i also haven't seen it. however, load 3.06 and see if it is improved.
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i also haven't seen it. however, load 3.06 and see if it is improved.
no it can happen, and I'm pretty sure it could have happened historically too. for 3.02 patch (I think) the AI had such problems quite often, but after that I have not seen it very often at all, and those times its usually been that they overcomitted to counter a british support invasion and got bogged down too long to prepare for russian assault
Yeah an AI that knows who the player is in SP is the logical next step and something we have been talking about
And something I could find quite enjoyable, as long as the fine line between "challenge the player" and "realistic threat evaluation" is taken into account. If I want to play a teddy bear peacenik USSR not as much should be devoted to challenging me directly. As it is I'm happy with the AI choices, since while I like ahistorical, this is also a WWII simulator, and a dozen years is a much smaller time frame than other P-dox games.
90% of all my games are as Japan. I've never seen this problem with norway. Germany breaks sweden and hits norway thru sweden every time. If the UK attempts to rescue norway a pretty reasonable force repels the UK. I think the root of this problem is probably related to the players doing specific things with diplomacy or playing as a specific allied nation and doing something to the scandinavian nations with diplomacy.
That would be a great solution to balance issues. Could I also suggest you think about archetyped AI's as well? Instead of having 1 main AI, have various AI's with different themes to them and have them randomly deployed to each new game so that each game you dont always face the same boring AI strategies.
My experience is quite different: I have seen Germany get bogged down in Norway at least 60%-of the time. I have never seen Germany attack Sweden. I play as Japan quite often. Also, I'm not sure what you could do diplomatically to make Germany send nearly its entire army into Norway.
They actually historically did bog down out there, just in much smaller numbers and just around Narvik, but still, they did.
Maybe, it would help to tweek UK and FRA AI so that these countries pull out their forces once either FRA or ENG is conquered (would be not only reasonable to draw back units from such irrelevant parts of the world to help more important theatres of war, but also more historical). In such case, GER AI would not bog down in Norway for so long, because they would conquer the whole territory once they conquer mainland FRA (or ENG)...
Never seen Germany get bogged down in Norway, either it beats the Norweign Arse, or it does invade at all. I must admit the declaring war, but not even attempting a landing irks me a little.
Japan is a major swing power no matter the game and can either end up with AI world domination, or just utterly fail. I've noted that AI Japan generally does better if it doesn't end up in the Axis powers and you can help Japan out even more by making the Soviet Union very threatening. I believe it makes Japan prioritise ground and air force units more because of however the AI works, but I've not run tests to check.
I've seen Portugal invade Britian, and Germany a couple of times but in 90% of games a 'd-day' of some kind never happens after the fall of France which doesn't always happen, hell after I made some of my own subtle changes recently along PeterHoI3 lines I've seen Poland turn the tide on Germany, although I must admit this might have something to do with me going to war over Austria earlier in the game. (I don't like the Annexation most of the time when playing in Europe, it bugs me for some reason).
Rough change list to head off questions;
Mainly changed the build priorities of mid-minors to focus on a tad more armour and light airpower, and majors to focus a bit more on their navies (hence mid-minor/major land army ratios are more even): And seeing Russia go mondo crazy in the winter war with a truely penis sized battlefleet had me feeling a bit warm and glowy. Some minors go for additional border forts like France, others get 'aggressive' build priorities in line with them possibly being targets of player (i.e. my aggression) so that the Balkens actually now is a challenge even for Italy or Germany. SU not so much, nor Romania so long as I go the south then west route, but I might tweak things a bit more for that in Yugoslavia. Plus I've been having some fun with Denmarks script... ¬.¬
Japan is a major swing power no matter the game and can either end up with AI world domination, or just utterly fail. I've noted that AI Japan generally does better if it doesn't end up in the Axis powers and you can help Japan out even more by making the Soviet Union very threatening. I believe it makes Japan prioritise ground and air force units more because of however the AI works, but I've not run tests to check.
I've seen Portugal invade Britian, and Germany a couple of times but in 90% of games a 'd-day' of some kind never happens after the fall of France which doesn't always happen, hell after I made some of my own subtle changes recently along PeterHoI3 lines I've seen Poland turn the tide on Germany, although I must admit this might have something to do with me going to war over Austria earlier in the game. (I don't like the Annexation most of the time when playing in Europe, it bugs me for some reason).
Rough change list to head off questions;
Mainly changed the build priorities of mid-minors to focus on a tad more armour and light airpower, and majors to focus a bit more on their navies (hence mid-minor/major land army ratios are more even): And seeing Russia go mondo crazy in the winter war with a truely penis sized battlefleet had me feeling a bit warm and glowy. Some minors go for additional border forts like France, others get 'aggressive' build priorities in line with them possibly being targets of player (i.e. my aggression) so that the Balkens actually now is a challenge even for Italy or Germany. SU not so much, nor Romania so long as I go the south then west route, but I might tweak things a bit more for that in Yugoslavia. Plus I've been having some fun with Denmarks script... ¬.¬
Germany getting beaten like that is extremely rare. I've only see it once in the countless games i've played. I was the Soviet Union and it was 1941. I'm just sitting here waiting for the Germans to invade. Then a streak of blue on the map catches my eye. It turns out the French have somehow managed to push all the way to Berlin and conquer Germany. It was pretty crazy but i've only seen it once.
Sorry to have taken so long with this, here's the main problem areas:
RAF Withdrawing North
Royal Air Force doesn't plan on collapsing and getting every single fighter destroyed. The fighter wings were to be transferred to northern bases in Scotland to rregroup and rebuild out of the Luftwaffe's range. Come D-Day, the British can bring them back and contest the air somewhat.
Luftwaffe Doesn't Have The Right Planes and Tactics for Sinking Ships
The Luftwaffe can't actually keep the RN from intervening. They don't have any single-engine torpedo bombers at the time, no trained naval bomber forces, and had in fact done a pretty pretty embarrassing job of sinking easy targets up to that point. At Dunkirk, against sitting duck naval vessels loading troops in an enclosed space, they only managed to sink six out of forty-two RN destroyers. The tactics and technology that helped them score high kill rates later on around Malta and Crete simply have not been developed yet. And even in Crete, with the Luftwaffe in absolute control of the skies, they still couldn't protect transports by sea, and the paratroopers had to be reinforced from the air alone.
RN Home Fleet is Just Too Big and The Luftwaffe Has Too Much To Do
There are also just too many RN ships to hit. There's a carrier, five or six capital ships, and something like a hundred cruisers and destroyers based in the Home Fleet. They'll take some harsh punishment to be sure but even in the most ideal conditions, there's no way the Luftwaffe will be able to sink the majority of that fleet before it gets in the way. The Luftwaffe also has to divide its forces between other key missions as well, including close air support for the landings, maintaining air superiority, hitting the rail network, and raiding civilian targets to get the refugees onto the roads.
Negligible German Surface Fleet
Hardly any major German naval units even available. Bismarck's not done, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau are out of action, half the destroyer fleet was lost in the Norway campaign. If I remember correctly, the only major surface units that were to actually accompany the barges were ten destroyers and one light cruiser. The only major units available were Admiral Hipper and Admiral Scheer, and it was planned to send them out on sorties as decoy targets.
U-Boats Aren't Cut Out for Channel Battle
The U-boats will be massacred if its a brawl in the Channel. WWII submarines were small boats and these are 1940 ones with torpedo issues. Submarines are simply not meant to duke it out in enclosed spaces of water with surface ships. Realistically the U-boats get one chance to ambush the leading elements of the Home Fleet (which were probably be the destroyer and light cruiser escorts, not the battleships) and then they'll be slaughtered by the rest of the fleet. The British cruiser and destroyer force outnumbers the U-boats here at least 2 to 1, and that's not even counting the thousands of various small patrol craft as well.
Germans Outnumbered in Small Craft, Short on Minelayers and Minesweepers
Speaking of small craft, the British also outnumber the Germans here several times to one. The Germans are relying on E-boats and other little ones to actually do most of the escort work. The British have thousands of small craft which can at minimum shoot up the barges. The Germans don't have enough minelaying vessels to completely block the Channel at all before the Home Fleet arrives. The Germans are also short of minesweepers themselves - the British laid a lot of mines as well.
The Germans Can Only Get a Limited Army Across
The Germans can't get enough men across. Their optimistic estimate was just barely being able to bring across and sustain ten divisions if all things went right. This is ten divisions short on artillery and tanks, by the way, since wasn't enough capacity to get many across the Channel and those that did would have had to go by very haphazard means (either loaded up in slow fat freighters or floated across singly on barges). That's still a very strong force early on when the British army is at its weakest, but victory would depend utterly on forcing the British to capitulate with a quick capture of London. Given what we know about Churchill and the British, the fall of London would not end the campaign at all. The British wer mobilizing hundreds of thousands and would have soon badly outnumbered the Germans. The Germans also lose their capacity to reinforce and sustain the campaign as more and more barges get sunk, and worse, also lose their capacity to evacuate with every barge that goes down.
And They Can't Supply It Effectively
Supply, supply, supply. Just like the game. Germany had very little of a freighter fleet for a nation of their industrial standing, and what big freighters they did have were being prioritized for decoy missions to draw off the Royal Navy and transporting heavy equipment. Actually supplying the landed divisions would fall mainly on the barges...it's plausible for most of the barges to make a first trip or two across the Channel if the weather is good and the RN is kept away, but just imagine the attrition they'll have suffered after a week or two. And the Germans can pick a good day to launch the invasion, but those stretches of good weather can only be counted upon for a few days, maybe a week at most....the moment it starts to storm or even gale in the Channel, 90% of the German supply fleet would be unable to cross the Channel.
Germans Had No Practical Experience with Amphibious Ops
The Germans had not had practical experience with amphibious warfare yet. Remember how the Dieppe Raid worked out? That and the island hopping in the Pacific was where the Allies learned the do's and don'ts of invading enemy territory by sea. The Germans have had none of this and this will be where they make their mistakes - just about everybody bungled their first amphibous operations against defended targets - the disastrous British/Canadian Dieppe Raid, the Japanese embarrassment in Wake Island, the American bloodbath on Tarawa (we won and the Japanese lost more, but over 1600 men were killed for a few pebbles).
Haphazard Planning and Terrible Command Structure
German planning is extremely rushed and the branches of their military are abysmal at coordinating with one another. All three branches were throwing together their own individual plans and Hitler appointed no single joint commander. Germany had not really made contingency plans for invading the UK and the final form of the Sea Lion was essentially something slapped together at the last minute. Compare that with Operation Overlord, in which over two years were spent planning and assembling the resources for it.
Now, there are ways Germany could have addressed some of these problems, but it would have taken a combination of almost all of them together for it to work, something not likely from an alternate history point of view (but plausible in hindsight). In history as it happened, it's a virtual certainty the operation would have failed if launched, even if the Luftwaffe had won the air campaign. I personally think that maybe if the Germans panzers had captured the whole BEF at Dunkirk, if the Norway invasion hadn't trashed the Kriegsmarine so badly, and if they'd won the air battle (and maybe if Vichy France had declared war after Mers El-Kabir and forced the British to reinforce the Mediterranean), then maybe there could have been a chance of success - but still an enormous and unlikely gamble.
Of course, in a Hearts of Iron scenario, where the player's in charge and preparing Germany for war with UK since 1936, it's entirely possible not only to avoid the historical mistakes and do the things Germany theoretically could have done, but also to stack the odds in your favor the way real life Germany never could - getting the battleships into water in 1940, build a merchant marine bigger than the UK, call in Japan in 1940 (and a Japan that had conquered China no less), etc.
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Costly pet peeve there...that's 500 manpower you miss out on plus the extra IC and resources from cores.
Sounds like very cool stuff you're doing with the build plans though.
You don't need any of that. You can use subs and unescorted transports and in most cases it will be more enough. As soon as you bring your panzer divisions across and capture London, the enemy loses all supplies and is done. Sometimes important ports are not even defended.
The Sea Lion would be a risky operation IRL, but it isn't very difficult in HOI3 SP. BTW you can do it by using AI control only after the initial invasions are done. It isn't very hard for the German AI, either, when it actually lands in GB.
"Bogged down" is a poor choice of words...it conjures up visions of the tiny Norwegian army miraculously stopping the Germans. What actually happens is the Germans invade with over 300-brigades (including heavy armour), never mind that there aren't enough ports to supply such an army. This leads to the German army being stuck in Norway, thereby getting to the main event (Barbarossa) late, even never.
I'm aware, it's far too easy to sneak past the AI or an unprepared player.
The AI's timidity problem is replaced by an overindulgence issue once you've captured the ports for it. Theater command by nature will send all units not garrisoning a city or port up to the front line, and if Germany invades Norway and has no simultaneous front line in France, it will try to ship its whole western army over. Funadamental error in AI, it needs to calculate based on its ability to supply the invasion force.
The most fundamental problem with the AI nations on the whole is that their theater commands just cannot figure out where they need to apply their forces. It always seems to make the wrong choice - either it's leaving its home territory defenseless to pour troops into the front or it's letting the enemy advance unchecked on the front line because its infantry divisions are all sitting on stupid level 1 ports. Getting it to properly recognize and prepare itself against seaborne threatswhile balancing it out with the front lines' needs, and also to recognize supply and stacking issues are all essential.
The AI's timidity problem is replaced by an overindulgence issue once you've captured the ports for it. Theater command by nature will send all units not garrisoning a city or port up to the front line, and if Germany invades Norway and has no simultaneous front line in France, it will try to ship its whole western army over. Funadamental error in AI, it needs to calculate based on its ability to supply the invasion force.
The most fundamental problem with the AI nations on the whole is that their theater commands just cannot figure out where they need to apply their forces. It always seems to make the wrong choice - either it's leaving its home territory defenseless to pour troops into the front or it's letting the enemy advance unchecked on the front line because its infantry divisions are all sitting on stupid level 1 ports. Getting it to properly recognize and prepare itself against seaborne threatswhile balancing it out with the front lines' needs, and also to recognize supply and stacking issues are all essential.
I also must point out that sometimes AI has problem with evaluating its strategical position. For example - it might be easier and wiser to send troops from the mainland of Japan onto the Chinese shore directly, it's large and exposed. However, AI is very indecesive in making invasion attack, even if you give it large forces (both naval and land units) and mark a single province to capture. If you link it to any higher HQ that's currently in Korea then AI will attack via Korea. It's long way to the objective, with very short front where units can suffer from lack of supply and be bogged down by concentrated enemy forces. AI needs to learn how to think on the strategical scale, which is easier said than done.
The thing is, almost all of those problems can be easily adressed. RAF going north? Well, that just made the Germans control the air over the channel. Which again means, when coupled with mining, the Royal Navy won't be able to even touch the German naval ships operating in the channel without amazing casualties.
Supply: why would the Germans have troubles supplying the troops after major ports are taken, and the channel secured? It's a few kilometres between the British coast and France. I believe the Germans estimated supply problems only until they captured major ports.
Amphibious experience: The British army in summer-autumn 1940 was nonexistant, only militia was active. I doubt the Germans would have any problems storming the beaches.
and it goes on and on.. To almost every single one of your problem there is a possible solution, as you said. None of them are game-breaking, so to speak. Imo, this pretty much says that the Germans did have a realistic chance at taking Britain, if not probable.
Supply: why would the Germans have troubles supplying the troops after major ports are taken, and the channel secured? It's a few kilometres between the British coast and France. I believe the Germans estimated supply problems only until they captured major ports.
Amphibious experience: The British army in summer-autumn 1940 was nonexistant, only militia was active. I doubt the Germans would have any problems storming the beaches.
and it goes on and on.. To almost every single one of your problem there is a possible solution, as you said. None of them are game-breaking, so to speak. Imo, this pretty much says that the Germans did have a realistic chance at taking Britain, if not probable.
I think that the word "possible" is the right one. It was not really very realistic in 1940. Most historians agree that the Sea Lion in 1940 was unlikely and the lost Battle of Britain made it impossible.
I don't see how that's relevant to this thread, though. The fact is that for an average player the Sea Lion is a cakewalk and even the German AI can do it when it has many transports and actually lands on the British shores. Therefore, the real question is how to make the Sea Lion HARDER in-game, not whether the Germans had a real chance of conquering GB IRL.