Can we talk about the 3 designers?

[batata1]

You can't expect everyone to religiously follow the dev diaries. People tend to ignore things until it directly impacts them, i.e. in a new patch.

I'm willing to bet the the median number of dev diaries read is 0

 

[Ironside112]

Afterwards many transitioned fully to cannons anyhow. 3-4 cannons and few if any mgs became the norm (outside of US sticking to like 6-8 .50 cals instead..)

Anyhow I agree some general presets would be nice.

Yeah, most aircraft that used 4x MG and 4x cannons were heavy fighters like the Mosquito anyways, but presets seem to be missing in general from the designer this time round which is unfortunate. Especially names, seeing "Improved Light Airframe 2 Series II" in the sky doesn't really invoke the same level of interest as Supermarine Spitfire Mk Vc

 

[Balesir]

I love the designers. I'm a history geek and really like the flexibility they give. That being said, I do like to have presets, something that @Balesir 's Waltzing Matilda mod does really well for tanks.

Thanks for the mention; others have said that they seldom tinker with the designers, especially in MP, once war starts - this was why I set out to make all historical designs as decisions that could be created with one mouseclick. I will say, though, that to make this really work I changed the tank module definitions quite a bit to avoid the strange meta that has also been mentioned and get mirrors of historical designs that actually approximate the capabilities of historical tanks. I'm now commencing the same exercise for aircraft.

 

[goodcigar]

I believe the idea is a fine idea to have Designers. However, the execution is somewhat lacking from a historical/realism/logical/ease of use standpoint. One thing that really annoys me is how I can't build historical mid-late war Submarines and Tanks due to the limited slots. Limited in arbitrary ways that don't make any logical sense.

The removal of unique historical Ship Class names when Man The Guns released bothered me too. It's never a good idea to remove features (Home Port function was also removed in MTG) especially ones that increase historical immersion imo.

The Tank Designer is designed in a way where the Max Speed stat doesn't correlate to reality at all. This harms the immersion and believability of the whole thing and makes it hard to create historical Tanks. I wrote extensively about how I would improve the Tank Designer: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/german-tank-designs.1502351/#post-27949260

Overall there are some things (like modules, stat effects, roles) missing from the Designers that should be there imo. The Designers really should have pre-built historical presets for everything. If not unlocking pre-built presets then at least showing you a historical preset so you can build it yourself.

I've also never liked the XP requirement for physically designing things (especially now that XP has to be used for so many other things) I don't think anyone does. Doesn't make any sense and really limits you and probably the AI as well. And it forces you to have a large army permanently exercising 24/7 or grinding in wars which is goofy and unrealistic. Especially annoying that removing/downgrading things costs XP as well. Makes no sense at all.

 

[Supremeleaderpies]

i think fundamentally one of the biggest problems with the designers outside of multiplayer is the ais fundamental inability to use them.

why would i take the time to design something to counter the ai, when the ai can barely even put gas in the tank to start it? to use an analogy.

all the designers have become in sp simply, find the "meta" unit for your intended play style., mass produce it and roll over the ai as it wont react to it at all nor will it build any counter for it.

its now the exact same for all 3 designers. I can build a fleet the ai cannot destroy. I can build tanks the ai will never build to pierce. Now i can build planes that rarely are shot down and can trade insane numbers with the ai. my last brazil game i had 3500 fighters over london, with them fighting with an equal number of planes. The british were taking upwards of 30-40 planes lost per day. i can now build cas that wipes out enemy divisions in ways even early cas 3 previously could never do.

in my view i think this is where majority of the problem lies.

 

[Corpse Fool]

I can build a fleet the ai cannot destroy. I can build tanks the ai will never build to pierce. Now i can build planes that rarely are shot down and can trade insane numbers with the ai.

Have you just tried not being so sweaty?

 

[pro.gamer.69]

Have you just tried not being so sweaty?

that comment is like a week old but I thought of it (/that thread) when I read Supremeleader's too lol

 

[Supremeleaderpies]

Have you just tried not being so sweaty?

I hadn't seen this yet. I haven't laughed that hard from this forum in a while thank you for that

 

[Shadow_Edwards]

I believe the idea is a fine idea to have Designers. However, the execution is somewhat lacking from a historical/realism/logical/ease of use standpoint. One thing that really annoys me is how I can't build historical mid-late war Submarines and Tanks due to the limited slots. Limited in arbitrary ways that don't make any logical sense.

The removal of unique historical Ship Class names when Man The Guns released bothered me too. It's never a good idea to remove features (Home Port function was also removed in MTG) especially ones that increase historical immersion imo.

The Tank Designer is designed in a way where the Max Speed stat doesn't correlate to reality at all. This harms the immersion and believability of the whole thing and makes it hard to create historical Tanks. I wrote extensively about how I would improve the Tank Designer: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/german-tank-designs.1502351/#post-27949260

Overall there are some things (like modules, stat effects, roles) missing from the Designers that should be there imo. The Designers really should have pre-built historical presets for everything. If not unlocking pre-built presets then at least showing you a historical preset so you can build it yourself.

I've also never liked the XP requirement for physically designing things (especially now that XP has to be used for so many other things) I don't think anyone does. Doesn't make any sense and really limits you and probably the AI as well. And it forces you to have a large army permanently exercising 24/7 or grinding in wars which is goofy and unrealistic. Especially annoying that removing/downgrading things costs XP as well. Makes no sense at all.

I disagree the the argument that XP doesn't make sense. It's a tool of abstraction to represent use and experience. When fielding equipment in the military it takes actual use by soldiers in the field to figure all the bugs out.

Additionally the military through combat and training figures out what sort of equipment it needs to field. I see the use of XP to change design as an abstraction of that process.

Looking back at the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, we saw soldiers modifying weapons and vehicles to address gaps in their equipment. These modifications lead to the development of things like the armor packages for the hummer, and adoptions of plate carriers.

The same thing happened in WW2, they made adjustments to designed based on feedback from soldiers. It strikes me that the XP system makes a lot of sense when you consider all the work that goes into developing force structure or vehicle design in real life.

 

[Shadow_Edwards]

i think fundamentally one of the biggest problems with the designers outside of multiplayer is the ais fundamental inability to use them.

why would i take the time to design something to counter the ai, when the ai can barely even put gas in the tank to start it? to use an analogy.

all the designers have become in sp simply, find the "meta" unit for your intended play style., mass produce it and roll over the ai as it wont react to it at all nor will it build any counter for it.

its now the exact same for all 3 designers. I can build a fleet the ai cannot destroy. I can build tanks the ai will never build to pierce. Now i can build planes that rarely are shot down and can trade insane numbers with the ai. my last brazil game i had 3500 fighters over london, with them fighting with an equal number of planes. The british were taking upwards of 30-40 planes lost per day. i can now build cas that wipes out enemy divisions in ways even early cas 3 previously could never do.

in my view i think this is where majority of the problem lies.

I get what your saying, but I would suspect most players don't have your issue, and I think tweaking the AI could be the fix for those that are having the issues you mentioned. However I have no idea about what that would take.

 

[Supremeleaderpies]

I get what your saying, but I would suspect most players don't have your issue, and I think tweaking the AI could be the fix for those that are having the issues you mentioned. However I have no idea about what that would take.

I will say that i definitely do not think the solution is for the ai to just build the "meta".

maybe it may lie in having the ai perform similiarly to how historical ai functions now? Where the ai functions historically up until the player starts doing so much in the world that it causes the ai to deviate. simply put it needs to be a little more reactionary than it is now, where it makes a shotgun spread of templates and hopes it will match up on the front.

 

[Shadow_Edwards]

I will say that i definitely do not think the solution is for the ai to just build the "meta".

maybe it may lie in having the ai perform similiarly to how historical ai functions now? Where the ai functions historically up until the player starts doing so much in the world that it causes the ai to deviate. simply put it needs to be a little more reactionary than it is now, where it makes a shotgun spread of templates and hopes it will match up on the front.

Maybe, I feel like the problem is that top players will always min/max beyond what a competent AI could develop. The challenge for the AI team is building one that won't steam roll the larger player base while also giving higher skilled players a challenge.

The more sophisticated the AI the more CPU cycles right? That means you need a spec bump or a worse player experience for lower teir systems. If the AI just has a predetermined template it follows every time it becomes easier for the player who gets to design a custom craft to overmatch.

No being a programmer, I have a hard time imagining how difficult of a problem this is to solve, especially when confronted by a number of constraints you need to balance.

Maybe there could be a system where the AI at a certain Intel limit can just cheat a bit and copy your design with a slight bump leading to an eventual arms race?

 

[Ffire]

high reliability on a Russian tank

 

[Timmysoboy]

Don't know if it has been posted already, but here's a relevant suggestion thread:

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/massive-qol-suggestion-presets-configs-on-air-naval-and-army-designers.1545197/

 

[Hoi Neuling]

You'll quickly find that the average HOI4 MP players' favorite pastime is inhaling industrial amounts of copium, therefore anything that has any effect on the games' MP aspect will be coped about. This is the way. As for mod languages, well, it's an international community. I don't think you can blame the modders for not translating their mods into every language lol. I understand what you mean, though.

That being said, I don't really see why people that play MP can't desire quality of life improvements for the part of the game they love. It's a feature provided by paradox at the end of the day. They have just as much right as anyone else, I suppose. You can't say x part of the community is allowed to comment on features from their perspective but not the others.

I only showed my personal few of MP from bad Experiance in Strategy Games and what get seen on Twitch, Youtube as well as read in MP-Forums etc.

That why I and many others from the older (40 Years+) / medium (25 to 30 Years+) Gamers with that long Game-Experiance incl. the upcoming Multi-Player-Parts from the beginning 2ks prefer SP.

What the big Mods belongs, I play them in English too if there is no Translation availible, but then Selected ones [Ultra-Historical, Walzing Matilda, 1930 and if the UUMC get done fully that too again].

 

[Hoi Neuling]

I disagree the the argument that XP doesn't make sense. It's a tool of abstraction to represent use and experience. When fielding equipment in the military it takes actual use by soldiers in the field to figure all the bugs out.

Additionally the military through combat and training figures out what sort of equipment it needs to field. I see the use of XP to change design as an abstraction of that process.

Looking back at the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, we saw soldiers modifying weapons and vehicles to address gaps in their equipment. These modifications lead to the development of things like the armor packages for the hummer, and adoptions of plate carriers.

The same thing happened in WW2, they made adjustments to designed based on feedback from soldiers. It strikes me that the XP system makes a lot of sense when you consider all the work that goes into developing force structure or vehicle design in real life.

I understand what you mean. With that XP use for General-Staff, getting integrated in Attack-Plans, in the Designers / Buildup your Troopers and other Secrets we have now, everything get fine.

But not with the previous old System from 1.00 Base-Version on, where for only 1 Upgrade of an Ship / Aircraft or Tank get used 25 XP and the XP-Squander up to 1000 XP for them, which brought absolutely nothing in the Field. That´s what we mean.

Now we can use the Experiance-Points from the Navy / Army and Airforce the first time (after the Upgrade from Ships, Tanks and Aircrafts to the new System) and integrating the General Staff-Feature fully with Rhyme or Reason.


Now back to Topic:

I like the 3 Designers and the R & D-Features for them. It´s not perfect and the one or other Part is still missing to get it more realistic. The Devs are not finished yet with Upgrades, Reworks, Refits and Integrations for the Game yet, so let us see what comes in with the remaining 1.12.-Version-Upgrades and esp. with the next medium / big Version Upgrades.

The Fact, that on that new Designer-Systems incl. R & D (esp. on the Army-Side) more work needed is fully clear. But we are in the big Refit- / Rework-Beginning-Part with the 1.11-Version and 1.12-Version now, so let us surprise what we get for 1.13+ in that Parts.

The Designers are in General fully OK and you can build real Fighters / Bombers / Ship-Variants / Tank-Variants as well as never build, small build or Prototype-Variants from them (like the Pionier-Tank, Flamethrower-Tanks, AA-Tanks, Biplane CAS / Coast-Guard-Ships etc.). Esp. what is with them in Mods doable to get from the exsisting R & D.

The best example is here the older Naval Rework Mod I / II, which shows what can be done at best with the exsisting Features.

 

[HugsAndSnuggles]

Depends on the definition, I suppose:

 

[redcoat22]

I agree with the OP. On balance I probably preferred canned ships, tanks and planes. The designer has some merit but I really prefer a thematic experience and this is much harder given manual design.