Hi everyone,
Here is the second Developer Diary for the Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes DLC.
With Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes, you will be able to play the United States of America and only them, but like you never played it before in an Hearts of Iron game.
In this diary, we will talk about three news features:
+ A new face of war
+ Famous US divisions
+ The nerve of war
+ Awakening of the Giant
+ Lend-Lease
+ A-historicity
+ AI on steroids
+ Battlescenarios
We also decided to include unique units such as 101st Airborne or the not-so-useful Paramarine regiment and some more. Those units are meant to be carefully used by the player as they go with some unique stats but also at a great risk: if you lose them, you won't have the opportunity to play with them again until your next campaign (or reload).
As Ciceron wrote someday: "nevros belli, pecuniam infinitam" which means "endless money forms the nerves of war", in Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes you will need money to transform your post-1929 crisis country into the leader of the free world. In HOI3 money is not that important, because we don't have any crisis mechanisms and start the game as a happy President of the rich United States. In this DLC, you won't.
The first thing we changed in the game was the 1936-1939 course of action. We added several Strategic Effect in order to depict the economic shape of the country by the time. No field is spared: you have less IC, less leadership and less manpower until you solve those internal problems with a good politic, i.e. with money. Lots of. Each Strategic Effect has a decision you can fire as soon as you have the required cash. Each solution may have a different price so you have to decide in which order you want to fire them. Start with the bank reforms and earn more money (ergo fire decisions more quickly)? Rush the manpower decisions in order to build your pool ASAP? Make your decisions and live with your choices, you always can retry a campaign after this one and try another reforms' rate.
Beside the classic HOI3 trade system allowing you to exchange ressources for cash we added two Japan related commercial agreements. They may not have been that important in History but in DI:S&S you will have to decide if you want to receive money from Japan in exchange of oil and fuel for their war machine, or if you want to stop that as soon as possible and prevent their industry to run at full capacity. Basically, they help you build up your army but you make them more and more powerful as time goes by. You decide the balance here.
The whole idea of this Nerve of War feature is to make you feel the slow build up of the country and let you decide the general directions you want to follow. The 36-39 years aren't a chevron 4 fast-forward piece of cake as in HOI3, now you have to think, plan ahead and take action!
But be careful with your choices, because a surprise could come if you solve your way out of the depression too quickly and don't keep enough cash in reserve...
For The Motherland added a new feature: Battlescenarios. Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes will allow you to re-enact one famous Operation and try out a fictionnal one.
OPERATION OVERLORD
I won't offense you by explaining what operation this one was. I just want to say that you start at June 1st 1944 and have several timed objectives. In order to win, you have to make it at least equal or better than the historical operations. For instance you have to take Cherbourg before July 1st, or Paris before August 25th otherwise the Axis will earn victory points. Since the date is starting a few days before the actual operations, you have to decide where you want the landing to happen. By no means you are obligated to assault Normandy.
OPERATION DOWNFALL
I'll quote Wikipedia here:
The scenario is taking place at March 1st 1946, with Southern Japanese Island Kyūshū under Allies control. You have until 1948.1.1 to take Tokyo and reduce the Japanese army down to 25 brigades (starting 184).
Here ends the second Dev Diary, we hope you enjoyed it.
Dies Irae Team, Danevang and Devildread
--Bonus picture:
You can re-enact Operation Overlord in the 1944 scenario as well. Now the leadership of units has been transfered to USA (you even control UK and French units through Exp.Forces). Check your supply situation and use your transport planes to support your troops and keep them supplied!
Here is the second Developer Diary for the Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes DLC.
With Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes, you will be able to play the United States of America and only them, but like you never played it before in an Hearts of Iron game.
In this diary, we will talk about three news features:
+ A new face of war
+ Famous US divisions
+ The nerve of war
+ Awakening of the Giant
+ Lend-Lease
+ A-historicity
+ AI on steroids
+ Battlescenarios
Famous US divisions
As in Götterdämmerung, Dies Irae: Stars&Stripes will put you in charge of some famous US divisions through the war, with special events, techs and units. In the buildable units we have US Marine Corps included with special counter and amphibious armored unit, Rangers battalions to boost your foot divisions or National Guard infantry as some sort of super-Militia (but still not as strong as regular Infantry). You can build those as much as your Industrial Capacity and manpower can handle. The USMC has its own technology tree as you can see in the screenshot below. We decided to make it some sort of reduced elite battalion in the early game and then as the war goes by (and the techs get researched) you can slowly renforce the US Marine Corps up to full division status and shiny amphibious toys to deploy in the Pacific!We also decided to include unique units such as 101st Airborne or the not-so-useful Paramarine regiment and some more. Those units are meant to be carefully used by the player as they go with some unique stats but also at a great risk: if you lose them, you won't have the opportunity to play with them again until your next campaign (or reload).
The nerve of war
As Ciceron wrote someday: "nevros belli, pecuniam infinitam" which means "endless money forms the nerves of war", in Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes you will need money to transform your post-1929 crisis country into the leader of the free world. In HOI3 money is not that important, because we don't have any crisis mechanisms and start the game as a happy President of the rich United States. In this DLC, you won't.
The first thing we changed in the game was the 1936-1939 course of action. We added several Strategic Effect in order to depict the economic shape of the country by the time. No field is spared: you have less IC, less leadership and less manpower until you solve those internal problems with a good politic, i.e. with money. Lots of. Each Strategic Effect has a decision you can fire as soon as you have the required cash. Each solution may have a different price so you have to decide in which order you want to fire them. Start with the bank reforms and earn more money (ergo fire decisions more quickly)? Rush the manpower decisions in order to build your pool ASAP? Make your decisions and live with your choices, you always can retry a campaign after this one and try another reforms' rate.
Beside the classic HOI3 trade system allowing you to exchange ressources for cash we added two Japan related commercial agreements. They may not have been that important in History but in DI:S&S you will have to decide if you want to receive money from Japan in exchange of oil and fuel for their war machine, or if you want to stop that as soon as possible and prevent their industry to run at full capacity. Basically, they help you build up your army but you make them more and more powerful as time goes by. You decide the balance here.
The whole idea of this Nerve of War feature is to make you feel the slow build up of the country and let you decide the general directions you want to follow. The 36-39 years aren't a chevron 4 fast-forward piece of cake as in HOI3, now you have to think, plan ahead and take action!
But be careful with your choices, because a surprise could come if you solve your way out of the depression too quickly and don't keep enough cash in reserve...
Battlescenarios
For The Motherland added a new feature: Battlescenarios. Dies Irae: Stars and Stripes will allow you to re-enact one famous Operation and try out a fictionnal one.
OPERATION OVERLORD
I won't offense you by explaining what operation this one was. I just want to say that you start at June 1st 1944 and have several timed objectives. In order to win, you have to make it at least equal or better than the historical operations. For instance you have to take Cherbourg before July 1st, or Paris before August 25th otherwise the Axis will earn victory points. Since the date is starting a few days before the actual operations, you have to decide where you want the landing to happen. By no means you are obligated to assault Normandy.
OPERATION DOWNFALL
I'll quote Wikipedia here:
Operation Downfall was the Allied plan for the invasion of Japan near the end of World War II. The operation was canceled when Japan surrendered after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Soviet Union's declaration of war against Japan. The operation had two parts: Operation Olympic and Operation Coronet. Set to begin in October 1945, Operation Olympic was intended to capture the southern third of the southernmost main Japanese island, Kyūshū, with the recently captured island of Okinawa to be used as a staging area. Later, in spring 1946, Operation Coronet was the planned invasion of the Kantō Plain, near Tokyo, on the Japanese island of Honshū. Airbases on Kyūshū captured in Operation Olympic would allow land-based air support for Operation Coronet.
The scenario is taking place at March 1st 1946, with Southern Japanese Island Kyūshū under Allies control. You have until 1948.1.1 to take Tokyo and reduce the Japanese army down to 25 brigades (starting 184).
Here ends the second Dev Diary, we hope you enjoyed it.
Dies Irae Team, Danevang and Devildread
--Bonus picture:
You can re-enact Operation Overlord in the 1944 scenario as well. Now the leadership of units has been transfered to USA (you even control UK and French units through Exp.Forces). Check your supply situation and use your transport planes to support your troops and keep them supplied!