GuidesGameplayUpdated: Aug 29, 2026

Star Wars Zero Company Difficulty Levels & Beskar Mode

Four standard difficulties plus a separate ironman-style Beskar Mode. Here is what each one changes and who should pick it.

The Short Answer

Star Wars Zero Company ships with four standard difficulty settings — Story, Normal, Hard and Expert — plus Beskar Mode, a separate ironman-style modifier that can be combined with any of them. Difficulty can be changed between missions through the game menu, so your first choice is not permanent. The exact enemy health and damage multipliers for each setting have not been published, so the guidance below is based on what the developer and launch coverage confirm.

Story, Normal, Hard and Expert

Launch coverage from GamesHub and NerdsChalk lines up with the developer’s own framing:

Story — the most forgiving option, and the one Lead Designer James Brawley describes as forgiving. Pick it if Zero Company is your first tactical strategy game and you want to focus on the campaign and decision-making.
Normal — the intended middle ground for players with some strategy experience, and where most players are expected to land.
Hard — the developer-recommended choice for genre veterans. It is challenging without becoming overwhelming; Xbox Wire’s Will Fulton played his launch campaign on Hard.
Expert — the top standard setting. The Bacta Tank is disabled on Expert, so there is no easy healing between fights, and clearing Expert is tied to the highest standard achievement.

Beskar Mode

Beskar Mode is not a fifth difficulty slider — it is a separate modifier, comparable to XCOM’s Ironman. It prevents you from reloading an earlier save after a bad decision, so mistakes really hurt. Beskar Mode can be paired with Expert, and if you want to 100% the achievement list, that Expert + Beskar combination is required. It is free for every player and not tied to any special edition.

Permadeath Is a Separate Toggle

Permadeath is on by default but can be switched off. With it on, Operators collect Injuries, and three Injuries mean permanent loss. Difficulty sets the overall challenge; the permadeath toggle sets how severe losing an Operator is. The two are independent choices.

How to Change Difficulty

Xbox Wire’s launch-day tips confirm that difficulty can be adjusted between missions from the game menu, not only in the settings screen at campaign start. A sensible approach: start at the level that matches your experience, play several Tactical Missions, and if you are struggling because the mechanics are new rather than because the fight is genuinely too hard, drop a step. You can always raise it again between missions.

Visible limit: exact numeric modifiers (enemy health, damage, hit chance) for each setting are not documented in launch sources. If a patch exposes them, this page should be refreshed.

Sources

All sources accessed August 29, 2026.