Configuring World Difficulty on a Windrose Server

Windrose lets server owners decide how punishing combat and world encounters feel for the people sailing with them. The difficulty value lives inside each world's `WorldDescription.json` file, which you can edit through your control panel's FTP access. This guide walks through the change, and covers the per-parameter tuning available under Custom difficulty.

Difficulty Presets in Windrose

Windrose offers four options: Easy, Normal, Hard, and Custom. The first three are presets that apply a fixed batch of combat values across the world with one flick of a switch. Custom unlocks seven individual multipliers, useful when you want to tune one piece of the equation (say, mob health) without inflating everything else.

The table below shows how the five core combat parameters change under each preset:

Two extra parameters control co-op scaling: `StatsCorrectionModifier` and `ShopStatsCorrectionModifier`. These are not touched by the presets and stay at their default values no matter which option you pick. They only become relevant when you switch to Custom.

Difficulty is set per world, not per server. If you maintain more than one world, every world has its own `WorldDescription.json` and needs its own edit.

Steps to Change Difficulty

1. Open your HolyHosting control panel and stop the server. The change will not register while the server is still running. Then open the FTP client from your panel menu and log in with your FTP password.
2. Open the `R5` folder.
3. Inside `R5`, open `Saved`, then `SaveProfiles`.
4. Open the `Default` folder, then the `RocksDB` folder.
5. Open the version folder (for example `0.10.0`), then `Worlds`.
6. Locate the currently active world. Its folder name is an ID made up of random letters and numbers.
7. Open `WorldDescription.json` and search for `WDS.Parameter.CombatDifficulty.Normal`. Replace the last segment with the preset you want: `Easy`, `Hard`, or `Custom`. For example: `WDS.Parameter.CombatDifficulty.Hard`.
8. Save the file and restart the server.

Custom Difficulty Parameters

Once difficulty is set to `Custom`, the parameters below can each be adjusted independently inside the same `WorldDescription.json` file:

Every parameter accepts a float within the listed range. None of these edits take effect unless `CombatDifficulty` is set to `Custom`, so update that line first.

Notes

The edit only applies to the world you modified. Swap to a different active world later and you will have to repeat the steps in that world's `WorldDescription.json`. Worth keeping in mind before your crew picks the next destination on the map.