Hi !
First of all I played the demo and bought the game the minute it was over, it's an amazing game !
But I started the game on normal difficulty in the demo and it seems i can't change it (I would like to play expert).
What are really the differences beetween the different level ? Because I'm now 5 hours into the game in Phillip Campaign, I've captured at least 8 city but i've never lost a battle or even a unit whereas I capture or execute entire hoplite unit regulary.
So Is it gonna get harder or should I start a new campaign with the maximum level of difficulty to experience the best of this game ?

Thanks and sorry for my crappy english !

For a player with good knowledge of strategy and tactics all the standard difficulty levels are rather easy, because although the game is so amazing, it does not have much depth in terms of strategic decisions that you can choose from. (and with decisions I mean choosing what you do and what you don't because of cash/recruit shortage, which both never come up after the beginning any more). That and the (historically accurate, but sometimes rather annoying) fact that your units can steamroll anything if not stuck in a very disadvantageous situation make the standard difficulties rather easy to play. It's not ridiculously easy, I don't want to say you can "sit back and wait until the world domination timer has ended" like in some other games on 'normal' difficulty, but the AI doesn't rip you apart if you fail miserably on expert, either.
The latter part is why I think the game is too easy. If you want a little bit of challenge, play the game on expert or one of the additional scenarios provided in Gold.
If it is still too easy and you want it to be a real challenge (and a real pain if played badly), take a look at this file here (unzip it to your Hegemony Game folder, then go to the Resources\Data folder there, rename the orignal globals.xnt and put this one into the mentioned folder). It's a file that changes many of the unit's stats (and most of them to your disadvantage) and the frequency of recruit respawn. Best served on expert difficulty on recruitment set to "off" (unlike the original, "off" doesn't mean no respawn, but merely enough respawn).
The file was not created by me, but by "User #67147", as mentioned in this thread. The only change I made I can think of is that you now actually get a very small number of recruits if playing on diffficulty level expert if recruitment is set to off, which you need if you want to proceed further than Paeonia/Southern Illyria/Chalkidike/Thessaly.

Heh. I am amazed that this is still floating around. I had a lot of fun creating it.

Have fun with it, I think it made the Phillip campaign a lot more challenging. I did continue to fiddle with tweaking the stats but got bogged down as I never was able to get the respawn rate somewhere between 'far too many recruits' and 'no recruits'. I'll take a look at your file, if you managed to do that, my heartfelt compliments!

....and I feel I have to give the campaign another go while waiting for the third chapter of Rome.

Thanks to longbow for these amazing games!

Thanks a lot for all of that !
I will try on expert and if it's still too easy put your file !
So without th file if the game is set on off there is absolutely no new recruit and with the file there is just a few that's it ?

No, the game is harder in a military aspect, if you fight hoplites for example, they will be a good match for your phalangites instead of being wiped out, among others. The units' stats are tweaked to make your Macedonian units less overpowered, because in comparison with the Athens and Sparta scenarios (where you have sometimes even weaker troops than your opponent) the Philip scenario is very easy as far as combat is concerned, which makes a good part of the overall game difficulty. But for a first game, I would recommend not playing with the changed file from my first post. If you win the additional Peloponnesian war scenarios and know how you have to lead an army, then it could be a good challenge, however.

@User #67147: I just made the expert's playerrecruimentwhatever value -0.002, as I don't know exactly how that variable changes the "off" recruitment modifier of 0.006. As I played, I got some recruits, and I think it could become far too many of them in the lategame, but at least you can gain some recruits. As long as I can't reinforce one big or two small consecutive losses I'm more or less happy with it.

I've decided to try your file on the Phillip Campaign, is it gonna work or do I have to start a fresh game ?
I've lost my first major battle (3 phalangiste defeated, 1 executed) and that was good but I don't know if it's the file or just a coincidence, but I seems to have less soldiers.
So if it's working, thanks you ! It seems more interesting than the original

Regarding using 'my' file: I _think_ you do not need to start a new game...but am not sure.

Look at production times of siege weapons (if you can already build them) or at triremens. If their production time is a lot longer (3-4 times as long as in the original), then the file 'works'.

Have fun!

I've decided to try your file on the Phillip Campaign, is it gonna work or do I have to start a fresh game ?
I've lost my first major battle (3 phalangiste defeated, 1 executed) and that was good but I don't know if it's the file or just a coincidence, but I seems to have less soldiers.
So if it's working, thanks you ! It seems more interesting than the original

Less soldiers in the brigades or less recruits? Because the former isn't even moddable in Gold (iirc).

Regarding the loss in battle: Watch out for Thebes! They sometimes even show up with troops that can defeat 5 or 6 phalagite units + support, and even in vanilla they are one of the major opponents regarding military strength. Probably because their AI tells them to rally in Thebes and throws all of them at once against any major army that dares to trespass... ( Sparta was surprisingly easy after that, though :-) ).

Less recruits yes.
I just took all the city of the Tyran of Phaece or something like that (orange on the map) and maybe I underestimated the AI because Athene starts to launch coordinated navy raid on diferent beache and with my empire stretch it'ss be difficult to defend.
Anyway thanks for your file ! It made my early game much more enjoyable, I always have to care for my troops and try trop trap him instead of just throwing everything at the enemy, if it's get too hard I will put back the original file but right now it's awesome thank you !