Hearts of Iron IV - 46th Development Diary - 26th of February 2016

[podcat]

Welcome to a new development diary. This time *takes a sip of earl grey* we are going to look at United Kingdom. They start as the leader of the allies (who at this point is basically the commonwealth) and what really sets them apart is their sprawling colonial empire and the Royal Navy - the strongest fleet in the world at this time at 35 capital ships and around 200 smaller vessels.

United Kingdom starts with 3 national spirits. British Stoicism which makes them less affected by foreign attempts to change their political alignment. The War to End All Wars which impacts their conscription negatively (war is not as popular as since the first world war), and finally the King (King George V) boosts their national unity.

United Kingdom has a well developed naval industry already at start with 19 dockyards. They also have 34 civilian factories and only 14 military factories.

United Kingdom has one of the widest focus trees with lots of different options. It's split into 3 major parts.

Rearmament
The rearmament tree focuses on getting ready for and fighting another war. You will find things like research bonuses to motorized and mechanized troops, implementing the Shadow Factories scheme to allow quicker conversion of civilian industry to military.

Reinforce the Empire
Managing your empire takes up a large portion of the focus tree. The main choices are: Focus on buildup in asia, further developing the commonwealth nations, fortifying the mediterranean (suez malta etc), or securing Iraq and Iran which will set you on a path of war with the Soviet Union.

Home Defense
Home defense focus both on local defense such as coastal fortifications and getting rid of the The War to End All Wars spirit as well as allowing intervention to stop nations from joining the axis. You can for example step in and set up a puppet government in norway should their fascists leanings become too strong, so as to secure scandinavia from Hitler.

Armor & Planes

United Kingdom relied heavily on lend leased American Sherman tanks (which you of course also can through lend lease) but also had their own tank design and eventually developed the incredibly successful Centurion design (too late for the war though).

A well developed air force is important if you want to stop German bombers as well as give them back some of their own medicine.

Next week we'll talk about naval invasions!

 

[Havebeard]

Not to nitpick, but doesn't King George V die pretty much instantly in the game timeline? I hope you have another spirit lined up

We have something in mind =)

 

[podcat]

@podcat

i also forgot to ask which topic will discussed in the next dev diary?

We'll talk about naval invasions next week. and naval leader traits if we havent already.

Have you overhauled naval starting OOBs to represent more classes through variants now, as was planned?

yea, lots more starting variants now.

What purpose does TAC and heavy fighters serve? Now that troop air support is by adding air forces directly to the armies, it seems that one should specialize in fighters, cas and str. Range doesnt seem that important. Maybe heavy fighters for str support.
Price is important though...

TAC is an inbetween plane. If you dont want to put the research time and production time into both strategic bombing and CAS. They are not as good as either but can do both jobs to a degree.

Dunno what you mean by "Now that troop air support is by adding air forces directly to the armies" thats not how it works. You assign planes to areas, so if you assign CAS to an area they can help out in combat there.
Range is also very important to be able to reach things. if you get bad coverage over a region because of bad range you wont be able to fight as well.

Heavy fighters are two jobs: be able to escort bombers early on when regular fighter range isnt good enough (still useful later on, but you can develop fighter variants with more range as well as doctrines so you can say rock Mustangs), the other job is as interceptors. They have much stronger armament so will be much better at killing enemy bombers than regular fighters.

I know how it is designed now, but would be interesting what we can do/ mod out of this.
As a WW2 strategic and detail lover nerd, my eyes are burning, when I see a "Typhoon" has same stats as "Ju-87 Stuka"
I don't expect it for release or to be done by pdox, but would be outstanding if there's the possibility to do it ourself.

Since you pick different design companies and create variants nations will seldom have the same stats on their planes even of same class.

Will releasing India as Britain make India a permanent ally?

What benefit does giving them independence do?

If you check the Japanese dev diary a few weeks back I mentioned they can support the indian national army. This sort of gives UK a timer where if they dont go through promising india freedom there is a big likelyhood of a local civil war there (probably supported by axis equipment). btw its only a promise of independence, they only become independent after a certain time period + end of war

I'm 95% sure that the national spirit pertains to George VI and not George V. Look at the middle national spirit picture. That is George VI.

Second, beautiful organization and structure of this DD. I would kill for all the other country DDs to have been set up this well. It does a great job explaining the national focuses, their purpose, and does not cut off the national focus tree. Very nicely done.

yeah its actually George VI in the screenshot. Thats because the picture is from 1943.

 

[podcat]

As for Edward, we got some plans *wink* *wink*

 

[podcat]

I agree with Fisker and Grimsley. The first tank would be better being something like a Vickers MK- II, a Medium Mk-II or Cruiser Mk-I (any would be more suitable than the one we get), and the light tanks Vickers MK-VI and Ml-VII "Tetrarch". Is there still time to implement this?

finding the right tank to please everyone is hard. UK didnt even classify tanks in heavy/medium/light. The matilda was an infantry support tank which is likely what you will use that tech level tank for. We could invent some made up model there that would "fit" better, but the thing is that the Matilda II was well known and produced in pretty high numbers, so would silly not to be able to have it in the game. In these cases we have gone with including them even tho it doesnt fit perfectly

 

[podcat]

I haven't really kept up with what all the symbols mean. The troops in the Britain I can tell there are what looks like some medium tanks, some American light tanks, but there a lot of some armoured looking vehicle and a lightning bolt. Is that Mechanised Infantry?

its from World War Wednesday stream. Its a custom divison template symbol you can pick to differentiate your troops. That particular one he uses for his fast motorized divisions supported by medium tank destroyers and lots of support.

 

[podcat]

I agree, the Matilda should be in the game, and as an infantry tank - I am pleased to see you say that. But what about the Vickers heavy (Medium Mk-I or II?) being the first starting tank, the Matilda being the first heavy in a position more suited to it's role, and the Vickers Mk-Vi and Mk-VII "Tetrarch" as the two light tanks. Would that not work better?

all of the early heavy tanks are of a specific (dumb) type. they are multi turreted, very slow etc. so Vickers A1E1.

not sure a 1939–1945 tank fits into that 1934 slot. you also probably would not meet any matildas fighting UK if we did that. Dunno. I can see where you are coming from and neither solution is optimal.

 

[podcat]

Sooo no Edward VIII abdication crisis? :\ Is there at least an event dealing with Chamberlain stepping down?

both are in the game

 

[podcat]

In that first pic, are those light tanks or mech infantry being used as garrisons?

They are on garrison mission yes, which works as area defense also

Will there be Anti Air Tanks ? Thanks!

Yea, one of the tank chassi variants are self propelled AA

 

[podcat]

Cheers for the DD Podcat . As always, it looks good, but I do note that the UK in HoI4 seems to be the 'rock' around which the sandbox for other nations is built. By all means turn Germany democratic, or take the US to war with the UK, or turn France in any number of directions, but the UK seems to be far more 'locked in' to a more traditional route (other than war with the USSR). I'm not suggesting this is a bad thing (if the AI/NF system can't handle every country being off the wall, then there needs to be a cornerstone, and the UK is comfortably the best choice), but if there was scope to give the UK the same range of sandboxy choices down the track it would be cool. A focus for intervening in the Japanese-China conflict, for example, shouldn't send things too far out of whack.

remember that focus trees supply you shortcuts and easier ways (as well as ai guidance) to doing stuff, its not your only option. UK could get involved in asia for sure should you want to.

 

[podcat]

Plz early access this I cant wait any longer

BTW plz do a dev diary on china

we dont do early access. we will do a diary on china tho

 

[Havebeard]

Can George V become the british Kim Il Sung?

Added to my suggestionbox!

Someone mentioned about the BUF and Britain going Axis. Maybe when King George V dies it will trigger an event chain regarding the Abdication Crisis, and despite the gross exaggeration it would be to suggest that Edward VIII was a Nazi-sympathiser, his perceived fascist leanings could be used to increase fascist support in the UK.

That's just my suspicion judging by the "we have something in mind."

It's probably going to be simpler than you imagine.
Kill king. King abdicates. Get new king.