Quick Questions - Quick Answers

Hey guys, some Qs on naval invasions / amphibious assaults.

1. Is it only possible to amphibiously assault provinces with naval bases? As Germany, I kept trying to invade UK provinces in Africa, but it did not work (the transports just went back every time upon getting to the adjacent sea province). Transports had full org.

2. Does that mean it is unnecessary to defend provinces without naval bases against invasions by AI? Right now as Germany I have a garrison division in every single coastal province from Spain to Denmark. Did I waste a lot of manpower and IC?

Starcraftmazter said:

1. Is it only possible to amphibiously assault provinces with naval bases? As Germany, I kept trying to invade UK provinces in Africa, but it did not work (the transports just went back every time upon getting to the adjacent sea province). Transports had full org.

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No you can invade anywhere, but you need to move fleet manually of shore and select divisions on the fleet and give them move orders.
If you have HQs or other divisions that can't attack the fleet will always instantly retreat using the invasion command.

Starcraftmazter said:

2. Does that mean it is unnecessary to defend provinces without naval bases against invasions by AI? Right now as Germany I have a garrison division in every single coastal province from Spain to Denmark. Did I waste a lot of manpower and IC?

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Nope, you and the AI can invade anywhere, but Ports are more important since you will need them long term to get supplies ashore and keep your troops in good fighting shape. Without a port secure your troops will run out of supplies within a month.

Starcraftmazter said:

Hey guys, some Qs on naval invasions / amphibious assaults.

1. Is it only possible to amphibiously assault provinces with naval bases? As Germany, I kept trying to invade UK provinces in Africa, but it did not work (the transports just went back every time upon getting to the adjacent sea province). Transports had full org.

2. Does that mean it is unnecessary to defend provinces without naval bases against invasions by AI? Right now as Germany I have a garrison division in every single coastal province from Spain to Denmark. Did I waste a lot of manpower and IC?

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1. Apparently this is a common problem when your HQs are in the boats: the HQ can't fight (if it doesn't have a front line brigade attached), so aborts the debarkation. Try ordering the transports to move, then manually selecting and ordering the attack for whichever div.s you want to make groundfall (the HQ can maybe stay in the boat until a landing has been cleared ). It's sometimes handy to keep the transports nearby, too, in case the ground troops get beaten back, or need to redeploy again (using the "invasion" order has them immediately return to their base port after drop-off, iirc). The other nice thing about ordering invasions manually is that you can split your divisions over several targets, e.g. either side of a fortified position.
2. In my experience, the AI doesn't seem to risk invasions a lot, if ever: they'd rather move troops to a friendly-held port and walk it (although I have seen the Allies land in occupied Yugoslavia in the earlies, but this may be because I set them some Victory targets).
My practice is to station some GAR in positions of strategic importance: coastal regions that count for VP, provide resources or IC, or that are easy to defend, and build up coastal forts there. The idea is, if the AI wants to invade, they'll have to contend with a landing zone that's heavily defended, or perhaps land in the middle of an empty plain, where they won't suffer from amphibious/fort penalties, but they will be under constant harassment by air, and have little cover when the tanks arrive.
Note: if your nation can't afford tanks or planes, you probably still can't afford to garrison every coastline, and your best strategy may be to hope that the AI is more concerned with fighting your more powerful friends to bother with invading your poor backwater nation!

edit: emu'd.
And yes, you don't have to attack ports directly, but they should be your next target so that you can bring in reinforcements and supplies; otherwise your nice expensive marine divisions will soon be dying of starvation.

Hi people,

I'm curently playing my first game as Romania. It's February 1939, and Germany asks me to join the Axis. Here is my situation:

- I conquered Hungary, Bulgaria and Yougoslavia
- My army is: 6 Corps of 2inf+ 1 art , 1 corps of 3*light inf (playing Black Ice mod) , 1 corps of 3*Mtn . I also got 2 Corps of 2( 2*LT+AC) and 3(2Mot+AC) .

I was wondering what i should do for my future. Shall i join the Axis? Will i be able to stand against soviet invasion? Or should i stay alone and take any opportunity i get to extend? I also precise i can't use the "buy prod licence" since it seems to be bugged and causees my game to crash.

Question: Playing as, e.g. SU, and Communist China is a member of the Comintern... is there any way of giving conquered Nat. Chinese territories to CC? For example, if I were to "conquer" Nationalist China, when the war is over, could I then "create puppet" the CC cores back? Or am I better off tag switching to CC and having them assign the wargoal? It seems like I would still keep any SU-controlled lands after the surrender, but CC definitely can't take on NC (and Shanxi) by themselves!

Edit: Another question!

Q2: I've recently deployed a transport plane and a small paratrooper division. I've let both units fully reorg, they're well supplied, the paras have boarded, and... the transport plane won't go anywhere. Well, if I told it to rebase, it might, but I thought the whole point of having paratroopers was that they were equipped to jump out of planes while still in the air? I've tried ordering an airborne assault on various targets (enemy-controlled, friendly-controlled, friendly-owned, and all in range, natch), but the plane just sits there "resting".
Am I missing something? If I leave it alone for a few hours, will it eventually get off its tin can and drop the paras where I want them? I'm invading Honshu from Hokkaido, and don't want my marines to end up Bay of Pigs-ed.

Thanks.

edit: edit!: In case anyone else wants to know the answer to this, it's...

...I'll tell you later (patience).

Some more questions

1. In HoI2, you could not get manpower from provinces not connected to your capital by land. Is this still the case in HoI3 or can you get manpower from anywhere? India for UK and China for Japan come to mind.

2. Playing as Japan, is it worth it to liberate India and the Dutch East Indies into puppets with the aim of getting a larger proportion of resources from them?

3. Is it just me or does USA have significantly less manpower (not base, but what you get to start and can get until you're at war)? Are there events that will give them a lot of it?

4. A carrier can have 2 CAGs, that right?

Starcraftmazter said:

Some more questions

1. In HoI2, you could not get manpower from provinces not connected to your capital by land. Is this still the case in HoI3 or can you get manpower from anywhere? India for UK and China for Japan come to mind.

2. Playing as Japan, is it worth it to liberate India and the Dutch East Indies into puppets with the aim of getting a larger proportion of resources from them?

3. Is it just me or does USA have significantly less manpower (not base, but what you get to start and can get until you're at war)? Are there events that will give them a lot of it?

4. A carrier can have 2 CAGs, that right?

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1. No, you receive manpower from any provinces you control, but this is reduced IIRC if they're occupied or non-core, and again quite harshly if they're on a continent on which you have no cores (so UK actually gets the full benefit of Indian regiments; including her colonies, she has cores on just about every continent/group in the world)

2. I couldn't say, I've never played as Japan. You might want to look out for provinces that supply fuel, though; you're bound to need it for a carrier navy.

3. Significantly less... than what? Than other nations? Than you expected? I'd imagine if the USA has sucky manpower in 1936, it's a reflection of them still recovering from the Depression. Not sure about manpower-boosting decisions/events; check the Wiki/files. Also, tech Agriculture!

4. Yep, and escort carriers only get one.

Another thing I always wonder, you know how for technology you have the coloured bars indicating knowledge for that area (be it practical or theoretical) and a corresponding number. Is having even more experience there than the highest bar (over 20 I think?) beneficial in terms of further bonuses to construction/research time - or does it merely give room for decay to occur without hurting them?


Also, I notice in the strategy guide, they often mix either all arm or mot/mech with spart or engi. Is it a bad idea to have some divisions with only combat brigades? In particular I really like having 4x Arm and 1x Mot because it gets the lowest possible 33% softness to get the combined arms, they are of equal speed and it can field 15 frontage. Is it better to have something like 4xArm with eng or 3xArm with 2 eng/1eng 1spart for mech divisions?


Additionally, is it possible to make the game end later than 1948?

soup_alex said:

Question: Playing as, e.g. SU, and Communist China is a member of the Comintern... is there any way of giving conquered Nat. Chinese territories to CC?

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Not without creating some sort of decision.

Q2: I've recently deployed a transport plane and a small paratrooper division. I've let both units fully reorg, they're well supplied, the paras have boarded, and... the transport plane won't go anywhere. Well, if I told it to rebase, it might, but I thought the whole point of having paratroopers was that they were equipped to jump out of planes while still in the air? I've tried ordering an airborne assault on various targets (enemy-controlled, friendly-controlled, friendly-owned, and all in range, natch), but the plane just sits there "resting".

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Is it later than 1948 in your game?

Ciaphas Cain said:

Not without creating some sort of decision.



Is it later than 1948 in your game?

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Rats, and

Thanks, but I did work it out (but was just being cryptic). The answer was to just let them be for a few hours, then they carry out the orders as you'd expect. Any idea if paratroopers recovering from airborne assault get any benefit from the tech that reduces attack delay?

Cheers, Commissar

@Starcraftmazter: Knowledge levels can go beyond 20, but as you guessed, the benefit to build/research speed stops there. I think the Wiki has a graph showing the effect of knowledge levels, somewhere... knowledge impact increases then decreases as knowledge level goes up, eventually capping out (there's more difference between knowledge 9 and 10 than between 19 and 20, for example, and no difference between 20 and anything above). Yes, there is the side effect of being shielded somewhat against decay, though.
No, there's nothing wrong with all-combat divs: you may get less punch per your frontage, but big, all-frontline divisions are more resilient than those that swap a combat brigade for a support.

Hard on Soft bonus.

I have seen a lot of references to it in various posts, but I cannot find it in either of the manuals or strategy guides. Where is this bonus documented at? Is it a global modifier in one of the files somewhere?

EDIT:
Nevermind. I found it in the defines.lua.

I sure do wish this was in the manual.

1. I've noticed that when changing the drafting policies to go closer to service by requirement, the base manpower always gets reduced when a new policy is enacted. Why is this? Is it temporary?

2. Playing as both Germany and Japan, raise national unity never does anything. I played Japan for 1.5 years from 1936, had 10 spies at home the entire time raising national unity - and it did not budge even by 1%. The only other impact on national unity was from fractured government which was much less than the spies. What is going on here? I need to increase unity to enact the best industry law...

3. I just tried to do a port strike, and the "Accept" button is greyed out, it says I need to select a second province? I don't understand, what if there is no second province with a naval base to attack in range - can naval bombers not bomb a single naval base for some bizarre reason?

soup_alex said:

@Starcraftmazter: Knowledge levels can go beyond 20, but as you guessed, the benefit to build/research speed stops there. I think the Wiki has a graph showing the effect of knowledge levels, somewhere... knowledge impact increases then decreases as knowledge level goes up, eventually capping out (there's more difference between knowledge 9 and 10 than between 19 and 20, for example, and no difference between 20 and anything above). Yes, there is the side effect of being shielded somewhat against decay, though.

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Here is the graph in question from the Wiki. But I don't really see what you mean with that it doesn't go beyond 20?

Alex, this is the graph I was thinking of:


...I didn't realise knowledge levels had different effects on research (my chart) and build (your chart) times. Neat!

Starcraftmazter:
1. Not sure, but the laws say something about "peacetime manpower rotation". No idea what this does, it could be related?
2. Raise National Unity seems to have very little effect; I think 10 spies will get you +0.3%. A month. No, that's not a lot (I've seen strategic convoy impact go as low as -2% per month). Still, it's enough to counteract the slow downward spiral of having FG, and your domestic spies to still seem to perform (some) counterespionage.
If it's that serious a problem, I think there are some events that can raise NU (and decisions like the great officer purge for SU).
3. When the air mission pop-up tells you to "select a second province", what it really means is to find another job for that wing/air detachment, because they don't have the range required to reach the target you're trying to set them. Try building air fields directly from the Production menu and holding them in "reserve", and prioritise fuel tank upgrades.

Just built several flying bombs in my first game, and I wanted to clarify how these work before trying them against England.

It says in the manual that 'rockets are continually replaced, so they can fire again.' So I'm assuming that it does actually make sense to assign leaders to the V-1 units and let them build organization, since they are not one-shot weapons?

Playing with all the add ons, fully patched. Are there no more country specific brigade pics? And why doesn't the AI use ANY planes I give it? They just sit in base, doing nothing at all.

Genosse said:

It says in the manual that 'rockets are continually replaced, so they can fire again.' So I'm assuming that it does actually make sense to assign leaders to the V-1 units and let them build organization, since they are not one-shot weapons?

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You have to replace them manually.

Falls101 said:

Are there no more country specific brigade pics? And why doesn't the AI use ANY planes I give it? They just sit in base, doing nothing at all.

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Not for every country and not for every tech level. Has the AI the agrassive air stance? Has the AI aircraft it can actually use? If you build lots of multi roles you're in deep trouble.

Falls101 said:

And why doesn't the AI use ANY planes I give it? They just sit in base, doing nothing at all.

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In my experience, the AI will not use it's air asset unless it also has land units (to support with it's planes). More divisions equals more efficient use of planes by the AI. An AI corps with 3-5 divisions won't use it's planes very much (although a single small bomber wing might work), but once you assign planes to army groups with dozens of divisions the AI uses rather nicely.

joeldaalv said:

In my experience, the AI will not use it's air asset unless it also has land units (to support with it's planes). More divisions equals more efficient use of planes by the AI. An AI corps with 3-5 divisions won't use it's planes very much (although a single small bomber wing might work), but once you assign planes to army groups with dozens of divisions the AI uses rather nicely.

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of course it is better to attach air units to HQs with divisions to support but the AI will use planes even without them.

Ciaphas Cain said:

You have to replace them manually.

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In that case, is flying bomb effectiveness increased by assigning leaders and letting them gain org, or is it all the same to just fire them as soon as they're built?