Final Fantasy vii Difficulty Modes

[Webrat]

Hi all,

I installed a bunch of mods via bootleg and everything looks great, but there's something I don't understand.  I'm not sure what the difference is between all the difficulty modes.  I only have a save at the first save point so my experience with them so far is extremely limited

The ones that have my attention are
-Lost Wing  (not sure what it does -- seems to make Barret's weapon weak and Cloud's super strong)
-Remastered  (Attacks just seem to miss a lot)
-Reasonable Difficulty (not sure -- supposedly a less fierce version of Hardcore)
-Hardcore  (Woah!  Can't survive the first two fights!  And enemies take forever to kill!)

Can anyone explain what the differences are between these in a nutshell beyond what I've seen so far?

Also, I understand that hardcore mode has additional fights/bosses/scenarios, etc. but the difficulty is just too fierce for my taste.  Is it possible to have something less spicy than hardcore (although still tougher than "normal") and still have the extra goodies?

Thanks to everyone who took the time to look. 

[Tenko Kuugen]

You need to play better if Hardcore turns into:
(Woah!  Can't survive the first two fights!  And enemies take forever to kill!)

It's harder but far from bone breaker difficulty. Only Nightmare 7 does bone breaker.
I believe there was a toned down version of hardcore but no idea where

personally I never bothered with any of the difficulty mods that AREN'T the hardcore mod so I dont know what they're about.

[ManuBBXX]

Hardcore mode is just fantastic and offers a little challenge, it's just awesome !

You need to play better if Hardcore turns into:
(Woah!  Can't survive the first two fights!  And enemies take forever to kill!)

It's harder but far from bone breaker difficulty. Only Nightmare 7 does bone breaker.
I believe there was a toned down version of hardcore but no idea where

personally I never bothered with any of the difficulty mods that AREN'T the hardcore mod so I dont know what they're about.

What is the bone breaker / nightmare7 you talking about ? Very harder than hardcore ?
EDIT : okay, saw on the forum. Just crazy amazing harder modd ! oO

For fun, I played the PSX version on an ePSXe emulator, and same with shaders and opengl effects activated, I laughed of the difference, graphics and difficulty of 'original' game !
With thoses mods, we taste the best, and forget the past of or 'old' FFVII, waaawwww

[Webrat]

You need to play better if Hardcore turns into:
(Woah!  Can't survive the first two fights!  And enemies take forever to kill!)

It's harder but far from bone breaker difficulty. Only Nightmare 7 does bone breaker.
I believe there was a toned down version of hardcore but no idea where

personally I never bothered with any of the difficulty mods that AREN'T the hardcore mod so I dont know what they're about.

I'm not sure what you mean by "play better" considering I'm talking about the first battles of the game when Cloud is solo, so I don't exactly have a large arsenal to play with.  Cloud starts off with somewhere between 160 and 180 HP (starts at level 1 instead of 5) and the enemies do anywhere from 35-125 damage per hit depending on what they do.  I run out of potions way too quickly.  Most enemies seem to take anywhere from 4 to 5 hits with the sword to take out and the warmech enemies seem to have more HP than Cloud can deal if he dedicates all his MP to Thunder spells.

If it gets more manageable after the starting bits, please let me know.  I don't mind enduring a bit of a grind if I know that my survival won't rely mostly on luck and saving after every won battle down the line.  I really like how super hard enemies sometimes appear (an enemy called "robot" sometimes appeared and 1hit KOed me with no chance), and the other game modes don't seem to have these extra surprises.

[Tenko Kuugen]

I have the feeling something in your install got a little borked. Either that or you tried to play the game exactly the same way as vanilla,
namely run through and kill stuff on the side and omg is the new post box annoying.
I for one didn't have these problems when I played hardcore. Sure, enemies hit harder but not that much.
Grind up some potions on MPs ( the field before you get barret is good for that ) after you get barret and you should be fine.
and what kind of enemy does 125 damage?
not to mention, you should be getting levels quickly at lvl 1

[Webrat]

Yeah, the first fight with the two soldiers brings me from level 1 to 3.
The enemies that do over 100 damage are the blue dog enemies with the tentacles.  If they bite, it only does about 35-45 damage.  If they use their tentacle, about 95-125.  They actually appear in the area you mentioned before you get Barret.
I find I do the best when I try to run as fast as I can and use spells exclusively for attacks using potions between all encounters.  I can reach the Scorpion guardian that way, but between his stop-causing scanner and really powerful attacks, I don't stand a chance.

I honestly don't know if something got borked, or if my approach is all wrong - both are very possible.  A couple of questions might help me figure this out:
Is it expected that I'll reach one or two limit breakers in EVERY battle (because I do) and they can't kill anything in one hit?
Secondly, is there anything in the BFE.exe for bootleg I could have enabled that would have messed with Hardcore mode?

As a side note, I've been trying out "reasonable difficulty" and I haven't made it far with it, but it seems very similar to vanilla--I just hold down attack and the game plays for me  :\.

EDIT:  I tried downloading and installing the latest version of Hardcore, and it seemed to temper some of the enemies' freakish damage.  Most enemies do 30-40 damage, but those dogs don't do over 100 anymore.
Kuugen, I think I understand your advice now.  The dogs (who still have wayyy to much HP) do not appear on the bridge to the reactor.  What I did was immediately run inside and get Barret on my team, then run back out.  The bridge only has soldiers and those green magic things, which are easy to kill in a few hits and they drop potions and ethers.  My strategy is to now grind like hell in this area until around lvl 10 or so and then I'll have lots of potions and ethers to take on the inside of the reactor and hopefully not get killed too fast.

[Tenko Kuugen]

If people have so many problems with Hardcore, I wonder how they would fare with Nightmare
Including all the new stuff that's happening in my mod

[Webrat]

Actually I think I'm good now.  My suspicious seemed to be right, there's a hard spike of difficulty at the beginning, but once you get the characters up to speed with the levels and items, it's more manageable.  I think I get it now.  The challenge seems to come from knowledge of the game itself (what items enemies drop, what's effective against what) and then taking advantage of those things (e.g. collecting grenades and bolt plumes from soldiers/mechs to spam on the Scorpion boss).
I'm actually really enjoying the challenge now.  I really like that I have to pay attention and be smart with my battle decisions and not just hold the attack button for most of the game like before.

[Tenko Kuugen]

you should try the even harder version then

[Webrat]

 
Yeah, I might try the nightmare mod sometime just for the fun of it, but I'm pretty sure I won't play the game seriously with it.
I was really just looking for a mod to make the game an interesting difficulty and a fun challenge without it being unfair or punishing.  At the moment, hardcore seems to be hitting the sweet spot.  I hope it stays that way.   

[Tenko Kuugen]

the difficulty fell through, imo, after junon.
at least in the hardcore mod