Hearts of Iron IV - 23rd Development Diary - 4th of September 2015 (1 day early)

[Johan]

Welcome to another developmentdiary for Hearts of Iron IV! Today we'll talk about the industrial buildup...

In all previous iterations of the Hearts of Iron series, we’ve had something called Industrial Capacity, but, as we mentioned back in Dev Diary 5, we have splitted that into Military Factories, Civilian Factories and Naval Dockyards.

Civilian Factories are used for trade, consumer goods & all types of buildings.

• Naval Dockyards are used for building ships.
• Military Factories are used for everything from planes to rifles and tanks.

There are also another few buildings which are categorised as factories when it comes to rules.

• Synthetic Refineries - which each produce 1 Rubber and 2 Oil.
• Nuclear Reactor - producing new nuclear bombs.
• Rocket Test Sites - allows deployment of rockets.

So how does the industrial buildup work in Hearts of Iron IV?

First of all, each state has maximum capacity of factories it can have, depending on its population and infrastructure. There are some focuses or events that may extend that cap, but this is the limit you have to plan about.

You can always destroy a factory if you want to, and there is also the possibility to convert a civilian factory to military use, and back.

The speed of building new buildings like bases, forts and factories depends on your total level of civilian factories in your country, where up to 15 is used on one project at a time.

One difference from Hearts of Iron 3 is that damaged industry needs to be repaired using your own industry instead of being free repairs over time. As well as being more realistic it also make the impact of strategic bombing matter a lot more.

Here's a screenshot of New York which has 2 military factories, 9 civilian factories and 3 naval dockyards. They have the capacity to build 2 more factories with current infrastructure, and if that is improved they reach the maximum of 20 buildings, due to their high population. As a compaison South Carolina only have population for 11 factories, Corsica for 2 and Gotland for 0!

Next week, we’ll go into details about trade.

 

[incarnate]

Nice! I really like it. It forces more meaningful decisions and at the same time a more balanced gameplay imo. I take it Naval Dockyards cannot be converted ever then? That seems only right.

Also a nice surprise to have the DD a day early! yay! Thanks Johan.

 

[Vonboe]

@Johan You just couldn't wait

You can always destroy a factory if you want to, and there is also the possibility to convert a civilian factory to military use, and back.

Are there any penalties for converting military/civilian factories back and forth ??

 

[Rudawitz]

Is the state population growing or static? Is it diminished by recruitment into the armed forces?

 

[Wulf145]

• Rocket Test Sites - allows deployment of rockets.

Does this mean that a Rocket Test Site is needed in a Province to deploy a Rocket unit there or is a facility needed on your territory to produce Rockets?

 

[Niko92]

Looks great. I have to do a bit of complaining though, I don't think that that is the best way to represent how many factories there are. Is it really necessary to have an individual icon for every factory? Why not just have an icon and then a number denoting how many factories there are of that type. That way you wouldn't have to scale the interface based on the max size of the province. Something like this:

Maybe make the numbers more transparent, or put them above/below the factory type

 

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

Woah awesome

Since factories now can be destroyed and repaired using your own industry, does it make sense to use scorched earth tactics to prevent the enemy from using the city's factories?

For example, as the USSR, is it convenient for me to raze many cities before they fall to the Wehrmacht?

 

[DeveronMagi]

i really like that placing factories is limited by population. this guards against placing factories far away from enemy bombers in thinly populated areas.

also a very quick calculation (and assuming a linear caclucation) you need around 600K pop. for 1 factoryunit currently.

 

[Insentient]

Having more than one factory in a province does what? Increase capacity or increase speed? Can a battleship be built with one dockyard in a province (or a whole country)?

 

[Centurion1973]

.....

You can always destroy a factory if you want to
.....

Can we destroy them permanently, or just temporarily (so advancing enemy would just need to repair them)?

Will destruction of factories take some time?

Will destruction of factories have some consequences (reduced NU etc.)?

 

[rjohansen]

I like the idea that you have to use your own resources/industry to get damaged structures up and running again.

However, I am uncertain if the state/province max factories number is a good thing. For instance a HIGH population province should not automatically have a possibility of more factories than a LOW population province. People can move. Or work shifts. Normally there are other elements than population that matters when deciding on what is a suitable place for industry. Population should matter way less then natural suitabilty (can have a hidden stat for each province), infrastructure, railroad, docks etc.

In Gotland you cannot build factories? Is that logical? I don't know the terrain or anything. But if Sweden decided that they wanted to build a factory on that Island that would be impossible? For instance we had/have a weapons manufacturer in Kongsberg in Norway... Not the highest population density in that town...

Also, forts arent they normally built by military engineers, with the use of civilian materials/companies at times, but also, conscripts as a work force, sometimes even POW's... However you should use military factories for that in my opinion. Or perhaps a combination if that is possible.

 

[Poh]

Looks great. I have to do a bit of complaining though, I don't think that that is the best way to represent how many factories there are. Is it really necessary to have an individual icon for every factory? Why not just have an icon and then a number denoting how many factories there are of that type. That way you wouldn't have to scale the interface based on the max size of the province. Something like this:

Maybe make the numbers more transparent, or put them above/below the factory type

Agreed that something of this sort would be really nice. Afaik they do not scale the interface though it could be made smaller if the ressources was on a while underneath what you are showing (depending on how they are represented other placed this might be a good or a bad thing to do imho.).

Im not sure you would need a number on "new building slot or non unlocked" however i agree on the representation. And the picture with all the factories makes my OCD go crazy. I want to line them up in 5s and not mix them.

 

[Centurion1973]

I like the idea that you have to use your own resources/industry to get damaged structures up and running again.

However, I am uncertain if the state/province max factories number is a good thing. For instance a HIGH population province should not automatically have a possibility of more factories than a LOW population province. People can move. Or work shifts. Normally there are other elements than population that matters when deciding on what is a suitable place for industry. Population should matter way less then natural suitabilty (can have a hidden stat for each province), infrastructure, railroad, docks etc.

In Gotland you cannot build factories? Is that logical? I don't know the terrain or anything. But if Sweden decided that they wanted to build a factory on that Island that would be impossible? For instance we had/have a weapons manufacturer in Kongsberg in Norway... Not the highest population density in that town...

Also, forts arent they normally built by military engineers, with the use of civilian materials/companies at times, but also, conscripts as a work force, sometimes even POW's... However you should use military factories for that in my opinion. Or perhaps a combination if that is possible.

Problem with that is, that during 30s and 40s minimal number of workers had ability to commute more than a few km - so factories had to be located close to where workers lived.

 

[D3m0]

So consumer goods are still there but what happened to supplies?
They don't even seem to be something you produce and stockpile anymore, just a capacity value that a province has which is checked against the supply consumption value of the divisions in it.

 

[Victor Cortez]

There goes any world conquest with Tibet.

 

[Centurion1973]

How do we make supplies?

Please, dont tell me, that supplies appear by magic - their production took a significant effort, if you had a large army.

 

[Modestus]

Nice interface, I presume the 2 diggers means you can build 2 new factories but the rail needs to be at 10 to unlock the other 4 slots?

 

[Praetori]

First of all, each state has maximum capacity of factories it can have, depending on its population and infrastructure. There are some focuses or events that may extend that cap, but this is the limit you have to plan about.

Sounds good. I recon there's no mechanic for a change in demographics? Will battles still only destroy INFRA and not affect population?
I fully understand that this is really shady areas where you must tread very lightly but the Soviet evacuation of their industrial base eastwards also meant displacing A LOT of people to work in said industry. Will this be reflected through events for those certain instances or will there be a mechanic in regards to population?

 

[Price21]

YES! Something on the Economy!

 

[Nelfe]

i really like that placing factories is limited by population. this guards against placing factories far away from enemy bombers in thinly populated areas.

It's exactly what I did in HoI3. Why building factories in the western border of USSR when I can build them far beyond Ural - so far beyond German's bombers and troops.

Now that the maximum factories per province is tied to the province's population, it will be more realistic and you can't anymore build them in desert or the siberian's wasteland