Quick Questions - Quick Answers

[Kovax]

Is Germany actually attacking your ships in the strait, or is it bombing Denmark? CAG Duty will only function if one of your fleets in the province is the target of the attack. Bombers can fly across that province with impunity.

More confusingly, bombers enroute to Denmark will never actually exist in your sea province, they teleport up to their maximum movement distance each hour and appear in the target province, never actually entering any of the provinces along the way. To intercept the planes heading to Denmark, you've got to Intercept them over the target, over their own airfield, or at whatever province they happen to make their hourly pause in along the way, if the distance is more than they can cover in an hour. If your fleet is in a province (or sea province) adjacent to the target, your planes may occasionally intercept them, but it's not very reliable.

 

[Ingelise]

Hey all, I'm playing the Black Ice mod and the Spanish Civil War just started in July 1936. I'm the Republicans. I can't seem to get my air units to fly missions. I set them to Ground Attack or Air Superiority or Strategic Bombing or whatever and they just sit there resting -- for days. Not one has ever flown a mission. They're in supply and everything seems okay but no droppa de bombas. What am I missing? Is there a tech needed in Black Ice to fly missions? Minimum organization? What is it?

 

[Count Blue]

Minimum organization? What is it?

If ORG is low the units might wait until ORG has a certain level (depending on stance - agressive/passive/defensive).
To test one could choose the mission "air superiority".
Because this one lets your plane instantly take off and you see if it works in principle or if something grave is ill.

 

[Kovax]

Hey all, I'm playing the Black Ice mod and the Spanish Civil War just started in July 1936. I'm the Republicans. I can't seem to get my air units to fly missions. I set them to Ground Attack or Air Superiority or Strategic Bombing or whatever and they just sit there resting -- for days. Not one has ever flown a mission. They're in supply and everything seems okay but no droppa de bombas. What am I missing? Is there a tech needed in Black Ice to fly missions? Minimum organization? What is it?

Supplies aren't usually the limiting factor for aircraft, it's Fuel. If their Fuel bar is empty, they can't fly, EXCEPT to rebase elsewhere. If there's even a few teaspoons of Fuel, they can run ONE mission without any issues, but then won't be able to fly again until the Fuel bar moves back up again. Normally, there's a delay of days or weeks (possibly over a month if they're far from your capital) until the game can draw Fuel from your capital all the way to the airfield where your planes are stationed. I sometimes place an Armored Car, MOT, or other fuel-hungry brigade at an airfleld before rebasing planes to it, so the planes can share the ground unit's fuel reserve until its own starts showing up. Also, as stated, you can't fly a combat mission without at least a bit of Organization.

I recall one screwed-up game (possibly the Black ICE mod) where both Nationalist and Republican Spanish aircraft were placed at the same airfield at the outbreak of the civil war. I couldn't do anything with my planes other than rebase them to somewhere else, and they were attacked the moment they left the ground. Weird.

 

[Wraith11B]

Hey all, I'm playing the Black Ice mod and the Spanish Civil War just started in July 1936. I'm the Republicans. I can't seem to get my air units to fly missions. I set them to Ground Attack or Air Superiority or Strategic Bombing or whatever and they just sit there resting -- for days. Not one has ever flown a mission. They're in supply and everything seems okay but no droppa de bombas. What am I missing? Is there a tech needed in Black Ice to fly missions? Minimum organization? What is it?

EDIT: Nevermind, didn't check that this was the HoI4 forum.

 

[Ingelise]

I think I found the problem. The range of the air units is extremely short but, for some reason, the game would allow me to set a more distant target, one they could not possibly reach. So they would sit there resting. Anyways, thanks for the suggestions.

 

[Johnnyvidya]

Thought I would revive this because I feel like I'll have more questions later and a whole thread doesn't really need to be devoted to it.

So I've picked up HOI3 after it's been sitting in my library for years and I really enjoy the game. I've been playing it for about two weeks now and I feel that I've learned a lot. I am still confused with a lot of game mechanics but I'm sure through playtime it'll weather out. My questions are kinda random, so I'll just list them out.

There are so many land, naval and air research techs. I find the naval and air ones especially hard to understand because I don't understand what their modifiers, besides organization, do to units. Should I aim to research everything in there that I'm using or intend to use later on? Are there certain nations that can skip out on a particular tech in the land doctrines? For example I don't think Germany would ever need the human wave tactics but what should I use besides all of the mobile warfare stuff?

How should I organize air and naval units? So far I have been only using air wings of purely one type of thing, 4 interceptors, 4 bombers, 4 multi role etc. Typically my interceptors are guarding my bombers and cas and my multiroles are either doing the same or ground attacking as well. I don't understand a thing about naval organization and tactics. I've been keeping submarines separate from my main fleets of light cruisers, destroyers and whatever else. What should an effective fleet consist of?

When you unlock the 5 brigades per division tech, is there a way to add them to existing frontline divisions without manually sending them up there and attaching them? The same thing with any other brigade, what I usually do is just move the two I want to merge into one province and combine them if there are too many units to sort through. Otherwise I just select them with the shift click option.

Should you mix armor and infantry into one corps? Should you have armor dedicated to a separate corps instead to possibly maximize traits and efficiency or is it situational?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Gamer_1745]

@Johnnyvidya

Here is my long, not quick, answer: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3dhz7KQXyI7ICVCM5E3nPA

The HoI 3 games are mostly with BICE.

 

[marxianTJ]

As far as techs go the general rules of thumb I go by are as such:

Majors can research EVERY land doctrine, at least one type of air craft (as in light, medium, or heavy), and every Infantry related tech, with some able to dip into tanks if they aren't super focused on their navy. Most majors have enough leadership to handle whatever it is you want to do - you really only have to start worrying about tech placement when you go with regional or minor powers who are just as limited by their ability to produce things at all as they are by their techs. Human Wave has one of the most valuable techs in the whole game because it reduces attack delay and virtually every nation will want to take it, even Albania! Some of the other HW techs won't be that useful to you if you're playing say, Germany, but some still will be nice in certain situations. Germany has an INCREDIBLE amount of leadership so you shouldn't feel pinched unless you're going way ahead of time in certain areas or trying to research literally everything (which Germany almost has enough LS to do and stay up to date in all things).

Air units: You're basically doing it right. Don't mix bombers and fighters into the same formation because the fighters will stay to fight and let your bombers get torn up in the process because they won't be able to leave either, but two separate formations in the same tile will behave normally.

Navy: It depends on what you want your navy to do. Subs being kept away from surface ships is a good idea. Transports being mostly kept out of surface fleets is also a good thing (just do with them as you do your air units, 2 formations in the same tile). You can basically do what you like with ships HOWEVER never, ever, mix a carrier with a capital gunship. Basically, screens (CLs & DDs) have a priority listing, and they'll stay near the ships with the highest priority, CVs have the very highest priority, and also do not close to fire in a battle, they actually run away. So all of your small ships will hang with the carrier far from the battle, while your battleships and so on rush forward and die because they will be the only target for the enemy fleet to shoot at. Anything else is typically fine unless you want the fleet to perform super specific functions, which are essentially just as much for role playing as they are for being efficient.

Typically once I get superior firepower, I just deploy the brigades into the tile I want, and if that's to inconvenient, I just don't bother with them and just build 5 brigades to my new divisions and leave the old ones at 4. You could use the quick deployment menu, but that would require knowing the names of the tiles fairly well and would take about just as long as dropping the brigades manually.

As far as Corps go it doesn't really matter. Any trait that benefits armor will also benefit most infantry formations. I prefer to keep them separate simply because they're easier to find that way.

 

[Barvinok]

In the 1941 scenario as Soviet Union, is a Dvina-Dnieper line possible to hold, or should I have retreated further?

 

[Sir Garnet]

You might want to check out the very extensive Q and A etc. for the HOI3 mod The Historical Plausibility Project

 

[Kovax]

To expand a bit on marxianTJ's post, the answers generally depend on which country you play and how you intend to play them. There are few "clear-cut" answers to tech research, other than a handful of "must have" techs and doctrines. These include:
- 4 basic infantry equipment techs, which some minors may not even need the Infantry AT weapons. Infantry is the basic unit of the game, so anything you do to improve them is important.
- Infantry doctrines such as Infantry Warfare and Mass Assault, which provide essential increases in Organization and Morale (Organization keeps a unit fighting, and it will retreat once it runs out of ORG; Morale restores ORG over time).
- the doctrine to reduce Attack Delay (which means your division doesn't sit there for a week after winning a battle).
Beyond that, everything else depends on what country you play and your objectives. As marxianTJ points out, Germany is ridiculously overpowered in terms of Leadership points, and can literally spam everything for the first couple of years; after that, it will need to pick and choose a bit. Note that researching ahead of time incurs a steep research penalty, so only do so for the most critical techs, and don't do so early or else you'll need to research them ahead a second time, and the extra Leadership days you spent on the initial research penalty will have been wasted.

Remember to keep your Officer Ratio up. At 100%, you're operating at "normal"; below that your units will break and run a lot more quickly, and you can boost them up to 140%. Ideally, you want it to be over 100%. Anything over 140% will be tracked by the game, but will not have any additional effect on combat. Note that Germany or the Soviet Union have sufficient IC to run their Officer Ratio down quickly, by building a lot of new military units. If playing GER, I try to pump 5 points of Leadership into it from the start, otherwise it will crash spectacularly when I start cranking units out in volume in 1938-39, and I still need to boost that further at some point.

Naval warfare relies heavily on having at least as many screens (DD, CL) as capital ships, or face a combat penalty, and as said, don't mix CV and BB or BC in the same fleet. CVLs have lower priority than BB, so you can add a CVL to a Surface Action Group (SAG). You can have a CV fleet and a SAG in the same sea province without any problems. Depending on the skill level of your Admiral, you can often create a massive doomstack and have him negate most of the stacking penalties.

3-5 fighters per group seems to be the norm. I prefer 3, because I can have two groups in the same province (either INT+TAC or 2xINT) without crippling stacking penalties. 4-6 Interceptors work well as a single group against tough opposition, but you'll actually do LESS total damage if you accidentally have two groups in the same place. Depending on mission, stacking penalties are either -10% effectiveness per plane, or -10% effectiveness after the first plane. Flying a mission which uses a -10% efficiency per plane, the total firepower is:
1 @ -10% = 1x0.9 = 0.9
2 @ -20% = 2x0.8 = 1.6
3 @ -30% = 3x0.7 = 2.1
4 @ -40% = 4x0.6 = 2.4
5 @ -50% = 5x0.5 = 2.5
6 @ -60% = 6x0.4 = 2.4
9 @ -90% = 9x0.1 = 0.9
30 @ -90% = 30x0.1 = 3.0 (penalty capped at -90%) a "doomstack" of 25+ planes will deliver as much, or more, damage than 5, but would be FAR more effective if split into groups of 4-6.

Running 6 planes will divide up damage 6 ways, and may be slightly more "survivable" than 5, despite the marginally lower firepower. Note that CAG stacking penalties are lower (-5% per plane), so you can "doomstack" up to 10 CAGs without reducing total firepower.

 

[Riktol]

Naval warfare relies heavily on having at least as many screens (DD, CL) as capital ships, or face a combat penalty, and as said, don't mix CV and BB or BC in the same fleet. CVLs have lower priority than BB, so you can add a CVL to a Surface Action Group (SAG). You can have a CV fleet and a SAG in the same sea province without any problems. Depending on the skill level of your Admiral, you can often create a massive doomstack and have him negate most of the stacking penalties.

So when playing as the UK I shouldn't stick my starting battlecruisers with my carriers? But I could run 2 fleets in parallel and just split it in half? If both parts were in the same battle, would the escorts in the carrier part stick with the carriers or would they move forward to protect the BC? If the CV kept half the escorts that would still make the fleet under-powered compared to a normal fleet.
But sticking 1 escort carrier with each battleship fleet will be OK?

 

[Kovax]

You can run a surface action group (BB or BC fleet) and a separate CV fleet in the same sea zone without any problems. As soon as you put the CV in the same fleet with a BB or BC, the escorts will hang back to protect the carrier, leaving your BBs and BCs hanging out to dry. Normally, the escorts draw as much fire as the capital ships, but the odds of those shots hitting are far worse. That in effect armors your capital ships, by drawing more than half of the inbound shots (assuming that you've got more screens than capital ships) toward targets that are unlikely to be hit.

CVLs, unlike their full-sized CV counterparts, have a lower priority than BB or BC, so you can mix them. The CVL will attempt to hang back on its own (although its slower speed may or may not be sufficient to maintain the range if the enemy is trying to close), while the DDs and CLs protect the highest priority ships up front. As long as the CV or CVL runs CAG Duty (the default mission for carrier planes), any air attacks on your ships will first be engaged by your CAG group, and still have to trade shots with the AA on the ships if it does get through. Meanwhile, your CV or CVL will "fire" its CAGs as extreme-range guns (provided that they have a shred of ORG left, and even if they're busy dogfighting), doing some damage to the opposing ships. CAGs are already a fairly powerful naval tool in 1939, and get a lot stronger as the game goes on. With CVLs, one CAG is barely enough, and will be easily de-ORG'ed. I try to build 2 CVLs to boost Carrier Practical, while I finish researching another round or two of engine techs before putting 2-4 "real" CVs in the production queue. Those CVLs can be handy for supporting my BB fleets during the early phases of the war while I wait for the CVs to come on line.

 

[Riktol]

You can run a surface action group (BB or BC fleet) and a separate CV fleet in the same sea zone without any problems. As soon as you put the CV in the same fleet with a BB or BC, the escorts will hang back to protect the carrier, leaving your BBs and BCs hanging out to dry. Normally, the escorts draw as much fire as the capital ships, but the odds of those shots hitting are far worse. That in effect armors your capital ships, by drawing more than half of the inbound shots (assuming that you've got more screens than capital ships) toward targets that are unlikely to be hit.

CVLs, unlike their full-sized CV counterparts, have a lower priority than BB or BC, so you can mix them. The CVL will attempt to hang back on its own (although its slower speed may or may not be sufficient to maintain the range if the enemy is trying to close), while the DDs and CLs protect the highest priority ships up front. As long as the CV or CVL runs CAG Duty (the default mission for carrier planes), any air attacks on your ships will first be engaged by your CAG group, and still have to trade shots with the AA on the ships if it does get through. Meanwhile, your CV or CVL will "fire" its CAGs as extreme-range guns (provided that they have a shred of ORG left, and even if they're busy dogfighting), doing some damage to the opposing ships. CAGs are already a fairly powerful naval tool in 1939, and get a lot stronger as the game goes on. With CVLs, one CAG is barely enough, and will be easily de-ORG'ed. I try to build 2 CVLs to boost Carrier Practical, while I finish researching another round or two of engine techs before putting 2-4 "real" CVs in the production queue. Those CVLs can be handy for supporting my BB fleets during the early phases of the war while I wait for the CVs to come on line.

That's great but doesn't quite answer my question.
If I have 1 fleet with CV x3 and DD x3 and another fleet with BC x3 and CL x3, and both fleets get into a battle in the same sea province, will the DD (which are in the same fleet as the carriers) move forward to screen the BC or will they hang back to screen the CV?

 

[marxianTJ]

The DD's would stay with the CV because they're part of the CV fleet and will thus hang near the object in their fleet with the highest priority (the CVs). The CVs will actively run away, and thus the DDs will actually get further and further from the battle as it goes on. However your CLs which are in your BC fleet, will stay with the BCs because they have the highest priority in their respective fleet, and will move towards the enemy because the BC is moving towards the enemy.

If you for example had a fleet of 2 BBs and 4 DDs, and another fleet with 3 CAs and 4 DDs, all of the DDs would close in (move towards) the enemy fleet because all of their capital ships in their fleets will be moving forward to come into gun range. The CA would likely even take more damage, at least at first, because BBs have a longer firing range, and thus will stop moving towards the enemy fleet before the CAs would, so there would be a few rounds of combat where the CA fleet would present a few more available targets than the BB fleet.

If you threw a CV + 3CL fleet into the mix described above in the same tile, the 3 CLs would stay with their CVs and actively move away from the enemy fleet, in order to stay with their CVs.

So in any case it's highly unlikely for screens which are tied to CVs to ever see naval gun battles unless you get unlucky and the enemy fleet starts out VERY close to you (this can happen in bad weather) or if the enemy fleet is VERY fast and can catch up to your fleet as you run away.

That's the whole reason why mixing capital gunships and CVs into the same formation is so bad - because the CVs will begin combat far away, and spend the whole encounter trying to make the distance longer, and every screen in the fleet will follow them - whereas the gunship will go *towards* the enemy and will get shot to hell because it's the only available target for the enemy's guns, and capital gunships are not particularly agile or able to avoid enemy fire.

Another thing to note, is that fleets which are devoid of capital ships, will *always* move towards the enemy and so as to be able to fire, as of all gunships, the only ships which run away in combat are CVs, LCVs.

For example the reason it's safe to include LCVs and BB/BCs into the same fleet, is that BBs have a priority of 9 (second only to CVs), and thus while the LCV will spend the whole battle running away, the BBs, and any/all screens included will follow the BBs as they move forward to come into firing range.

Another funny thing on the subject is that transport ships have the LOWEST priority of all ships, so their movements will always be ignored by every ship in the fleet lol. That's why it's best to keep them separate (generally) so you can just start banging on the retreat button and hope to get them out of whatever predicament they're in, while any separate combat fleets in the area engage the enemy.

 

[Big Nev]

...

Another funny thing on the subject is that transport ships have the LOWEST priority of all ships, so their movements will always be ignored by every ship in the fleet lol. That's why it's best to keep them separate (generally) so you can just start banging on the retreat button and hope to get them out of whatever predicament they're in, while any separate combat fleets in the area engage the enemy.

I think this is correct. At least, it's a correct representation of what should happen if an invasion fleet is attacked. It's not that the other ships in their fleet ignore them, it's that the other ships in their fleet do everything they can to protect them.

Including sacrificing themselves.

A little abstract in the way it's implemented, perhaps, but accurate in the outcome.

 

[Didz]

It's also logical that if the attacker focusses on destroying the escorts then the convoy is as good as dead anyway, and you can take you time sinking them. That was always my tactic when playing Silent Hunter. Sink the escorting destroyers first, then you can simply surface and finish off the entire convoy with your deck gun and save your torpedoes.

 

[Kovax]

That is part of why there were a few armed merchantmen mixed into some convoys, armed with light guns. They were no use against a capital ship, but enough to put some hurting on a torpedo boat or surfaced sub, or even do light superstructure damage to a Destroyer. Your 37mm deck gun on the sub was about on par with what could be shooting back at you (generally a dual-purpose 40mm "pom-pom" gun or two), although you would be a harder target to hit in the sub.

 

[thedarkendstar]

That is part of why there were a few armed merchantmen mixed into some convoys, armed with light guns. They were no use against a capital ship, but enough to put some hurting on a torpedo boat or surfaced sub, or even do light superstructure damage to a Destroyer. Your 37mm deck gun on the sub was about on par with what could be shooting back at you (generally a dual-purpose 40mm "pom-pom" gun or two), although you would be a harder target to hit in the sub.

I did always question why a sub wouldn't surface after they took out the escorts and just deck gun the ships nice to know.