• We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.

HoI4 Dev Diary - Resistance and Compliance

Hello HoI bois and ladies, welcome to the second dev diary on our upcoming unannounced expansion and 1.8 ‘Husky’ update. This update features some big changes to how occupied territory functions. The biggest part of this is an overhaul of the game’s current resistance system into what we are calling the “Resistance and Compliance” system. This should help curb a bit of power from snowballing (Hello, Germany), remove gamey early war sniping of provinces, and put a bit of a clock on world conquest runs.

The old resistance system is rather simple. Each occupied state has a suppression requirement. If you meet that requirement nothing happens. If the suppression requirement is not met then you suffer from increasingly common sabotage to factories or infrastructure as resistance strength grows. We decided we could make this more interesting and use it as a way to further control the power of snowballing.

The growth of resistance is no longer stopped by having an adequate garrison. Resistance now functions with a target system. The resistance level will grow or decay towards whatever the current target is. The target is impacted by the development of the state, the core owner still existing and other factors. Resistance activities will still scale with the level of resistance, but the garrison will now work as a shield that absorbs these sabotages. If the garrison is adequate, the garrison shield will absorb the vast majority of sabotage attempts and take losses to manpower and equipment. Not having an adequate garrison means a higher resistance target and more resistance activity making it past the garrison shield to the state.

DD_RESCOMP_COMP.png


Compliance is in some ways the opposite of resistance. It is a rating of how willing the local state is to work with their occupiers. Compliance will normally start at zero and increase slowly over time. Compliance growth will generally be slow and several factors can affect that speed of growth. As compliance increases in a state, it will decrease local resistance and give access to more resources, factories, and manpower.

DD_RESCOMP_COMP2.png


Resistance and compliance also will have various effects that are unlocked. Resistance will gain the ability to more frequently bypass the garrison shield after it reaches a strength of 25%. Reaching 25% compliance means reducing suppression requirements for the current level of resistance.

DD_RESCOMP_UNLOCKS.png


The highest level of resistance unlocks include two levels of uprising. The first is a passive malus that is applied to the state, adding attrition, decreasing move speed, and slowing org regain for occupying forces in the area. The 2nd level uprising is a full scale organized uprising that functions somewhat like a civil war. The states that rise up will gain low-quality divisions and either rejoin their former master or if that no longer exists, reestablish themselves on the map. Both of these should be somewhat rare and will require the local resistance being supported by an outside source.

DD_RESCOMP_UPRISING1.png



In conjunction with these new systems, we have reworked how occupied states are handled. Colony states will be removed as a concept and every state not controlled by a nation with a core on the state will be viewed as occupied. Occupied states will now be less rewarding for the occupier. Access to the factories and resources of the state will by default be much lower than before. However, the conqueror can get more out of the state by cultivating compliance or adjusting occupation laws. This gives a bit of granularity between what was previously colony states and cores.

Occupation laws will also be updated to work with the new resistance and compliance systems and give the player more choice. Previous occupation laws were mostly a linear system of paying PP and increasing suppression need for increasing rewards. If you could afford it, harsher occupation would almost always be more beneficial. This was also a system not a lot of people interacted with as it was hidden behind several layers of the menu.

New occupation laws are built around trying to give the player choice based on playstyle and short and longterm goals. The new laws tend towards one of three objectives: compliance growth, resistance suppression, factory/resource exploitation. Compliance growth is a longterm reward, while resistance suppression and resource gains are more short term. These laws will, in turn, be bad at what they are not concerned with. IE focusing on resistance suppression will generally not be very rewarding in terms of resources or long term compliance growth. Cultivating compliance will mean that the player will have to deal with a period of low yields and maybe a more active resistance movement. Each of the big three ideologies will also get their own special occupation laws. These laws fit the themes of the ideologies and give them some unique choices

DD_RESCOMP_OCULAW02.png


That's all we got for this week. Next week we will update the good people of these forums on what is going on with France. Secrets and things hidden will be revealed!
 
What I would like to see next is:
1. Bigger capitals or major cities getting small (Luxemburg sized) provinces of their own so that sieges, nukes and uprisings could take place there.
2. Events for uprisings (obvious example being Warsaw).

And more of a wishlist:
1. More internal politics. I know it's a war simulator, I get it. But the popularity of Kaiserreich is partly because of more fleshed out internal stuff.
2. Legit "supply line" system. I would be in favour of introducing a simplified HQ for armies (without the micro) and having a literal line from capital/port to that HQ so that enemies could attack it. The line would get "thinner" the further the HQ unit is, the worse the infrastructure, resistance, et cetera. It could be linked to espionage system so spies would have a chance of discovering where those lines are and where the HQ is. And potentially super-simple commando/partisans for a random chance of sabotage.
3. A Cold War game. ;)
 
How will this work with Colonies and Puppets/Integrated Puppets? There are some deeply unsatisfying (not to mention, cheap and low-effort) events associated with the Quit India focus and Quebecois conscription crisis. Will this be changed to a resistance/compliance system?

Those are cores not colonies/occupied territories so this system doesn't really apply to them very much, it would for example if India was owned directly by the UK instead of being it's own tag
 
On one hand it's great that such an important WW2 sub-theme gets tackled, also the systems look interesting and promising.
On the other hand though, a resistance DD published just three days after the 80th anniversary of the WW2 outbreak and the illustrating cases are... Chad? Not e.g. the Warsaw Uprising? I believe You guys might have heard about quite possibly the biggest resistance operation in the occupied Europe? That's the elephant in the room IMHO, at least for me.
 
Last edited:
For now we are doing one unique law per major ideology.
  • Democacies will get "Autonomous Occupation" which will focus on generating compliance at the cost of initially higher resistance
  • Fascists will get "Brutally Oppressive Occupation" which will focus on suppressing resistance at a high material cost
  • Communists will get "Liberate Workers" which will focus on getting more factories from the state at the cost of increased resistance
It is a very good thing you're working towards making ideologies more distinct than the current state, which is merely affecting:
* Color on the map
* which side of the conflict
* on whom they may declare war
 
This was considered, but we decided not to do it for now as it created too many headaches from a gameplay and UX perspective.

It would be really interesting if core states could have resistance or low compliance, reflecting general strikes and all sorts of civil unrest. Have 100% compliance be full production and non-cores effectively limited to some lower amount, with cores having a large compliance bonus.

That would also play very nicely with setting up a puppet and potential legitimacy problems they could have.
 
This can get a bit complicated and is something we discussed. What will likely happen, is that if there is an uprising and either a GiE or the a core controller still exists, the uprising will join with their countrymen.
So no chance for a communist Yugoslavia to revolt and take back their country without becoming a Soviet puppet? :(

However, for this to happen the GiE or original owner will have to have an opposing ideology to the occupier.
I don't quite understand, does it mean that if two nations of the same ideology are at war and partisans rise up, those partisans will have a different ideology?
If so, then couldn't that be applied independent of it being the same ideology or not?
That would at least make the Yugoslav situation possible.
 
This can get a bit complicated and is something we discussed. What will likely happen, is that if there is an uprising and either a GiE or the a core controller still exists, the uprising will join with their countrymen. However, for this to happen the GiE or original owner will have to have an opposing ideology to the occupier.
I would expect their legitimacy to also be a factor. Its there, so may as well use it - unless I'm misunderstanding that particular mechanic.
 
Could the rebels be divided by ideologies and possibly start fighting each other, as it happened in Greece or Yugoslavia?
 
So, if exploiting an area generates more resources and factories from occupation, and the compliance policy increases long term compliance, why would you bother with resistance suppression? Does it give a substantial discount on the number/quality of occupation forces? Or would the resistance suppression policy increase the ability of garrisons to shield buildings from partisans?

I'm very much a "the war was won in the factories" kind of player, so this is of real interest to me. I want a reason not to exploit occupied areas economically when playing the Axis. (Because as we all know, right now Germany can gain ridiculous factories and resources from harshest occupation.)
 
In conjunction with these new systems, we have reworked how occupied states are handled. Colony states will be removed as a concept and every state not controlled by a nation with a core on the state will be viewed as occupied.

I don't know...I hope this doesn't mean we are falling back to the old days where you had to conquer like all off India, Malaysia and what not just to peace the UK out...
 
Does it give a substantial discount on the number/quality of occupation forces? Or would the resistance suppression policy increase the ability of garrisons to shield buildings from partisans?

At the very least it will most likely reduce the resistance growth and as long as the number is low you will suffer less. For example if the resistance is above 25% they will start to bypass your division shield more often and your factories will be affected.v
 
I don't know...I hope this doesn't mean we are falling back to the old days where you had to conquer like all off India, Malaysia and what not just to peace the UK out...

I don't think he means that Malaysia and the Raj are going away.
 
So, if exploiting an area generates more resources and factories from occupation, and the compliance policy increases long term compliance, why would you bother with resistance suppression? Does it give a substantial discount on the number/quality of occupation forces? Or would the resistance suppression policy increase the ability of garrisons to shield buildings from partisans?

It sounds like more resistance means more garrisons required to shield the attacks (and more lost manpower and equipment to absorb those attacks). Plus high resistance has a higher chance of making attacks that go around the garrison. Plus high resistance can reach a point where your garrisons are suffering constant attrition (if not outright rebellion).

That seems like a fair number of sticks.
 
Sounds interesting, but will we get the possibility to core states? If all of our non-core states will be affected by this new mechanic, it would be nice if we could get the ability to core states (even if it costs PP or whatever).
 
Sounds interesting, but will we get the possibility to core states? If all of our non-core states will be affected by this new mechanic, it would be nice if we could get the ability to core states (even if it costs PP or whatever).

Don't think so, but you can get 100% compliance and that will give you far better benefits than a occupied territory does now.
 
I love how resistance disables strategic redeployment. Now, if we can affect resistance in other countries' somehow, I can see players doing things like invading Normandy and at the same time using resistance fighters to delay German divisions from the east.
 
At the very least it will most likely reduce the resistance growth and as long as the number is low you will suffer less. For example if the resistance is above 25% they will start to bypass your division shield more often and your factories will be affected.v

It sounds like more resistance means more garrisons required to shield the attacks (and more lost manpower and equipment to absorb those attacks). Plus high resistance has a higher chance of making attacks that go around the garrison. Plus high resistance can reach a point where your garrisons are suffering constant attrition (if not outright rebellion).

That seems like a fair number of sticks.

That seems reasonable.

I'll have to probably do a complete rework of Germany's production and resources under the new system and see what works.

If I have to make tough choices, I consider that a success. But the Devs should know now that if I have to put 3 million men in western Europe to get 90% of the factories and resources in France, Benelux, Spain, Portugal, Norway, Denmark, and Switzerland, I will probably still do it.

I want those factories and that steel and tungsten; we'll get the manpower from somewhere. (Looking at you, Desperate Defense.)
 
Nah, rebellions is something you will only really see with external powers involved (which we cant talk about yet) So it wont be naturally happen very much. High resistance is bad enough.
Stuff like the Four Days of Naples happened without external intervention - all through some absolutely brutal German repression (Hitler personally ordered Naples to be razed to the ground when it didn't comply - wink wink nudge nudge), which drove the citizenship to stealing German and old stock Italian weapons and rise up in rebellion. Successfully - the German garrison was forced out of the city, and the Allies would march in an already liberated Naples.