HOI4 Dev Diary - 1.6.2 Open Beta Patch

[Zackermeister]

I dont know if you guys have a troll coding in your AI department or something but Japan steam rolling china is even WORSE in this build. China lost the war in this game by September 38. This is after sending an attache as the US as soon as I reached my first 50 CP. China had 10 divisions by April. This is really ruining the game outside of Europe.

 

[FieldMedic]

On the topic of imbalance, the Soviets look incredibly weak right now. Maybe it's just the AI but the Axis is just rolling right over them like they're not there. I think in general Germany needs a nerf. They're just insane in MTG.

 

[SeekTruthFromFx]

I'm not even sure how to report this one but can you figure out why ones allies rarely send units now to help out? Like I will play France, allied with Spain (who will have 200 armies sitting in spain) and he will send maybe 30 to help out verse Germany and Italy. I will play UK, go after Bulgaria allied with Turkey and Turkey won't send more than one or two units to help me out after I push into in to Bulgaria via Istanbul. I see this across the board with nearly every "ally"; in 1.6 they simply camp out in their own borders and do nothing but defend their ports.

Two thoughts. Firstly, this is not what I'm seeing in 1.6.2. I'm seeing allied nations do a reasonable good job of supporting me. But they tend to do it by launching their own invasions, rather than having a dozen countries all overlapping on the same front line. IMHO this is an improvement. Secondly, if you have MTG, you can now co-opt allied expediitonary forces into your armies if you are UK, so you should be able to gain control of Turkish forces.

Speaking of ports, when AI countries run out of stuff to do they really to do do something else or you (as a player) should be able to force a peace if lets say have X time no provinces have been taken by EITHER SIDE. Like a couple times now I took the Monarch path as the UK and it ends up with me trying to naval invade a solo Italy (neither him or I allied with Germany and we are both in our own factions of one) and you know, you just can't crack Italy with their 400 units sitting at home no matter how big your make your invasion force because even if you punch through you die on counterattack and the Axis own every other piece of land touching them. OK I'm fine with that, but then I should be able to sue for peace instead of fifty year stalemate waiting until I have 48 marines and hundred of nukes completely precluding me from doing any of the other war focus because I can't peace out with italy. While sure that is "fair" (as in I would do the same as them if was in their situation) I would equally agree to peace out so we could both get on with our lives, i.e. maybe Italy wants to the rest of their focus tree as well without me bothering them.

This would be a major change to the structure of the game - it belongs in the Suggestions subforum, not here.

On the type of imbalance, the Soviets look incredibly weak right now. Maybe it's just the AI but the Axis is just rolling right over them like they're not there. I think in general Germany needs a nerf. They're just insane in MTG.

I'm not sure that Germany needs a nerf so much as the USSR needs some love. And I don't mean the big rework that seems likely to come in 1.7, I mean tweaking the improvements that were made to the Soviet AI in 1.6.0, as suggested earlier in this thread.

 

[ThePHD]

On the type of imbalance, the Soviets look incredibly weak right now. Maybe it's just the AI but the Axis is just rolling right over them like they're not there. I think in general Germany needs a nerf. They're just insane in MTG.

- They have no air force compared to Germany.
- They don't build up their industry the way Germany does.
- They get no help from their allies. Germany gets a lot of help from their allies. Especially Romania and Italy.
- They constantly shuffle their forces around and send them to the middle of who knows where.
- They build 2nd tier infantry equipment and 1936 light tanks for the entire game. The Germans actually keep their tech up to date. Germany easily crushes them because of their tech advantage.

If you combine all of those then it's no wonder why the Soviets always lose. It looks like they optimized Germany as far as how they build up their military and just neglected everyone else.

 

[GPounda]

- They have no air force compared to Germany.
- They don't build up their industry the way Germany does.
- They get no help from their allies. Germany gets a lot of help from their allies. Especially Romania and Italy.
- They constantly shuffle their forces around and send them to the middle of who knows where.
- They build 2nd tier infantry equipment and 1936 light tanks for the entire game. The Germans actually keep their tech up to date. Germany easily crushes them because of their tech advantage.

If you combine all of those then it's no wonder why the Soviets always lose. It looks like they optimized Germany as far as how they build up their military and just neglected everyone else.

You forgot to mention that their air force simply sits on the tarmac instead of being deployed. . .

 

[GPounda]

six pages of comments and not a single response from Paradox. . .

 

[Ruskhan]

I'm not sure that Germany needs a nerf so much as the USSR needs some love. And I don't mean the big rework that seems likely to come in 1.7, I mean tweaking the improvements that were made to the Soviet AI in 1.6.0, as suggested earlier in this thread.

- They have no air force compared to Germany.
- They don't build up their industry the way Germany does.
- They get no help from their allies. Germany gets a lot of help from their allies. Especially Romania and Italy.
- They constantly shuffle their forces around and send them to the middle of who knows where.
- They build 2nd tier infantry equipment and 1936 light tanks for the entire game. The Germans actually keep their tech up to date. Germany easily crushes them because of their tech advantage.

If you combine all of those then it's no wonder why the Soviets always lose. It looks like they optimized Germany as far as how they build up their military and just neglected everyone else.

nah its been already well documented that Germany still have all its equipment, oil, manpower etc after fighting Human player for 3-4 years, Germany is OP as ****

 

[MrDziurkacz]

Personally, I believe that the biggest problem is the combination of the way AI plays Germany now, middle east oil sale and week allies AI when it comes to the navy.

1. Germany, oh boi, AI was never so infantry oriented as it is today. It spams hundreds of cheap infantry, using (in one of my games) 90 (!) military factories on guns, while less than 30 on its entire armour! I think AI should be much more armour oriented. This way it would produce fewer divisions, while still being powerful enough to push soviets and steamroll Europe and they should get an Oil problem later in game stopping their advance and giving SOV time to counterattack. There is only one problem then:
2. Let's say it loudly. "Oil, oil for everyone!" is what you hear when looking at middle east now. The amount of oil ai is selling this patch is enormous! When I played Germany, I don't even have to rush the Caucasus for oil, I had plenty! For AI it is even more visible, as the infantry spam makes it less oil consuming and allows it to operate its air spam 24/7. Now when I think about that, the rush for being green on oil might be the factor that makes AI abandon its armour production. If only someone could stop the transports of this valuable resource...
3. The incompetence of Allies... Oh, god. They totally fuck things up. Mostly in their inability to sink Axis' convoys. Germany is able to transport so many troops to Africa, not only to northern but also to the southern part (!), that the British are never able to hold. If only they could sink them all in the sea while they are moving right through the English channel then the Atlantic. With Africa defended the Allies should be able to stop middle east oil from reaching Axis thus start the process of their decline...

 

[Dan1109]

Two thoughts. Firstly, this is not what I'm seeing in 1.6.2. I'm seeing allied nations do a reasonable good job of supporting me. But they tend to do it by launching their own invasions, rather than having a dozen countries all overlapping on the same front line. IMHO this is an improvement. Secondly, if you have MTG, you can now co-opt allied expediitonary forces into your armies if you are UK, so you should be able to gain control of Turkish forces.



This would be a major change to the structure of the game - it belongs in the Suggestions subforum, not here.



I'm not sure that Germany needs a nerf so much as the USSR needs some love. And I don't mean the big rework that seems likely to come in 1.7, I mean tweaking the improvements that were made to the Soviet AI in 1.6.0, as suggested earlier in this thread.

All of the Allies need love. China, UK, USA, SOV. Its death by 1000 pin pricks. Some high level issues:

UK can't handle fuel, at all, can't get USA fuel from LendLease - land AI is still horrible, Africa and India fall IMMEDIATELY

USA won't lend lease properly to SOV and UK - USA doesn't attack Pacific at all, and try to counter Japan - ignores them completely

China - sinkiang should not be part of China, but in the comintern IIRC - they are communist after all - if they go with China, and they fall, then JAP has 2 borders with India, immediatelty after war start, and can flank Raj and take it over ASAP. If UK loses RAJ, then UK loses SE Asai, and AUS and NZL are next - especially with a USA that doesn't fight back.

SOV - I can't say, maybe front line shuffle and garrison issue people have mentioned hurts them the most, but the point is, unless USA/UK mount pressure against GER by 43-44, its game over for SOV.

When I play USA, its almost like I don't need to put high difficulty on, because my allies are SO BAD, its already USA against the world. And yeah, if GER Annexes SOV, its game over. USA can max out it factories in 1943, but still not enough to compete against GER owning that much land. USA would have to invade South american, just for more factory potential. I don't want a game lasting until the 50s.

In general, its just due to all of the bugs. Most of these are fixed in EAI, but unfortunately the new 1.6.2 "negative convoy bug" when lend lease is modified, is preventing @Chondrite from updating to 1.6.2, and now I can't even play that anymore. And of course the convoy bug will be low priority compared to the hundreds of other more important bugs out there.

 

[cnwi]

if GER Annexes SOV, its game over

Not at all, in my last game Germany did just that (700+ divs, 600 mil. factories, 50k planes), but kept on attacking for 5 years the same tiles in Africa, milling itself to 0 manpower (overall death count 27m for Germany). Most of their attacks started at 95+ org ratio in my favour.

 

[Dan1109]

Not at all, in my last game Germany did just that (700+ divs, 600 mil. factories, 50k planes), but kept on attacking for 5 years the same tiles in Africa, milling itself to 0 manpower (overall death count 27m for Germany). Most of their attacks started at 95+ org ratio in my favour.

I don't want a game lasting until the 50s.

 

[-Piranha]

Game balance needs to be based off a working group of the top HOI 4 multi-players (community knows who these people are) not the player vs the AI. To reiterate, balance needs to be based off player vs player, not player vs AI. Look at how Starcraft 2 does their balance as a template. That's my 2 cents...

 

[jpinard]

Are the Axis supposed to win every single game? I've played 12 games and the result was the same every time. Italy wipes out the UK & France from Northern/Central Africa. Japanese take over all of China. I lose as Russia to Germany (but that may be my fault).

So I decided to run a bunch of tests without me playing at all (FOW off and I'm Ireland) to see what happens, and the results are exactly the same. 15x in a row. This is medium difficulty, with historical on.

 

[Kozality]

Just adding my two cents that I'm seeing the same. I've quit about 6 games now as the U.S. Going historical, I put a lot of resources into naval production, with a lot of attention to subs and destroyers since I can't count on the UK to secure the Atlantic. I've been doing pretty well at stopping Japan in the Pacific, but China always seems to fold quickly. (I have *yet* to see a game, whether I'm playing as China or watching them, in which they survive the war.) Part of the issue is that without using console commands, I just don't know what to send them. There needs to be a mechanic to do this without involving jumping out of the game's mechanics.

In Europe it seems hopeless. Africa folds quickly unless I pick focuses to get over to Europe ASAP. Strategic bombing is a non-starter, I simply can't throw the planes required to make any difference, as I have 2-3k planes swarming any region I target. I can have several hundred fighters hitting northern France and they're simply overwhelmed. I'd continue this thinking it would help draw planes off the Eastern Front, but I'll see there's a few thousand more over each region there as well. Germany will throw up 7-10k planes easily.

No idea. I'm still trying out different strategies, but without restoring to constant switching back and forth to other countries via console commands (I'm sorry, but that's not an acceptable solution to gain information or fix strategies. Hacking the game should not be required.) or min-maxing the heck out of my country, I don't see a fix in the short term.

Playing Battletech until this gets resolved. =P

 

[Dan1109]

The incompetence of Allies... Oh, god. They totally fuck things up. Mostly in their inability to sink Axis' convoys. Germany is able to transport so many troops to Africa, not only to northern but also to the southern part (!), that the British are never able to hold. If only they could sink them all in the sea while they are moving right through the English channel then the Atlantic. With Africa defended the Allies should be able to stop middle east oil from reaching Axis thus start the process of their decline...

Yeah, so all of those awesome escort missions U.K. AI deploys just wave at the GER transports and put over maritime radio “you’re lucky mate, we have orders to defend our convoys, I don’t want to sink your troops, kill 100k Jerries, but go through a court martial for it”.

A human would change the escort mission right away to raiding and sink those defenseless convoys. And it’s even easier to do as troop convoys are 5x easier to spot that resource convoys, per the defines.

 

[jpinard]

Just adding my two cents that I'm seeing the same. I've quit about 6 games now as the U.S. Going historical, I put a lot of resources into naval production, with a lot of attention to subs and destroyers since I can't count on the UK to secure the Atlantic. I've been doing pretty well at stopping Japan in the Pacific, but China always seems to fold quickly. (I have *yet* to see a game, whether I'm playing as China or watching them, in which they survive the war.) Part of the issue is that without using console commands, I just don't know what to send them. There needs to be a mechanic to do this without involving jumping out of the game's mechanics.

In Europe it seems hopeless. Africa folds quickly unless I pick focuses to get over to Europe ASAP. Strategic bombing is a non-starter, I simply can't throw the planes required to make any difference, as I have 2-3k planes swarming any region I target. I can have several hundred fighters hitting northern France and they're simply overwhelmed. I'd continue this thinking it would help draw planes off the Eastern Front, but I'll see there's a few thousand more over each region there as well. Germany will throw up 7-10k planes easily.

No idea. I'm still trying out different strategies, but without restoring to constant switching back and forth to other countries via console commands (I'm sorry, but that's not an acceptable solution to gain information or fix strategies. Hacking the game should not be required.) or min-maxing the heck out of my country, I don't see a fix in the short term.

Playing Battletech until this gets resolved. =P

If we modded them in the short term... to give them more units would that help? Maybe some higher level defensive units to help them hold their lines?

 

[Kozality]

If we modded them in the short term... to give them more units would that help? Maybe some higher level defensive units to help them hold their lines?

Well as some others have investigated, there seems to be an issue with the Soviet AI pulling units off the front it seems. So you could give them better units, but they'd be sent to Siberia for "reeducation". =P

 

[Draco_Caesar]

teng duda sacaran algun DLC para Sudamerica??? o siempre sera una zona generica?

 

[Zanithan]

Yeet Mannerheim!

 

[jpinard]

Dear developers. Can you please make Britain less stupid?

(frustration incoming, so only read if you want to read about AI deficiencies and balance issues)

Spoiler

This is Normal difficulty with historical checked. Great Britain is so awful, at times it appears as if they'd do better if they didn't move their troops at all. Case in point - Gibralter/Egypt. As I simulate a game for the umteenth time, I watch them move troops into it Gibralter, then out of it, then into it, then out. Literally hundreds of times over a few months just teasing Nationalist Spain to declare war on them (which they do). Sometimes they actually leave it with no troops at all - a situation even worse in Egypt. The critical Cairo, Suez area? Britain says, "hey, lets abandon that and instead fight in South Central Africa". After they inevitably lose those wars to Italy, they never go back and reinforce the Cairo and Suez areas. At this point it's game over for Britain in the Middle East and Africa.

So, what if I mod it to add starting troops to both Great Britain AND British Raj to help out Africa? What if I also add 15 troops to China AND another 15 to Communist China to help fix that imbalance? Good infantry too, not the crappy stuff they start out with? Maybe that will fix them abandoning those critical areas? I add 10 more troops to GB in Egypt and to GB Raj in India. Let's also add some forts to the Cairo area to help Britain out. How did this all work out? No difference. They just lost a little slower. In fact, Britain is dumb they don't even bother using the level 10 forts I gave them to defend themselves. 4 forts in the Cairo cluster!

You need to make some kind of script so the AI parks units in these spots, as losing them without a fight destroys the rest of the game. Once Cairo and Gibraltar fall, the Axis are unstoppable in the entire Mediterranean AND Middle Eastern theaters (AI playing itself). I've played 14 games as Russia, and simulated 20 games as I test different things, and not once have the Allies survived outside of the Americas.

... speaking of which... America is useless. I've yet to see them take islands from Japan. Since I can't see Naval stuff with the FOW command, I don't even know what the U.S. is doing in the Pacific except losing their islands half the time.

The game is so messed up it's ridiculously easy as the Axis and super hard as the Allies. I just learned the game in a week, had to learn how to mod, and it's frustrating just how messed up this is. I've got to admit I'm perplexed how the game is in such a terrible state, although I do have say it's rock stable and never crashes.

Also - last time I checked, Romania didn't conquer half of the Soviet Union in WWII either. Frustrated as I just spent so much time finally learning this thing, only to be disappointed at how broken much of it is. I expected that with the game having been out for years it would be more refined, not suffering the same kinds of issues I read about on game launch (all DLC latest beta)