Can anybody give some advices how to develop my economy at the start of the game. I have seen people mostly build civilian factories first but if I want to build strong army I have to build military factories as well. I have 877 hours in the game but so far I have mostly just fucked around with some mods and cheats, I have only 23 achievements, I know how to make armies, and all those strategies but economy is confusing part.
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Civilian factories (and other necessary infrastructure like ports or radar stations) until 3 years before you intend to be at war, military factories thereafter.
So for example, historical UK and France should build military factories pretty much from day 1, while the USSR can wait until mid-1938.
So for example, historical UK and France should build military factories pretty much from day 1, while the USSR can wait until mid-1938.
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It can vary a lot depending on country and what you want to do, but i'd say a simplistic rule of thumb prepping for a 1939 war is to build civ factories 36-37 then switch to building mil factories 38-39. Almost always though, you're going to want to switch from civilian econ to something more productive asap. Again, specifics on timing can vary a lot from country to country.
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Oh yeah, since most countries start on civilian economy (giving penalties to factory construction but not other construction) it's a good idea to front-load any ports, spy agencies, railroads, supply dumps, and radar stations you might need to the early game.
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I would say that if you are not a major country in the beginning, just forget about building civilians. You need to expand fast and loot all the civilian factories from the others. If you are a major country, generally speaking, you first start to build infrastructure and civilians until you are getting yourself into war in 2 or 1.5 years' time.
For example, if I am playing SOV I just start to switch to the military factory when it reaches the end of 1939. You could try that yourself. By using the buff given from the national focus and decisions, you should be able to reach 450+ factories in total when the Germans declare war against you. If you could do this, then you can consider yourself graduating from HOI4-ECON 101.
Let's talk about buffs as well. I'll cut over all the math and give you a conclusion. Infranstrure is only needed if and only if there are more than 4 slots available in a single state. The cost of one level of infrastructure can be covered by the discount of 4 military factories. Don't forget to switch economic policies to have as less factories for consumer goods as possible. No mercy, we are war criminals. I remember in the old versions if you are playing Chang Kai-Shek after completing the national focus of "Agriculture Tax" you can reach negative consumer goods factory occupation together with other economy policy buffs.
BTW, there is also a trick of using puppets. Most of the puppets should have their first few national focuses on industrial development. You can release the puppets and re-annex them after a while. For example, when I was playing Ethiopia, I always click on the "A Federal Empire" to release the puppets and use the decisions given by the "Develop the Horn of Africa" to develop and annex them again.
Yeah, there are also some black-magic, such as using double-industry research buffs. The mechanism behind is, there are certain countries are set to research "Concentrated Industry I" at the beginning such as Sweden or Yemen.. lots of them. And you use espionages for operation "Steal Industry Blueprint" to steal their technology at the beginning of the game after they researched them. Because the only industry tech is that so you will definitely acquire this tech. And the point is, you do not research "Concentrated Industry I" until there are only a few days before the finish of this espionage operation, and you research it. Once the operation is finished, the game will give you the stolen tech, and skip the research phase of your current tech (cuz you already stole it). Then the game will think you researched the tech as well, and therefore give you the doubled buff of "Concentrated Industry I" (a researched one and a stolen one).
For example, if I am playing SOV I just start to switch to the military factory when it reaches the end of 1939. You could try that yourself. By using the buff given from the national focus and decisions, you should be able to reach 450+ factories in total when the Germans declare war against you. If you could do this, then you can consider yourself graduating from HOI4-ECON 101.
Let's talk about buffs as well. I'll cut over all the math and give you a conclusion. Infranstrure is only needed if and only if there are more than 4 slots available in a single state. The cost of one level of infrastructure can be covered by the discount of 4 military factories. Don't forget to switch economic policies to have as less factories for consumer goods as possible. No mercy, we are war criminals. I remember in the old versions if you are playing Chang Kai-Shek after completing the national focus of "Agriculture Tax" you can reach negative consumer goods factory occupation together with other economy policy buffs.
BTW, there is also a trick of using puppets. Most of the puppets should have their first few national focuses on industrial development. You can release the puppets and re-annex them after a while. For example, when I was playing Ethiopia, I always click on the "A Federal Empire" to release the puppets and use the decisions given by the "Develop the Horn of Africa" to develop and annex them again.
Yeah, there are also some black-magic, such as using double-industry research buffs. The mechanism behind is, there are certain countries are set to research "Concentrated Industry I" at the beginning such as Sweden or Yemen.. lots of them. And you use espionages for operation "Steal Industry Blueprint" to steal their technology at the beginning of the game after they researched them. Because the only industry tech is that so you will definitely acquire this tech. And the point is, you do not research "Concentrated Industry I" until there are only a few days before the finish of this espionage operation, and you research it. Once the operation is finished, the game will give you the stolen tech, and skip the research phase of your current tech (cuz you already stole it). Then the game will think you researched the tech as well, and therefore give you the doubled buff of "Concentrated Industry I" (a researched one and a stolen one).
What's the strategy for converting Civs to Mils? Worth it or not? If yes, when to do it?
For SP it depends a lot on if you are playing a nation that can/will get into early wars or if you are waiting til WW2. Rule of thumb is that civilian factories take ~2 years to pay off. Usually tho for people going into WW2 it's easy to just say stop building CIVs in January of 1938. Building up a civilian industry is vital to snowball your speed of building MILs and to have enough to trade for resources later on. Even as minors it's usually worth it for the latter reason. You can get away with more "civ greed" (building civs for longer) the more starting mils you have, e.g. as Germany or Italy or the Soviets. The only thing you absolutely need to build some of early is dockyards if you are trying to build a navy bc ships take ages to complete, but if you have no decent navy tech then it's pointless anyway...
Also keep in mind that for nations that do do early wars in SP, your opponent also probably has a tiny early game economy, so I wouldn't like go into military production just bc you are invading one neighboring nation of similar size. Rather use their industry to further propel your civ buildup. You will steal a bunch of equipment when you cap them anyway.
Also keep in mind that for nations that do do early wars in SP, your opponent also probably has a tiny early game economy, so I wouldn't like go into military production just bc you are invading one neighboring nation of similar size. Rather use their industry to further propel your civ buildup. You will steal a bunch of equipment when you cap them anyway.
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One other nice thing about dockyards is they dont count towards your consumer goods count and have no building speed debuffs malus in lower exonomy laws…so for some nations that start in civilian economy or will need a decent navy, they might benefit from building them early or at least before switching to mils.
Same with infrastructure, although thats even more funky in if its ever going to be a worthwhile investment…from tests Ive run, you need to be able to build 6+ civilian factories in the same spot for the infrastructure investment to be worthwhile. Also sometimes the resources you get from it can be significant, either landing you a free civ factory from trade or saving you from buying resources yourself.
My rule of thumb is generally to keep building civs until 2 years before going to war, but there are a ton more factor that play into it too.
Same with infrastructure, although thats even more funky in if its ever going to be a worthwhile investment…from tests Ive run, you need to be able to build 6+ civilian factories in the same spot for the infrastructure investment to be worthwhile. Also sometimes the resources you get from it can be significant, either landing you a free civ factory from trade or saving you from buying resources yourself.
My rule of thumb is generally to keep building civs until 2 years before going to war, but there are a ton more factor that play into it too.
it is old patch things. Now Civ is cost much more than MIL.
For WW2 economy:
1. You don't do any wrong build a MIL.
2. No need to build CIV then MIL, you can build them anytime when need. When you build a CIV you may not get it available if not in war economy.
3. There is a lot of CIV in the focus tree. So get them from there first.
4. Don't automatic change production for a new weapon and lose production efficiency. As long as it does the job then keep it. Most regular equipment can skip 1 level before change production. For example try to get more armor, pierce gun for your old tank production line before change chassis. As long as they don't get pierced and they pierce then no need to change in the middle of a war.
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There might be cases where this is still worth to do, but one should be aware how the game currently deals with buildings/slots when ownership is transfered. IMO, the applied logic is either bugged or at least inconsistent, unintuitive and not leading to good gameplay:
HoI 4 - Building slots and buildings getting destroyed when releasing a nation and created nation not inheriting tech [v1.12.6 (BETA)]
Description of issue Building slots and buildings getting destroyed when releasing a nation [v1.12.6 (BETA)] What platform do you play on? Steam Game Version v1.12.6 (BETA) Enabled DLC Together for Victory, Death or Dishonor, Waking the Tiger...
I sometimes like to make 2 production lines for this reason, for rifles for example. That way I can upgrade one line to modern rifles to equip my elite divisions, and keep the old rifles at high efficiency for garrisons and such.
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In the most cases I prefer to build civilian factories first to make a good snowball efect, but everything depends on with country I'm playing currently. For example:
1. if I'm playing Italy, German Reich, USSR, USA - probably this is my decision, when the war kicks off, so I'm bulding civilian factories for the first at least two years - I will be unstoppable.
2.. If I'm playing UK, France, when I have a tons of civilian factories, bur mutch less the military ones, and involving will be not my choice, I'm starting from buliding mills.
3. Minor countries - in most cases civs, but I like to check, what can I get from my focus tree. For example: via decisions and focuses as Turkey I will get a lot of civs and mills, but no dockyards, and a lot of my enemies are behond the seas. So I'm starting from buliding dockyards.
4. If I'm playing one-state countries with generic focus tree, I'm builiding infrastructure. Generic focus tree is still pretty cool, two, maybe three years ago this was even one of the most OP focus tree in the game, but there is a two annoying focuses, which blocks You from the good one, which gives You two civs, and the second one with free research slot - if You are playing as Cuba or Luxembourg, this buffs are to tempting for waiting.
1. if I'm playing Italy, German Reich, USSR, USA - probably this is my decision, when the war kicks off, so I'm bulding civilian factories for the first at least two years - I will be unstoppable.
2.. If I'm playing UK, France, when I have a tons of civilian factories, bur mutch less the military ones, and involving will be not my choice, I'm starting from buliding mills.
3. Minor countries - in most cases civs, but I like to check, what can I get from my focus tree. For example: via decisions and focuses as Turkey I will get a lot of civs and mills, but no dockyards, and a lot of my enemies are behond the seas. So I'm starting from buliding dockyards.
4. If I'm playing one-state countries with generic focus tree, I'm builiding infrastructure. Generic focus tree is still pretty cool, two, maybe three years ago this was even one of the most OP focus tree in the game, but there is a two annoying focuses, which blocks You from the good one, which gives You two civs, and the second one with free research slot - if You are playing as Cuba or Luxembourg, this buffs are to tempting for waiting.
Its all dependy on country u wanna play. if u expect gettin CIV "for free" for OP focuses or conquest, don't need bother with it.
With germany in special, its just 2 playstyles.. u can just build MILS from begin, or play the "civ economy".
With germany in special, its just 2 playstyles.. u can just build MILS from begin, or play the "civ economy".