HOI4 Dev Diary - Acclimatization and Special Forces

[KiwiNoob]

The whole idea of the research system is to make you prioritize and make choices.

If you stick in a 'behind time' bonus to research it'll maintain the scarcity/trade-off decisions of up-to-date techs but will allow countries to keep a ok spread of slightly outdated tech

 

[mjb2k]

So....MP favors Axis...entire game comes down to Airpower...Strats are banned...

So you don't play MP either, you apparently play house rules 'Axis Wins' simulator.

How are you getting the Army XP needed to fund Infantry Divisions, Armored Division, Cav MP divisions, Mot divisions as Germany prior to WW2 if you are not
A) Abusing SCW to farm XP; or,
B) Deleting all of your divisions and exploit training your way up?

If it's either of these, again you dont play HOI4 you play cheese the exploit simulator.

Then I read further and you flat out admit you play with exploits.

Taking back the world from Hitler is supposed to be hard. The game isnt about Nazis taking over the world. Its about taking back the world from the Nazis.

Im not saying SP is better. It isnt, with the right people, everything is better with people. I'm saying the folks in the "competitive" MP scene who stick to rules like banning strats, 1 art per 10w, deleting armys for XP (this one really fucking pisses me off, cause you retards dont understand that building templates over time is its own balance in of itself), and have goals of 44w divisions with 1942 tanks in 1938 play a version of the game that isnt a) competitive b) balanced c) fun d) representative of the actual conflict they are playing a "historical rules" game of.

Not really sure how to respond to this, you don't play in house games which are the best because you see the most amount of action and because the games last so long which is when the good stuff starts happening. We play to win, that's why we get 1944 tech in 38 because we know our way around the system better than most SP people could ever figure out on their own. Yes we use the 1 division "exploit" but otherwise it isn't fun to have really bad divisions when you go to war and have to build them up by throwing them at a wall. If in MP you kept your original army as Japan for example, and China kept theirs and built it up then China would rofl stomp Japan. Doesn't really matter what I say to you because you'll play all welcome games and I don't.

 

[mjb2k]

I empathize with your concerns. I also have concerns with what I consider obvious mistakes in a historical multiplayer game. But I don't think its fair to say Paradox doesn't "put an ounce of thought for the MP community". Rather, I think they have conflicting demands and they are trying to weave a path that keeps everyone somewhat happy. Hence, that is why we have a camel, not a horse.

Can't the "balanced" MP community get together and create a mod that reduces, if not replaces, these "page upon page" of rules necessary to run a balanced MP game? Specifically, regarding the proposed Special Force limit simply change it to a higher percentage?

For the "historical" MP gamers, having some sort of mod is the only way I see us getting the results we want from the game. Though it doesn't appear we are anywhere as organized as the balanced MP community, from the thread discussions I have seen.

There are mods that exist and certain groups use them, but like having to make a mod to play a somewhat balance game is a bit ludicrous when the game should realistically give SP players their alt-history stuff whilst keeping in mind MP balance. Paradox devs should play with their community some time and find out themselves what we mean balance.

P.s. paradox: more alluminum for Japan and the allies, thx m8.

 

[mjb2k]

I heavily agree with this- but if D-Day becomes impossible- then another naval invasion front will have to be opened. Germany and Italy simply don't have the manpower to cover every coastal province and fight the Sovs(unless Allies are incompetent and don't feed them the resources they need). Especially since the borders could be around Scandinavia and maybe even Turkey. The Axis overextend a lot in most games I've watched. The games that have D-Day rules in 1944 would have to change to adapt to this if D-Day became impossible.

Remember it's about air power. Naval invading in Scandinavia is hard because planes can't go that far to help out. Remember the allies often lose the air war so you can't pick losing fights. Italy is hard as well and can only be done if you take Africa and islands around Italy for the air bases. And taking back Africa is hard as well. So all in all, it's a rather hard and daunting task to begin with.

 

[Sourlol]

I put around 300 hours into MP between TFV and DOD. I played the competitive scene.

Its okay.

If the players werent arrogant, entitled, "autistic", screeching, racist, xenophobic, rude, misinformed, and probably more harsh words I'm unable to string off I might still be playing.

But after suffering 6 hours for the 9th time with a different hitler apologist white nationalist, someone with an open mic and mouthbreathing, and the inevitable guy who trolls the entire game and is the reason your group added rule 22 sub rule c....it gets old. On top of it, while I did have a few games that went to 1944-45 the majority dont.

**sorry for the disparaging remarks

Someone makes a colossal error and we all lose.

Its nonsense. I sit there and prepare for 2-3 hours and its over before it gets going because UK couldnt hold med, or USSR shits itself (or just as often Germany cant keep it together). That "competitive" scene has adopted a general case strategy of playing an edge case.

No one fights a war like that in real life. No one would over commit like that in real life. but here its the fate of 3 hours not your country.

I hope pds keeps implementing other mechanics to make 40w divisions ill-advised except for possible niche roles. Slowing the flow of recruit-able population may help with this issue. If you cant recruit enough people to fill the needed division count to hold a line with all 40w, you'll have to default to 20w--at least in the early years.

Regarding Army XP exploit, I cant help you if you think an entire game mechanic is "unfun" because you have to progress through it. Its freaking nuts you people think its okay to play that way. And frankly makes any opinions from your crowd irrelevant to the greater balance discussion of the game. You're not playing the real game. Army XP and how you spend it should be really important to your decision making. It can be found on NFs and by consuming your produced equipment (in a variety of forms) and by the minister. It is used for the two of the most important things in the game upgrading tanks and upgrading division templates. And you just ignore it. Thats akin to ignoring dribbling in basketball or breathing in swimming.

You willfully play with and encourage the use of exploits. Its like steroids in baseball....sure you hit a lot of home runs, but you're missing the point.

Your meta is false.

 

[Farquarsen]

Sound quite clear to me. Speed and terrain bonuses decrease, the larger your pool size.

If 20% of your army is "special forces", then they are not really "special", and their quality will not be that much higher than regular infantry. It's a simple percentage considederation. You select cream of the crop - you get fitter special forces who perform a little better in difficult terrain. You mass reform infantry into marines/paratroopers (or Soviet Guards for that matter), the terrain bonuses will not be quite as awesome.

These forces are not special forces in the sense of commandos. Its a term the swedish developers have adopted. If you have served a day, you would recognize these forces as specialized infantry. And yes, the US has about 20% of its land force in these specialized infantry roles from WWII on. Again back to my original mathematical analysis. 6 marine divisions plus an equivalent US Army amphibious trained force of 6 divisions, one mountain division and 5 airborne divisions ( the 11th Airborne, 13th Airborne, 17th Airborne, 82nd airborne and 101st airborne) equals specialized infantry of 18 divisions out of 97. (91 US Army active divisions and 6 Marine divisions) 20/97 = 20%

I am surprised the 1st marine division is not present in the game in 1936. Amphibious assault doctrine began in the early 30s. The marines in 1936 were an amphibious force. Its historically inaccurate for a US player to have to research initial Marines as an amphibious assault force.

www.usmcu.edu/sites/default/files/HD/Publications/A%20Chronology%20Of%20The%20United%20States%20Marine%20Corps%201935-1946%20%20PCN%2019000317800.pdf
links you to the history of the USMC before, during and after WWII. Amphibious assault training began in 1935. Please note the USMC is a branch of the United States Navy and not a branch of the US Army.

Another note, while I am on this, during operation torch, US Army units made several amphibious landings without the USMC. These units trained with landing craft and Marine instructors but the Corps was tied up in the pacific.

Now to the game, these amphibious functions are tied to battalions the game calls marines, they really should be titled amphibious specialists.

MP players are focused on Marines because as the game is now played, its the only hope you have of breaking the Atlantic wall when you are not facing a very dumb AI. I really do not want the terrain bonuses to decrease as I build out the marine force required to dig out a very experienced German player when I am the US.

 

[Lukevan16]

I put around 300 hours into MP between TFV and DOD. I played the competitive scene.

Its okay.

If the players werent arrogant, entitled, "autistic", screeching, racist, xenophobic, rude, misinformed, and probably more harsh words I'm unable to string off I might still be playing.

But after suffering 6 hours for the 9th time with a different hitler apologist white nationalist, a guy from brazil who is pissed off Brazil is banned, some dude from eastern Europe who has the logic and reasoning skills of an evangelical, and the inevitable guy who trolls the entire game...it gets old. On top of it, while I did have a few games that went to 1944-45 the majority dont.

**apologies for the stereotyping, but just imagine being a fly on the wall for that...knowing you cant mute comms since you are on a team...in the Allies channel, no less...

Someone makes a colossal error and we all lose.

Its nonsense. I sit there and prepare for 2-3 hours and its over before it gets going because UK couldnt hold med, or USSR shits itself (or just as often Germany cant keep it together). That "competitive" scene has adopted a general case strategy of playing an edge case.

No one fights a war like that in real life. No one would over commit like that in real life. but here its the fate of 3 hours not your country.

I hope pds keeps implementing other mechanics to make 40w divisions ill-advised except for possible niche roles. Slowing the flow of recruit-able population may help with this issue. If you cant recruit enough people to fill the needed division count to hold a line with all 40w, you'll have to default to 20w--at least in the early years.

Regarding Army XP exploit, I cant help you if you think an entire game mechanic is "unfun" because you have to progress through it. Its freaking nuts you people think its okay to play that way. And frankly makes any opinions from your crowd irrelevant to the greater balance discussion of the game. You're not playing the real game. Army XP and how you spend it should be really important to your decision making. It can be found on NFs and by consuming your produced equipment (in a variety of forms) and by the minister. It is used for the two of the most important things in the game upgrading tanks and upgrading division templates. And you just ignore it. Thats akin to ignoring dribbling in basketball or breathing in swimming.

You willfully play with and encourage the use of exploits. Its like steroids in baseball....sure you hit a lot of home runs, but you're missing the point.

Your meta is false.

Never played mp so I'll keep quiet about your comments on that front, but can we please avoid disparaging the religious on this forum? I'm not evangelic but I honestly don't think that this is the place for any type of religious debate, and I imagine that some might find your insinuation that evangelicals lack 'reason and logic' to be quite offensive.

 

[Haydob13]

Can we expect to seen new leader portraits for major and minor nations in the patch/DLC? New fascist portrait for Finland maybe (Viho Annala) ?

 

[mjb2k]

I put around 300 hours into MP between TFV and DOD. I played the competitive scene.

Its okay.

If the players werent arrogant, entitled, "autistic", screeching, racist, xenophobic, rude, misinformed, and probably more harsh words I'm unable to string off I might still be playing.

But after suffering 6 hours for the 9th time with a different hitler apologist white nationalist, a guy from brazil who is pissed off Brazil is banned, and the inevitable guy who trolls the entire game...it gets old. On top of it, while I did have a few games that went to 1944-45 the majority dont.

**sorry for the disparaging remarks

Someone makes a colossal error and we all lose.

Its nonsense. I sit there and prepare for 2-3 hours and its over before it gets going because UK couldnt hold med, or USSR shits itself (or just as often Germany cant keep it together). That "competitive" scene has adopted a general case strategy of playing an edge case.

No one fights a war like that in real life. No one would over commit like that in real life. but here its the fate of 3 hours not your country.

I hope pds keeps implementing other mechanics to make 40w divisions ill-advised except for possible niche roles. Slowing the flow of recruit-able population may help with this issue. If you cant recruit enough people to fill the needed division count to hold a line with all 40w, you'll have to default to 20w--at least in the early years.

Regarding Army XP exploit, I cant help you if you think an entire game mechanic is "unfun" because you have to progress through it. Its freaking nuts you people think its okay to play that way. And frankly makes any opinions from your crowd irrelevant to the greater balance discussion of the game. You're not playing the real game. Army XP and how you spend it should be really important to your decision making. It can be found on NFs and by consuming your produced equipment (in a variety of forms) and by the minister. It is used for the two of the most important things in the game upgrading tanks and upgrading division templates. And you just ignore it. Thats akin to ignoring dribbling in basketball or breathing in swimming.

You willfully play with and encourage the use of exploits. Its like steroids in baseball....sure you hit a lot of home runs, but you're missing the point.

Your meta is false.

Why should army xp be the deciding factor for what your division looks like? Please explain that. Did the allies in ww2 just happen to realize the best division has this much arty and this much infantry? Or did they have years and previous wars to figure that out same for axis and soviets? I bet you think tanks belong in infantry divisions in this game because that's totally balanced. Also if the allies do not do the 1 division "exploit" they will lose Africa because Germany and Italy and the entire axis essentially can have complete and good divisions well befofe the war starts because the SCW and Jap - Sino war. Also Germany can grind Poland and Italy yugo, giving them vastly superior divisions compared to the allies. If you ban that to "play the game right" then forget holding Africa with whatever divisions you could afford, there is a balance reason why we do things the way we do.
Regarding your 20 width, do you want a ww1 sim in MP? And how would that change SP in any meaningful way? 20 widths can't push, and 20 width tanks are only as useful as infantry practically. As far as I can see you're just out to attack the MP community based on your very limited experience (300 hours is not a lot compared to most of the competitive scene), given you called us re----ds already reaffirms your bias.

 

[Lukevan16]

Can we expect to seen new leader portraits for major and minor nations in the patch/DLC? New fascist portrait for Finland maybe (Viho Annala) ?

Hopefully portraits for the Australian PMs as well

 

[Farquarsen]

@Sourlol, I have found two groups of MP players, those that are concerned about balance and historical accuracy and those who are not. You can find the former on MP forums. These games have posted start times and go for several weeks. Many have a mod to correct balance issues, for example, reduced cost for templates, cooling down the CAS a bit to make it more accurate.

 

[Coozer]

Left field question for the devs or anyone else that knows, why does the Industrial and electronic tech tree end mid-late war?

I don't know if its for some design reason but personally I like it being impossible to reach the end of tech trees so you always have to make interesting R&D decisions, those who invest in tech do not lose that advantage, and because of immersion, we don't reach the end of tech in real life.

I was just curious is all.

 

[Sourlol]

Why should army xp be the deciding factor for what your division looks like? Please explain that. Did the allies in ww2 just happen to realize the best division has this much arty and this much infantry?

From a gameplay perspective, because Army XP is literally the mechanic with which you build templates.

Or did they have years and previous wars to figure that out same for axis and soviets? I bet you think tanks belong in infantry divisions in this game because that's totally balanced.

Lets say the US only began their mobilization the day after pearl harbor. It still took until Guadalcanal for the Americans to launch an offensive Aug 7, 42. Serious European Theater operatons didnt begin until november.

A number of US infantry divisions were re-organized in 1942 from square to triangular divisions. -That would be like going from 12w to 18w.

The allies were relatively speaking unprepared for the war. It was a war they didn't want. If they were prepared for the war, Germany never would have attacked in the first place.
That is modeled in game, in part, through the XP system. Forcing the player to choose to upgrading a tank one tick, or adding a two new support companies and a infantry battlaion added on the their template--thats a real choice. Thats a gameplay decision.

Also if the allies do not do the 1 division "exploit" they will lose Africa because Germany and Italy and the entire axis essentially can have complete and good divisions well befofe the war starts because the SCW and Jap - Sino war. Also Germany can grind Poland and Italy yugo, giving them vastly superior divisions compared to the allies. If you ban that to "play the game right" then forget holding Africa with whatever divisions you could afford, there is a balance reason why we do things the way we do.

Grinding wars is a problem, I dont have a good solution. But allowing allies to lend lease china--which usually isnt allowed, may fix this for the UK at the very least.
you can hold africa with a UK and her commonwealth. Forts (which need balance tweaking), in el alamein, forts all along the eastern bank of the nile. Axis cant afford much in the way of Strats at this point--and my experience has been a lot of players dump all their factories into CAS not TAC. Park UK/France fleet off red sea and eastern med. Pump sky full of RAF. Put All the Raj/Aussie/Canadian/UK divisions you can spare on those tiles and hold on, put a second line of reserves so you can move them in if tiles start to get overwhelmed.

You need to put some infra and ports on the red sea too

Regarding your 20 width, do you want a ww1 sim in MP? And how would that change SP in any meaningful way? 20 widths can't push, and 20 width tanks are only as useful as infantry practically. As far as I can see you're just out to attack the MP community based on your very limited experience (300 hours is not a lot compared to most of the competitive scene), given you called us re----ds already reaffirms your bias.

Not everything needs to be 20w or 40w or 10w. There should a place for all of them. Armored, Paratrooper and Marine divisions should all benefit from being larger. The issue is in the current game, in part due to the downside being reload instead of death, the optimal division is 40w. The 'competitive' person, will use every advantage to win, including cheating. So to compete, everyone is forced to cheat, even those who dont want to. 40w shouldnt be the norm, but the time you can afford it you cant afford to template swap en masse and youve got variants to upgrade.

300 isnt a lot compared to a lot of yall, but its long enough to draw conclusions from my experiences.

I did call you guys retards. Because you exploit to avoid a core game mechanic and manage to self title yourselves "competitive".

 

[C-Breeze]

its fairly moddable
View attachment 319255

This looks good. Lots of mod options and an important step toward making weather more meaningful.

 

[zhiweiwba]

@podcat so how on earth do the allies D-Day now? Infantry and tanks are absolutely useless for some reason, so all you're left with is 4-5 40w marines which are nowhere near the 30 40w marines minimum you'll need to land in 3 beachheads and succeed.

Perhaps one way to do it is to introduce national spirits which can input a modifier regarding proportions of special forces with infantry.

 

[ragingrondo12]

I empathize with your concerns. I also have concerns with what I consider obvious mistakes in a historical multiplayer game. But I don't think its fair to say Paradox doesn't "put an ounce of thought for the MP community". Rather, I think they have conflicting demands and they are trying to weave a path that keeps everyone somewhat happy. Hence, that is why we have a camel, not a horse.

Can't the "balanced" MP community get together and create a mod that reduces, if not replaces, these "page upon page" of rules necessary to run a balanced MP game? Specifically, regarding the proposed Special Force limit simply change it to a higher percentage?

For the "historical" MP gamers, having some sort of mod is the only way I see us getting the results we want from the game. Though it doesn't appear we are anywhere as organized as the balanced MP community, from the thread discussions I have seen.

Most MP modders are

A. Lazy and are only capable of making small numbers changes with out much overall and long-term balance in mind.
B. remove certain things they disagree with instead of using the tools all the available to them to manipulate and tweak them.

With the proposed SF changes, one could balance in this manner:

SF stay 5% of max battalions.
Boost SF Combat abilities significantly (on terrains and similar terrains of speciality.) Then use for small slowly pushing attacks to break through enemy lines and fortifications in key places.


As it currently is in my group I have completely overhauled all terrain penalties and (offensive, defensive and movement) for all units, giving SF stronger bonuses amd required SF to have an additional 75 inf and 50 Support per battalion. At the moment is acting as a very good soft cap. But the SF changes will make my true vision easier to achieve.

Terrain changes

A few short excerpts from my latest changlogs.

Even simple defines changes like:

Combat Width 90 Base increase multiples of 30.
DEFINES CHANGES
MAX NIC PER LINE 5
MAX CIC PER LINE 5
BASE_FACTORY_SPEED = 7.5
BASE MIC SPEED = 7.5
Maximum industry hit for no resources 80
production lack per resource = -3% per resource missing
base ahead of time penalty now 250% instead of 200%
Building in max infrastructure will be faster for shared buildings (1.25 instead of 1) - aka each infra gives more speed boost- Helps germany rearm faster
base tech cost to 110
radar max range 220
Doubled effect of recon skill advantage on tactics
increased tactics swap frequncy (more role on recon and general skills in tactics selection and war)
Chance to avoid being hit if attacker offensive>defensives from 60->70 # returned to 65
Air supperiority impact on speed and defense to 25% from 35%
planning decay to 2% from 1$
Encirclement penalty from 30% to 40%
Maximum vs average armor wieghted at .375 (compensate for increased pen sources)
decrypt bonus 10% off deffensive
Maximum leader traits and trait XP gain increased
land unit bas upgrade cost 10 scale 1
Air and water base 20 scale 1
carrier sortie delay 6 hrs
supply planes from .3 -> .4
 
Infantry maximum speed now 3.2 KMH
 
ALL NAVAL DEFINES CHANGED
 
defines for naval changed
SHIPS will retreat sooner

As you can see, there's a lot of balance going on underneath the hood.

OR
More drastic Game balance changes are out of the minds of most MP modders. They don't think enough about it or fully commit to it. Once you start changing one thing for balance you have to tweak everything.

Increased AA stats to make more effective as poor mans AT and give some more SA for anti inf duty
 
All Planes 15% cheaper & Rebalanced Resources (Make proegression more steady each new level only requires 1 new resource and resources are more balanced out (more rubber usage on general))
 
Rebalanced Mechanized Stats a bit
Mech upgrades and research  moved back 1 year each
 
Increased all LARM costs by 20% MARM by 15% HARM 10% SHARM 5% Redid resources a bit, more spread out. Hopefully promotes the need for more mixed tank brigades, (LARM, MARM in same etc, but only varianted up.)
-INCREASED heavy TD by 15% on top of the above (After increase above)
 
Tweaked LARM STATS MORE
 
Resources for production for most units rebalanced took a while LARM got +1 chromium or tungsten costs
 
Maximum upgrades # higher, all upgrade stats do a 75% of a vanilla stat increase. more levels overall, promotes variants.
land unit bas upgrade cost 10 scale 1
Air and water base 20 scale 1
Upgrades increase unit costs by .1% per level, so total 4% cost increase for max upgrades. Should make highly modified variants valuable, especially when running into resource deficits or shortages.
 
LOWERED TANK RELIABILITY BASELINES USE THE VARIANTS TO SHIFT UP
SHARM 40%
HARM 50%
MARM 60%
LARM 80%
 
Lowered Plane reliability
FGHT 70%
CAS 65%
NAV 70%
HFGHT 80%
TAC 75%
STRAT 70%
JETFIGHT 50%
JETBOMB 50%
JetSTRAT 65%
rocket inter 44 35%
Rocket inter 45 50%
Rocket inter 46 75%
rocket suicide  65%
transport 75%
guided missile 70%

-you can switch between concentrated and dispersed industry at any point in the tech branch

War at sea naval side techs
stats+variants
Sub raiding is effective. Protect your convoys.

-cavalry has a suppression value of 1 and military police gives 100% suppression for the first tech, and 50% for each one afterwards

SF Units Train from 200-270 days
Increased supply use
Require 150-175 rifles per battallion
require 50 support equip


ART TECHS boost SP and ART SA
TD TECHS boost SPTD and TD HA and piercing
AA TECHS boost SPAA and AA AA, and piercing
Each armour tech gives 1% armour for all armour and Mechanized

Theorists give more XP
LAND and AIR xp per year from Theorists is 100
NAVY Theorist is 200
ARMY & AIR CHIEFS: 100
NAVY CHIEF: 200
ARMY AND AIR HIGH COMMAND: 50
NAVY HIGH COMMAND: 100

Summary: Most MP Modders do not think big enough with the tools they have available to them. Most want slipshod solutions instead of trying to address the real issues. Also most have differing definitions of fun and competitive. The HOI4 MP community is a one giant big Circlejerk for the most part. People in it dismiss people like @Axe99 , @Alex_brunius ,@Secret Master , or @Had a dad with out forethought and without looking through a lot of the tests and conclusions that they reach on the basis of anecdotal personal evidence, in spite of understanding the game mechanics far less than those four.

Disclosure: Based My mod off of PFU, then started tweaking a lot of things from there, incorporated with @Axe99 's TWAS for the Naval changes. Group is very pleased with the changes (12 man group)

 

[grandad1982]

Why is it that recently so many threads have sprung up or devolved in to arguments with a particular subset of mp players?

 

[Porkman]

Why is it that recently so many threads have sprung up or devolved in to arguments with a particular subset of mp players?

Because MP is the one way to play the game where your enjoyment is dependent on other people. In SP, if we mess up... it's our fault or we can reload or whatever. We can also pause so we're not under a ton of stress to juggle a ton of balls in the air.

But for MP, none of this is true. So they want the system to set in place the ground rules for everybody. Which leads to arguments about where the rules should be.

 

[diceyy]

Given that they are only going to effect 5% of your divisions are the special forces techs going to have a shorter research time than is standard?

 

[Sanny]

What determines the force limit of 24? or is that just a hard cap?