly, your own prior statements reveal a clear bias. Your hostility toward skilled or dedicated players—whom you have characterized with openly dismissive and derogatory language—undermines the credibility of your position. It strongly suggests that your argument is not grounded in objective balance considerations, but rather in a subjective and emotional stance.
Likewise, the criticism regarding hypocrisy from Juuteki, that you called a dog is not unfounded. You defend the current easy-difficulty structure, despite the fact that such options were not originally part of the intended design and were explicitly presented differently in earlier expectations. Yet at the same time, you dismiss legitimate concerns about the measurable disadvantages imposed on Unspoken difficulty players.
This inconsistency exposes the central flaw in your reasoning. You are not addressing the objective facts: that higher difficulty currently imposes a structural efficiency penalty. Instead, you are defending a position rooted in personal preference, while ignoring the fundamental game design principle that increased challenge must not result in worse progression outcomes.
This is not a matter of opinion. It is a matter of internal consistency, fairness, and rational incentive design.
No, that is factually and objectively incorrect. This is not a matter open to interpretation or personal opinion unless one deliberately ignores the underlying mechanics and incentive structure. When higher difficulty results in equal or worse loot efficiency compared to lower difficulty, it creates a measurable imbalance. That is not subjective,it is a direct consequence of how time, difficulty, and reward interact.
Virtually every well-designed progression-based game and every experienced developer understands this principle. Higher difficulty is not intended to penalize players—it is intended to either preserve efficiency or appropriately compensate increased challenge. This is a foundational design standard, not a controversial or fringe perspective.
I also want to emphasize that I have taken the time to respond carefully and directly to your claims, yet your responses continue to rely on assertions rather than addressing the structural issue itself. Dismissing these concerns as mere opinion does not change the underlying reality, nor does it refute the observable outcome that higher difficulty currently results in worse efficiency, wich is not intended by statements of the CEO himself and you just lied about it
Statements from leadership and prior design expectations further reinforce that consistency, fairness, and meaningful difficulty choice were core goals. That is precisely why this issue matters. When the current system contradicts those principles, it deserves scrutiny and correction—not dismissal.
Ultimately, this is not about emotion, hostility, or personal bias. It is about preserving logical consistency and ensuring that higher difficulty remains a legitimate and respected progression path rather than a self-imposed disadvantage.
And given the non-sequitur of the first part of your reply, I’d rather not even read your trainwreck of thought that you pass for a reply post.
You’ve taken enough of my time despite your trollish goading, so you can go sit on the mute list while you bullshit about credentials nobody who’s been unfortunate to endure your post will believe.
We both know you read it. It’s fine — I’ve also been proven wrong and crushed by facts before. You’ll get over it.
I find it amusing that your delusion can’t accept that a Japanese person on an online forum could work as a developer. I haven’t even bragged about it, yet I don’t know a single 29-year-old who has achieved as much as I have. Four games considered masterpieces, two GOTY titles, and I was one of the main developer and originator of the Sekiro combat system, which is still regarded as the best combat system to this day. The early concept stages are my proudest pieces of my portfolio as developer and properly ever will be.
I would even stream directly from the office if you joined live on camera, just to see your disappointed face — including my portfolio. A portfolio Thomas would definitely appreciate and properly immmidently hire me. I really hate poeple accusing me of lying, so what do you say? Now that i bragged about it you can not resist cmom , 50/50 chance in exposing me, well also 50/50 to make a clown out of yourself . Deal?
This is exactly the point the previous person was making, and I completely agree. You also need to consider that the current endgame is a cakewalk compared to version 1.0, as Thomas himself stated. People need to understand the difference between an increase in difficulty that feels rewarding and one that simply keeps the loot per hour at the same level.
There’s no logical reason why choosing a harder difficulty should result in worse loot acquisition. Like I can maybe see why not more.. but why less? lol
Why does there need to be an incentive to play hard? I understand wanting to make things consistent, but I don’t understand needing to motivate players to challenge themselves. I play hard because it is more fun for me. I could care less about efficiency. Most of the single player games I have played don’t incentivize playing on hard. At best, you might get an achievement. Why does playing hard have to feel rewarding beyond overcoming the challenge? Difficulty for NRFW is not part of progression. The intent isn’t to have the player get gear on easy so they can play normal, then on normal so they can play hard, etc. So why does it need to feel rewarding? If you value challenge the most, you play hard. If you value efficiency the most, you play easy. If you value both, then that is where normalizing loot acquisition would take efficiency out of the decision. But that doesn’t mean the game has to make hard feel any more rewarding the normal.
yeah I believe he is referring to the first post which could have simply been lucky/unlucky RNG. From a programming sense the loot tables are the same across difficulties, but a lucky streak could make it seem otherwise. I’ve experienced it myself on hard where I started a new play through and for whatever reason was getting fallen embers left and right. I have 7 max level characters right now and have only seen this once.
With all due respect, I would like to ask that you please perform your role as a moderator more carefully and consistently. You were informed yesterday—or even the day before—about this individual calling people “dogs” and using other offensive language, yet this behavior was ignored a second time, despite previous concerns being raised about potential bias in his favor from you
As a human being, you can surely understand that when someone is repeatedly combative and begins to insult and harass others, people will naturally defend themselves. This situation could have been avoided if appropriate action had been taken earlier, such as issuing a timeout or ban, similar to how quickly action appeared to be taken against the other individual, I assume, considering hisout of teh blue dissapearance
Thank you for your time and consideration.
To return to the topic, as you requested, could you please explain the position you are actually taking? You have contradicted yourself multiple times. First, you stated that loot is not an incentive to play on lower difficulties, but you presented this as a fact while it was only your personal opinion. Then, you argued the opposite when it was suggested that loot should be increased on Unspoken—NOT to create an advantage, but simply to ensure that the loot acquisition rate is consistent, which should be standard.
Do you still not understand the point, or are you actually suggesting that the loot acquisition rate should be nerfed as the difficulty increases, thereby incentivizing players to play on lower difficulties? If that is your position, please explain why players who choose to play on harder difficulties should be punished, what game design philosophy supports this approach, and why fair and consistent treatment across all difficulty levels would be considered a bad thing ?
Not confusing. You just mentioned needing to reward mastery or the higher difficulty multiple times.
So it started feeling like you wanted harder difficulties to be more rewarding than other difficulties. But you were clear in your reply that you do not.
I have noticed one thing on my realm and it doesnt occur everyday. sometimes killed enemies doesn’t appear to drop anything across every difficulty on the same realm-
-but they do drop something, because after i have killed alot and nobody dropped anything i only moved forward and killed a few others in a nearby area and then i went back to the earlier area to check if i missed anything..
and when i see those old corpses they now have loot?
Maybe we should give the mobs a bit more time to choose what they want to give the player upon death?
Meanwhile the RAT is thinking:
-hmm.. maybe i should give the player a Dress instead of roughcut meat..
5 minutes later…
-hmm.. okay, i have decided to give the player roughcut meat..
I only have two questions how have you compared the loot acquisition for difficulties?
I apologize if you take harm in this next question im not good at wording so please cast aside emotions for now:
How can you say that you know how difficulties should work, across different difficulties when From Software is known to not have any difficulty sliders?
(Sorry for asking these questions but i just have to know! i have nothing against you and its only for my own better understanding of other peoples perspective and opinions)
