Advices needed regarding land warfare

[Black Ader]

Hello to everybody,

Although I have seen several tutorials on Youtube, I still struggle to understand how the land warfare is functionning, especialy regarding the offensive planner. I played a lot HoI2 and some mods (darkets hour for the most part), and HoI4 is very different from it.

Being not so original, I play Germany from 1936. I start the war end of october 1939 (mostly because I want to wait 1939 to end Czechoslovakia, and after that time to complete national decisions force me to wait until autumn). I have an armored spearhead in Eastern Prussia, another in Silesia. I have set frontline along the borders for my armies, but then I give my orders manually.

I am able to encircle western Poland with my two armored Korps, and to advance my infantery from the border, but after that, front is becoming a real mess. My units start wandering along the whole front, some divisions departing from Silesia to travel to Pomerania, and when I want to resume offensive around Warsaw with my panzer divisions, I realize than one has decided to take some vacation on the coast near Danzig, another is guarding the flank of a pocket, despite the fact that 9 other infantry divisions are doing the same. Of the 9, only 3 were commited to that area, should I mention.

As a result, 4 months after the beginning of the war I have only occupied the western half of Poland. I don't lack troops, polish army is nowhere a threat, but I spend my time bringing back my divisions where i need them.

I cannot imagine what it would be during Barbarossa. Probably an absolute nightmare.

Should I forget about the whole planiffication thing ? I suppose there are some advantages, besides the +50% preparation bonus. Plus, it is a feature of the game, I would like to experiment it. I would be very grateful for any advices from experienced players, because at this point, I don't see how to conduct a war like that.

PS : I am not a native English speaker, so be kind to ignore my mistakes.

 

[marcelo r. r.]

You can safely delete messed war plans, and reorganize it. U don't imediatelly loss planification bonus, its a gradual loss while the troops aren't assined to a new plan.

You can, a example of situation: organize a front with 5 generals, trap enemy troops in pocked, then delete all plans, and remake it all, leaving 1 general to finish the pocket.

Be aware that also, when u advance, some warplans frontline stretch their draw, and others shrink, it can cause confusion.

Theres 2 playstyles with warplans, one more easy, and other more complicated.

The easy one is "Layered" style, assign your generals to the same front, to them all stack, its a "steamroller" playstyle:

the another more complicate, is "serial" borders, this is problably suitable for ppl doing some RP, but its more complicated to manage.

 

[Cavalry]

You can try these:
- Use shorter front line for army, and choose the option: more cohensive.
- Use battleplan for the whole army group (click the FM), don't use plan for each army, excep the tank army.

And yes, manual control is more fun and more effective. You can manual control your tank army. And use battleplan for infantry, but don't click attack button on infantry, they will automatic advance to cover the land the tank capture.

 

[him_15]

Battle Planner is indeed very hard to learn and implement for new HOI4 players. It took a while for me to get used to it as well.
My advice is to have shorter frontline by assigning more armies. SO troops won't easily shuffle long distance all the time. When you still have to adjust the frontline accordingly when battles go on. For panzer army you might want to just manual control them for breakthrough and encircling tactic.

 

[Black Ader]

Thank you for all your answers.

My frontlines are quite short, I usually form 12-divisions armies which are covering 4 or 5 provinces. So I don't understand why some Upper-Siliesia divisions commited themselves to Pomerania. Perhaps because there was a huge pocket, all the frontlines were around itI think.

I still struggle to understand the benefits of battle planner apart the preparation bonus : sure, you don't have to control manually every division, but if you have to redraw your frontlines every in-game week, with the risk of some lunatic moves, it looks quite tedious also.

I put 36 divisons along the french border with a hold-the-line order, and this went well. But I could have all the same just posted those divisions, as they are not supposed to do anything before Fall Rot.

 

[marcelo r. r.]

I still struggle to understand the benefits of battle planner apart the preparation bonus : sure, you don't have to control manually every division, but if you have to redraw your frontlines every in-game week, with the risk of some lunatic moves, it looks quite tedious also.

Its a "raw" atack bonus, if its is 50%, ur troops deal +50% damage on atacking.

Its possible win with Germany just using battleplaner;.

Just superimpose the battleplanning like this, incluind tanks, they will atack along with infantry and u will notice encirclements forming, but its a "economy game" playstyle, to play using only battleplanning u need economic superiority;

 

[TruckerBarry65493]

Its a "raw" atack bonus, if its is 50%, ur troops deal +50% damage on atacking.

Its possible win with Germany just using battleplaner;.

Just superimpose the battleplanning like this, incluind tanks, they will atack along with infantry and u will notice encirclements forming, but its a "economy game" playstyle, to play using only battleplanning u need economic superiority;

View attachment 985905

use a field marshal frontline, not this ui clutter lmao

 

[HugsAndSnuggles]

I still struggle to understand the benefits of battle planner apart the preparation bonus : sure, you don't have to control manually every division, but if you have to redraw your frontlines every in-game week, with the risk of some lunatic moves, it looks quite tedious also.

Frontlines are weird (to the point of being borderline unusable) with pockets, yes. They still save a lot of micro on defence: waging a global multi-front war requires too much attention without having to check all frontlines for gaping holes every other day. Minor adjustments of frontlines via alt also take less time than manual control of divisions.

Most of my offensives are done via single-tile frontline with spearhead order, which I find working quite fine (with sole exception of divisions supporting nearby battles that have nothing to do with them, but I can work around that).

 

[marcelo r. r.]

use a field marshal frontline, not this ui clutter lmao

- Field Marshall frontline can have bugs related to trait gain, i don't trust it.
- is problematic to split fronts, perhaps this is the cause OP is having problems with army frontlines.

 

[TruckerBarry65493]

- Field Marshall frontline can have bugs related to trait gain, i don't trust it.
- is problematic to split fronts, perhaps this is the cause OP is having problems with army frontlines.

grind organizer in spain or china, i've never had that issue
a field marshal frontline is much much simpler to deal with than 4 general frontlines