E3 2012: New Expansion for Hearts of Iron III Announced!

[podcat]

But how exactly the elite units thing will work? Won´t revive what was already discussed in the threads, but I´m a bit skeptical on that one. What will they have? Better morale and ORG? Better stats? More chance for combat events? And above all how many can be recruited?

each nations unit is different. they are limited in number by a percentage of your other army, so you cant just replace your entire infantry with Gurkhas. for actual stats you have to wait for a future dev diary.

But we can expect new patches for For the Motherland, until and after new expansion release?
Or FtM become obsolete after 3.06 public patch?

3.06 will be the last one for FTM unless it has some big problem (which I dont think, we are being careful and doing several public beta versions first)

 

[Darkrenown]

So only in MP? No improvements to coordinated actions with AI allies?

Well you can certainly draw up some plans in SP if you like (cool arrows are cool), but no, you cannot coordinate with the AI with them.

 

[podcat]

This sounds good, anyway. Great tool for AARs.

EDIT:
On-map espionage, hmm... I've just noticed that the Intelligence tab is different and it appears that you can no longer see units there. Does this mean that military espionage will now show units on map? That would be AWESOME.

yeah, that is on-map now where you can actually see it. where it used to be in intel tab you can now spy on the enemy production queue

 

[Darkrenown]

First: Yes.
Second: You'll only be able to modifiy your own nation, so no influencing others.

 

[podcat]

Good to hear that.


How will it work, exactly? Will we get "points" and be able to use them to "buy" techs, resources, IC, units etc.? Will the AI be able to use that feature, too?

BTW when can we expect DDs?

yes you get points to spend that are based on the scenario you pick (year), AI uses historical setups so doesnt use this (but points are based on the historical so should be reasonably balanced still). The custom game scenarios are scriptable separately from other history files, so easy to mod the amount of points etc if you want for MP sessions to give handicap etc to a particular country or faction

we havent decided when to do the first dev diary yet actually.

Any way to slip in some better in game sortable military leader searches? Like looking for the best LW leader instead of having to scroll through a few hundred leaders?

yeah its on the todo list. As we usually do the last couple of dev diaries will be dedicated to small stuff like this. Also all features in the expansion arent on the announcement so there will be more stuff revealed in dev diaries

 

[podcat]

How will AI USE the info about building que?

you have probably noticed by now that I dont like answering these questions for 3 reasons:
1. I havent actually modified the AI to take advantage of this yet
2. AI gets modified and tweaked throughout development, so the answer is likely to change.
3. I dont like people to know exactly how the AI works because they will game it (see russian checks on attack on london for example of something that was very cool at first but exploited quickly as people figured out the ai triggers)

basically, I prefer to keep AI discussions, when not bugs, with betas to keep the mystique going (you can apply to beta test once we are ready for that though. no date yet)

 

[podcat]

Because it looks so nice, I already translated it for the german only speaking folks in the german section..
Neues Add-on für HOI3 angekündigt! -Deutsche Übersetzung

thanks! I wont be able to answer questions there though because my old school-german is very rusty

 

[podcat]

1. Can you tell us if and who of the "Main Moders" was/is involved in this expansion?
2. Is the Expansion in any kind connected with the mod "Finest Hour"?

1. no, we don't give out betas names without their approval, and even then only at the end of the project so they don't get spammed with questions they arent allowed to answer, but we havent started the beta yet.
2. no, sorry if the creator feels he need to change the mod name now saw it and couldn't say anything earlier to warn him before the announcement

Whats new in the first two screen-shots?

Who will be project lead and who will be working on it? I assume you will be Podcat?

nothing new in the first 2, they are just padding. these screens are shown to people who sometimes might not have played the game before so we like to put in a few regular screens too.

core team will be me, darkrenown and tomasz + yonaz & aerie doing any art stuff but as is customary other people are likely to chip in for parts they find interesting.

This probably has something to do with the "custom game" tab and feature.

yes this is a screenshot during a custom game setup

 

[podcat]

The fact that particular screenshot was shown at E3, despite the 3 of us not getting any credit, still puts a smile on my face. I at least know that what PI is showing off to everyone is my work that we volunteered to provide.

That's not to mention all of the other map modders who worked on the map. The screenshot of Spain shows the map work of sauloaleia, who redid all of Iberia just as jat85, ATLeow, and I redid all of East Asia. PaxImperator, VetMax, Frank+Frei, and many others also contributed to the new map as well.

We very much appreciate the work because the updated map is really nice. This stuff has been handled in the beta forums so only really the beta guys have been credited. I forgot about the other contributors, so sorry about that. I'll put in a thank-you notes to the team in the credits once the 3.06 patch is final though. (also do apply for beta next time if you can).

 

[podcat]

Are these landing craft and elite brigades new units or abstracted as techs?

new units, there a few new techs tied to them also

 

[podcat]

However, it is possible that we will still be able to make amphibious invasions with standard TPs, but at much lower ranges, while landing craft will have high range, speed and good protection.

yeah, old transports can still be used, but have a number of inefficiencies.

 

[podcat]

A german forum user "Umbosch" has some questions too:
1.)
How does that work with the "More detailed control over strategic warfare and a generalized lend-lease system"?
Will there be new ressources that can be shared worldwide?
And for the lend-lease will that be some sort of "IC-split"/"IC-modifier", or just easier to supply your own units in foreign countries?


2.)
Will the leaders now start without any trait? Will there be complete new traits?
How would I get a "logistics wizard"? Can we choose a trait at "level-up" of a commander, or ist that completely bound to the way he is used or can be even influenced by the enemy?

Cheers,
Chromos

1) the main idea is sharing of IC
2) leaders will still start with traits, we are adding a bunch of new ones that are gainable (and modifying some old)

More details will have to wait for a diary.

 

[podcat]

Ah, it's okay. I understand why no warning could be given to me. I will leave the mod name as it is, should be alright. All that matters is that we will have another expansion this year and so that we can look forward to it.

PS: I'm almost starting to get used to the fact that Paradox-published games are being named after my mods. For example, I have a mod for Blitzkrieg named "Achtung Panzer" and few years after that, Pdx published a strategy game with the same name. And then it continued with Motherland Calls --> HOI3: For the Motherland; The Other Side --> Magicka: The Other Side of the Coin; or Finest Hour --> HOI3: Their Finest Hour.

It's nice, actually. But is this just a coincidence?

haha you are on to us, in fact when a new project is about to be announced I tell someone to "go check GCZ posting history and pick a name from it" ;P

 

[podcat]

I guess you probably won't change this, but if you could get the AI to:
1. Show you its battle plans and where it would like you to play a role
2. Accept and try to carry out the role you make for it in your battle plans
This would probably be the greatest feature ever in any strategy game.

But right now the battle plans feature is just cosmetic, right? It just allows you to draw on the map without interacting in any way with the AI systems?

right now yes

 

[Darkrenown]

Yes, there's already a downside. At army group and theater level the experience gain is ridiculously slow. I understand it's some kind of last promotion as you reach the summit of the hierarchy, but leading and army group or theater for YEARS (and winning sometimes many, many battles) should give more experience than a few percent points !

Have you checked 3.06?

 

[podcat]

podcat said currently its ~60% complete feature wise

What I said was:

Usually when you enter about 60% of features are done or such and it gets updated weekly.

Which is just a hint on the state a project is usually in when betas get access. I wouldnt write about feature progress on an active project on the public forum. its a hard number to estimate exactly anyway.

 

[Darkrenown]

The game is unplayable as it is. Every nation has been balanced, I can't beat France as Germany no matter what I do, Russia is nigh impossible. My navy gets wiped out in days. I can't do anything anymore, the game is completely broken. Who thought balancing the game would be a good idea? It's not Victoria II, it's WW2, things were not balanced.

You'd need to be playing worse than the GER AI for this to be true. Why not make a separate thread and upload your save just before you attack France, that way people can comment on your setup and/or give tips.