Paradox, if you're listening,
_please_ focus on these awesome fixes/additions/mechanics to core elements of the game that mods cannot do by themselves. For example, fuel, some stockpiles (implemented in a better way than HOI3 did), etc., just like you've been doing with chains of command and other areas to add detail back in. The elimination of all these compared to HOI3 turned me off at the beginning, and it's only now that I'm starting to become interested in the game again.
I *LOVE* the alternate history options though- that is one area that the mods (short of Kaiserreich) never treat very well.
Focus trees... that's so laughably easy to mod that I beg you to please not waste much time on those. Please direct your valuable time on adding the missing features that we want and that modders can hook into and further improve.
Its not about a previous game ever made. Its about the previous game in this series. So your argument doesn't make much sense. The developers deliberately chose not to add a fuel system. And to add oil in production as way to represent fuel use. They got critique for simplifying the game. Only to add in a fuel system now in a DLC.
This is a WARGAME fuel, chain of command, lend-lease, etc etc. are pretty essential in a WW2 game!
Agreed.
Please, Paradox, do something meaningful in this expansion instead of the lame national focus trees that you think are worth way more than they actually are; I still feel that the last expansions were not worth the season pass since all you added were things that mod developers already did better. When I got the Field Marshal edition I thought you were going to do expansions like you did in previous games that added the Cold War and stuff; instead I got focus trees for nations that are quite honestly something other companies would throw in for free to keep their fans happy.
EXACTLY. See above. I and most other people couldn't care less about the national focus trees - they're the easiest part of the game to mod and the modders have already improved all of these for free for you. Take advantage of that by focusing (pun intended) your effort elsewhere.
Yay for naval revamp, boo for the alt-history stuff. Will buy this like the other DLCs, but I really don't like how the alt-history is starting to dominate even in the advertising of the game. I get that USA needs something to do until WT reaches 100% and giving them a war to fight in a war-game makes sense, but the South rising again? Maybe I'm not as knowledgeable about the domestic situation in the US between the World Wars, but was there even the slightest chance of something like this occurring? Never mind the South rising, even a civil war of any kind?
The alt-history stuff makes this game 10x as good. Go pick up a Harry Turtledove or Robert Conway book and see what I mean.
The industrial output of Soviet Russia, USA, and Germany, was hardly matched by anyone, even closely. After the war, Russian industry eventually even overtook production in US, as US was switching to a more modern, service based economy. (not something what was all that apparent to outside observer)
I'm not sure that Soviet industrial production outstripped the USA until many decades later..
For the love of god please do not get carried away with the alternative history stuff. I'm all for the realm of possibility here, but some things you guys have undertaken and crafted into formulation have gone way beyond the scope of reasonable differentiation to history.
Disagree! This stuff is fun. I'd especially appreciate mechanics so an extended timeline / cold war expansion or mod could happen.
The other problem is that the core Clausewitz 2.0 engine that HOI4 is built on is still 32-bit, and 10 years old. It struggles with all of the units and combat happening after 1943 and becomes basically unplayable in multiplayer after that time also.
That would be too bad if that is true. There is zero reason why a 32-bit engine should be any slower than 64-bit on a modern CPU. The single-threaded nature and memory limitations of the engine in HOI3 is about the biggest reason for abandoning that game. It just can't cope with all the units late game with mods...
The problem with the HOI III system was the ridiculous resource stockpiles. Any game where the Axis can easily trade for enough resources pre-war to last them to the end of the war has some serious design issues.
So yes, HOI4 may have gone too far in abstracting certain things, it also is vastly improved simply because of the far superior economic engine. Then there is the likelihood that it is that very level of abstraction which has allowed them to sell a million copies which in turn funds continued development of new features.
As far as reintroducing some concepts that had been in HOI III and dropped, there is a common theme here. Those things being added back in are being done so after it being clear that the majority of the community wants them (rather than simply a few diehard fans). Further if those items were deemed cumbersome and not conducive to ease of play, they will be added back in such that it is with much less overburdening detail than the HOI III version had.
I look forward to having fuel rules and having them in such a way that it matters instead of being something I can stockpile to the rafters and then ignore.
The resource stockpiles are important because a huge part of Germany's war planning revolved exactly on the concepts of stockpiling critical materials before the war and finding alternate sources. They arguably lost WW1 only because of their resources being strangled by the allied naval blockade. I think this should be represented in-game somehow, although everyone could see that the stockpile system in HOI3 had issues. A lot of the mods (including Black Ice) did good work at balancing this, and you had to put serious planning and effort into preparing your resources to support a massive war effort, so much so that it became one of the most fun parts of the game.
