Only if the Difficulty level is HARDER than the one you're playing at.

And, if the AI says something like "I just took a level in BadAss. Prepare to have your's handed to you!"

I agree with joeball

I think the point here is to find a way of alleviating the end game tedium of most 4X games. Changing difficulty level may be one way, but maybe StarDock can find another (perhaps better?) way? Some kind of invention could be well worth it in patent rights.

I really must ask why this restriction should be in place. There is nothing at all wrong with deciding that you'd rather play an easier game at an advanced point in the tech tree, or in deciding that the difficulty you originally set (or most recently set) is too high for you or for your tastes, and as far as the single-player side of things goes, why should I care how anyone other than me is adjusting the game difficulty? Nor is it necessary for multiplayer games, as for those the difficulty should not be changed without the consent of at least the majority of the players, no matter which direction the difficulty changes, nor is it inconceivable to find a group which decides that perhaps it would rather do something easier but doesn't want to waste all the progress made up to that point. So would someone mind explaining to me just why it is that it should be possible to increase game difficulty but not decrease it?

I agree. If some players decide they get more out of the game by playing it a certain way, that's up to them. Don't tell me ProfoundGlee has never used cheat codes on a GTA game

I don't see the suggestion as proposed as a rubber-banding type thing - it's the player who is deciding the difficulty should change, not the computer. The player's goal in changing the difficulty during an in-progress game is most likely to keep the game fun, whereas the goal of a dynamic difficulty system is to keep the game challenging; these two goals are not the same thing, despite what some people will tell you. Worse to me is that I personally find that dynamic difficulty can make progression less rewarding, simply because it means that I haven't really accomplished anything despite all the stuff I've done, since my character or empire still has more or less the same strength relative to the same opponent in the 'after' picture as in the 'before' picture (when done particularly poorly, as in TES IV: Oblivion, you're actually going backwards in relative strength compared to the same opponents as you advance the game).

Dynamic difficulty done well can be a good thing, such as by introducing thematically-appropriate tougher opponents, as when done well it can provide a challenge without that sense that you're not making any headway despite all your efforts. When it's not done well, it can make you feel cheated or like you've made no progress or even gone backwards (why is it that in Oblivion my level 1 Bosmer Assassin can kill a goblin in 1 shot with a bow but my level 10 Bosmer Assassin cannot under the same circumstances with level-appropriate equipment and given the same target?), or like the computer's an idiot (if it has the economic power to sustain a fleet bigger than my own despite having only a hundredth of the colonies that I have, why did it never make use of that economic strength while it was in a position of strength. Ultimately, though, dynamic difficulty is not a solution to the tipping point issue; at its best, it delays the onset without irritating the player, while at its worst it makes the player feel cheated.

I would like to see each difficult level scale by itself as the game goes on. But this would have to mean that Hard is more than the AI getting more starting stuff and nothing else the rest of the game. I would like to see as the game moves on to mid and end game, Moderate vs. Hard etc. has consequences that make the game adjust to the mid and end game to keep the difficulty the same difficulty.

While past games get easier when the game transtions to mid and end game, i would like the AI or something to adust to keep the difficulty statis as the transistions occur instead of having to manually increase the difficulty.