Is Scaling affected by difficulty setting too?

[doublebuck]

On hard difficulty, I was in a battle against five, 3rd rates of 680 men each to my two third rates, of 500 men each so I went back to harbor and sold off my two 3rd rates thinking I would lower the scaling because now I only have 5th rates in my harbor so I then started the battle and the same five, 3rd rates still showed up so nothing changed. Does that mean in the hard campaign we can't affect scaling or bring it down a bit by what we have in our harbor?

[pandakraut]

The scaling factors increase as the difficulty goes up. This doesn't mean scaling can't be affected by player actions, but it does make it harder for the player to affect the AI ships in a given battle. It'll be easier to push scaling up rather than down on hard.

Edited May 2, 2020 by pandakraut

[doublebuck]

1 hour ago, pandakraut said:

The scaling factors increase as the difficulty goes up. This doesn't mean scaling can't be affected by player actions, but it does make it harder for the player to affect the AI ships in a given battle. It'll be easier to push scaling up rather than down on hard.

Thanks for your info. I was surprised in that battle I had to face a 5 pack of wolves like that and me getting rid of my 3rd rates was foolish for I still had to face that force with out them.

I had to use the money from those two, 3rd rates that I sold to buy two sloops and I had to convert one of my transport ships so those three ships became explosive barrels. 

You start the battle against four, 5th rates, which I can handle them but my ships become a little depleted too, then I get a few reinforcements which was my troop ships, one 5th rate and those three explosive barrel ships and the enemy brings in two, 5th rates along with five, 3rd rates of 680 regardless of what you bring.

I used two sloops to take out two of those 3rd rates on fire, also using my slow transport I somehow, got lucky, the last three, 3rd rates came at me two abreast and one in the back so my transport glanced off one of them setting him on fire and somehow went a little distance and kept on sailing enough to hit the one that was in the back and set him on fire too, I was supper happy at that point now I only had to deal with one of them left.  Which, if I didn't get lucky by taking out 2 birds with one stone I would have had to face two of them and that would have been a big problem for me at that point.

So, the last 3rd rate of 680 came at me and I surrounded it with my four, 5th rates and seeing how tough that 3rd rate is it took hours of pounding and when it got down to about 250 men I took everybody from all my ships got to 550 and boarded it and won it barely.  I know I am playing hard so hard it is.  I am just giving this info for giggles. Do you see what it took me to take one of them over now think how could I have done that if all five of them surrounded my ships and what that would have been like.  That one, 3rd rate ship, only after hours of hitting it, I damaged two mast and half armor and by the way when I got to harbor I had to spend 3k to 4k in repairs on all my ships.  I don't even think I have enough force or money to continue and fight the next sea battle. It's a challenge for sure!