Developer Diary | Summer Open Beta

[McMantis]

Examples from wikipedia: range in miles
Spitfire Mk Vb: range 479, combat range 248, ferry 1100 with fuel tank
P-39Q Airacobra: range 525 internal fuel, combat range not given
P-51D Mustang: range 1650 with external tanks, combat not given
Bf-109G-6: range 547-711, combat range 273-355, ferry 711-1239 (711 without & 1239 with droptank)
A6M2 (type 0 model 21) Zero: range 1160, combat not given, ferry 1927
F4F-3 Wildcat: range 845, combat not given
P-38L Lightning: range not given, combat range 1300, ferry 3300

Having ranges more realistic should give heavy fighters a bigger role in game than previously, and I am all for it.

 

[HmJ_JP]

Examples from wikipedia: range in miles
Spitfire Mk Vb: range 479, combat range 248, ferry 1100 with fuel tank
P-39Q Airacobra: range 525 internal fuel, combat range not given
P-51D Mustang: range 1650 with external tanks, combat not given
Bf-109G-6: range 547-711, combat range 273-355, ferry 711-1239 (711 without & 1239 with droptank)
A6M2 (type 0 model 21) Zero: range 1160, combat not given, ferry 1927
F4F-3 Wildcat: range 845, combat not given
P-38L Lightning: range not given, combat range 1300, ferry 3300

Having ranges more realistic should give heavy fighters a bigger role in game than previously, and I am all for it.

Again: we're not saying reality was different about ranges. Issue is how the rest of the game is setup: if air regions were smaller and we could have 100% mission efficiency, then no problem. Problem is that other parameters are considered to succeed in air war, and when it's out of control then you're simply have to reconsider more than just one parameter.

 

[FLUX2226]

if air regions were smaller and we could have 100% mission efficiency, then no problem.

If the air regions are made small enough, I'd even remove the coverage penalty entirely. Air regions are just a rough estimate where the encounters happen, planes shouldn't get a debuff because they can't reach the corner of an air region that has no strategic value.

A system with more air regions would need other changes as well to keep plane micro at a practicable level, but that's a different topic.

 

[HmJ_JP]

If the air regions are made small enough, I'd even remove the coverage penalty entirely. Air regions are just a rough estimate where the encounters happen, planes shouldn't get a debuff because they can't reach the corner of an air region that has no strategic value.

A system with more air regions would need other changes as well to keep plane micro at a practicable level, but that's a different topic.

Yes, I could concur. But then, when you position each of your CAS wings, you always have some units following divisions in neighboring regions. A nightmare, unless you really on the attach wings to a division function.

 

[Metz]

Would it be possible to add localized names for armies, army groups, and theaters? They already exist for divisions for most countries.

 

[punnykobold]

Yes, I could concur. But then, when you position each of your CAS wings, you always have some units following divisions in neighboring regions. A nightmare, unless you really on the attach wings to a division function.

Ranges like these would be fine if the air worked like it did in hoi3, with airbases on every tile and no air regions. With the system as it currently exists, it's just going to put a massive defender's advantage in place for air combat and make projecting air superior impossible. Anyone's super cool 60 ic long range heavy fighter is going to get shredded to bits by defensive fighters that cost half as much and beat it in every stat but range. It's just a bad idea.

 

[HmJ_JP]

Ranges like these would be fine if the air worked like it did in hoi3, with airbases on every tile and no air regions. With the system as it currently exists, it's just going to put a massive defender's advantage in place for air combat and make projecting air superior impossible. Anyone's super cool 60 ic long range heavy fighter is going to get shredded to bits by defensive fighters that cost half as much and beat it in every stat but range. It's just a bad idea.

Agreed. In the end of the day, I don't like this range nerf because of the current air regions implementation.

 

[HmJ_JP]

OMG, the German IA really improved in the recent days. It was not the case at beginning of the open beta, but now I really sweat in 1940 against Germany.

 

[Dimmie_Dumm]

I appreciate air war getting easier for defenders, that is both realistic and good for gameplay as long as HoI4 sticks to its model of completely ethereal air units. Stopping factors are lacking, and if reduced range needs to become one, it's fine with me. The exact values can be always fine-tuned, obviously.

 

[HmJ_JP]

Anybody else experiencing much improved IA? I had very tough game with Germans and Italians. They use now 9/1 and tanks more efficiently, it seems. Lost quite a bit of tiles.
What's interesting: I ran the same playthrough dozens of times since 1.11.x, maybe once a month, and always get the same good result. Except this one time: I'm curious about your own findings.

 

[Dimmie_Dumm]

Battle of Britain was actually fought fighter-wise in a small area, representing the combat range of the Me 109s. They couldn't reach most of the British Isles at all with the single-engine fighters. Spitfires had very short legs. P-47s with droptanks could only escort as far as Aachen. Took P-51s with drop tanks to escort to Berlin.

So, do you want realism, or not? Make up your minds.

Another reason why fighting on defense in the air is better is often overlooked (i.e. HoI4 makes no mention of it whatsoever, neither explicitly nor implicitly) is that an offending aircraft has to have extra fuel to then make it back to its home base, thus it inheritantly carries that extra weight detrimenting its flight characteristics (e.g. agility) even if it is the same damn aircraft it faces in the fight (i.e. both are Bf-109s; and Me-109 is an arbitrary name, i.e. incorrect).

Given how HoI4 equalizes the equipment across the nations [almost] perfectly, it should come as no surprise that the same 1940 airplane on the offense appears to be less cost effective in a dogfight compared to its defending couterpart, which operates from a closer airfield. The said Bf-109 consumed like 300 kg of fuel per flight hour (at cruise speed) - for a plane of roughly 3 tonnes, that's whopping 10% of its weight. That's a lot of a combat penalty if you give it even a slightest thought.

 

[Taish0]

The combat width changes are very confusing. Having arbitrary reinforce widths instead of the current 90+45 on plain and 84+42 on forest will just make stacks of divisions behave unpredictably under multiple combat directions. Honestly the combat width system is already difficult enough to adapt to, and making it even more random just takes the strategy out of division design.

The other changes are nice to hear, but it's combat width changes probably need some tidying up or revoked.

I share your opinion on the complication of the new system. It feels like an unnecessary band-aid to a bigger problem.

The key issues with the announced changes (in the version with +29 reinforcement width, not the 2 versions initially suggested) are:

- Way too many main and reinforcement widths with no relation to each other, making it extremely painful to remember and calculate.
- Low over-width penalty makes it a hassle when min-maxing rather than an interesting mechanic with an appropriate reward. Make it 1% punishment per 1% overwidth for the sake of simplicity and flexibility. The only punishment for exceeding the width would be in committing more army than needed.
- I don't get the main reasoning behind the changes other than trying to refresh the meta and make all division sizes comparable in terms of width efficiency.

I'm neutral about increasing the reinforcement widths, as long as the values don't look like randomly generated numbers.

By the way, variant 1 had 46%(!) of the votes. It was the one where Forest/Jungle had immersion-breakingly and illogically more width than the Plains/Desert and should be discarded for this reason alone. Churchill was right about democracy.

 

[Harin]

Anybody else experiencing much improved IA? I had very tough game with Germans and Italians. They use now 9/1 and tanks more efficiently, it seems. Lost quite a bit of tiles.
What's interesting: I ran the same playthrough dozens of times since 1.11.x, maybe once a month, and always get the same good result. Except this one time: I'm curious about your own findings.

On the beta, I played Germany on normal difficulty. When testing something I like to stay on normal as I think that is probably what the developers try to balance to. Several things I noticed about the AI.

• Italy did a much better job, over all. It still kept to many units down in Ethiopia and eventually lost it all, but I did not see any of Italy's better units down there.
• Around June 1940 and after taking France, I declared war on Yugoslavia, instead of using the focus. I just wanted to do it different this time. When Yugoslavia fell, Bulgaria asked for a piece of the country and I accepted. This pushed Bulgaria to the border of Albania. Italy, then declares on Greece, but does not bring Albania into the war. This causes Italy a problem, because Bulgaria did not join the Greek war so Italy had no land route to Greece. What did Italy do? They launched a really good amphibious attack just south of Athens and they won! Most games in the past Italy just grinds against Greece with red battles, for years if I let them. This time they won in just a few months time and had green battles, almost the whole time. I was really impressed. I had my customary army on stand by to bail them out, but I did not even have to use it. Italy did it all by itself.
• Italy is till holding Libya and it is July 1941. I rarely see that happen. Italy and the Allies are trading a province back and forth. As you noticed, the Italians are defending the Libyan coastline well and, again, all by itself.
• Italy still has a fleet! The naval changes are really welcome. I got lucky and spotted one large fleet engagement and noticed that both the Italians and UK fleets immediately retreated. This was the correct thing to do, because they were practically equal in light and heavy attack. If the AI is set on moderate risk, retreat is what they are supposed to do, but in the past, that engagement would have happened and the Italians would have lost their fleet and 'ruined' the Mediterranean war in 1940.
• When it was time for Barbarossa, I used 20w tank divisions. I know, this is not a great tank division. Heck, it is not even a good one. Still, I sometimes limit myself to 20w tank divisions to give the AI a chance. My tanks broke through, with little problem, but the AI really did a good job moving units to plug the hole and stalled my tank advance out. I had to keep taking my tanks out to refuel and bring them back to attack, just to take a few provinces. No snaking was possible, because I could not advance very far before the tank divisions ran out of fuel. In the past, my little 20w tank divisions owned the AI.
• Impressed, I decided to reload a save to one year before Barbarossa to make 30w tank divisions and this time, to attack on a wider front. The 30w tank divisions are doing much better, but I think attacking on a wider front is helping even more. I attacked the same spot, just for comparison sake. The breakthrough happened quicker, but the AI still responded quickly. Since the AI made me play a better game, this time I had places closer to the front to refuel so there was no going back and forth like before. The main point is that I did have to play better. I could have still won with my 20w tank divisions in my earlier game, but the AI surprised me with how quickly it responded and I wanted to try something different and see if the AI could do it again.
• The Russian AI did not weaken its front lines like it did a long time ago, by shuffling all its troops along the front. Back in those days, the AI shuffled troops and created multiple weak points that 10-0 infantry divisions could push through. This time, the shuffling did not create weak spots like that. Instead of moving all the divisions, the AI seemed to move only one or two divisions per province, leaving the rest to maintain their entrenchments. If I had been playing a better game, I could have taken advantage of a few less-strong spots, but I did not expect the beta game to turn out so well. I just wanted to see how combat felt with the changes in beta. I did not really put much thought into my attack.
• The Russian AI seemed to have plenty of divisions for what it needed to do. This was very welcome. The AI is horrible when it is forced to make choices with limited resources and there is no good choice. Once it has a reasonable amount, it does not seem to freak out so much.

I am glad you posted your experiences. It could be coincidence, but I noticed a difference, too.

 

[HmJ_JP]

On the beta, I played Germany on normal difficulty. When testing something I like to stay on normal as I think that is probably what the developers try to balance to. Several things I noticed about the AI.

• Italy did a much better job, over all. It still kept to many units down in Ethiopia and eventually lost it all, but I did not see any of Italy's better units down there.
• Around June 1940 and after taking France, I declared war on Yugoslavia, instead of using the focus. I just wanted to do it different this time. When Yugoslavia fell, Bulgaria asked for a piece of the country and I accepted. This pushed Bulgaria to the border of Albania. Italy, then declares on Greece, but does not bring Albania into the war. This causes Italy a problem, because Bulgaria did not join the Greek war so Italy had no land route to Greece. What did Italy do? They launched a really good amphibious attack just south of Athens and they won! Most games in the past Italy just grinds against Greece with red battles, for years if I let them. This time they won in just a few months time and had green battles, almost the whole time. I was really impressed. I had my customary army on stand by to bail them out, but I did not even have to use it. Italy did it all by itself.
• Italy is till holding Libya and it is July 1941. I rarely see that happen. Italy and the Allies are trading a province back and forth. As you noticed, the Italians are defending the Libyan coastline well and, again, all by itself.
• Italy still has a fleet! The naval changes are really welcome. I got lucky and spotted one large fleet engagement and noticed that both the Italians and UK fleets immediately retreated. This was the correct thing to do, because they were practically equal in light and heavy attack. If the AI is set on moderate risk, retreat is what they are supposed to do, but in the past, that engagement would have happened and the Italians would have lost their fleet and 'ruined' the Mediterranean war in 1940.
• When it was time for Barbarossa, I used 20w tank divisions. I know, this is not a great tank division. Heck, it is not even a good one. Still, I sometimes limit myself to 20w tank divisions to give the AI a chance. My tanks broke through, with little problem, but the AI really did a good job moving units to plug the hole and stalled my tank advance out. I had to keep taking my tanks out to refuel and bring them back to attack, just to take a few provinces. No snaking was possible, because I could not advance very far before the tank divisions ran out of fuel. In the past, my little 20w tank divisions owned the AI.
• Impressed, I decided to reload a save to one year before Barbarossa to make 30w tank divisions and this time, to attack on a wider front. The 30w tank divisions are doing much better, but I think attacking on a wider front is helping even more. I attacked the same spot, just for comparison sake. The breakthrough happened quicker, but the AI still responded quickly. Since the AI made me play a better game, this time I had places closer to the front to refuel so there was no going back and forth like before. The main point is that I did have to play better. I could have still won with my 20w tank divisions in my earlier game, but the AI surprised me with how quickly it responded and I wanted to try something different and see if the AI could do it again.
• The Russian AI did not weaken its front lines like it did a long time ago, by shuffling all its troops along the front. Back in those days, the AI shuffled troops and created multiple weak points that 10-0 infantry divisions could push through. This time, the shuffling did not create weak spots like that. Instead of moving all the divisions, the AI seemed to move only one or two divisions per province, leaving the rest to maintain their entrenchments. If I had been playing a better game, I could have taken advantage of a few less-strong spots, but I did not expect the beta game to turn out so well. I just wanted to see how combat felt with the changes in beta. I did not really put much thought into my attack.
• The Russian AI seemed to have plenty of divisions for what it needed to do. This was very welcome. The AI is horrible when it is forced to make choices with limited resources and there is no good choice. Once it has a reasonable amount, it does not seem to freak out so much.

I am glad you posted your experiences. It could be coincidence, but I noticed a difference, too.

Thanks a lot for your detailed post, quite useful. I'll detail as well what I saw in 3 separate playthroughs (each started from scratch, not same save seed).

• Started as France. Guaranteed Poland but refuse to join Allies. Historical: Popular Front, got rid of most debuffs except Army's and Maginot's.
• My 2 strongest armies stationed against Belgium always get pierced after several months, and I lose from 1 to several provinces, whether I use 8/1 or 9/1 template with support AA+ART+ARM REC + ENG. Only adding heavy tanks to add armor will give me stability, otherwise constant juggling/micro managing divisions is necessary not to lose/retake provinces. Usually I leave these armies as is and never touch for several months, while German army breaks its teeths
• There are Brigades Coloniales (6/0) everywhere else: Maginot/Alps/Tunisia
• By Dec 39 I usually use my 7 motorized + some tanks to fight Italy in North Africa / Sardinia / Sicily, but Italy really upped their game: naval landing Sardinia once failed, and my Brigades Coloniales were often not able to hold the line in Sicily.
• Not only this: in one game Italy pushed hard in the Alps and I had to retreat near Rhone river: that's quite new since at least 1.11.x.
• So: by 1941 I may have succeeded some landings in Italy but am also much weaker than usual. I have to wait at least a full year to get enough equipment (e.g space marine armies or upgrade my 7 motorized to medium tanks) in order to push back Germany behind the Rhine river.
• Important: even positioning spies in Vlaanderen and Piemonte doesn't seem to break their planning, which is quite unusual. I think that was one of the big reason for success before.

Attached one save file: change conscription law, beef up the 8/1 to 9/1 in the North and position your spies. See that fighting Italy in Tunisia/Sardinia/Sicilia becomes spicy.

 

[HmJ_JP]

Sharing again why more air debuffs are pretty annoying: wherever you put them, your IW medium bombers are unable to cover Spain air regions. Here, it means only 65% efficiency, although we're almost there.

But worst: as air accidents have been pretty much increased in a former patch, one is really questioning the merit of spending IC for air, instead of more armor to protect the army. I mean, 3 months into the Spanish Civil War and I lost already 19% of my air wing to accidents...

In the end: many give up the naval war part of the game. I'm afraid soon we do the same with air, unless we have access to unlimited IC.

 

[FindFloppies]

Sharing again why more air debuffs are pretty annoying: wherever you put them, your IW medium bombers are unable to cover Spain air regions. Here, it means only 65% efficiency, although we're almost there.

But worst: as air accidents have been pretty much increased in a former patch, one is really questioning the merit of spending IC for air, instead of more armor to protect the army. I mean, 3 months into the Spanish Civil War and I lost already 19% of my air wing to accidents...

In the end: many give up the naval war part of the game. I'm afraid soon we do the same with air, unless we have access to unlimited IC.

So, you're saying if you can't build the perfect, best, most optimized air force and navy, you just won't bother?

If you have to compromise, like was done IRL, that's not something you're willing to do?

 

[HmJ_JP]

So, you're saying if you can't build the perfect, best, most optimized air force and navy, you just won't bother?

If you have to compromise, like was done IRL, that's not something you're willing to do?

Of course I do. But we're talking here about substantial headwinds, adding a lot of debuffs on top of more debuffs. I believe there's a balance everywhere, right? Also some countries may start war much later, say 1941, and don't necessarily face same issues, so experience feedback/sharing is all what this thread is about. Correct?

 

[Herennius]

I noticed AI improvements in my game a historic Romania as well, like Italy being slower to lose Ethiopia to the UK and still holding Lybia end of 1941. German AI might have been improved on the battlefield as well, but they still have their biggest problem around - poor use of occupation laws, leading to regularly accepting resistance levels around&above 50%:

 

[69arthurrr]

I'm don't feel good about the air changes, the last big navy update effectively ruined vanilla navy in competitive settings and now they look to be completely ruining air. Navy is forgivable but air is terminal.

What's not fully appreciated by the devs is players can get 30k+ planes with strong play, at that point UK airport capping becomes an issues for DDAY - i.e. the game just ceases to function to work properly as allies can't deploy their IC.

@C0RAX - given the proposed changes would you consider doubling the size of airports that can built and reducing the supply usage of planes? Another cool idea is to make the max airport size dependent on the nature of the state i.e. megapolis can get 5.5k, dense urban 5k, scaling down to rural.

I'm really worried about airport saturation as lower ranges make planes less fungible across air zones! You can't change air ranges in isolation without looking at things like the cost of planes & airport size caps!

Thank you & sorry for the downbeat tone, but I'm quite worried.

 

[FLUX2226]

the last big navy update effectively ruined vanilla navy in competitive settings

Out of curiosity, why does vanilla naval gameplay no longer work for competitive multiplayer?