Free Repair "Fix" = Bombs away!

[Neural Reaction]

Free repair (the speed at which buildings repair without any factories) is minimally clamped to 1% regardless of debuffs or BASE_FACTORY_REPAIR in defines.lua. BASE_FACTORY_REPAIR was originally defined as 0.3% per day, but still with the 1% clamp. Paradox eventually changed the define to 1% for the appearance. The define and clamp means every building will repair in 100 days so it's hard for strategic bombing to keep up with free repair. I also don't like the idea that 1 civ needs 2160 days to build another civ, but 0 civs can fully repair one in 100 days.

I have provided a removal of the 1% clamp for repair using Cheat Engine in the attached zip file. You can also change the BASE_FACTORY_REPAIR from the CheatTable so you don't have to mod it if you don't want to. It should work in multiplayer if all players use it, but I didn't test that. Note there's still a bug with construction research bonuses applying twice. Paradox please fix.

Before with BASE_FACTORY_REPAIR = 1 (or anything less than 1):

After with BASE_FACTORY_REPAIR = 0.3:

 

[Jays298]

There's been talk of an anti-naval bias, but I also think there's an anti-air bias that basically makes air force minimally useful / totally optional / only needed for micro, etc. As in the game, the air force is basically the equivalent of a rail gun or shore bombardment (outside of ground attack)

I would prefer to have mils permanently destroyed by bombing (production efficiency lost), maybe have nerf the passive repair like you stated.

 

[Happy Trigger]

I would prefer to have mils permanently destroyed by bombing (production efficiency lost), maybe have nerf the passive repair like you stated.

Having them permanently destroyed would not be fair, as many factories were repaired and put back to work. I agree with the loss of efficiency though. But I think that the solution relies in the supply system. Supplies should be required to complete a repair. So, the more distant, with less infrastructure, is a place, the longer should be a repair. If a place is across the ocean (from the capital of your nation), for example, than a construction/repair could be interrupted by Submarine Attacks. The same place could take longer to make repairs or to build factories, if it has low level ports and infrastructure. What do you guys think?

 

[stormsand9]

Having them permanently destroyed would not be fair, as many factories were repaired and put back to work. I agree with the loss of efficiency though. But I think that the solution relies in the supply system. Supplies should be required to complete a repair. So, the more distant, with less infrastructure, is a place, the longer should be a repair. If a place is across the ocean (from the capital of your nation), for example, than a construction/repair could be interrupted by Submarine Attacks. The same place could take longer to make repairs or to build factories, if it has low level ports and infrastructure. What do you guys think?

I think that's a great suggestion- Convoy raids already block resources and resource trade, troops, blocking overseas repairs and factories would be good as well.

 

[Herennius]

Even in case you bring enough bombers to offset free repairs, they mess up the overall bombing campaign - the permanent micro-repairs cause bombers to over and over attack the same closest region instead of spreading out to do real damage:

Strategic Bombing damage increases and decreases (almost exponentially) with the amount of factories in a state. adding more bombers has little effect

Summary Strategic Bombing damage increases and decreases (almost exponentially) with the amount of factories in a state. adding more bombers has little effect Platform Steam Operating System Windows 10 Game Version 1.14.3 Enabled DLC By Blood...

forum.paradoxplaza.com

 

[William9113]

Strat bombers are kinda perculiar in general, for example they bomb faster if there are more buildings in a state (10x faster for lvl 10 fort compared to lvl 1). Assuming they're actually you know, aiming the bombs, this is a bit silly

"Free repair" is also silly but as a gameplay abstraction I tolerate it, although yeah it should probably be lowered in value

Realistically of course equipment produced from a factory should have to travel from that factory but I imagine that's computationally intensive.

 

[quicklyrainbow]

They're peculiar, but they're also just... kinda useless? The air war, in a nutshell, boils down to getting enough fighters for green air, enough naval bombers to make up for not having a navy, and enough CAS to win ground engagements. It's tactical. There's really no strategic component involved. Free repair is a big part of that. The cost of strat bombers is another one. And frankly so is the extreme effectiveness of CAS in ground battles. There's just no point in putting a bunch of factory time into strats when you could make five CAS for every strat and double the effectiveness of your armor. CAS right now does what field artillery ought to do.

 

[Kanitatlan]

The current system of free repair is largely based on actual performance during the war. The dominant effect of bombing factories tended to be extremely temporary due to the fact that damage was generally extremely focused on the less essential elements of the factory. Bombs could easily cause extreme damage to factory buildings whilst imposing very little damage on the actual tools and equipment used for the actual production process. This means that factories could be back working in extremely short periods of time but with reduced efficiency that would be slowly recovered. What isn't simulated is that there would be some damage (on average) that required actual production to recover - if a bomb wrecks your lathe then you need a new lathe. Unfortunately this complexity would be very hard to recreate.

Also, we have the unfortunate situation that the impact of certain types of bombing fall into the Paradox "don't talk about it" and "we aren't going to explicitly include it in the game" category.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

fighting a good player who has total air dominance is already borderline unwinnable. i don't think tipping this more would be a good idea.

 

[pro.gamer.69]

fighting a good player who has total air dominance is already borderline unwinnable. i don't think tipping this more would be a good idea.

agreed. strat bombing (from strats and tacs alike) is extremely rehabilitating if you have less than ~30% air superiority, in that it destroys railroads, airbases and forts very efficiently, destroying the loser's ability to supply or contest air. factor in supply bombing and the situation gets even worse.

 

[quicklyrainbow]

I mean... it's a strategy game modeling one very particular war in which dominating air power was a critical -- maybe the critical, if you include the ability to produce and man those planes -- element in victory. I feel like the game's already tilted towards the implausible and making things fair and balanced over the realistic. If one side gets 70%+ air superiority and the other side doesn't have overwhelming advantages on the ground, the side with air power should win an overwhelming majority of the time, because that's how this war worked. The single-player historical experience is already wonky as hell; please let's not make it worse to serve either the multiplayer crowd or the alt-history crowd.

The current system of free repair is largely based on actual performance during the war. The dominant effect of bombing factories tended to be extremely temporary due to the fact that damage was generally extremely focused on the less essential elements of the factory. Bombs could easily cause extreme damage to factory buildings whilst imposing very little damage on the actual tools and equipment used for the actual production process. This means that factories could be back working in extremely short periods of time but with reduced efficiency that would be slowly recovered. What isn't simulated is that there would be some damage (on average) that required actual production to recover - if a bomb wrecks your lathe then you need a new lathe. Unfortunately this complexity would be very hard to recreate.

Also, we have the unfortunate situation that the impact of certain types of bombing fall into the Paradox "don't talk about it" and "we aren't going to explicitly include it in the game" category.

This is true and a good point. One way of getting at this would be to buff the crap out of Concentrated Industry (especially when it comes to shifting production lines) and move the majority of the free repair to Dispersed Industry. It doesn't accurately model the effects of industrial production and repair and strategic bombing, but we also can't target power plants, raw resource production, or equipment in stockpiles (no attacking planes on runways if they don't have pilots assigned to them or ships in drydock that haven't been completed yet!). And it doesn't reflect the IC cost or production output differentials in building either ultra-bombproof factories underground or camoflauged dispersed sites under heavy forest cover, as the Germans had to, when compared with US industrial assembly lines.

I think people underestimate in these conversations just how much German manpower and production capacity was tied up in repair and anti-aircraft production. In 1944, one-third of artillery and optical production (glass lenses and so on) and two-thirds of radar, radio and signals equipment production and 20% of all ammunition production were used in anti-air defenses. Two million workers were employed either at AA guns or in repair crews. Between manpower, direct production consumption and destroyed or diverted production from bombing missions, German forces at both fronts received roughly half the weapons and equipment they could have otherwise expected.

 

[Kanitatlan]

I think people underestimate in these conversations just how much German manpower and production capacity was tied up in repair and anti-aircraft production. In 1944, one-third of artillery and optical production (glass lenses and so on) and two-thirds of radar, radio and signals equipment production and 20% of all ammunition production were used in anti-air defenses. Two million workers were employed either at AA guns or in repair crews. Between manpower, direct production consumption and destroyed or diverted production from bombing missions, German forces at both fronts received roughly half the weapons and equipment they could have otherwise expected.

This fair but I think the argument that strategic bombing is ineffective in game is also underestimating the cost of air defence to the other side. The above quote talks about 1944 but the figures for 1943 are more relevant because the cost to the German war effort of air defence significantly exceeded the impact of the bombing on air defence. Air defence does cost resources in game as well.

 

[quicklyrainbow]

This fair but I think the argument that strategic bombing is ineffective in game is also underestimating the cost of air defence to the other side. The above quote talks about 1944 but the figures for 1943 are more relevant because the cost to the German war effort of air defence significantly exceeded the impact of the bombing on air defence. Air defence does cost resources in game as well.

It does, but static AA only costs civilian factory production time. It doesn't require manpower or tradeable resources, and it doesn't have any supply weight -- those folks manning the AA guns need to eat, and they need shells and lubricants and spare parts.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

It does, but static AA only costs civilian factory production time. It doesn't require manpower or tradeable resources, and it doesn't have any supply weight -- those folks manning the AA guns need to eat, and they need shells and lubricants and spare parts.

"only cost civ production" --> massive opportunity cost. enough to make it not feasible in many cases. just because there isn't any clear upkeep cost beyond repairing the static aa in the game's timeframe doesn't mean you're not paying a massive cost to set up static aa, considering just how much of it you need to get good coverage against strat bombing and log strikes.

and even after all of that, you will still lose lots of trucks (30-60+ monthly) and some armored trains in zones with 25+ static aa and full radar coverage. this is cheaper than the ~30 monthly planes getting shot down, but it's a lot of investment just to get a somewhat favorable trade...and the moment you push out of that territory, log striking you is back on the menu, in contrast to having your fighters continue to cover.

again, hoi 4 is already massively favoring the side with air superiority. at present level of abstraction, it doesn't need more.

 

[quicklyrainbow]

"only cost civ production" --> massive opportunity cost. enough to make it not feasible in many cases. just because there isn't any clear upkeep cost beyond repairing the static aa in the game's timeframe doesn't mean you're not paying a massive cost to set up static aa, considering just how much of it you need to get good coverage against strat bombing and log strikes.

and even after all of that, you will still lose lots of trucks (30-60+ monthly) and some armored trains in zones with 25+ static aa and full radar coverage. this is cheaper than the ~30 monthly planes getting shot down, but it's a lot of investment just to get a somewhat favorable trade...and the moment you push out of that territory, log striking you is back on the menu, in contrast to having your fighters continue to cover.

again, hoi 4 is already massively favoring the side with air superiority. at present level of abstraction, it doesn't need more.

It massively favors air superiority because air superiority is massively favorful. Nerfing the effects of air power would be antihistorical. Where it's overly impactful is in ground support and CAS missions, which are much more impactful in-game than IRL. Those need to be nerfed. Whichever way the balance of CAS vs strategic bombing swings, the fighter v. fighter war is always going to be critical, and should be.

I don't care about multiplayer balance. This isn't Starcraft. There's a historical basis that needs to be respected.

 

[Kanitatlan]

It does, but static AA only costs civilian factory production time. It doesn't require manpower or tradeable resources, and it doesn't have any supply weight -- those folks manning the AA guns need to eat, and they need shells and lubricants and spare parts.

Yes but. It is true that they only require civilian factories. Personally I would prefer them to require military production but it would be quite different from any other production - military AA production is mostly light AA and static AA is mostly heavy. Using civilian factories does affect war production and it is reasonable for the infrastructure they require (flak towers and the like), perhaps adding AA equipment requirements would be nice. On the manpower issue static AA is rather special because it can be staffed by personnel that would be unsuitable for normal military operations as was the case for large quantities of German AA. To be honest I think the deficiencies are subtle enough to not be any sort of priority.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

It massively favors air superiority because air superiority is massively favorful. Nerfing the effects of air power would be antihistorical. Where it's overly impactful is in ground support and CAS missions, which are much more impactful in-game than IRL. Those need to be nerfed. Whichever way the balance of CAS vs strategic bombing swings, the fighter v. fighter war is always going to be critical, and should be.

I don't care about multiplayer balance. This isn't Starcraft. There's a historical basis that needs to be respected.

the gameplay ramifications of air advantage are already historical, even if the precise representation isn't (and due to scope limitations, can't be). if you're not fighting a brain damaged ai opponent, sufficiently red air is an insurmountable scenario. you just lose. that's the state of hoi 4 right now. yet somehow, lacking air needs to be nerfed despite that this is already the reality of the game?

 

[Kanitatlan]

the gameplay ramifications of air advantage are already historical, even if the precise representation isn't (and due to scope limitations, can't be). if you're not fighting a brain damaged ai opponent, sufficiently red air is an insurmountable scenario. you just lose. that's the state of hoi 4 right now. yet somehow, lacking air needs to be nerfed despite that this is already the reality of the game?

I think there are variations in just how bad red air is since there are 4 distinct air intervention effects and red air only fundamentally triggers one of them.

Air advantages are

1. Air superiority affects enemy defence
2. Level (count) of ground attack in battle applies modifiers to ground units
3. Ground attack capability does actual damage
4. Logistic bombing screws with supplies

If one player goes for the "low air support" strategy where they build enough air focused on fighters to effectively dispute the other sides air support then going no air as a counter could be quite effective. The key thing here as that no extreme version of an air strategy works unless you can confidently predict enemy air strategy, which of course you can do against the AI.

You can even mess with the enemy air strategy by your choice of ground units as your choices can significantly affect the average amount of combat width that is currently fighting across a front. Lower levels of engagement justify higher ground attack values in more expensive aircraft and higher levels of engagement invite the use of more numerous cheaper planes and/or fighter-bombers to make up numbers.

 

[Vlad123]

Yes but. It is true that they only require civilian factories. Personally I would prefer them to require military production but it would be quite different from any other production - military AA production is mostly light AA and static AA is mostly heavy. Using civilian factories does affect war production and it is reasonable for the infrastructure they require (flak towers and the like), perhaps adding AA equipment requirements would be nice. On the manpower issue static AA is rather special because it can be staffed by personnel that would be unsuitable for normal military operations as was the case for large quantities of German AA. To be honest I think the deficiencies are subtle enough to not be any sort of priority.

I want remember in 43 and 44 germany produce TONS of AA and their parts,ammo etc...this was a huge shift of production

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I think there are variations in just how bad red air is since there are 4 distinct air intervention effects and red air only fundamentally triggers one of them.

Air advantages are

1. Air superiority affects enemy defence
2. Level (count) of ground attack in battle applies modifiers to ground units
3. Ground attack capability does actual damage
4. Logistic bombing screws with supplies

If one player goes for the "low air support" strategy where they build enough air focused on fighters to effectively dispute the other sides air support then going no air as a counter could be quite effective. The key thing here as that no extreme version of an air strategy works unless you can confidently predict enemy air strategy, which of course you can do against the AI.

You can even mess with the enemy air strategy by your choice of ground units as your choices can significantly affect the average amount of combat width that is currently fighting across a front. Lower levels of engagement justify higher ground attack values in more expensive aircraft and higher levels of engagement invite the use of more numerous cheaper planes and/or fighter-bombers to make up numbers.

if enemy has multi-roles or strats they can also just bomb your non-logistics too. however, even the 4 above are insurmountable at similar skill levels.

• you can offset the air superiority penalty with aa, though support aa isn't fully sufficient for this.
• you can mostly block cas damage with support aa + commando with camo expert stacked ( <10% damage with all of support aa, general, and fm with trait), although it is quite difficult to roll or farm enough generals to have this on everyone.
  • you can shoot down lots of planes if you make a ton of division aa
  • however, the enemy can switch to log strikes then, forcing you to also invest an incredible amount of cic into state aa to not become helpless due to low supply
• you can't really force low vs high levels of engagement unless you're attacking. even if you are attacking, you're doing so in red air against full enemy combat width most likely...you don't want a "low level of engagement" then (enemy width advantage), plus at any moment enemy can extend width by doing counter support attacks etc. if enemy is attacking you, they dictate the width instead.
  • unless you shut down log strikes, pushing into enemy air zone where your state aa isn't in play is just asking to get all your logistics bombed out and then you're not going to push anymore because you have no supply. this is completely oppressive; even the ai's level of "micro" can beat the player if player lets logistics get bombed out. you simply don't have the stats or org to hold up to even the most braindead battleplanning then.

these factors together mean it costs way more to counter air with no air than it does to make the planes.

there are lots of legit criticisms of hoi 4 but given the above, i find it hard to believe that the threat presented by enemy planes in hoi 4 doesn't at least approximate its historical threat, considering that neglecting massive investment against enemy planes one way or another will result in losing the war outright.