Sir CarcassI have been shown the end of my worldRound Rock, TXRegistered Userregular
I haven't played as Japan, but I'd imagine fighting China would be similar to fighting Russia as Germany. I basically have divisions to hold the line to keep their hordes back, and slowly punch through and surround weak spots with tanks and artillery to keep the line moving. It's still probably going to be a huge slog.
While to be fair I haven't played HOIV for a long time, the main issue with Japan vs. China is good defensive terrain for China, terrible supply limits for everybody, and very long movement times between provinces. You probably want to surround and kill most of their army near the coast before you start pushing inland, and either way it'll take awhile to actually capture all their territory.
Not as bad as invading Siberia from the east though.
I'm a fan of hold the line, marines land behind and encircle part of their forces, and then push forward to the new line and repeat. It's not as easy as doing it in Italy, but China capitulates relatively quickly.
My last attempt was doing ok, but I had Historical Focuses turned off and Marco Polo didn't trigger the war, and then Manchukou became Qing China and stabbed me in the back. I think I was mostly confused by min-maxer stuff that youtubers and multiplayers do. Seems like my plan would have eventually worked if the game were in historical mode. China yet again threw 650k bodies at me within the first few months of the war.
Also, any nation fighting a war in the pacific or asia should invest in logistics company technology. The less supply your units need to fight the more war power your can pack in each province. That will win you some fights almost by default when you get into the lower infrastructure areas in asia or pacific islands. Units that are in supply move so much faster and mobility will win you the war.
The real key to playing as Japan in China is to make sure you're encircling and destroying the Chinese troops rather than pushing them back - the Chinese will win a war of attrition.
The big strength of the Japanese position is the naval supremacy in the seas around China. You can launch multiple invasions into the major industrial areas of China. Using naval invasions it's possible to trap a significant portion of the Chinese army around Beijing where you can destroy them.
I haven't played HOI4 for some time. Has Germany been nerfed at all? It was a real struggle to beat them as the allies.
I never got too comfortable or familiar with the Navy stuff. As Germany I would just pump out a bunch of subs to put out into the Atlantic areas around the UK and such. Did the naval DLC make it any ..hm, clearer or something?
If the general reddit consensus is to be believed, the navy DLC just resulted in...different weird naval spam.
But from what I've seen everyone thinks spamming subs is a pretty great strategy post DLC, so sub spam away!
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Zavianuniversal peace sounds better than forever warRegistered Userregular
edited December 2019
Speaking of China, I've been wanting to try playing as them. All I know is they have bicycle troops, which seem awesome yet squishy. What are some good strategies/research focuses?
And I have all the DLC except the navy one, though I'm interested in it for the new national focuses, not so much the new navy micromanagement meta
EDIT: apparently bicycle divisions are Japan only
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Sir CarcassI have been shown the end of my worldRound Rock, TXRegistered Userregular
For navies I like to have fleets of subs doing convoy raiding, fleets of destroyers to protect shipping lanes (and supply lines), and then a couple of large fleets for general use, but I mainly use them during naval invasions.
I know not much has happened in this thread lately, but I saw that Kaiserreich finally released the China revamp. It sounds really interesting so I'll probably give it a go, though one of the things I struggled with in my most recent game as Japan was the fuel and navy stuff. Does Kaiserreich use the fuel mechanic and the new method of ship design that I had such a hard time with? In particular I found it impossible to earn enough naval experience to actually design a new ship without blowing through completely ridiculous amounts of fuel that was necessary for my land war in Asia, and then when I ended up at war with the USSR I was having extreme difficulty dealing with their submarines.
That run was fairly interesting, because Germany actually ended up with the Sudeten Crisis firing and Hitler being assassinated, which resulted in a Civil War with the other side joining the Allies and holding the German coast, which naturally ended up with a severe lack of Nazi Germany to distract the world from the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere. I was able to defeat China easily enough (barring one screwed up naval invasion anyway), but Communist China joining the Comintern was a surprise. They were in their own faction with Sinkiang so I figured it was safe to declare, but I didn't notice that they had absorbed Sinkiang which dissolved the faction. Also it was the only time I saw China back down from the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, so I got Beijing for free but then had to fabricate on each China individually which was a hassle.
Anyway, anybody played Kaiserreich lately? I haven't done anything with it in quite some time, and have actually only played the one game where fuel was a resource.
I wish the game had become more engaging than it did. The naval update only seemed to add a bunch of micromanagement with little discernible benefit unless you really like ensuring your ships have year-accurate radar and torpedo tubes. Minefields are also more micromanagement; they also seem to have marginal effectiveness for the amount of effort they require. I don't know if the AI does'nt use them much or their effects aren't well reported to the player or they're ineffective. The fuel is a decent change at least.
The dev obsession with focus trees that make everything feel static and both weirdly tied to history yet inexplicably ahistorical. The roughness of the focus trees is especially evident now that they have a way more dynamic event system in place (that also more closely mimics all the past games). I want HOI2's events and tech with HOI3's politics and OOB and HOI4's production and resources.
I'm not sure any of the HOI games have had a really compelling naval game.
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Zavianuniversal peace sounds better than forever warRegistered Userregular
I wish the game had become more engaging than it did. The naval update only seemed to add a bunch of micromanagement with little discernible benefit unless you really like ensuring your ships have year-accurate radar and torpedo tubes. Minefields are also more micromanagement; they also seem to have marginal effectiveness for the amount of effort they require. I don't know if the AI does'nt use them much or their effects aren't well reported to the player or they're ineffective. The fuel is a decent change at least.
The dev obsession with focus trees that make everything feel static and both weirdly tied to history yet inexplicably ahistorical. The roughness of the focus trees is especially evident now that they have a way more dynamic event system in place (that also more closely mimics all the past games). I want HOI2's events and tech with HOI3's politics and OOB and HOI4's production and resources.
I'm not sure any of the HOI games have had a really compelling naval game.
oh I dunno, I had fun in my last game where a civil war broke out between Communist America and the Confederacy
I like that there's gamey stuff like if you bring back Trotsky you can get subversive activities reduction which basically lets you have global communist revolutions. The upcoming DLC adds stuff for Portugal and Spain which Im also kind of hyped about, I like the new focus trees they add with each DLC. As for the Naval stuff, I agree, I don't really like the new stuff they added, but then again I haven't played as the UK/Japan/US enough to really get into it, so I mostly just ignore everything Naval
Used lots of naval invasions to create fronts along the coast that China then had to send divisions to defend. One front in particular down by Nanking they were throwing men into the meat grinder 24/7 for like the entire war. The big thing I was doing wrong was I was over-manning the northern front beyond my supply limit, so all those divisions were under supplied while trying to attack. Once I chilled out a bit and got the supply situation right, I found I could push the Chinese back pretty easily. Eventually got to the point where I had 3 full armies on the northern border and China could only ever defend against two of them, so one was always advancing. I pushed hard in the far North and knocked out all those satellite nations, and then a final naval invasion in the far South broke their back as my three big armies were basically walking over them at that point.
Just quit the game after the China war as that was my objective. Tried a few games as Communist Brazil where I lightning-striked Venezuela, but it always ended with them joining the Axis and I end up invaded by Italians and Germans.
For navies I like to have fleets of subs doing convoy raiding, fleets of destroyers to protect shipping lanes (and supply lines), and then a couple of large fleets for general use, but I mainly use them during naval invasions.
IIRC this is what I did mostly. And shitloads of naval bombers for coastal areas.
Started a couple runs in Kaiserreich as Qing, but didn't really have much success, so decided to play as Russia again and this time have Savinkov as leader. It didn't seem terribly different from what I remember of the last time I played as Russia, but it's amusing enough since I haven't done it in a while.
One thing I did notice in all these runs is that the Ottomans were successful in holding things together every time. It really looks like the northern part of Saudi Arabia being impassable desert has made their lives a heck of a lot easier. Only the Russian run did I go far enough to get the Second Weltkrieg to fire off, and Germany just effortlessly curbstomped France. Granted the Kingdom of France was also involved in the war, and Austria intervened almost immediately, but the Second Weltkrieg was kind of just a sideshow war. Also the Pacific States never broke away, so the USA was actually winning the Second American Civil War. I'm not sure how common these occurrences are, the only one that happened consistently (partly due to game length) was the Ottomans dominating their opponents. Well that and Qing getting stomped I suppose.
As for the Kaiserreich China revamp, has anybody done much with that here? Qing has so far been kind of disappointing, I tried supporting Anqing but in the seven days it took my volunteers to arrive they were beaten so badly that all I could do was delay their inevitable defeat. I also watched a bit of a youtuber playing as Qing and the focuses that are supposed to let you deal with the other factions seem very underwhelming and/or non-functional. I really enjoyed the old version of Qing, but couldn't really get anything done as this version. Maybe I should take the loyalty path or the Manchu restoration path? I don't know, the independence path feels like there is very little I can do to influence the outcome, like even if I send all the available support I have to the Ma Clique they still get crushed between Mongolia and Tibet, and helping out with the famine in Sichuan doesn't make them like me even a little.
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Kane Red RobeMaster of MagicArcanusRegistered Userregular
edited January 2020
I've had similar experience as Qing, tried supporting Anqing and failed, tried Manchu restoration and got stomped by Fengtian. All around it seems pretty difficult to succeed as Qing, possibly deliberately.
Yeah I gave up as Qing for a bit and decided to try playing as Left KMT after watching a few videos. I'm starting to think I'm just bad at the game, because I've had a few really promising starts that fell apart when I was unable to finish off an enemy fast enough and got dogpiled. My most recent attempt would have been a smashing success if I had been able to annex Liangguang for free (which you can only do if the KMT rises to power there, and not the Right KMT either) like all the youtubers were able to, but instead I got stuck in a slog of a war and Qing decided they hated me and I had nothing to stop them with. I might be able to salvage the run if I can move a good chunk of my army to their border, which would require abandoning all hope of progress in the south just as I finally started making gains. If I go full defensive I might be able to hold off Qing long enough to Fengtian to dogpile them (Qing is currently fighting Shanxi and my Left KMT), but success is far from assured and I might have more fun just starting over again and hoping for better luck with Liangguang.
-edit- And I just realized there is a button that shows the alignment of all the various Chinese factions, that's super handy!
Yeah I did a recent Kaiserreich Japan run until I had all of asia. It was pretty good, but the German east asian fleet just didn't have the punch to hurt me and China fell like it usually does to good infantry with some doctrines and air support.
I did a russia run with Dmitri Romanov and it worked out fairly well. Hyper aggressive, built up industry, massive infantry army, didn't mess with Germany until the Syndacalists did, then was in Berlin before they knew what happened.
Kaiserreich is always a fun change of pace. I'll probably try a faction in the US civil war.
Anybody have any advice in general about the naval warfare stuff? I played a non-KR game as Japan a few weeks ago and I just wasn't able to get any meaningful naval experience even with doing fleet exercises, which crushed my fuel stockpile. Do I just need to bite the bullet and trade for oil / make synthetic refineries so I can exercise and get enough naval experience to actually use the new hulls I research? I get that they wanted to make the navy stuff more interesting, and I think it managed that, but it almost feels like too much as well.
I'm definitely not an expert on how navies work. That said, I'll offer some thoughts that others can agree/disagree with:
1) All things being equal, the big stack wins. This means that unless I'm doing a lot of simultaneous invasions (like those little islands in the pacific) and need to spread the fleet out to get regional coverage, I keep the fleet in a big stack. I'll split submarines off into a separate "theater" and divide them into groups of 6, set them on "low risk attacks" and then have them do their thing. If I'm a naval power, I'll also keep a "theater" of destroyers for convoy protection, split into smaller groups as well. But the main fleet is a big stack.
2) While the big stack wins, attrition is king. I build a LOT of naval bombers. Especially if I'm Germany or Italy and know that I'll be up against a larger fleet, but, unlike Russia, I'll have to deal with that at some point. I like to keep at least one squadron of about 200 naval bombers going (more if I can afford it) on naval bombing and port strike near an enemy fleet location. Obviously this group needs fighter cover and regular reinforcement. I've found that they do "nothing" for a bit but then cumulative damage starts to help tear up enemy destroyers and convoys, making the "big" fight easier, supporting my sub attacks, and generally making my life easier and their life harder.
3) I prefer carriers with naval bombers to other types. But you need a good mix in your "big stack". Something like 2-5 carriers with a mix of 2/3 naval bomber 1/3 fighter, any of the 3-7 battleships or "big" ships you started with (I never build newer models of heavy ships), and then I like double that for heavy cruisers (so about 8-20), double THAT for light cruisers (16-30), and double THAT for destroyers (30-50). The smaller stuff throws up a ton of "screening" and absorbs a lot of the other side's punch, while your heavy hitters pound away and your naval bombers just wreck stuff.
4) Like with land and air combat, doctrines are just silly important. And it almost doesn't matter WHAT doctrine as long as you have one and have progress in it. Given all the above, I prefer the base strike doctrine and I build out a lot on the submarine angle as well since I always have those out. I also like as advanced a naval bomber as I can afford (I usually prioritize fighters>tac bomber/close air>naval bomber> any other plane). But making sure you have progress in a doctrine is key.
5) ACTUALLY answering your question about experience, I will usually run drills after I get my fuel stocks maxed out, and stop them when I'm back to half stocks. If I see a war coming soon and my fuel stocks are down, I MIGHT sacrifice a civ factory to get an extra 8 units of oil pumping into the fuel reserve. But I don't honestly worry about naval experience so much as the above. Maybe I'm wrong here, curious about other thoughts.
That's some decent naval advice, I kind of wish that putting like destroyers and stuff out on patrol missions gave at least a little experience (I guess it might but I've not noticed?) so I could at least do something with my researched naval upgrades. When I played Japan I had a bunch of stuff researched that I just couldn't build because I had no experience to spend.
Anyway I finally have managed a pretty decent Left KMT run in Kaiserreich. Ming didn't support either the LEP or Anqing, and instead did the Manchu Restoration which was neat. I have only declared two offensive wars (Shandong / Millenarians and Yunnan) and have a solid chunk of China under my control. Sichuan became the Zhili Clique after the Manchu Restoration and puppeted Tibet, and the Ma Clique actually defeated the Mongolians and puppeted them. Then the Zhili Clique thought they could take Yunnan and me a the same time, and even brought the Ma and their puppet into the war. It didn't end well for them, I took all Zhili and Ma land and puppeted Mongolia, apparently Tibet didn't actually do anything so they ended up at peace and independent. Before I was able to finish the Zhili that jerk Li Zhongren (who refused to join the KMT central committee peacefully) declared on me, so I held him off while finishing off the Zhili, Ma and Mongolians, then dogpiled him with my still growing army. Oh also the Legation Cities collapsed and they all got occupied by the neighboring Chinese states except for Shanghai, which joined the Co-Prosperity Sphere, so I have all those ports back now. I think the one bordering Qing somehow went to Fengtian but whatever. The remaining Chinese nations are myself (National Revolutionary Government for now, Republic of China eventually), Shanxi, Qing, Fengtian and whatever the hell is going on over in Xinjiang (I have not paid any attention to that western region, and I'm not sure I will). Fengtian is independent, Shanxi exists I guess and Qing is actually under invasion by Japan and their lackeys.
Going forward I haven't decided what to do just yet. I'm thinking I will keep building up my army and take Shanxi, and if Qing starts doing poorly against Japan I guess go after Qing. I'm a little surprised the Fengtian haven't joined in, I'm sure they'd like to take Qing land as well. The problem with going after Qing is I don't want Japan to end up taking Beijing or something, that would be quite vexing as I'd have to go through Fengtian to get to Korea and be able to cause the Fading Sun event to fire I think. It's bad enough that Shanghai is part of their faction and provides a pre-made naval invasion, plus the one that Japan already has going against Qing. At least I am nearly done with the army reforms, and I have a pretty solid resource base and industry going.
The whole situation is still pretty volatile, but is at least going far better than my previous KR China attempts. Maybe after this I'll try Liangguang under Li Zhongren, I've heard good things about playing the Right KMT.
I think in every successful single player Japan game (KR or regular) I focus more on the Army than the Navy (and it's not really all that close). I mean, sure, you need resources. And yeah, you're eyeing the South Asia Resource Area like every other country in the game, because who doesn't want the world's rubber supply? But for Japan to actually punch near her weight, she needs civilian factories (the road through which all good things come). And to get them in the time frame you need, that means taking China. Japan before it takes China is a lot like Italy. After China, it's a lot more like Germany. And taking China means good division templates, infantry doctrine, and army focused PP, not to mention a pretty big army.
That's always been one of my challenges with Italy, I think: there isn't an easy way to go grab a bangload of factories. You either pick on Yugoslavia and Greece (which, 1) isn't that much to begin with and 2) leads directly to the Big War) or you can try to go way off script somehow. It's also tough to do the standard (but developer accepted) "cheat" of reducing your army to 1 division and training it to get enough Army XP to reform your division templates into something useful because you have to fight that Ethiopian war and then the Spanish civil war and by then you're in the time where you would want to build up an army not tear it down.
The best Italian runs I've done involved hitting yugoslavia hard from multiple directions, preparing really well for the 2-sided British-French war in North Africa, and keeping my beautiful navy in port so the British don't destroy it. Even then, I had trouble getting enough naval bombers and fighters in the air to work attrition on the British Med fleet. Will probably revisit this soon since I'm sure there's a reasonable path forward for Italy that doesn't rely on cheese and luck.
So an update on my Kaiserreich Left KMT game. Since Japan was invading Qing, and I really wanted Beijing and didn't want Japan to get a larger foothold in China (bad enough Shanghai is their puppet), I went ahead and jumped on Qing while they were busy. Since their army was busy, I was able to rapidly occupy all their land that wasn't full of Japanese soldiers, including Beijing, at which point they capitulated. Then something really interesting happened, Japan apparently didn't actually want any land or something because they had 0 points at the peace conference so either it was bugged or they gave all their points to me. Perhaps something to do with not wanting land they aren't directly connected to? Regardless, I got all the Qing land. I then immediately moved all my troops to the border of Fengtian, because I'm no fool. Sure enough, while my troops were still getting into position I got a communique from Fengtian asking if I was going to honor my agreement to give them some of Qing's land. Now I never made any sort of agreement with Fengtian, I never took the focus to negotiate with them or any decisions to do such, and never had any popups prior to this about cooperating with them in any way. So naturally I told them to piss off, there can be only one China, and for some reason they got mad and declared war on me. I did goof and forgot to reinforce the northern Mongolian border so I had to move some of my army up there, then once I stabilized that front I was actually able to push quite rapidly into Fengtian from Mongolia, which forced them to move troops up there so I was then able to push pretty easily from the south. Then I noticed they were unable to maintain equipment levels on the units that had been facing heavy combat, so after that I pretty much rolled them up at will. About three days before I took their capital, Japan decided to attack . . . Fengtian, for whatever reason. So once Fengtian capitulated I was able to take all their land, and I immediately moved all my troops to the Transamur, Korean, Shanghai and Siamese borders, assuming that the Co-Prosperity Sphere was coming for me next, and they are actually pretty scary with something like 50% more troops in the field than I had at the time. I, of course, kept training new troops but Japan didn't actually do anything, so I used the new troops to take out Shanxi, which pretty much united all of China except for East Turkestan, Shanghai and the German held coastal cities. I'm not sure I actually care about East Turkestan, but I am able to get a decision to attack them so I might try.
Really at this point there isn't a ton left to do. I might see if I can get Shanghai for free (if I'm reading the mod files right it should be a 50/50 shot at either direct annexation or a wargoal) and if not maybe go to war with the Co-Prosperity Sphere. I kind of want the German coastal cities back too, but that's tricky because the land is directly owned by the German Government in Exile, who is part of the Entente (who is losing rather badly) and some of that land is occupied by the Japanese right now, which also makes that a bit tricky as I don't really want to do anything to help the Germans, since they are the reason the KMT wasn't able to form the Republic of China in the 1920s in the KR timeline. I don't have any particular reason to hate the Japanese currently, except for them having Shanghai as a puppet, so it might be about time to call this run complete.
Just an update, I wrapped up my Left KMT run in Kaiserreich after Shanghai accepted my ultimatum and became part of China, and also Portugal capitulated and I was able to snag Macau for basically free. As the game ends, the Third Internationale owns Western Europe, Africa and Mexico, the Russian Sphere controls Russia (obviously), Eastern Europe and the Middle East, the Co-Prosperity Sphere consists of Democratic Japan, Josean Kingdom (Korea), Transamur, Philippines, Kingdom of Siam and a united India under Hyderabad. Then there is my China plus Mongolia puppet faction (and I could take Tibet but that sounds like a pain in the ass I don't really care). Canada is still technically in the fight, but the socialist USA is probably going to have something to say about that (for some reason my "pivot to Washington" focus was unavailable, I wouldn't have minded joining a faction with the USA). Also the 2nd American Civil War didn't end until 1945, it was pretty silly.
I was a little sad that I didn't get to grab the coastal cities that were under control of Germany-in-Exile when they capitulated, and I don't have Taiwan but that's alright. This result actually seems fairly "realistic" and is now my headcanon for how the 2nd Weltkrieg finishes. Kind of weird that China and Japan are basically the only democracies left standing, but this is a situation I could see being a bit interesting moving forward. The Third Internationale ends up in a cold war with the Russia Sphere, while the Co-Prosperity Sphere and the Chinese faction just kind of get on with business and move forward fairly peacefully. The USA probably goes their own way after absorbing Canada.
So there was an update to Kaiserreich that did some mostly minor changes I think. The Russia tree got updated to use the new decision system, and be tougher to focus lock (though this can still happen). Canada got some tweaks though I'm not sure exactly what changed there. I think some tweaks to China and Japan, and Mongolia I guess got buffed for some reason. So I decided to give Democratic Russia a try again.
I managed to avoid the civil war, stabilized the country and started expanding. I easily took the Central Asia provinces, though Germany blocked me when I went for Caucasia and Don-Kuban got invited to the Reichspakt. That actually blocked me from going after Transamur and Japan through the focus tree, though I had some interesting events with Ukraine about economic cooperation that resulted in four provinces getting a building slot and a civilian factory for free, and then Ukraine offered to leave the Reichspakt and join my faction which I considered declining, since some of the focuses and decisions require owning Kiev (or having a puppet own Kiev, but not an ally), but I figured I was democratic so I'd play nice and accept them into my faction. This enraged Germany beyond all reason, but I had moved my army to defend Ukraine as well as my own borders, so when Germany declared I was ready. I made initial gains while Germany's army moved into position, then held in place until France demanded Alsace-Lorraine (an extremely late demand, it was like mid 1939) and started the Second Weltkrieg. Once Germany moved troops back to the Western Front I started moving in and capitulating Reichspakt members one by one, including the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth which I hadn't seen since EU4. With France coming from the west and Russia from the east, Austria and their faction (they had all the Belgrade Pact members as puppets) intervened so I had to reposition my armies again. Once I stabilized the situation I pushed into Germany again and got to Berlin first, and in the peace deal against the Reichspakt I got everything except for Belgium and the Netherlands (Dutchland actually) and one bit of western Germany. This included Denmark but not Sweden. Then the Third Internationale noped out of fighting Austria through a white peace event or something, so I was technincally outnumbered at that point but I pushed forward regardless. One by one the Austrian faction (I cannot spell that for the life of me) fell, and Austria was down to a couple provinces when I noticed that their surrender threshold was -20% (they had 1% of their VPs controlled). I eventually had them down to a single tile, yet somehow they still had like 30 military factories and a million soldiers. Thankfully they did give up once I took their final province, so now I have a ton of puppets throughout Europe, basically everybody east of Italy and north of Greece (and part of Italy for that matter). Peace in my time!
Except that Iceland was independent and at war with me, and didn't even have any troops. So I naval invaded them and setup another puppet. Then I took out Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia, and at that point I'm kind of done I guess? I could go to war with the Ottomans (who are still fighting the Cairo Pact) or pick a fight with the Co-Prosperity Sphere through manual justification (I cannot access the decisions to try for a plebiscite in Transamur because Kiev is owned by an ally, not a subject or myself), but really I have most of Europe and a good chunk of Asia under my control so I may just call this run a success. It was pretty fun, though I dislike being locked out of the Eastern Asia decisions because I allied Ukraine. Heck the borders even look reasonably OK, no nasty enclaves or anything to mess up the map. The AUS is going to win the 2nd American Civil War, and I have no idea what is going to happen to the Entente but I doubt it's good because the Third Internationale is way stronger and has nobody else to fight, plus the Co-Prosperity Sphere is at war with the Entente as well. France, Britain and Spain are all syndicalist (somehow the syndicalists won the Spanish Civil War even though they were nearly dead at one point).
Overall I think this update fixed a good number of things that were annoying, including apparently fixing Austria's intervention in the 2nd Weltkrieg since they actually waited for Germany to be losing before jumping in this time, instead of instantly joining the fight like I've seen them do a bunch in the previous patch. Overall I rate this patch a solid 8/10.
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Zavianuniversal peace sounds better than forever warRegistered Userregular
edited June 2022
new DLC announced, By Blood Alone, which has new focuses for Italy, Ethopia and Switzerland https://youtu.be/IH-DgLg_iiQ
they have more in the latest dev diary announcement:
In By Blood Alone, you will chart the course of Mussolini’s regime in Italy or subvert Italy’s historical path in one of many new alt-historical paths in the new Italian focus tree, driven by the constant involvement in war from the beginning to the end of the game.
Choose to take on the task of resisting the Italian colonial occupation as Ethiopia in their new, expansive focus tree. Will you go into exile only to return stronger than ever when the greater conflict ignites, or can you beat the ultimate challenge and evict Italian troops from your land before forging a new path for your country in the prosperous Horn of Africa?
Experience the true meaning of ‘building tall’ by balancing your precarious situation as Switzerland, sandwiched between an ever-growing array of totalitarian regimes. Will you succumb to their pressure, or stand as a shining beacon of democratic ideals in the face of greater odds?
How often does this game's DLC go on sale, if ever?
Used to be a lot. Last few years, not so much.
"The western world sips from a poisonous cocktail: Polarisation, populism, protectionism and post-truth"
-Antje Jackelén, Archbishop of the Church of Sweden
Unfortunately that hasn't really included No Step Back much -- it's fairly recent and has only been down to $17 on those sales -- or the most recent one.
The Winter War: Relive the defining moment of Finnish history, defying the odds in a war against a much more powerful Soviet adversary.
A Powerful Sweden: The richest of the Nordic nations, Sweden is well-suited to a path of vigorous neutrality and to serve as both an arms designer and arms trader.
Norway: Relive the historical challenge of a young industrializing nation trying to stay neutral in the face of German aggression or prepare for war by quickly arming to resist the war that is coming to your doorstep.
Denmark: A long-standing policy of neutrality leaves Denmark unready for a continental war.
A War Machine of Your Design: To make sure you have an industry that matches your ambitions, national manufacturers and weapons designers can specialize their craft.
Guns for Butter: In the new International Market, you can become an arms exporting powerhouse, selling weapons to other nations in return for civilian factory output, increasing your own industrial production at home while fueling the fires of war abroad. This is a new way for rich and advanced neutral nations to stay viable and active in a world war.
New Military Options: Many updates and changes to the design and organization of military divisions, including customization of special forces units, divisional specializations, and more.
New Art and Music: New unit art, including Finnish snowmobile brigades, and 10 new songs inspired by the key cultures in Arms Against Tyranny.
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Zavianuniversal peace sounds better than forever warRegistered Userregular
Another new DLC announced for Hearts of Iron IV: Trial of Allegiance, focusing on a continent that up until now has received no love/content, South America! The focus appears to be on alt-history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iBXgrDqvn0
Write new alternate histories of the globe’s most dramatic conflict in Trial of Allegiance, a new content pack for Hearts of Iron IV. Explore and dominate a world where the strife of the Second World War threatens the safety and security of South American nations. Build a regional superpower to counter the rising global powers, or join the war early, taking your chances with one of the major ideological blocs. South America is rich in resources and manpower - can you lead Argentina, Brazil or Chile to a glorious alternate future?
Hearts of Iron IV: Trial of Allegiance includes: National Focus Tree for Brazil:
Challenged by a decade of internal strife and constitutional crises, Brazil can follow the historical path as a late but valuable member of the Allied cause. Alternately, seek continental hegemony under a new government with new priorities. National Focus Tree for Argentina:
Rife with corruption, revolts and worker unrest, Argentina presents a difficult political challenge. Once you’ve settled the problems at home, you can contribute more on the world stage and help this nation reach its full potential. National Focus Tree for Chile:
Chile is a vigorous republic with a radical tradition that must face domestic fascist parties, the embers of ethnic unrest and the imposing influence of the United States. Chart a course of equality and renewal, rallying under the banner of continental unity. Paraguay and Uruguay:
Minor content as well as several new releasable nations. New Art:
New 3D unit sprites for the Brazilian army, as well as new unique 2D art for National Focus trees and units New Music:
Six new songs, with two each for the major nations in the pack. New Voiceovers:
Voiceovers in Brazilian Portuguese, Argentinian Spanish and Chilean Spanish.[/quote[ https://store.steampowered.com/app/2695150/Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Trial_of_Allegiance/
Damn they neglect South America for 20 years then give us a South America DLC for Victoria 3 and HoI 4 back to back? I like it.
I bet Brazil is going to be one of the most played countries once the DLC releases, cause yeah people have been asking for some South America love since the game came out it seems like.
HOI4 DLC seems to be getting better and better with country focuses and unique mechanics, so excited to see what they come up with
(I really enjoyed Arms Against Tyranny, the new International Market makes playing as minor countries much more viable)
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Not as bad as invading Siberia from the east though.
The big strength of the Japanese position is the naval supremacy in the seas around China. You can launch multiple invasions into the major industrial areas of China. Using naval invasions it's possible to trap a significant portion of the Chinese army around Beijing where you can destroy them.
I haven't played HOI4 for some time. Has Germany been nerfed at all? It was a real struggle to beat them as the allies.
But from what I've seen everyone thinks spamming subs is a pretty great strategy post DLC, so sub spam away!
And I have all the DLC except the navy one, though I'm interested in it for the new national focuses, not so much the new navy micromanagement meta
EDIT: apparently bicycle divisions are Japan only
That run was fairly interesting, because Germany actually ended up with the Sudeten Crisis firing and Hitler being assassinated, which resulted in a Civil War with the other side joining the Allies and holding the German coast, which naturally ended up with a severe lack of Nazi Germany to distract the world from the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere. I was able to defeat China easily enough (barring one screwed up naval invasion anyway), but Communist China joining the Comintern was a surprise. They were in their own faction with Sinkiang so I figured it was safe to declare, but I didn't notice that they had absorbed Sinkiang which dissolved the faction. Also it was the only time I saw China back down from the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, so I got Beijing for free but then had to fabricate on each China individually which was a hassle.
Anyway, anybody played Kaiserreich lately? I haven't done anything with it in quite some time, and have actually only played the one game where fuel was a resource.
The dev obsession with focus trees that make everything feel static and both weirdly tied to history yet inexplicably ahistorical. The roughness of the focus trees is especially evident now that they have a way more dynamic event system in place (that also more closely mimics all the past games). I want HOI2's events and tech with HOI3's politics and OOB and HOI4's production and resources.
I'm not sure any of the HOI games have had a really compelling naval game.
oh I dunno, I had fun in my last game where a civil war broke out between Communist America and the Confederacy
I like that there's gamey stuff like if you bring back Trotsky you can get subversive activities reduction which basically lets you have global communist revolutions. The upcoming DLC adds stuff for Portugal and Spain which Im also kind of hyped about, I like the new focus trees they add with each DLC. As for the Naval stuff, I agree, I don't really like the new stuff they added, but then again I haven't played as the UK/Japan/US enough to really get into it, so I mostly just ignore everything Naval
Used lots of naval invasions to create fronts along the coast that China then had to send divisions to defend. One front in particular down by Nanking they were throwing men into the meat grinder 24/7 for like the entire war. The big thing I was doing wrong was I was over-manning the northern front beyond my supply limit, so all those divisions were under supplied while trying to attack. Once I chilled out a bit and got the supply situation right, I found I could push the Chinese back pretty easily. Eventually got to the point where I had 3 full armies on the northern border and China could only ever defend against two of them, so one was always advancing. I pushed hard in the far North and knocked out all those satellite nations, and then a final naval invasion in the far South broke their back as my three big armies were basically walking over them at that point.
Just quit the game after the China war as that was my objective. Tried a few games as Communist Brazil where I lightning-striked Venezuela, but it always ended with them joining the Axis and I end up invaded by Italians and Germans.
IIRC this is what I did mostly. And shitloads of naval bombers for coastal areas.
One thing I did notice in all these runs is that the Ottomans were successful in holding things together every time. It really looks like the northern part of Saudi Arabia being impassable desert has made their lives a heck of a lot easier. Only the Russian run did I go far enough to get the Second Weltkrieg to fire off, and Germany just effortlessly curbstomped France. Granted the Kingdom of France was also involved in the war, and Austria intervened almost immediately, but the Second Weltkrieg was kind of just a sideshow war. Also the Pacific States never broke away, so the USA was actually winning the Second American Civil War. I'm not sure how common these occurrences are, the only one that happened consistently (partly due to game length) was the Ottomans dominating their opponents. Well that and Qing getting stomped I suppose.
As for the Kaiserreich China revamp, has anybody done much with that here? Qing has so far been kind of disappointing, I tried supporting Anqing but in the seven days it took my volunteers to arrive they were beaten so badly that all I could do was delay their inevitable defeat. I also watched a bit of a youtuber playing as Qing and the focuses that are supposed to let you deal with the other factions seem very underwhelming and/or non-functional. I really enjoyed the old version of Qing, but couldn't really get anything done as this version. Maybe I should take the loyalty path or the Manchu restoration path? I don't know, the independence path feels like there is very little I can do to influence the outcome, like even if I send all the available support I have to the Ma Clique they still get crushed between Mongolia and Tibet, and helping out with the famine in Sichuan doesn't make them like me even a little.
-edit- And I just realized there is a button that shows the alignment of all the various Chinese factions, that's super handy!
I did a russia run with Dmitri Romanov and it worked out fairly well. Hyper aggressive, built up industry, massive infantry army, didn't mess with Germany until the Syndacalists did, then was in Berlin before they knew what happened.
Kaiserreich is always a fun change of pace. I'll probably try a faction in the US civil war.
1) All things being equal, the big stack wins. This means that unless I'm doing a lot of simultaneous invasions (like those little islands in the pacific) and need to spread the fleet out to get regional coverage, I keep the fleet in a big stack. I'll split submarines off into a separate "theater" and divide them into groups of 6, set them on "low risk attacks" and then have them do their thing. If I'm a naval power, I'll also keep a "theater" of destroyers for convoy protection, split into smaller groups as well. But the main fleet is a big stack.
2) While the big stack wins, attrition is king. I build a LOT of naval bombers. Especially if I'm Germany or Italy and know that I'll be up against a larger fleet, but, unlike Russia, I'll have to deal with that at some point. I like to keep at least one squadron of about 200 naval bombers going (more if I can afford it) on naval bombing and port strike near an enemy fleet location. Obviously this group needs fighter cover and regular reinforcement. I've found that they do "nothing" for a bit but then cumulative damage starts to help tear up enemy destroyers and convoys, making the "big" fight easier, supporting my sub attacks, and generally making my life easier and their life harder.
3) I prefer carriers with naval bombers to other types. But you need a good mix in your "big stack". Something like 2-5 carriers with a mix of 2/3 naval bomber 1/3 fighter, any of the 3-7 battleships or "big" ships you started with (I never build newer models of heavy ships), and then I like double that for heavy cruisers (so about 8-20), double THAT for light cruisers (16-30), and double THAT for destroyers (30-50). The smaller stuff throws up a ton of "screening" and absorbs a lot of the other side's punch, while your heavy hitters pound away and your naval bombers just wreck stuff.
4) Like with land and air combat, doctrines are just silly important. And it almost doesn't matter WHAT doctrine as long as you have one and have progress in it. Given all the above, I prefer the base strike doctrine and I build out a lot on the submarine angle as well since I always have those out. I also like as advanced a naval bomber as I can afford (I usually prioritize fighters>tac bomber/close air>naval bomber> any other plane). But making sure you have progress in a doctrine is key.
5) ACTUALLY answering your question about experience, I will usually run drills after I get my fuel stocks maxed out, and stop them when I'm back to half stocks. If I see a war coming soon and my fuel stocks are down, I MIGHT sacrifice a civ factory to get an extra 8 units of oil pumping into the fuel reserve. But I don't honestly worry about naval experience so much as the above. Maybe I'm wrong here, curious about other thoughts.
Anyway I finally have managed a pretty decent Left KMT run in Kaiserreich. Ming didn't support either the LEP or Anqing, and instead did the Manchu Restoration which was neat. I have only declared two offensive wars (Shandong / Millenarians and Yunnan) and have a solid chunk of China under my control. Sichuan became the Zhili Clique after the Manchu Restoration and puppeted Tibet, and the Ma Clique actually defeated the Mongolians and puppeted them. Then the Zhili Clique thought they could take Yunnan and me a the same time, and even brought the Ma and their puppet into the war. It didn't end well for them, I took all Zhili and Ma land and puppeted Mongolia, apparently Tibet didn't actually do anything so they ended up at peace and independent. Before I was able to finish the Zhili that jerk Li Zhongren (who refused to join the KMT central committee peacefully) declared on me, so I held him off while finishing off the Zhili, Ma and Mongolians, then dogpiled him with my still growing army. Oh also the Legation Cities collapsed and they all got occupied by the neighboring Chinese states except for Shanghai, which joined the Co-Prosperity Sphere, so I have all those ports back now. I think the one bordering Qing somehow went to Fengtian but whatever. The remaining Chinese nations are myself (National Revolutionary Government for now, Republic of China eventually), Shanxi, Qing, Fengtian and whatever the hell is going on over in Xinjiang (I have not paid any attention to that western region, and I'm not sure I will). Fengtian is independent, Shanxi exists I guess and Qing is actually under invasion by Japan and their lackeys.
Going forward I haven't decided what to do just yet. I'm thinking I will keep building up my army and take Shanxi, and if Qing starts doing poorly against Japan I guess go after Qing. I'm a little surprised the Fengtian haven't joined in, I'm sure they'd like to take Qing land as well. The problem with going after Qing is I don't want Japan to end up taking Beijing or something, that would be quite vexing as I'd have to go through Fengtian to get to Korea and be able to cause the Fading Sun event to fire I think. It's bad enough that Shanghai is part of their faction and provides a pre-made naval invasion, plus the one that Japan already has going against Qing. At least I am nearly done with the army reforms, and I have a pretty solid resource base and industry going.
The whole situation is still pretty volatile, but is at least going far better than my previous KR China attempts. Maybe after this I'll try Liangguang under Li Zhongren, I've heard good things about playing the Right KMT.
That's always been one of my challenges with Italy, I think: there isn't an easy way to go grab a bangload of factories. You either pick on Yugoslavia and Greece (which, 1) isn't that much to begin with and 2) leads directly to the Big War) or you can try to go way off script somehow. It's also tough to do the standard (but developer accepted) "cheat" of reducing your army to 1 division and training it to get enough Army XP to reform your division templates into something useful because you have to fight that Ethiopian war and then the Spanish civil war and by then you're in the time where you would want to build up an army not tear it down.
The best Italian runs I've done involved hitting yugoslavia hard from multiple directions, preparing really well for the 2-sided British-French war in North Africa, and keeping my beautiful navy in port so the British don't destroy it. Even then, I had trouble getting enough naval bombers and fighters in the air to work attrition on the British Med fleet. Will probably revisit this soon since I'm sure there's a reasonable path forward for Italy that doesn't rely on cheese and luck.
Really at this point there isn't a ton left to do. I might see if I can get Shanghai for free (if I'm reading the mod files right it should be a 50/50 shot at either direct annexation or a wargoal) and if not maybe go to war with the Co-Prosperity Sphere. I kind of want the German coastal cities back too, but that's tricky because the land is directly owned by the German Government in Exile, who is part of the Entente (who is losing rather badly) and some of that land is occupied by the Japanese right now, which also makes that a bit tricky as I don't really want to do anything to help the Germans, since they are the reason the KMT wasn't able to form the Republic of China in the 1920s in the KR timeline. I don't have any particular reason to hate the Japanese currently, except for them having Shanghai as a puppet, so it might be about time to call this run complete.
I was a little sad that I didn't get to grab the coastal cities that were under control of Germany-in-Exile when they capitulated, and I don't have Taiwan but that's alright. This result actually seems fairly "realistic" and is now my headcanon for how the 2nd Weltkrieg finishes. Kind of weird that China and Japan are basically the only democracies left standing, but this is a situation I could see being a bit interesting moving forward. The Third Internationale ends up in a cold war with the Russia Sphere, while the Co-Prosperity Sphere and the Chinese faction just kind of get on with business and move forward fairly peacefully. The USA probably goes their own way after absorbing Canada.
I managed to avoid the civil war, stabilized the country and started expanding. I easily took the Central Asia provinces, though Germany blocked me when I went for Caucasia and Don-Kuban got invited to the Reichspakt. That actually blocked me from going after Transamur and Japan through the focus tree, though I had some interesting events with Ukraine about economic cooperation that resulted in four provinces getting a building slot and a civilian factory for free, and then Ukraine offered to leave the Reichspakt and join my faction which I considered declining, since some of the focuses and decisions require owning Kiev (or having a puppet own Kiev, but not an ally), but I figured I was democratic so I'd play nice and accept them into my faction. This enraged Germany beyond all reason, but I had moved my army to defend Ukraine as well as my own borders, so when Germany declared I was ready. I made initial gains while Germany's army moved into position, then held in place until France demanded Alsace-Lorraine (an extremely late demand, it was like mid 1939) and started the Second Weltkrieg. Once Germany moved troops back to the Western Front I started moving in and capitulating Reichspakt members one by one, including the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth which I hadn't seen since EU4. With France coming from the west and Russia from the east, Austria and their faction (they had all the Belgrade Pact members as puppets) intervened so I had to reposition my armies again. Once I stabilized the situation I pushed into Germany again and got to Berlin first, and in the peace deal against the Reichspakt I got everything except for Belgium and the Netherlands (Dutchland actually) and one bit of western Germany. This included Denmark but not Sweden. Then the Third Internationale noped out of fighting Austria through a white peace event or something, so I was technincally outnumbered at that point but I pushed forward regardless. One by one the Austrian faction (I cannot spell that for the life of me) fell, and Austria was down to a couple provinces when I noticed that their surrender threshold was -20% (they had 1% of their VPs controlled). I eventually had them down to a single tile, yet somehow they still had like 30 military factories and a million soldiers. Thankfully they did give up once I took their final province, so now I have a ton of puppets throughout Europe, basically everybody east of Italy and north of Greece (and part of Italy for that matter). Peace in my time!
Except that Iceland was independent and at war with me, and didn't even have any troops. So I naval invaded them and setup another puppet. Then I took out Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia, and at that point I'm kind of done I guess? I could go to war with the Ottomans (who are still fighting the Cairo Pact) or pick a fight with the Co-Prosperity Sphere through manual justification (I cannot access the decisions to try for a plebiscite in Transamur because Kiev is owned by an ally, not a subject or myself), but really I have most of Europe and a good chunk of Asia under my control so I may just call this run a success. It was pretty fun, though I dislike being locked out of the Eastern Asia decisions because I allied Ukraine. Heck the borders even look reasonably OK, no nasty enclaves or anything to mess up the map. The AUS is going to win the 2nd American Civil War, and I have no idea what is going to happen to the Entente but I doubt it's good because the Third Internationale is way stronger and has nobody else to fight, plus the Co-Prosperity Sphere is at war with the Entente as well. France, Britain and Spain are all syndicalist (somehow the syndicalists won the Spanish Civil War even though they were nearly dead at one point).
Overall I think this update fixed a good number of things that were annoying, including apparently fixing Austria's intervention in the 2nd Weltkrieg since they actually waited for Germany to be losing before jumping in this time, instead of instantly joining the fight like I've seen them do a bunch in the previous patch. Overall I rate this patch a solid 8/10.
they have more in the latest dev diary announcement:
also getting a new Plane Designer, QoL improvements (guessing will be included with free patch) and "new functionality for owners of La Resistance and the intel system", peace conference overhaul, divisional commander system, new models/sfx/music tracks.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/developer-diary/announcement-hearts-of-iron-4-by-blood-alone.1530022/
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1880650/Expansion__Hearts_of_Iron_IV_By_Blood_Alone/
Used to be a lot. Last few years, not so much.
-Antje Jackelén, Archbishop of the Church of Sweden
It looks like basically every major Steam sale.
Unfortunately that hasn't really included No Step Back much -- it's fairly recent and has only been down to $17 on those sales -- or the most recent one.
I bet Brazil is going to be one of the most played countries once the DLC releases, cause yeah people have been asking for some South America love since the game came out it seems like.
HOI4 DLC seems to be getting better and better with country focuses and unique mechanics, so excited to see what they come up with
(I really enjoyed Arms Against Tyranny, the new International Market makes playing as minor countries much more viable)