Command hierarchy
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A historical battalion count will usually give you some weird number approaching 40, like a US Infantry division with all its usual attachments - 9x Infantry, 4x Artillery, 1x Tank, 1x Tank Destroyer, 1x Anti-Aircraft for 35 width. If you try to replicate historical equipment and manpower counts rather than battalion counts, you could even go over 40 width, since some reinforced German divisions and square Japanese divisions could have more than 20000 men in them, though smaller Soviet (in practice, if not on paper), Italian and later-war German divisions would be much smaller.
There's nothing particularly ahistorical about 40 width divisions in capability, the game's battalions are just oddly sized and support units, sans the 5 you can slap on for 300-500 men each, aren't modeled so the battalion count to make a 40 width isn't historical.
I could not agree more. The Game allows for up to 25 battalions in a formation for a reason.
I say again , Corps is needed in the game ... the gap between division and Army is unacceptable
Yes, Corps are the smallest relevant independent units in a game of this scale and of this time period. They had this right in HOI2, not sure why they ditched it.
http://militaryhistoryvisualized.com/update-hoi-4-historical-infantry-division-layouts-early-war/
Military History Visualized
The guy did a series of videos on "historical"-esque templates for HoI, but he's been doing military videos for a while.
Haven't watched any of them really. When I want my history oversimplified I'll watch History Oversimplified...or Drachinifel
"The Kamchatka announced it was sinking, which lead to great rejoicing amongst the fleet"
Why you need corps?
What would changed by having Corps with ~5Division in a separate group?
If you want a smaller group you can add only 5 Divisions to a General. Like i do with special Forces.
You dont have to put 24 in a group.
You can group them together as you want.
Generally, corps could allow for easier Battleplan Management, as I find it a pain to give Invasion orders to armies or plan Armour pincers.
And there are considerable Advantages to having maximum divisions in an army, as generals level faster and give better bonuses on average.
I'd like to see corps assets implementet in a way that the AI assigns them to divisions in need, from a pool designed by the player and otherwise like a division of its own.
And it's OK that only majors can build them (at least in great numbers). 40 width are still not completely unstoppable. A minor with many smaller divisions should be able to resist a few 40width if they are on defense and have an overall numerical advantage. But If the Major power commits their full force, a minor should have a lot of trouble to defend themselves.
If implemented, a Corps should probably have some special assets that can be used to boost the divisions (like artillery, engineers, supply etc.). Otherwise it would be just the same as a small army.
NO, because 40 width > 2 x 20 width for no discernible reason. Your blithe assertion that they are not unstoppable really just means exploit.
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Yes, but 3x20 width or even 5x10 width defeding a fortified province will usually resist a single 40 width division.
And while we agree that the current balance is flawed, we think providing some drawbacks to 40 width divisions would be better than just making them impossible.
I think there is no point in discussing 40w any further. Some people want them banned and anyone else behaves like a three-year-old 
But I checked the ratings, and it looks that the small sample has a popular vote in favour of 40w not being ahistorical or gamey.
Conclusion: this thread is a Kindergarten.
But I checked the ratings, and it looks that the small sample has a popular vote in favour of 40w not being ahistorical or gamey.
Conclusion: this thread is a Kindergarten.
You can already do this in practice, by building larger divisions with the assets that you want. You just create a duplocate template and the expand it to contain the hardware you want. Then switch templates in the area where you need it. After the operation where those assets were used, you switch back - the hardware is returned to the stockpile. And then you can switch templates in another area, etc. This means that you can magically transport your 200 Super Heavy Tanks from Stalingrad to Paris almost instantaneously - gamey for sure.
While I myself advocated for that approach, this is actually gamy If done like that.
I am a for permanent Templates with these assets.
This mod might be of intrest to this thread?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1327057985&searchtext=corps
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1327057985&searchtext=corps
For the love of christ this is tiresome. Just because something can possibly may be be overcome does not negate that as a general rule ti will not be.
It is still an exploit, and I have since rewatched the video I saw sometime ago explaining why.
It seems to stem from the fact that divisions attack other divisions randomly. So if you have four 20 width divisions attack one held by three, only one of those three may be attacked by the same division, whereas with two 40 widith either one division will get the entire force of 80 width, or two out of three will. He explains how combat modifiers are compounded once offense exceed defense.
He also explains how 40 width explout support bridage fucntion, where in effect you get a two for the price of one with artillery, at, whatever the support brigade is.
Neither of these make any sense in terms of combat. So, this is in fact a gamey exploit as I have maintained all along, not to mention by and large ahistorical.
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It is a good question, Eisscrat. If corps were added with no other changes of any kind, then you really do just end up with smaller armies and a shortage of generals.
Adding corps is typically included with some changes. For example, adding corps would naturally mean adding generals to represent the headquarters and leaders leading them. This is not a problem for some countries, but during the war Russia suffered greatly from a lack of leaders and headquarter staff officers. They were unable to form the corps they needed. It was very normal for Russian army generals to have infantry divisions report directly to them. This slowly got better, but was still a big problem in 1944. This caused serious command, communication, and battlefield intel problems that could be simulated in the game by adding corps and causing problems for countries that do not have the resources to build them.
Another popular idea is that the corps should have "assets" to aid the divisions assigned to it. In the war, these assets were typically battalion or even brigade sized combat units, such as heavy artillery, TDs, AA, AT, and the like. It could be an interesting change to have such support units.
First of all having just 5 divisions (following your example) wastes a full army slot under an army-group so It's not a really an efficient solution.
However in order for addition of Corps not alter the battle/battle-plan mechanic of the game that much , I suggest theese considerations to be implemented :
1- Generals assigned to corps cannot enjoy their rank bonuses , that means assigning a rank 6 general to a corps is just like assigning a rank1 because both cannot enjoy their rank effects
2- Following the previous point , also generals cannot gain experience thus rank up while commanding a Corps !
3- Generals still can gain trait experience (like Infantry leader , Mountaineers , ... etc) while commanding a Corps (however the rate of gain is discussable)
4- Following the previous point ,Generals assigned to a corps can have their traits intact (unlike their rank) so the corps can enjoy the bonuses of the assigned general's traits (again the amount of effects can be discussed)
these items can help addtion of corps not to radically change the game mechanic that much to the point people can somehow ignore it altogether !
on the otherhand ,Corps not only makes Armies a bit more managable (as @Zauberelefant mentioned) but also makes a military-historical WWII game more immersive and realistic.
I'm very much agree with this. Actually if this system expanded maybe to even Armies and by making these feature only achievable through research , decesions or spending army xp then along with addition of officer-pool suggested in another thread this can help increase the gap between armies of major/more advanced nations compared to armies of less advanced/minor nations !