UFO Difficulty Settings

[XCom42]

What are the main differences in the difficulty settings for UFO & TFTD? Are there more aliens per battle? Is research more difficult? Do the aliens infiltrate your financeers more quickly? More mind control attempts? Or all of the above?

[Pumpkinhead]

All I know that changes is:

• Varying alien stats
  
• Varying alien mission deployments
  
• What it takes to lose*
  
• Aliens searching for X-COM bases**
  

* If you have two consecutive "bad" months in terms of score, the game is over. "Bad" scores are as follows:

 

-900 Beginner

-800 Experienced

-700 Veteran

-600 Genius

-500 Superhuman

 

** The following list shows the percentage chance of the aliens beginning to actively search for your base:

 

4% Beginner

8% Experienced

12% Veteran

16% Genius

20% Superhuman

 

I'm sure other's here will know more differences.

[Hobbes]

Didn't knew about the search for your bases. That explains a lot of how you get so much more base assaults on Superhuman.

 

Other changes between both games include:

- Different difficulty levels (according to XComUtil). UFO has levels 0, 1, 2, 3 and 4 (beginner to superhuman). On TFTD the levels are classified as 0, 1, 2, 4 and 6. The higher the level, the more dangerous and hostile the aliens are.

- The use of Mixed crews on TFTD, combining several alien races. When you're fighting the same race it's easier to be able to exploit their weak points.

- The weapons inhibitations on TFTD's land missions that prevent you from using your heaviest weapons on Terror missions (Torpedo Launcher, DPL...)

- Slight differences on the craft weapons range. While you can shoot down a Terror Ship in UFO using several Avalanche missiles without risking your Interceptors, it's suicidal to try it on TFTD because your Barracudas will be in range of the USO's weapons. There are also other differences on weapons range that make it more likely for your craft to suffer damage from return fire of the USOs on TFTD.

- The limited ammo of Gauss weaponry (compared with the Lasers) plus the fact that they turn nearly obsolete when Lobstermen start appearing on the missions.

- A more complex research tree on TFTD, even with the patched version. On the original version you had to capture 2-3 Lobstermen navigators to research some very important pieces of technology. Also, on UFO you'd get some tips about how to defeat a particular race (Reapers/Incendiary, Sectopods/Laser), on TFTD the information is practically useless to the battlefield.

 

And there's plenty other stuff...

[XCom42]

That definitely gives me a better idea of what to expect - Thanks!

[Jman4117]

Difficulty is kinda insane in TFTD when compared to UFO. Be prepared for Genius or Superhuman difficulty on beginner.