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

[Secret Master]

Well you're right, but for some reason the majority of Hoi3 players never really mess with things like strategic bombing.

Mainly because amphibious attacks were so easy to pull off. Why bomb Britain when you can ninja her?

But I ran the tests anyway, and they were eye opening. The AI never could do it well, but a human player could get all kinds of mileage out of 3 STR and 15 INTs.

 

[Hans_Schnitzel]

Strategic bombing will be more risky now, too, though. You don't lose some % of a wing anymore, which will just fix itself over time, given that you put IC in "reinforcements", but instead you lose actual planes.

I doubt that we will produce 4 engine bombers at a high rate in HoI4, not without sacrificing in other areas.

So bombing runs deep in enemy territory could end up with your bombers quickly being decimated.

 

[safe-keeper]

I like how so many of the things handled by events in HOI3 are actual features now. So now the Soviet player can actually manually build industry east of the Urals, and then manually destroy the factories in the west when the German army invades? That's beautiful, and bodes really well for ahistorical/sandbox gameplay.

 

[safe-keeper]

Mainly because amphibious attacks were so easy to pull off. Why bomb Britain when you can ninja her?

But I ran the tests anyway, and they were eye opening. The AI never could do it well, but a human player could get all kinds of mileage out of 3 STR and 15 INTs.

Also because air units in HOI3 required a heck of a lot of micro-management of course. As a human player, it's fairly easy to bring Britain to her knees with subs and bombers.

 

[Poh]

My concern with the new system is that if STR is as efficient in HOI4 as it is in HOI3, then I reduce Germany to 1750 industrial levels within a week, and they will never recover.

I would consider that a balance issue. And from what we have seen theres also a tech reducing damage to factories so theres two different ways to adjust this balance (bombing damage and tech damage reduction)

 

[safe-keeper]

I would consider that a balance issue. And from what we have seen theres also a tech reducing damage to factories so theres two different ways to adjust this balance (bombing damage and tech damage reduction)

Strategic bombers suffered heavy losses in WWII, so I hope they will in this game, too, especially if the people you're bombing put lots of industry into AA and planes. It should be a real strategic consideration, especially for countries like Italy and Britain which aren't superpowers: you can build a powerful bomber force and give it lots of fighters and try to wreak havoc on enemy industry, but if you do, you'll have significantly less industry to spend on land forces, your navy, and so on.

Strategic bombing will be more risky now, too, though. You don't lose some % of a wing anymore, which will just fix itself over time, given that you put IC in "reinforcements", but instead you lose actual planes.

Both of which cost industrial power. It's the same system, basically, just that in HOI3 it's abstracted into "strength" and "reinforcements", whereas in HOI4, you build and track actual planes, guns, tanks, etc. Without knowing the actual numbers, it's impossible to say if bombing is more risky in HOI3 than in HOI4. We never even had a concrete idea of how many planes constituted a "wing".

As you say yourself, in HOI3 you needed to put IC into reinforcements (and every IC point spent rebuilding losses was an IC point not spent on supplies, consumer goods, lend-lease or building or upgrading units) -- likewise, in HOI4, you need to put industry into building planes. Losing planes may have the same impact in HOI4 as in 3, or a lesser impact, or a greater impact. We just don't know yet.

 

[Hans_Schnitzel]

Strategic bombers suffered heavy losses in WWII, so I hope they will in this game, too, especially if the people you're bombing put lots of industry into AA and planes. It should be a real strategic consideration, especially for countries like Italy and Britain which aren't superpowers: you can build a powerful bomber force and give it lots of fighters and try to wreak havoc on enemy industry, but if you do, you'll have significantly less industry to spend on land forces, your navy, and so on.

Both of which cost industrial power. It's the same system, basically, just that in HOI3 it's abstracted into "strength" and "reinforcements", whereas in HOI4, you build and track actual planes, guns, tanks, etc. Without knowing the actual numbers, it's impossible to say if bombing is more risky in HOI3 than in HOI4. We never even had a concrete idea of how many planes constituted a "wing".

As you say yourself, in HOI3 you needed to put IC into reinforcements (and every IC point spent rebuilding losses was an IC point not spent on supplies, consumer goods, lend-lease or building or upgrading units) -- likewise, in HOI4, you need to put industry into building planes. Losing planes may have the same impact in HOI4 as in 3, or a lesser impact, or a greater impact. We just don't know yet.

The thing is though, that we might not continously produce strategic bombers.

Example. In HoI3 you build 5 wings prewar. Those 5 wings will exist throughout the entire war, given they are not totally annihilated, and regain 100% after taking damage.

In HoI4, you might produce 10 planes every month, prior to the war. You have a stockpile of 500 or something prior to the war now. (Numbers pulled out of thin air, ofc) You start losing planes at a higher rate than 10 per month, thus your stockpile slowly depletes.

In HoI3 that can't happen. You'll always produce just enoguh planes to fill up your wings again, while in HoI4 you have to notice that you are running out of planes and manually asign more factories, but you might gotten used to producing a lot of tanks, or ships, etc.

In HoI4 I feel that equipment losses will simply matter more than in HoI3.

 

[paranoidsteve]

So New York starts limited to 5 anti aircraft, can this be increased?

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

I know its close to banned subjects, but does it mean there is a Soviet national focus to build Siberian gulags to facilitate infrastructure and factory upgrades east of the Urals (Its where part of my family ended up in 1940 as they where Polish)

 

[Poh]

I hope that it will be possible to get a balance where the it matters a whole lot if you pick the tech line with +10% factory output or the one with 5% factory output, +20% factory bombing defense. And if all 5 techs are similar that means +100% factory bombing defense from tech if the values havnt been changed.

 

[GhengisKhan]

Were not getting the usual responses to the DD we used to. Is today a holiday in Sweden or something?

 

[safe-keeper]

The thing is though, that we might not continously produce strategic bombers.

Example. In HoI3 you build 5 wings prewar. Those 5 wings will exist throughout the entire war, given they are not totally annihilated, and regain 100% after taking damage.

In HoI4, you might produce 10 planes every month, prior to the war. You have a stockpile of 500 or something prior to the war now. (Numbers pulled out of thin air, ofc) You start losing planes at a higher rate than 10 per month, thus your stockpile slowly depletes.

In HoI3 that can't happen. You'll always produce just enoguh planes to fill up your wings again, while in HoI4 you have to notice that you are running out of planes and manually asign more factories, but you might gotten used to producing a lot of tanks, or ships, etc.

In HoI4 I feel that equipment losses will simply matter more than in HoI3.

Similarily, in HOI3 it's quite possible to not notice that one of your many wings is at low strength, or that you suddenly need far more IC committed to reinforcements.

In HOI3, you have so and so many wings (which equals so and so many planes, except you can't micro them as individual units), and then when the war starts, they start losing strength.

Same thing, except in HOI3 it's abstracted, whereas in HOI4 the game actually tracks individual planes. It doesn't matter if it's "one wing" or "60 planes", or "IC" or "factories".

Don't quote me on this, but I think that even in peace-time, air units need reinforcements in HOI3. I know ground troops do.

Edit: I seem to recall Quill18 said that the game warns you if your army needs something you're not producing (for example, if you give a division an artillery battalion, but your country isn't building artillery guns). I hope there will be a warning from the game if you start running low on something, too, for example, if you are losing more planes than you can replace. Or maybe there is an automation thing that tells air units to be more careful in the air if they take too many losses.

 

[Wulf145]

Were not getting the usual responses to the DD we used to. Is today a holiday in Sweden or something?

Probably because it is Thursday, I only stumbled on the Dev diary by accident, I usually check the forum only on Friday. Seems like I'm not the only one.

 

[safe-keeper]

This does create a sort of 'chicken and egg' scenario.

I guess it's like in HOI3 where countries always had at least 5 IC, regardless of situations. As in, if you have no factories, you can still do some basic building.

 

[Nicolas I]

If you need factories to rebuild factories, what happens if all factories are destroyed?

Maybe go back to rely on artisans to produce goods like in Vicky2 ?

 

[Nicolas I]

In HoI4 I feel that equipment losses will simply matter more than in HoI3.

Which is a good thing and more realistic. We will have to rebuild what we lose, not just repair it.

In HOI3 if your forces were crushed but escaped you would lose them for some repair time, but then send them back to combat. Now if your forces are crushed you will have to rebuild some/most of them. Even if the IC cost was somewhat the same, the fact that you will not have forces available before they are rebuilt (most probably longer than repairing them) will be crippling.

 

[Secret Master]

Maybe go back to rely on artisans to produce goods like in Vicky2 ?

Become nomads and feast on the ashes of Constantinople?

 

[ZnIpE]

Waitwhat.. Gotland can't have a factory?!?!

 

[Communitnerd92]

looks awesome

 

[ArneHD]

I thought it said "everything from plasma rifles to tanks" instead of "everything from planes to rifles and tanks". I'm not sure which version I like better.

 

[Number 7]

Looks awesome! Seems like a very logical implementation of IC. I'm also very happy to see that strategic bombing is going to be more useful, which subsequently will make fixed Anti-Aircraft positions more valuable. Speaking of which...

Can you build fixed AA (Flak batteries etc.) like in HoI3?

i assume so, they are now more important than ever rather than being that thing you ignored ever building. i always preferred to just build more planes. but perhaps now strategic bombing can cause my frontline soldiers a lot of problems, i would build provincial AA as well to shoot down as many of the strategic bombers as possible.

I am kind of scared to play as Germany now, with all that strategic bombing and what not.

yeah it's both scary and pretty exciting! in hoi3 i usually roll my eyes at the annoyance of strategic bombers and just make sure i have enough interceptors in the area and then they usually are dealt with. in hoi4 when i see strategic bombers i will be scared for my frontline situation!

I don´t think the problem people have is the micro per se but the micro adding nothing to the game. And lets face it, HOI3 has a lot of of micro that is just anoying and kinda pointless (OOB anyone?). Of cource the broken UI did little to help. Anyways as far as i understand you will not have to mess around with every single factory but instead just assign X number of factories to a certain project. Oh and also letting the AI lead your troops? Realy?

the OOB is a useful organisational tool. for me where the micro got involved was the incredibly annoying restructuring of forces. like needing to build 30 art brigades and make sure every 3INF division you start with ends up with one. i used the OOB less at first and my advances were very messy. using it to group corps and make sure they advance along predetermined paths kept the army organised and moving forward and helped me micro less than without it.

Restructuring of forces has been made incredibly easy now, requiring very little clicks while allowing deeper customisation of each division, absolutely excited for it.

as for OOB, i believe if there are enough generals available you will be able to build historical OOBs hopefully for those that want, and much lighter OOBs for those that don't, for example just putting 100 divisions under the command of one of your generals for all your basic line infantry. If that is the case it will make me quite pleased. i think there is some value in a tidy OOB when it comes to re-organisation of forces. because if i want to re-assign troops to a new front i can just send an infantry army off an eastern army group and attached to a western army group and organise them along the border. this actually currently sounds easier than HOI4 re-assignment which may involve boxing a lot of units and filtering out the panzers, motorised, etc etc and then making sure you have the exact number of infantry and then assigning them to the commander who is on the other front who is basically functioning as an army group in this example.

there's strength in both arguments, i can really understand not wanting the OOB system from 3 back because i took a while to appreciate it myself. So my real hope is the system is flexible enough to work both ways. with basically no OOB and with quite a heavier OOB.

Mainly because amphibious attacks were so easy to pull off. Why bomb Britain when you can ninja her?

But I ran the tests anyway, and they were eye opening. The AI never could do it well, but a human player could get all kinds of mileage out of 3 STR and 15 INTs.

i personally like to fight the battle of britain in the air and in the seas until after Barbarossa. its a bit too easy to invade the UK in hoi3, i hope the AI is better at defending its homeland.

Similarily, in HOI3 it's quite possible to not notice that one of your many wings is at low strength, or that you suddenly need far more IC committed to reinforcements.

In HOI3, you have so and so many wings (which equals so and so many planes, except you can't micro them as individual units), and then when the war starts, they start losing strength.

Same thing, except in HOI3 it's abstracted, whereas in HOI4 the game actually tracks individual planes. It doesn't matter if it's "one wing" or "60 planes", or "IC" or "factories".

Don't quote me on this, but I think that even in peace-time, air units need reinforcements in HOI3. I know ground troops do.

Edit: I seem to recall Quill18 said that the game warns you if your army needs something you're not producing (for example, if you give a division an artillery battalion, but your country isn't building artillery guns). I hope there will be a warning from the game if you start running low on something, too, for example, if you are losing more planes than you can replace. Or maybe there is an automation thing that tells air units to be more careful in the air if they take too many losses.

i lose track of my wings in hoi3 all the time. i just end to give them big assignments "air superiority over this entire area" or "ground bombing over this entire area" and ignore them from then on until i have a breakthrough going on. at which point i usually just box over my airports looking for a tactical bomber wing or two to give an ad-hoc assignment to bomb the specific province and then tell them to do something else once the breakthrough had happened. the changes in hoi4 make me feel more immersed (dealing with exact counts of planes) while also making it sound a lot easier to manage. really happy with how it sounds.

i just hope they have the ability to order a concentrated bombing of a single province, or maybe it has to be done on a per region level. Specifically for breakthroughs in progress it would be nice for them to get bomber support prioritised