Will there be any RAILWAY and AUTOBAHN structure? That would be great if it adds those Infra`s onto the game.
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Both will be considered infrastructure and Germany will have level 10 Infra in nearly all their provinces to represent their autobahn and rail networks
I think the new supply system is silly. Does it cost materials other than oil to produce tanks such as rare materials and steel?
So what happens to the rare materials and steel in the old tanks when the new tanks with fuel replace them? Also this streamlines and simplifies the problems with attrition for ALL countries without the option to do it. Why would anyone ever build anything but the one best tank? Won't this cause perfectly upgraded armies on all sides? It's silly.
Just a little history here: the vast majority of tanks invading the SU in 1941 were obsolete German and Czech models. It was the tactics of the Wehr plus their total air superiority that allowed them to beat the way heavier armored and way better gunned soviet tank corps all the way to moscow in 41 (among other things). In reality one of the major reasons the Soviet Unions economy defeated Germanys was that they had a couple of working models churned out by the boatload and Germanys tanks were highly specialized and there were many competing models all vying for their place in the sun. It took an average of a couple days to churn out a T-34 from the Oktabyr Factory; their engine tolerances were so low (and this was planned, because the Soviets knew how long a tank lasted in the field and designed them to fit reality) that a kilogram of metal shavings would be found in the filter after the first oil change. Germany on the other hand, had hundreds of models that took weeks to build. So even though the Panzer commanders were taking out T34s left and right they were hindered by the ability of the Soviet economy to replace them and the inability of the German economy to do the same. The Germans had anything BUT a stockpile of fresh equipment. This new system just seems like all countries will streamline and mass produce their most technologically advanced weapons, and the old ones will magically disappear. Is that the realism we're shooting for?
Other thoughts on this: even though panzers ran out of fuel sometimes, that didn't just evaporate them from the area they were in. Tanks that can't move can still shoot and the enemy knows that as well. Munitions was key. Millions of people were employed on all sides making one thing alone. Millions of people in the factories means less people able to fight in the field. It's a tradeoff, like so many things in war.
What's so hard about supply and fuel depots? Have a supply system and fuel system from factories (NOT THE CAPITAL PLEASE) that is easily managed by the player. This would necessitate an actual transportation network though and it looks like we aren't getting one of those (which is really really silly, considering the entire war was fought over the transportation networks). I obviously understand the difficulties in making a game engine deal with everything but really supply should not be one of the things abstracted. The whole war was won and lost on logistics.
So what happens to the rare materials and steel in the old tanks when the new tanks with fuel replace them? Also this streamlines and simplifies the problems with attrition for ALL countries without the option to do it. Why would anyone ever build anything but the one best tank? Won't this cause perfectly upgraded armies on all sides? It's silly.
Just a little history here: the vast majority of tanks invading the SU in 1941 were obsolete German and Czech models. It was the tactics of the Wehr plus their total air superiority that allowed them to beat the way heavier armored and way better gunned soviet tank corps all the way to moscow in 41 (among other things). In reality one of the major reasons the Soviet Unions economy defeated Germanys was that they had a couple of working models churned out by the boatload and Germanys tanks were highly specialized and there were many competing models all vying for their place in the sun. It took an average of a couple days to churn out a T-34 from the Oktabyr Factory; their engine tolerances were so low (and this was planned, because the Soviets knew how long a tank lasted in the field and designed them to fit reality) that a kilogram of metal shavings would be found in the filter after the first oil change. Germany on the other hand, had hundreds of models that took weeks to build. So even though the Panzer commanders were taking out T34s left and right they were hindered by the ability of the Soviet economy to replace them and the inability of the German economy to do the same. The Germans had anything BUT a stockpile of fresh equipment. This new system just seems like all countries will streamline and mass produce their most technologically advanced weapons, and the old ones will magically disappear. Is that the realism we're shooting for?
Other thoughts on this: even though panzers ran out of fuel sometimes, that didn't just evaporate them from the area they were in. Tanks that can't move can still shoot and the enemy knows that as well. Munitions was key. Millions of people were employed on all sides making one thing alone. Millions of people in the factories means less people able to fight in the field. It's a tradeoff, like so many things in war.
What's so hard about supply and fuel depots? Have a supply system and fuel system from factories (NOT THE CAPITAL PLEASE) that is easily managed by the player. This would necessitate an actual transportation network though and it looks like we aren't getting one of those (which is really really silly, considering the entire war was fought over the transportation networks). I obviously understand the difficulties in making a game engine deal with everything but really supply should not be one of the things abstracted. The whole war was won and lost on logistics.
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I know I will dislike the supply system and its effects on production. I do not have to play the game to know this, because we have seen the system and it has been explained.
Another concern that is less clear is what the effects will be on attrition. I do not know, but I am worried. How does manpower, units and attrition tie together? The attrition rates will have to be higher if they reflect the useage of supplies and fuel than what they would have been if they had reflected merely accidents, disease, desertions and sometimes partisans. Will this higher attrition be applied on the units' manpower? Will my people die to fuel the units' movements? What would the effects be on the units' experience then? Will elite units turn green by a relatively harmless movement if it is long enough?
I am hoping that the manpower component is kept separate from the equipment components of a unit, so that attrition will only be applied on the equipment. I would rather lose the realism of attition on the manpower than have the manpower sucked out to fuel the units. The manpower component could the be subjected to losses from combat such as land combat or bombardment, but shielded from the attrition from fueling vehicles and using ammunition, making it possible to have more choices than a stationary experienced army or a mobile green one.
I am aware that I am merely speculating!
Another concern that is less clear is what the effects will be on attrition. I do not know, but I am worried. How does manpower, units and attrition tie together? The attrition rates will have to be higher if they reflect the useage of supplies and fuel than what they would have been if they had reflected merely accidents, disease, desertions and sometimes partisans. Will this higher attrition be applied on the units' manpower? Will my people die to fuel the units' movements? What would the effects be on the units' experience then? Will elite units turn green by a relatively harmless movement if it is long enough?
I am hoping that the manpower component is kept separate from the equipment components of a unit, so that attrition will only be applied on the equipment. I would rather lose the realism of attition on the manpower than have the manpower sucked out to fuel the units. The manpower component could the be subjected to losses from combat such as land combat or bombardment, but shielded from the attrition from fueling vehicles and using ammunition, making it possible to have more choices than a stationary experienced army or a mobile green one.
I am aware that I am merely speculating!
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I just thought of an idea that would be easy to implement a supply system that is player controlled. On top of building actual units, like divisions, you build supply divisions. These supply divisions use trucks or horse transport or whatever, so essentially they are land transport divisions, but you build them in different levels based on the capacity you need. So lets start with say a corps level supply depot (any lower would be too micro intensive) or an army sized one. It has x capacity for supply and follows the army it is attached to. That supply division requisitions supplies from a higher level division, say an army group level unit. That one in turn requisitions from a theatre unit which requisitions from the factory themselves. But the supply units can fill some of their requests if they are closer to the source of the requests than their higher level HQs. So if there is heavy fighting outside Stalingrad the ammunitions factories which historically existed there supply (as much as they can) the units requesting ammo from their divisional units. There would be no need for micro of these units beyond keeping them in range of the units they are supplying. Any overage would have to have their requests filled from farther back higher HQs. But it would also allow you to stockpile resources close to offensive areas prior to the battle by simply having extra supply units in reserve. Then of course the transport system (or lack thereof) would be the limiting factor in getting the supplies from the depot units to the troops, but it would eliminate the nonsense of having all supplies and fuel coming from the capital city. It would also work for naval units as well, where you could simply build tankers/supply ships to support invasions.
The side benefit of doing it like this is that the battles would focus more around cutting off supply lines and capturing supply depots or HQs, as it did like 99% of the time in land based warfare in WWII.
You could even potentially make these HQ units responsible for the overall supply and overall organization of its lower units, meaning that surrounding an army would cut it off from supplies but capturing its HQ would not only capture its supplies but also give a huge hit to its morale and organization.
I talk about this because a huge problem in HOI3 was that it was more like WW1 than WW2 largely due to the province structure of the map but also there was no real transportation matrix that gave any movement bonuses or actual goals to the AI to be mobile. It all ended up a technological stalemate with high attrition with corps level head bashing over useless provinces just like WW1.
In reality the only times in WWII a front STOPPED moving was either bad weather, bad terrain, poor roads or when the advancing army ran out of fuel and ammunition or when it meant the outcome of the war and every defending troop knew it.
The side benefit of doing it like this is that the battles would focus more around cutting off supply lines and capturing supply depots or HQs, as it did like 99% of the time in land based warfare in WWII.
You could even potentially make these HQ units responsible for the overall supply and overall organization of its lower units, meaning that surrounding an army would cut it off from supplies but capturing its HQ would not only capture its supplies but also give a huge hit to its morale and organization.
I talk about this because a huge problem in HOI3 was that it was more like WW1 than WW2 largely due to the province structure of the map but also there was no real transportation matrix that gave any movement bonuses or actual goals to the AI to be mobile. It all ended up a technological stalemate with high attrition with corps level head bashing over useless provinces just like WW1.
In reality the only times in WWII a front STOPPED moving was either bad weather, bad terrain, poor roads or when the advancing army ran out of fuel and ammunition or when it meant the outcome of the war and every defending troop knew it.
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See, this is a good example, how an unsound abstraction radiates through an entire model, in order to accomodate it.
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I recently learned that Japanese soldiers in jungle areas were expected to feed themselves. That gave me a thought. The ability to control how much supplies a unit should receive, and how much food there is in a region. I think food and equipment should be separated.
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They weren't expected to feed themselves. They were told to feed themselves because Japanese shipping was on the bottom of the ocean.
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I think the fundamental issue is one of results, not theory.
I like the theory of HoI3's system.. but [without playing, of course] I expect the results of HoI4's system will prove more realistic - and therefore a better method.
The 3 system was calculation-intensive.. but still produced the ridiculous effects as stated throughout this thread. So removing it was right..
Pdox should be commended for accepting that the 3 system couldn't be patched/tweaked to work as intended!
I don't care if I pay for all the gas a tank uses at the moment of production.. or throughout the game. It's the same amount of black gold.
Of course attrition needs to include oil and spares.. but attrition is a fantasy anyway, you can say it includes whatever you want. The important part will be how the supply/attrition/other modifiers function as Germany invades Russia / Japan invades China / Allies invade France, etc. But we'll never have the ridiculous supply issues that never went away from HoI3! Now they're looking to tweak other modifiers to accomplish the desired outcome -- Total number of functional tanks, spare parts needed, etc.
I like the theory of HoI3's system.. but [without playing, of course] I expect the results of HoI4's system will prove more realistic - and therefore a better method.
The 3 system was calculation-intensive.. but still produced the ridiculous effects as stated throughout this thread. So removing it was right..
Pdox should be commended for accepting that the 3 system couldn't be patched/tweaked to work as intended!
I don't care if I pay for all the gas a tank uses at the moment of production.. or throughout the game. It's the same amount of black gold.
Of course attrition needs to include oil and spares.. but attrition is a fantasy anyway, you can say it includes whatever you want. The important part will be how the supply/attrition/other modifiers function as Germany invades Russia / Japan invades China / Allies invade France, etc. But we'll never have the ridiculous supply issues that never went away from HoI3! Now they're looking to tweak other modifiers to accomplish the desired outcome -- Total number of functional tanks, spare parts needed, etc.
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Ehm I cant honestly imagine any troops in ww2 besides Japanese and maybe a few Russian ones to be completely ignored and told to feed themselves lol.....
I think the results of the new system will be very bad. As for theory versus results, I think the word You are subconsciously but obviously trying to avoid by speaking of theory is realism. I have not seen much discussion about theories in this thread.
You say You do not care whether You pay for all the gas a tank will use at the moment of production or throughout the game. It is the same amount of oil. Ehrm. No? It will for certain not be the same amount of oil. That is the whole point. Because not even the producer can know how much oil a tank will use because we cannot know when it will be knocked out and the game cannot know what we would have done with the tank during the span of its life, there is no telling how much fuel it will use in the future at the time of production. That is why it is better to exact the cost of producing the tank at the time of production and the cost of using a tank when it is being used. It is rather amazing how many people will stick their heads in the sand and deny this.
The oil cost at the time of production will HAVE to be some approximation of the weapons average lifespan and type of useage (stationary vs highly mobile). This is an inferior solution compared with measuring the oil consumption based on the ACTUAL way the weapon is used.
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The way i see it it's less about getting a representative amount of fuel usage as it is about getting representative effects of having or not having access to oil.
It's not representative to be unable to supply adequate amounts of new vehicles to air wings and divisions because you're lacking oil. It's not representative to have to build new vehicles once getting oil to replace those destroyed vehicles that should just have been starved for fuel. It's not representative to be able to use your existing vehicles without issue while lacking any oil and so on.
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No, it's not the same. Because if you cannot afford to pay all the lifetime fuel use at the moment of production you get no equipment at all even if you would have had the factory to build it and the fuel to operate it during its lifetime.
So the result is really not the same even if the total amount of black gold is the same.
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I think it is a shame that the devs haven't been on this thread since as there is a lot of misunderstanding going on in regards to the new supply system which really needs them to clear up.
From my understanding supply covers everything that the units need to be supplied with. From food, water, those all important socks, ammo, spare parts, fuel and possibly manpower. As long as you are in supply you are getting all of these things. All units will have a base consumption of supplies, based, I assume, on unit composition. So for example tanks will use more to simulate fuel usage. However as you move, fight, train etc. you consume more supplies. Therefore if you are finding you cannot supply all your units, you can as the player cut back on operations in that area, cease training/movement/combat etc. or you can move units out. The new interface should now tell you how many units you can have in an area, preventing you from overloading it in the first place unlike in HOI3 where you wouldn't know for sure.
Now this is where it gets extra confusing when you add in the new equipment mechanic.
If you cannot get enough supplies to your units, they will suffer increased attrition. If you think that even static units aren't truly static, men and equipment will be moving within the province, rotating from the front etc. As such accidents happen, jeeps crash, soldiers walk over mines, tanks lose tracks etc. If you cannot replenish these loses, as not enough supplies are coming through, they start to mount up. You begin to cannibalize parts of other pieces of equipment meaning you start to lose the total number of operational pieces of equipment. That's where your equipment stockpile comes in. If you are producing PzIIIs your tank units will get those as replacements. If however you have started producing PzIVs then those will be the replacements your units get up until you run out and they start using the old stockpile of PzIIIs again. You are not using the tanks to refuel the tanks just to replace those that were lost beyond repair.
It was mentioned previously by the devs (IIRC), we no longer produce supplies because, in effect that is a pointless exercise. We and the AI will always produce enough supplies for our units so to have to move a slider around or tick a box, press a button etc. to do this is just unnecessary. Add to that that in HOI3 mostly everyone had full supply and fuel stockpiles they have decided to abstract it out. The issue now is can we get those supplies (which includes fuel) to our troops by protecting those convoy routes and the infrastructure carrying them.
This applies to the naval units also. They do not run on fairy dust but supplies and if they can be supplied they can function fully as they have all the food, ammo and fuel they need. This however leads to the not so historical situations where the IJN and RM can carry on functioning as long as they have supplies regardless if they have lost access to oil resources. As a player you can either destroy the ships, knowing they cannot be replaced easily. Or you can destroy the infrastructure supplying them preventing them from functioning fully so in effect knocking them out.
From my understanding supply covers everything that the units need to be supplied with. From food, water, those all important socks, ammo, spare parts, fuel and possibly manpower. As long as you are in supply you are getting all of these things. All units will have a base consumption of supplies, based, I assume, on unit composition. So for example tanks will use more to simulate fuel usage. However as you move, fight, train etc. you consume more supplies. Therefore if you are finding you cannot supply all your units, you can as the player cut back on operations in that area, cease training/movement/combat etc. or you can move units out. The new interface should now tell you how many units you can have in an area, preventing you from overloading it in the first place unlike in HOI3 where you wouldn't know for sure.
Now this is where it gets extra confusing when you add in the new equipment mechanic.
If you cannot get enough supplies to your units, they will suffer increased attrition. If you think that even static units aren't truly static, men and equipment will be moving within the province, rotating from the front etc. As such accidents happen, jeeps crash, soldiers walk over mines, tanks lose tracks etc. If you cannot replenish these loses, as not enough supplies are coming through, they start to mount up. You begin to cannibalize parts of other pieces of equipment meaning you start to lose the total number of operational pieces of equipment. That's where your equipment stockpile comes in. If you are producing PzIIIs your tank units will get those as replacements. If however you have started producing PzIVs then those will be the replacements your units get up until you run out and they start using the old stockpile of PzIIIs again. You are not using the tanks to refuel the tanks just to replace those that were lost beyond repair.
It was mentioned previously by the devs (IIRC), we no longer produce supplies because, in effect that is a pointless exercise. We and the AI will always produce enough supplies for our units so to have to move a slider around or tick a box, press a button etc. to do this is just unnecessary. Add to that that in HOI3 mostly everyone had full supply and fuel stockpiles they have decided to abstract it out. The issue now is can we get those supplies (which includes fuel) to our troops by protecting those convoy routes and the infrastructure carrying them.
This applies to the naval units also. They do not run on fairy dust but supplies and if they can be supplied they can function fully as they have all the food, ammo and fuel they need. This however leads to the not so historical situations where the IJN and RM can carry on functioning as long as they have supplies regardless if they have lost access to oil resources. As a player you can either destroy the ships, knowing they cannot be replaced easily. Or you can destroy the infrastructure supplying them preventing them from functioning fully so in effect knocking them out.
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I agree with you except for:
While you can certainly "vote with your wallet", wouldn't it make more sense to express your preferences, even fight for them, so that it is more likely that changes may get made and your "vote" would be a purchase?
These forums exist for us, the players/readers/voters/participants to express our opinions. Paradox says that the Devs read the forums and take the feedback into consideration. So I take that as an open invitation, request even, to offer my opinions. It is certainly optional, but it is not, I feel, unreasonable to offer a vocal and strong opinion here. Regrettably though I can't "enforce" my personal preference on the game (oh, would that I could!), I can only agitate for the game I would like to see. I encourage everyone else to agitate for what they want too.
While you can certainly "vote with your wallet", wouldn't it make more sense to express your preferences, even fight for them, so that it is more likely that changes may get made and your "vote" would be a purchase?
These forums exist for us, the players/readers/voters/participants to express our opinions. Paradox says that the Devs read the forums and take the feedback into consideration. So I take that as an open invitation, request even, to offer my opinions. It is certainly optional, but it is not, I feel, unreasonable to offer a vocal and strong opinion here. Regrettably though I can't "enforce" my personal preference on the game (oh, would that I could!), I can only agitate for the game I would like to see. I encourage everyone else to agitate for what they want too.
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I understand the devs choice, and it's their game and their call, but when it comes to simulating the period or any large conflict, cutting out supplies introduces other issues. The issue with cutting out supply 'because you'd build it anyway' is that supplies accounted for a significant proportion of industrial output, and a larger proportion the larger the army got. You could equally make the statement 'everyone built an army, so let's abstract that out as well', and it would logically be just as appropriate. Rather, 'we cut out supplies because we thought people preferred to focus on the pointy end rather than logistics' would be how I see their approach. It's a reasonable game design decision, because it means players have less to think about strategically, but it's a distorting rather than abstracting decision. However, it's also reasonable that there are HoI players who appreciate the importance of logistics and would prefer a more rigorous logistical model, and will be trying to mod one in.
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I agree with you Axe. There should be some mechanic which accounts for the production of those supplies as this situation could lead to small nations having ludicrously oversized armies which they would have had no feasible way of supplying. Perhaps this will be revealed later on in other Dev Diaries. Supply production/armed forces limits could be based on total overall factory levels thus limiting armed forces sizes. This way you do not end up 'freely' supplying an armed force way beyond your means.
I was trying to clear up some of the misunderstandings that you have to produce tanks, to refuel tanks when it appears that being in supply is classed as refuelling them.
I was trying to clear up some of the misunderstandings that you have to produce tanks, to refuel tanks when it appears that being in supply is classed as refuelling them.
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The idea is to come up with an abstraction that comes to the same result over the course of some years -- not to precisely simulate Panther Ausf A #274's birth, life, and death.
It's not going to be perfect - but since we already gave up simulating oil and food levels from day to day, we need to come up with a mechanism for which the limit of all the oil usage over the course of the game is the same, integrated over time. I understand it has flaws. With apologies to Churchill, you might say that this is the worst possible supply system, except for all the rest that HoI has already tried and discarded.
Since you already assume that the factory needs and the oil needs would exist during the tank's lifetime.. what's the difference if the oil needs are subtracted at the beginning or over the course of the tank's life? Summing over all tanks/planes/ships and integrating over 39-45, the outcome is the same. One benefit is that there's much fewer calculations needed by the engine -- because the numerous day-to-day calculations weren't adding to playability.
Per day now, I'm only paying for new construction.. whereas before I was paying for the day-to-day use of tanks 1-10, planes 1-30, ships 1-40, and other units 1-50.. each of which modifies daily..
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