Difficulty has to do with how many coins are released.
And altering that flow if it needs to go up or down.
I don’t believe that affects the filter either, it’s its own mechanism.
Didn’t the Blues brothers have a song ““I’m a solo man””
There is a static number of coins being released, the way I think about it is as explanation in this article and I think of difficulty of challenges sent by Time Lord every 10sec. Based on below comment which to me means lower netspace = less farmers = lower challenge difficulty = higher chances of my plots passing filter and my proof getting accepted by Time Lord. I’m not an expert but that is my logic 
These proofs are not exact answers to the challenges of the network, but they’re really really close. Here is where the Time Lord comes back into play. As the NetSpace grows, more and more farmers will provide proofs to a single challenge. Its the Time Lord that decides which proofs to use to sign the block on the network. The Time Lord will always pick the best proofs. So, finding a proof doesn’t always mean a coin payout. Now, multiple farmers have won the same block before because their proofs were good enough. The most I have seen is 5 farmers to one block.
There are not a static no of coins being released at all from my understanding.
The first filter is set to apx 1 plot passes per 512 plots hosted.
Then we search for more proofs.
Any plot that has those proofs gets a reward if they respond in time.
So some days more coins are issued than others
If we vary from the planned trajectory difficulty then adjusts to allow more coins out, or reign more coins in.
You are correct, with so many coins out there its hard to keep the rules straight for each coin. As I think of it now the number of challenges is not fixed and can increase or decline based on difficulty so if each challenge is awarded 2XCH for the best proof the number of given out XCH is not static.
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You’ve taught me something also.
I didn’t realise exactly how it worked, but altering the no of challenges makes sense, that would work.
Edit.
Also it’s not 2 xch for the best proof.
Even in your snippet it says its seen 5 rewards from one block., they just need to be good enough, not best.
I went solo 6 months ago and results improved by a nice amount. In other words, have been lucky. Small 100 TB farm and runs very stable. I knew to expect long dry spells, but the interesting thing is all my XCH has come in groups of 2 wins within a 2-4 days period.
Which months did you get those wins? I also got several wins in March.
Farming solo with 315TiB - last win was on the 18th of January with an ETA of 19days in GUI right now.
87 days, so i’m at 4.5 times the ETA.
Wins before that were on 1/6/22, 1/3/22, 11/13/21.
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I do not use GUI at all and only manage the farmer from CLI (on Linux) while monitoring the log for key phrases that indicate issues, found blocks, or to confirm that everything is running optimally. With no blocks found on this size of a farm I would start looking closely at the log for issues. Also, if the farm is not running 24/7 that could be a source of the issue too.
EDIT:
I just looked at my history with 350TB and at worst I hit 1 block/mon. over the last 3 mon. So if your farm size is close in size I imagine you should have found a block over 3mon.
I disagree because you can have a dry spell for 6x the normal amount, so imagine waiting for 18 months before you see any reward for your work. Also pooling helps you see when something is wrong with your setup fairly quickly. The only downside of pooling is the fee, which is quite low everywhere and only apply to 7/8th of your earnings. You should get started with a pool and then switch to solo mining, but not before you reach a much bigger size.
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I’ve been tempted to go solo too lately, until I look at the large whales listed in the pools.
Why do large whales stay in a pool? They win several blocks per day - what’s the incentive? Is the reward split in their favor when they hold a large portion of the pool?
Reward split ( not done math ) but I think it does favor the big guns, could be wrong.
I think it’s just consistency. I’m only 700tb, and at 4 x late to hit a block it gets kinda depressing.
I now pool with no regret.
I believe the biggest players in the pool are sometimes the pool administrators and their friends, too.
Everything is smooth, no errors, just look at this Screenshot from Flexpool.
Once in a While they get like 500-700% Luck Wins.
Not that often but, keeps happening.
I do think this is a good question, Because you always need to keep up with what your farm is doing. I suspect it may have something to do with farm size though.
As you can see from my stats i’ve made more from pooling then I ever would have solo as I haven hit a block since I started pooling. I was lucky and did get a block very early when chia started. But statistically my farm size has been better off pooling. Granted this could easily change if I hit a block in the next few minutes.
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Sorry….deleted post……
I said that like a year ago and got flamed for it. 
Do you turn off your node / harvester from time to time or do you use the pcs for other stuff like gaming? This could fuck you up…
Well, maybe I was lucky, maybe it’s my server grade hardware but my blocks won are much higher then the odds. Yes, once I did not win for 2 months but then I have months where I win 4-5 times…