A Plea to the Developers

[Existential Yogurt]

Please allow us to do whatever we want with the land we conquer. From watching WWW, I've seen the options you have for occupied territory, and it's very basic. As far as I can tell, you can only annex land, give land to allies, release a nation as a puppet (only the nations that exist at the start), and puppet the enemies. These options are far too limiting and are not historically accurate. For example, say I'm playing as the USA and defeat Japan. I might want to create the puppet state of Micronesia (historically accurate), annex Hokkaido, make a democratic puppet of Kyushu, and leave the Emperor in power in Honshu. But under the current system, I can't. Another example, say I'm playing Germany and I've defeated the USSR. Maybe I don't want to annex the whole thing. I want to create a Ukrainian puppet, a neutral independent Muslim nation in the South, and a puppet of Siberia. But I can't. This can't be too hard to implement, and it would massively increase the enjoyment of the game for me.

 

[crusadertsar]

This is interesting. I didn't know that we couldn't create new puppet nations like Ukraine. I remember doing this in HoI 2 so took it for granted that this feature would come back. Not a game breaker for me but rather disappointing that some basic features were cut. Was it too hard to code or left out in anticipation of future dlc?

 

[agus92]

Please allow us to do whatever we want with the land we conquer. From watching WWW, I've seen the options you have for occupied territory, and it's very basic. As far as I can tell, you can only annex land, give land to allies, release a nation as a puppet (only the nations that exist at the start), and puppet the enemies. These options are far too limiting and are not historically accurate. For example, say I'm playing as the USA and defeat Japan. I might want to create the puppet state of Micronesia (historically accurate), annex Hokkaido, make a democratic puppet of Kyushu, and leave the Emperor in power in Honshu. But under the current system, I can't. Another example, say I'm playing Germany and I've defeated the USSR. Maybe I don't want to annex the whole thing. I want to create a Ukrainian puppet, a neutral independent Muslim nation in the South, and a puppet of Siberia. But I can't. This can't be too hard to implement, and it would massively increase the enjoyment of the game for me.

First let me say that I agree, but don't assume it's that easy to implement and balance. Moreover, they don't have a lot of time and a HUGE amount of work in front of them. That said, I would like to see this in a free expansion if it doesn't make it to DDay.

 

[3ishop]

Yeah I expect they are focusing on the base game and whats needed to play with a common depth. Then like EU4 they will keep releasing free patches and DLC that will focus on a region or mechanic to improve.

 

[YellowMoonshine]

Technically it would be quite simple and easy to mod in, just create a bunch of nations that don't exist at start and give them cores where appropriate. However having hundreds of new nations for the game to process could be a massive performance hit (only the devs could answer that) as well as having to design and research new flags and leaders etc.

They could also create a system like EU4 where you create and name a new nation out of conquered territory, but it would take quite an effort for something that would only be used by a small amount of players once the game is pretty much finished.

 

[FOARP]

This is interesting. I didn't know that we couldn't create new puppet nations like Ukraine. I remember doing this in HoI 2 so took it for granted that this feature would come back. Not a game breaker for me but rather disappointing that some basic features were cut. Was it too hard to code or left out in anticipation of future dlc?

Except they didn't have this feature in HOI3, and I was never able to get to the bottom of why - normally some talk around game balance but it never made much sense to me (just nerf puppeted countries if releasing puppets causes problems).

 

[Evan05]

It would be nice if they at least added tags like Ukraine and Belarus to be able to be released or puppeted.

 

[electriccat]

You would need to create the subtags to have things that are releasable. Otherwise what you are looking for already exists. If you look at the China peace deal there were options that involved some of the prewar that could be releasable.

You aren't wrong, I don't think it would be terribly difficult, would just need to define the areas. I don't think we are going to see something like the client state creator that is in EU IV but it would be a possibility there.

 

[FOARP]

You would need to create the subtags to have things that are releasable. Otherwise what you are looking for already exists. If you look at the China peace deal there were options that involved some of the prewar that could be releasable.

You aren't wrong, I don't think it would be terribly difficult, would just need to define the areas. I don't think we are going to see something like the client state creator that is in EU IV but it would be a possibility there.

The problem is the basic functionality to release tags on occupied, but not annexed territory has to be in the game in the first place, otherwise you can't release the tag without annexing the territory.

From what we've seen, the functionality isn't in-game. Maybe this can be partially addressed through events - I don't know. In HOI3 you could program decisions to kinda-sorta address this, though it meant having the decision permanently in your list of decisions, and the coding to cover every country wasn't simple.

The Chinese peace deal isn't releasing puppets on occupied (not annexed) territory.

 

[Had a dad]

Each country that you want to release needs to be coded, which is why I assume they only do a few. Modders always add more.

 

[FOARP]

Each country that you want to release needs to be coded, which is why I assume they only do a few. Modders always add more.

In HOI2 the functionality to release puppets on occupied (not annexed) territory was hard-coded - all you had to was define the tag, populate the tag with data, and define the tag's territory. Doesn't appear this functionality will be in HOI4.

 

[Had a dad]

all you had to was define the tag, populate the tag with data, and define the tag's territory. Doesn't appear this functionality will be in HOI4.

Pretty much all you had to do in HOI3 also. I'd be surprised if it wasn't very similar to hoi3.

 

[FOARP]

Pretty much all you had to do in HOI3 also. I'd be surprised if it wasn't very similar to hoi3.

To release a puppet on occupied (not annexed) territory in HOI3 required a decision be coded, it seemed a lot more complex than for HOI2 since you had to code all the triggers, requisites etc.

 

[Had a dad]

ah yeah.... though if you can release a puppet as shown in the WWW that was mentioned in the OP I would assume there must be a mechanic for defining it.

I may be wrong but ....

 

[potski]

Did we see any example of a puppet being formed except during a Peace Conference?

In HOI3 when China capitulated, for instance, you could annex or create puppet(s). If you annexed, you also got the option later to release an area as a puppet, such as to create Mengkuoko.

Edit: Referred to HOI4 when I meant HOI3.

 

[Zoe1444]

Did we see any example of a puppet being formed except during a Peace Conference?

In HOI4 when China capitulated, for instance, you could annex or create puppet(s). If you annexed, you also got the option later to release an area as a puppet, such as to create Mengkuoko.

Yeah. The only thing the game lacks AFAIK is cores and tags for nations to be released. Which will probably be added with later patches if not on release and easily moddable for now. I wouldn't worry about it too much.

MOD EDIT

 

[xtfoster]

Except they didn't have this feature in HOI3, and I was never able to get to the bottom of why - normally some talk around game balance but it never made much sense to me (just nerf puppeted countries if releasing puppets causes problems).

For HOI3 they left out all of the ahistorical releasers (i.e., the ones that didn't achieve independence during the timeframe of the game) because regardless of whether or not they existed, EVERY country was loaded (and slowed the game down) at game start.

 

[FOARP]

ah yeah.... though if you can release a puppet as shown in the WWW that was mentioned in the OP I would assume there must be a mechanic for defining it.

I may be wrong but ....

Did we see any example of a puppet being formed except during a Peace Conference?

In HOI3 when China capitulated, for instance, you could annex or create puppet(s). If you annexed, you also got the option later to release an area as a puppet, such as to create Mengkuoko.

Edit: Referred to HOI4 when I meant HOI3.

Yeah. The only thing the game lacks AFAIK is cores and tags for nations to be released. Which will probably be added with later patches if not on release and easily moddable for now. I wouldn't worry about it too much.

For HOI3 they left out all of the ahistorical releasers (i.e., the ones that didn't achieve independence during the timeframe of the game) because regardless of whether or not they existed, EVERY country was loaded (and slowed the game down) at game start.

All of these apply only to the circumstance where the territory had already been annexed in HOI3. If it had only been occupied, you could not release a puppet unless a decision had been coded to allow you to do this (which led to other problems, especially if you wanted to make lots of countries releasable).

In HOI 2 it was much simpler - if you wanted to release, say, Burma as a puppet after occupying Burma (but before defeating the UK) it was a single-click through a hard-coded functionality to release a soft-coded tag.

From the look of it, HOI4 has the same problem as HOI3 - unless there is a decision or event of some kind coded, puppets are not releasable on occupied territory, but can be released on annexed territory.

The reason why this is important is, especially when fighting against large empires, you might occupy a territory for a long time without annexing that territory. Especially in HOI3 occupation could be a huge chore. Historically the Japanese and others solved thus by establishing puppet-states, so the option should be there for the player to do so as well, and not just the few states that were released historically either.

Additionally, being able to release puppets on occupied territory added a lot of colour to the game. I remember a particularly fun West African campaign where I set about invading West Africa by sea and air and liberated a bunch of states there to take part in my campaign. I ended up with half a dozen West African states all fighting side-by-side, though in the end the cripplingly bad infra of that area and long supply-lines doomed my campaign and I ended up abandoning them to their fate.

TL;DR - No, you could not easily release puppets on occupied (but not annexed) territory in Hoi3

 

[GermanPower]

To release a puppet on occupied (not annexed) territory in HOI3 required a decision be coded, it seemed a lot more complex than for HOI2 since you had to code all the triggers, requisites etc.

Hmmm. I rather think they are attempting to draw back to HOI2/DH. Thats what I took from the modding guide. Maybe I need to reread it. It looks to appear they are trying to totally avoid HOI3..at least from Johans wording. So I'd expect to see things in the realm of Pre-HOi3 or rather EU4 or CK2 (Haven't touched these two though, so could be talking out my ass)

 

[Zoe1444]

TL;DR - No, you could not easily release puppets on occupied (but not annexed) territory in Hoi3

Occupation type seems to represent this mechanic. If you could create puppets out of occupied territory you would seriously just get to freely annex territory into a puppet whenever you want. That's pretty OP honestly. There's no reason Occupation Policy can't fill these shoes and potentially be fleshed out to be more accurate (IE adding a puppet leader which gives different effects on the land he oversees).