Mission choices, faction routes and late-campaign objectives can reveal story outcomes. The progression overview avoids listing every ending, but it does mention route structure and several named missions.
Fast answer
The answer before the background
There are 35 named missions in the base story campaign, arranged across three plot branches with six possible endings. The game does not officially label them as level 1, level 2, level 3, level 4 or level 5. Instead, you advance through a campaign map where choices open different routes. Each mission may be a wave-defense settlement, an attack, an escort, a boss fight, an exploration task or a special objective map. Difficulty affects economy, enemy presence, wave timing, wave size and enemy types, so a later mission can feel much harder even when its map number has not changed.
Campaign structure
How the stages are organised
The base campaign is a branching story rather than a straight ladder of numbered stages. The developer’s full-release notes describe 35 missions, three plot branches and six possible endings. That means two players can reach different mission sets after making different choices, so a search for “level 2” or “level 4” is often referring to a player’s personal order rather than an official stage name.
The opening section teaches the core loop: gather resources, raise population, research essential technologies, build walls and prepare for attacking waves. Named missions then introduce different objectives. Examples documented by the community include Wake-Up Call, The Beginning of the Resistance, The Rebel’s Thorny Path, Children of the Revolution, Ambush, The Long Walk and Hazy Shade of Winter. These are missions, not permanent difficulty tiers.
- Treat the campaign map as the source of truth for your current route.
- Use the mission name when looking for a walkthrough, because numbering can differ between branches, editions and player descriptions.
- Completed missions can be replayed, and the updated campaign navigation makes it easier to switch between available branches without rebuilding the entire profile.
| What players often call it | What the game actually uses |
|---|---|
| Level 2 or level 3 | A named campaign mission reached after earlier objectives or choices. |
| Chapter | A loose description of a story section or faction route, not the main in-game label. |
| Wave level | The attack schedule and enemy escalation inside one mission. |
| Difficulty level | A global campaign preset selected before starting missions. |
A mission can be early in the campaign but difficult because it has a short preparation window, a dangerous boss or several simultaneous attack directions. Campaign order and difficulty are separate systems.
Difficulty
What the difficulty settings change
The campaign has six presets after the addition of Easy-Peasy Lemon Squeezy: Easy-Peasy Lemon Squeezy, A Walk in the Park, Challenge Accepted, Ultra-hardcore, Pure Insanity and Your Worst Nightmare. The exact wording is part of the game’s preset system, so community posts that list only five settings are usually describing the pre-update version.
Developer guidance states that difficulty changes resource sources and their number, loose resources on the map, starting enemies, wave schedules, wave counts, wave sizes and enemy types. It does not primarily work by increasing ordinary unit health or damage. In practical terms, higher settings give you less economic slack and less time to convert that economy into defenses.
- Use A Walk in the Park if you are learning the campaign’s economy and mission objectives.
- Challenge Accepted is a reasonable first serious run, but expect early missions to punish delayed Town Hall upgrades and weak walls.
- Ultra-hardcore and the two highest settings require a planned opening build, rapid scouting and much tighter control of attack lanes.
- If a mission feels impossible, lowering the preset is a valid learning tool because it lets you study the map, objective and wave directions without changing the campaign route.
| Difficulty pressure | What to expect |
|---|---|
| Economy | Fewer or less convenient resource sources and fewer loose resources. |
| Map danger | More initial enemies, camps or hostile units in important areas. |
| Wave schedule | Less preparation time or more frequent attacks. |
| Wave composition | Larger attacks and access to more dangerous enemy types. |
| Unit durability | The developer’s explanation does not identify a general health-or-damage multiplier as the main difference. |
Do not judge a mission only by the first wave. Some maps are designed around a later siege, a boss arrival or a final attack that includes enemies left alive in nearby camps.
Waves and objectives
How progression gates work inside a mission
Most settlement missions combine a timer, a survival requirement and one or more map objectives. The next attack is not merely a test of military strength: it is a deadline for reaching the required economy, technology and defensive layout. Clearing nearby enemy camps can also matter because surviving hostile groups may join a later attack or make expansion unsafe.
Mission types vary substantially. A standard defense asks you to survive scheduled waves while growing the settlement. Other stages focus on moving a small force, escorting a target, attacking an enemy position, defeating a boss, reaching a population target or completing a special construction objective. A strong build for one type can be inefficient for another, so identify the win condition before spending resources.
- Read every objective before placing expensive buildings. Some missions reward expansion, while others punish overextending before the next wave.
- Scout attack approaches early and reserve workers for emergency walls, gates or repairs.
- Clear camps only when your army can do so without missing the next defense timing.
- Use the incoming-wave information and research improvements introduced in later updates to prepare counters instead of massing one unit type blindly.
- For escort and exploration stages, preserve the required squad or target; a large economy is not always the main requirement.
| Gate type | Typical response |
|---|---|
| Timed wave | Reach a minimum defensive position before the countdown expires. |
| Town Hall or technology gate | Prioritise food, wood, stone and research capacity instead of premature military expansion. |
| Area-clear gate | Scout camps, remove siege threats and keep a reserve force near exposed workers. |
| Boss gate | Prepare sustained damage, healing or siege support rather than only cheap frontline units. |
| Population or construction gate | Protect housing, food production and the required landmark until the objective completes. |
Later attacks can continue becoming more dangerous through heavier enemy composition even when the displayed unit count reaches a practical cap. Plan for quality and pressure, not only for raw headcount.
Route planning
A practical way to progress through the campaign
Start by completing the tutorial and early named missions without trying to optimise every resource node. The first objective is to learn how quickly the game expects you to build a Town Hall economy, secure food and place a defensive perimeter. Once you understand the opening rhythm, replaying an early mission on a higher preset becomes more useful than repeatedly restarting a late mission without knowing its win condition.
When the campaign map presents a choice, treat it as a route decision. Keep a separate save or profile if you want to compare outcomes, especially before a faction or ending branch. The updated mission list is useful for checking which missions are available, completed or replayable, but it does not remove the need to satisfy the story choice that opened the branch.
- Before a new mission, note its objective type, first attack direction and whether the map expects a base, a mobile army or both.
- Choose starting bonuses where available if you want to reduce the early economic bottleneck; take no bonus if you want the intended challenge.
- Keep one defensive reserve after each expansion. A cleared camp is not valuable if the next wave reaches an undefended production area.
- On a first attempt, pause freely to inspect objectives, production queues and attack routes. Speed matters less than avoiding a fatal unprepared wave.
- Replay earlier missions on a higher difficulty to practise openings before moving to a difficult branch mission.
| If you are stuck on… | Check first |
|---|---|
| An early mission | Town Hall timing, food income and whether your first wall is protecting workers. |
| A mission with camps | Whether untouched camps are adding pressure to a later wave. |
| A boss mission | Sustained damage, healing, siege positioning and a fallback route. |
| A branch mission | The exact objective and whether the result changes the available route. |
| The highest difficulties | Resource placement, wave timing and enemy composition rather than assuming enemy health is the issue. |
There is no verified universal rule that “level 5” is always the fifth hardest mission or that every branch contains the same numbered stages. Use the displayed mission name and current campaign map instead.
FAQ
Common questions
How many levels are in Diplomacy is Not an Option?
The base story campaign contains 35 named missions. Because it branches into three plot routes with six possible endings, one playthrough does not necessarily show every mission.
Is there an official level 2, level 3, level 4 or level 5?
Not as a universal naming system. Players commonly use those numbers for their own progression, but the campaign uses named missions and branching choices. Search by the mission title shown on your campaign map.
What are the campaign difficulty levels?
The current preset list is Easy-Peasy Lemon Squeezy, A Walk in the Park, Challenge Accepted, Ultra-hardcore, Pure Insanity and Your Worst Nightmare.
Does higher difficulty increase enemy health and damage?
The developer’s explanation focuses on resources, map enemies, wave timing, wave size and enemy types. It does not describe a general health-and-damage increase as the main difficulty change.
Can I replay an earlier stage or change route?
Yes. The campaign navigation update added a list of available and completed missions, making replaying and switching between available story branches easier. Keep a separate profile or save before major choices if you want to compare routes safely.
Is Fog of War part of the 35-mission count?
No. The developer has described Fog of War as a separate campaign with 10 missions, so it should be treated as additional content rather than part of the base campaign total.
Sources
What we checked
Official listings establish current availability and product facts. Community pages are used for mechanics and build history, then labeled separately.
- OfficialOfficial 1.0 release notes: 35 missions, branches, endings and difficulty presets
- OfficialOfficial December 2025 update: Easy-Peasy Lemon Squeezy and campaign navigation
- OfficialOfficial August 2026 update: starting bonuses and mission progression changes
- CommunityDeveloper discussion explaining what campaign difficulty changes
- ReferenceCampaign mission category and named mission reference
- CommunityCampaign walkthrough with mission objectives and stage examples
- OfficialOfficial Fog of War campaign announcement