British Raj NF

[RonBurgundy]

I played a game as the British Raj and couldn't help but notice how underwhelming their NF tree is. Its mainly focused on industrialization and modernization of the military, which is great, but politically, you spend most of the time building up to the civil war and then by the time that's done, you just get pulled into the war.

India, with its massive population, is poised to be a great power in the region. You could push east as a fascist or invade the middle east as a communist. You can invade the Dutch East Indies or take the fight to Japan. I feel like they have so many interesting choices laid out in front of them but the NF tree really doesn't take advantage of any of them.

Just my opinion

 

[vivear]

Totally agree , India has really a lot of very good possibilities in front of her but , in fact what we got is not THAT interessant compared to what it might be .

 

[--Yigito123--]

This. Raj currently has no political decisions apart from if "do you want to be a communist or fascist when the civil war breaks out?" which is really weird considering how influential an independent Communist/Fascist Indian regime could've been in the region. Australia and Canada have more unique political decisions than the British Raj, and that's saying something as those two nations are stuck in the corner of the map while Raj has political powderkegs inside and outside everywhere.

 

[Iskulya]

The Raj is one of the most underwhelming trees in the game. The civil war is a huge mess that to the point that it almost seems like it was never tested. It just leads to a forever war against the allies that is unwinnable, that or you have to cheese it.

Also it’s pretty lame that it has that huge agrarian society manpower nerf with absolutely no way of even mitigating it when there’s nothing thing stopping China from fielding an army of a few hundred million professional soldiers in the 1940’s in the same game.

 

[RonBurgundy]

Agree with all of you. I couldn't even finish the game because I just wasn't interested in it at all. It really needs an overhaul. I like the idea that India starts from nothing and has to rapidly industrialize to become a great power but there's really no payoff in the end because, as Yigito123 puts it, the only major choice you have is what party is in charge when WW2 breaks out.

I think an overhaul is important, especially now that we have a proper China that could serve as a rival in the region. Perhaps the Middle-Eastern nations could form a faction to protect itself from the growing influence of India if it goes communist or fascist.

I feel that we here could easily formulate a better NF tree than what we're given within an hour or so

 

[Ironside121]

There's not a lot to do with many nations in the TfV DLC. You either stay loyal and fight WW2, or become independent, or just join another major. Nothing else to do, which is pretty bland. India was not in a position to become a world superpower though- but with that being said there's no way Japan would've become a Communist Nation and no way the USA would have had a second Civil War.. so why not have more potential paths for the minors?

At least the DoD nations - despite being an unrefined trash DLC- have semi-interesting paths to take.

 

[Cancvas]

Civil war in Raj would be interesting if it occassionally would disintegrate to several competeting princely states, which could peace out to indepencent entities themselves.

 

[Oof]

I've played RAJ a couple of times and found it pretty interesting. It's relatively easy to become independent, the amount of MP is pretty good and IC wise you can be a powerhouse supplying the UK, while fighting the Japanese.

 

[Shaka of Carthage]

... I feel that we here could easily formulate a better NF tree than what we're given within an hour or so

Create a thread, then make a new Raj focus tree. Once completed, someone (if no one volunteers I will do it) can create a mod that replaces the base game's Raj focus tree with this new one.

Problem solved.

 

[Archangel85]

I feel that we here could easily formulate a better NF tree than what we're given within an hour or so

We are actually currently looking for a new Content Designer on HoI, so we are looking forward to your application. Please mention this post in your Cover Letter so we can make sure you only get an hour to do the work test instead of the usual week.

 

[James Hale]

We are actually currently looking for a new Content Designer on HoI, so we are looking forward to your application. Please mention this post in your Cover Letter so we can make sure you only get an hour to do the work test instead of the usual week.

As a minor suggestion, you could add a decision for an independent India to gain cores on Goa and Pondicherry.

 

[RonBurgundy]

We are actually currently looking for a new Content Designer on HoI, so we are looking forward to your application. Please mention this post in your Cover Letter so we can make sure you only get an hour to do the work test instead of the usual week.

I apologize. That bit, in retrospect, was insulting to the devs. I really love HoI4 and think you all did a fantastic job with the game. I just see a lot of potential for the British Raj that I feel hasn't been explored.

 

[RELee]

 

[RagingMonkey]

We are actually currently looking for a new Content Designer on HoI, so we are looking forward to your application. Please mention this post in your Cover Letter so we can make sure you only get an hour to do the work test instead of the usual week.

Savage. I love it.

 

[Archangel85]

I apologize. That bit, in retrospect, was insulting to the devs. I really love HoI4 and think you all did a fantastic job with the game. I just see a lot of potential for the British Raj that I feel hasn't been explored.

No hard feelings. I just really don't like the idea that some people in the community have about the amount of work it takes to make a focus tree. I feel like it is not so much insulting to us as it is insulting and demoralizing to modders who do actually pour a lot of time into their work and most certainly don't bash out a focus tree in an hour.

And I would fully agree that the Raj tree has some missed opportunities, and I would be very happy to hear some concrete thoughts about it.

As a minor suggestion, you could add a decision for an independent India to gain cores on Goa and Pondicherry.

This, for example, sounds like a good idea.

 

[Zwirbaum]

What about utilizing decision system to lower the agricultural society manpower penalty? (With progressively steeper cost with each step of the penalty removed)

For example - Mechanization of Agriculture

Requires: X amount of motorized equipment, Q amount of support equipment, R political power cost
Risk of Famine must be removed.

Takes Y days to implement, During the progress you get Weekly Stability -Z% stability.

After it is finished: You get Agricultural Society penalty NS lowered by S%.

You can enact only A steps at certain subject levels, and the rest of them can be only taken as independent India.

 

[anbory]

We are actually currently looking for a new Content Designer on HoI, so we are looking forward to your application. Please mention this post in your Cover Letter so we can make sure you only get an hour to do the work test instead of the usual week.

Besides trying to joke out the trouble, Content Designers should to admit - there are a lot of issues with their design. Just remember the famous Federative Republic of Kingdom of Yugoslavia, remember the recent thread about Japanese issues.

IMO, the problem is that designers put too much efforts on silly alt-history content. You had time and resources to do the communist Japan, but you don't have neither of this to do, for example, Suiyuan Campaign, which was a turning point in forming anti-Japanese movement in China. Actually, it was the FIRST time China repelled foreign troops and this is what players can expect in China themed DLC instead of hidden HRE restoration.

 

[James Hale]

This, for example, sounds like a good idea.

Well, I think it makes sense in that it is historical that India claimed these areas; you could have an event which fired for whoever owned them (usually Portugal and France) demanding them peacefully, but of course if either refused then India would get a war goal anyway because of the core. This would let an independent India fight anti-colonial wars against those countries.

My knowledge of India during this period is very limited so I cannot really make suggestions as to interesting focuses which relate to historical events or ideas. I think the current focus tree is actually pretty good, but it suffers as all older focus trees do in that as you guys make more of them you obviously improve, and so - at least from an ideas and content point of view - the newer ones tend to be better. This seems like a natural part of game development, though, and will be the same in other games' DLC.

I do think, however, that it needs some sort of QA pass. I have noticed a number of bugs in the tree, such as dockyard focuses attempting to place ports in incorrect states (so they are not given), and the Indian Gentleman Officers focus being strange, because instead of - like the Chinese version - giving all of your leaders (existing and future) an extra level in a particular category, it just makes future leaders start as level 2 generally, which is less useful.

I think it would make more sense if it was changed to add +1 logistics level to all generals; looking at the Chinese version (the Academy focus, which adds +1 planning), I think both the focus and national spirit need tweaking to do this, but it is a simple thing to change.

Also, the Assam Oil focus adds oil to the correct state, but requires that a different state (Bombay, I think) be controlled. Just a minor thing I remember from viewing the tree the other day. The Navy Funding focus has a text bug in that I think part of the custom trigger is wrong; it says "unlock light_cruiser_tech" or something, because that tech isn't localized. I think it needs a new or revised customer trigger.

A possible new pair of mutually exclusive focuses that tie in nicely with the new UK tree would be to decide whether - if you do the INC path - to become the Union of India, a full dominion like Canada and Australia, or the Republic of India, an independent republic with no shared head of state. Historically India and Pakistan in fact did both, being dominions for a few years until republican constitutions were ratified, but in the game there's no reason why it can't be a choice with different effects, such as political power, stability and different leaders and cosmetic tags. Just a small suggestion anyway... it's not important, but I think it would be nice to have, because it is in fact entirely plausible that India could have chosen a different route in the 1940s and still been a Commonwealth realm (with shared head of state) today.

Sorry for the long, rambling post! Just wanted to provide some feedback on the Raj.

 

[Alliegorical]

The Raj tree is actually one of my favorites. I've only ever played the Indian National Congress side of the political tree, so if the Swaraj side is lacking, I wouldn't know anything about that. But ever since TfV, India has been my favorite Democratic nation to play (tied now with Democratic Germany if you max-boost France, Italy, and USSR) and the Raj's focus tree is a big reason for that.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

We are actually currently looking for a new Content Designer on HoI, so we are looking forward to your application. Please mention this post in your Cover Letter so we can make sure you only get an hour to do the work test instead of the usual week.

Is content really the issue, or is this one among several? To me the biggest issue with NF isn't their design, but how they interact with game elements/break core game rules/break causality (examples include USA declaring on democratic Germany in the name of going against fascism, puppets joining hostile factions in China and ignoring puppet rules to fight you, Germany puppeting a larger Hungary with no option for player refusal, PRC magic-attaining land to produce an encirclement on-DoW in enemy territory, PRC declaring on China and calling the allies in an offensive war, to name a few). Expecting to anticipate every possible little interaction that might break something as the number of possible interactions increases seems like a recipe for disaster.

All of this comes off as putting the cart before the horse though. I don't know what can be reasonably expected of NF-rule interactions when nobody can actually state rules that consistently predict what happens in HOI 4 when it comes to who gets territory during a war.

That's a rather strong assertion, but I'm serious. It's held up to evidence. Bitmode did his best in a separate thread, and at least shed some light on where things might not be working properly...and that's the closest I've ever seen. Every single explanation attempt I've seen can be trivially refuted with screenshots showing the game implementation isn't consistent with it. Most likely, it's pretty bugged.

I don't think NFs CAN work decently until the faction nonsense/wrong capitulations/wrong occupations/weird occupation transfers stop happening. Maybe that falls under the umbrella of "content", but it's not what would come to mind when I hear "content designer". It really does invite serious bugs when NFs allow nations to bypass otherwise-established game rules though.

Take the example from earlier in this thread: right now, it is possible for OTHER nations to do civil wars without involving the entirety of their overlord's factions to get free. Others still can straight up declare on their overlord while the latter is in the middle of a war. A player knowing this and attempting India would not necessarily anticipate an exception because reasons. However, because the core rules are dysfunctional, exceptions because reasons are a pervasive issue in HOI 4 and I don't think more NF content put forth by a human being can change that w/o doing something about the underlying problems, no matter how good they are.

FWIW, the focuses themselves are pretty interesting and whoever does the art for them + achievement icons is amazing.