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podcat

Game Director <unannounced>
Paradox Staff
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Jul 23, 2007
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Hello and welcome to the last developer diary for Hearts of Iron III: Their Finest Hour. Today we are going to talk about all the little bits and pieces that didn’t quite fit into any of the other diaries. :)

Interface
We have done quite a bit of work on the unit interfaces so they should be much easier to use now.
The OOB browser now expands into two windows with the click of a button making it much easier to reorganize your troops by drag-dropping them to a new position without having to scroll.
doubleoob.png

We have also made it easier to give orders to multiple units - you can now group select units and Detach from HQs, Create new HQs above them, Upgrade, Prioritise, or toggle Reinforcements/Upgrades for all selected.

For single units we now have a shortcut to split them up into brigades with one click on the reorganize button. Very handy in conjunction with the OOB windows. You can also see brigades being upgraded directly on the unit now so you don’t forget and go and attach another brigade there.

UI.jpg

Gameplay - Naval
Super heavy battleships have been rather improved and should rule the surface combat food chain until 1940s BBs can be built.
CAG's damage has been reduced somewhat, and CAGs can no longer fly 20% below strength/organisation, but they now regain org on carriers at the same rate they would in an airbase.
Ships now have a special repair speed modifier so their upgradable parts, like AA guns, upgrade at a much more reasonable rate.

Gameplay - Leaders & Traits
In general, more XP is transferred up the chain of command, so you will see your higher ranked leaders improving throughout the course of a campaign.
Assigning a leader to a unit now halves its current Org, so less teleporting your best leaders around between battles.
We have changed how some traits work, Superior Air Tactician now gives a direct attack bonus, while Tank Busters now improve attack stats rather than decreasing their target's softness.
Finally, to make it easier to manage your leaders you can now jump to any leader's location on the map by clicking on them in the ledger, and when assigning leaders there is a new filter to quickly allow you to find only leaders with the traits you want.

Gameplay - General & Balance
When a country in a faction is defeated, it can now only go into exile in another major nation in the same faction. If there are no majors remaining, they will be annexed instead. In addition, all GiE nations in a faction will be annexed when the last major surrenders.

Transport planes now lose much of their Org when dropping Paratroopers, and must wait for it to be regained before they can drop any more.

To prevent Japan annexing all of China, and to encourage them to fight in the Pacific rather than India, we have added a default wargoal to their war with China. If they win they will annex a portion of China's coast and sign a non-aggression pact with them. This ties up a sufficient amount of units for the defence of the border and they can focus more on the US.

Oh yeah, and infrastructure now builds in half the time making it worth upgrading.

AI Improvements
We have done a lot of little tweaks and improvements but I thought I should outline some of the stuff that sticks out.
  • Trade - the trade AI has been rewritten and countries are much better at stockpiling resources, this of course means a more competent AI to fight against.
  • Invasions - we have done many tweaks on the invasion AI, its now much better at taking islands and will plan larger invasions of majors better. Having assault ships will help it out a lot here.
  • Neutrals - instead of an AI that is stubbornly refusing to join your faction neutral countries will now try to combat outside influences to remain neutral. A good example is Sweden and Switzerland. For example if Germany tries to influence the Swiss towards them they will align towards comintern or allies to stay neutral. This helps a lot with plausibility and feedback to the player.
  • Resistance - Governments in exile will now actively try and build underground resistance networks and try and break free when the time is right.
part-party.jpg

I hope you are as excited as we are about the new expansion! Stay tuned for some other goodies like AARs and video diaries in the days leading up to release!
 
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Awesome, awesome and more awesome! The minor changes compliment the major changes very well. As much as I leader hop myself I am happy to see that change on the org made. I think better exp rates will help along with more (and more visible) leader traits being able to be gained. My logistic wizards will continue to be at the head of the long fights though. :)
 
Go Norway! :))
 
woah, that are a lot of useful Interface changes, that will really help in (re)organizing everything in a more efficient manner
Also Naval&Leader changes sound good to me.

If everything in the release really works as awesome as described in the DD's im really hyped for that one. First two expansions didn't really do much to me, but this one... can't wait to get it!
Just hope, it won't take 5 patches again to make it work :/
 
Oh, I forgot to mention that Lothos and some of the other betas have helped out a lot with optimizing the production AI. It can build some really mean unit compositions now and is much harder to fight against.
 
pre-order time!
 
That's a really nice change for Japan. Hopefully we'll see both Japan (and the UK) pay much more attention to home defense when threatened.
 
Looks good but I had pinned all my hopes on this dev diary telling me you had done variable surrender levels for different Wargoals :(
 
Sounds good. I like the fact that CAGs will be grounded when they are low on STR/ORG. That should make carriers less uber. The ORG regain is good, too, and it helps the AI more than the player, as the player is usually better at CAG-shifting.

Transports losing ORG after dropping PARAs was a much needed change, so I'm glad that it's in!

What about homeland defence in case of island nations?
 
all those notes, and the ones that envigorated me the most were the CAG change and lower time INFRA.

If I were a general in this game I'm sure I'd have the Logistics Wizard trait ;p.



That said, question on the CAG change:
CAG's damage has been reduced somewhat, and CAGs can no longer fly 20% strength/organisation, but they now regain org on carriers at the same rate they would in an airbase.
Do you mean that a CAG that is below 20% of both STR --AND-- ORG cannot take off, or a CAG that falls below 20% on EITHER STR OR ORG cannot take off?

Also, why isn't CAG repair speed tied into the carrier "hanger" tech? Would certainly be way mroe useful than a visibility change it currently does ;p
 
Also, why isn't CAG repair speed tied into the carrier "hanger" tech? Would certainly be way mroe useful than a visibility change it currently does ;p
Something I've also suggested before. Guessing it might be tricky to do though, I'm not even sure the game actually tracks which CAG is based on which CV, just that there is enough room for them all.
 
These are many cherries on the top of an already big and beautifull cake, very promising indeed. Good work paradox !


Superior Air Tactician now gives a direct attack bonus

Against planes this time I hope ! If not, we still need a "flying ace" trait as the night flyer is now the only one with air-to-air attack bonus.

Invasions - we have done many tweaks on the invasion AI...will plan larger invasions of majors better. Having assault ships will help it out a lot here.

Larger doomed invasions ? Or less ill advised kamikaze invasions and better and larger ones when there is some chance of success ?
 
Assigning a leader to a unit now halves its current Org, so less teleporting your best leaders around between battles.

Wouldn't it be better if that would happen when you detach a leader from a unit? This way, you would have two units' org halved if you switch leaders, but you wouldn't lose anything if you assign a new leader to a unit without leadership.