Historical / Ahistorical setting

[Karimas]

And that is in fact what they have Jonas. As far as i remember Finland in the WWW had only 3 instead of 4-5 Research slots Majors have. Also if you saw that WWW you noticed how Finland had problems to even build up the basics of an Army in all that time. Finland will have Problems no matter how good you are as a player.

Every Minor Nation is from the begin weak and only trough you, as a player can become stronger. You wont defeat any Major alone, but the game surely gives you a little better chance of doing at least a Part. I see nothing wrong in this.

 

[Jonas]

Yes Finland has a small production capacity in the WWW. They used a national focus to get a fourth research slot though, and someone said they spotted another focus that would give five. If they have three slots and are stuck with that I am quite happy. I realise a smaller manpower, industrial base and fewer resources will translate into a smaller effect of overly advanced technology, should they acquire it. Some technologies will make a more immediate impact on the existing armed forces than others though, such as doctrines. I just do not like the idea of a minor nation full of radar and more advanced fighters (even though few) than Britain or Germany, unless the minor nation has focused very heavily on it at the expense of other fields.

The minors were in general behind the majors technologically in 1936. When the world is thrown into crisis though, and the majors mobilise to truly push technological advance, the minors should fall behind much more. The really significant gaps were created during the years we play, which translates more into research slots than starting positions.

Of course being able to make some difference as a minor is one of the reasons it might be fun to play them. If the level of impact one can make with reasonably realistic technology is not satisfactory for the player though, it is better to alter the difficulty setting or indeed even cheat, than to calibrate all minor nations to be overpowered by default.

 

[Karimas]

Why schould they? Consider every Country you play as "planning for war". This is what would make such a big difference to real life.

Science is abstract to begin with, so what to change? Having all the same tech speed is as well not realistic.
After all its a game, and you schould have the ability to lay a focus on something as a big minor to get a good research at it.

After all you said it yourself. lack of Manpower and industry as well as resources will it that will limit Finland.
And they wont have more advanced figthers than germany or UK if they not totally ingore that field. (Wont happen.)

If you think its overpowered just dont use it, its no harm and you even save the research time
for something else. But let those who are okay with "a little stronger than in RL" nations play it that way.

Really i understand your point, but the most players wouldnt have fun if the country not only lacks MP and industry but is lost
with the tech 3 years behind russia how hard they even try.
Thats what you plan to do....build up industry, try to get MP...get at least decent techs. That what you try as a Minor to have
at least some impact. Please understand that too.

 

[Jonas]

I cannot just "not use" the extra research slots to avoid the effect, because all minors (and there are many of them) will have those slots and the AI will use them. It will create a world where minors have unhistorical and unrealistic technology levels. It will distort the world/setting.

I am not quite sure what You mean by Your first two sentences. Of course minors will perceive the crisis and make a concentrated effort in military technologies just as majors will. It is their capacity to achieve progress in many fields that should be radically different to the majors.

To achieve greater realism, research should be more random, but I have much less of a problem with research not being random because it affects all nations exactly the same way. To boost a specific category of nations far beyond their historical capacity is another matter.

I understand that many people will want to have unrealistic technology levels to test the "what if Finland had better technology" scenario, or just to have a greater impact on events. I still think it is better to add a console command to add research slot or finish current research immediately to satisfy those people, than to set all minors up to be too technologically advanced, leaving those who want realism with no option to try that scenario out.

You say minors will not end up with more advanced weapons than majors. How can You be sure? What is to say that a Bulgaria which skips naval vessel and doctrine research cannot surpass USA in fighter technology if USA has compelling reasons to research much more broadly and their research capabilities are inexplicably similar?

 

[Karimas]

Because its the AI you playing against, you can. Not only will they use troops less effective,
they also use reasearch and decision less effective.
I still remember AI Hungary in a HoI 3 game research Naval stuff when i looked at them.
Why? Because of a sea...i guess?

I just mean that scientific war research was always a thing of how much a country was planning for war.
Sorry if my english is confusing, i did learn it more by myself so it is still far from perfect.

The only way to get it realistic is to cut it from game and give it the countrys at the time they archive it in Real life.

Not everyone is used or would like to use the console. Surely nearly everyone here in this forum can do this,
but all the gamers out there? If you really want realism wait for mods that do that,
but they will change many things more then just reasearch. And give you much less freedom to get to that realism.

How can i be sure? Because its Hearts of Iron...
And the AI wont do that, but always reseach all stuff.
And if its a player controlled country that doesnt count...
you surely can max out one research tree faster than every major country if you ignore everything else.
Do we really need to talk about the Hearts of Iron AI?.....

So...as said....what you think that schould happen wont happen in Vanilla HoI 4.
Because the research system, the industry build up system, the MP system (not everyone who can shoot a weapon can fly a plane)
and many other things are surely not totally realistic but are that way for gameplay and fun.
And i have the feeling the most players prefer it that way for Hearts of Iron.

Also, editing the decision tree (as its for all minor nations) in some file schould change that
or just ask here and you will got a fast solution(mini-mod) for your problem, if its only the reasearch.
At all...dont worry, you surely will get what you want fairly easy anyway,
just that most of the others get it the way paradox wants do to it. A little unrealistic maybe,
but more fun to play for the most Hearts of Iron players. But that surely cant be your problem then .

 

[mursolini]

hi, i have a bit hard time understanding the appeal Historical setting gets around here. the way i see it, it sure is fun to try and recreate WW2 and "make it happen" or "prevent this" and things like this. but this will pass because it is still a strategy game, and what fun (in a long term) there is, if you know about every major shift, that's going to happen?

so my questions are

1. if you think historical starts are better, please, tell me why. am i missing something? (because i think i will try it maybe once for Europe and once for Asia and that's it)
2. too soon, i know, but do we have any word on achievements? will they work for both historical and ahistorical start? will there be some achievements exclusive only to one setting?
3. given what we saw at World War Wednesday, even though they started with historical AI settings on, there is no FDR, no Stalin, Gdansk was given away, the Franco-British Union was formed and i'm sure i've missed something. (let's bet on how likely it is Churchill to show up hehe). so is it because of the internal release and should it be considered more as a series of bugs? because if this is "correct" for a historical setting, then what is ahistorical? Japan turning to democracy and marching to Moscow and stuff like that?

thanks for replies and devs please release it already. so not cool to keep playing it and posting it online like this. cheers.

People like playing historical games some times. Having an option to garantee that the game goes historical till (and IF) you chose to dirupt it, is totally valid option to have.
You are missing out on the idea that sometimes one wants fried chicken, sometimes one wants a fish salad. Having a choice there, is preferable, even if some people prefer mostly one or another.

This, so much this.

Why not just watch a movie about WW2? I always wonder where people would draw the line regarding historical accuracy. If you want to play 100% historical, Germany inevitably loses the war. How much fun is that?

What would be the arguments for making all political decisions 100% historical, but all military decisions (like movements, attacks, etc) ahistorical?

Where did you sliped in the premise that one can`t enjoy playing an equivalent of WW2 film? Nobody wants to watch the same film all the time, but watching it more than 1 time is perfectly fine.

 

[Denkt]

The majority of minor nations have very little industry potential and many have very few strategic resources. Finland have very little industry and zero strategic resources. You will probably not build aircrafts because you need to focus on the army and aircrafts need many strategic resources. You will probably not build tanks either. Why build radars then forts are so much more important for Finland?

The chances are that you will spend most of your industry building forts (no need for strategic resources and your neighbour is very powerful) and maybe infantry weapons (you need some sort of army).

Army doctrine, Finland did very well and that is the whole point of doctrines so it was in no way inferior to the major powers.

I can't find anything that say that major countries did enjoy a massive technological advantage over minor countries nor that the technological difference between major and minor grew.

 

[SchLoTTi]

The majority of minor nations have very little industry potential and many have very few strategic resources. Finland have very little industry and zero strategic resources. You will probably not build aircrafts because you need to focus on the army and aircrafts need many strategic resources. You will probably not build tanks either. Why build radars then forts are so much more important for Finland?

The chances are that you will spend most of your industry building forts (no need for strategic resources and your neighbour is very powerful) and maybe infantry weapons (you need some sort of army).

Army doctrine, Finland did very well and that is the whole point of doctrines so it was in no way inferior to the major powers.

The problem is, if the only need some research fields then they can have better tech in this areas as major countrys, which need to focus on other tech in other theatres. Maybe you are right and can be on one level in tech, but not in everything. Finland for example just has a population of 5 millions. Not that much or? Its ok for me that someone say he prefers that gameplay wise, but for me it doesn't make sense in realiy. Where ist the Limit? Can 1 million people or 500.000 still research the same as ~80 million germans? You have at least to admit that there is some difference. Would be really strange if Siam has nukes, V2 and the best tanks in the world.
The technology/eduction level was just very different. And how much american scientist were involved in the manhattan project?

My preferred solution would be that all minor countrys get more MP and IK and slower tech. It was really cool with minors in HOI III, that you had to specialize your research ambitions.

Or another idea would be that minors cant research more ahead of time than some major nation!? That would be at least something.

 

[Denkt]

The problem is, if the only need some research fields then they can have better tech in this areas as major countrys, which need to focus on other tech in other theatres.

Not really as the tech rush penalty is very large, no a country of Finland capacity will not have better infantry weapons then the majors well maybe if the majors avoid researching infantry weapons they can have better). Finland may research some aircrafts and such but will most likely not build them because of what I said before. Nukes also are expensive because you need to build special factories (nuclear reactors) to get them and I don't know how many you may need to even get a single nuke out before the game ends.

Major countries have 1 more tech slot over minors and differen't national focuses which may give them extra technological advantages. So minors don't have the same research capacity as majors in HOI4. But the main limitation for not using a tech in HOI4 is the production factor and that is often the case in real life as well.

 

[Karimas]

So i looked into the Minor Decision Tree and found out every minor can get 1! research slot extra at the end of an whole decision tree. (WWW Finland)
So many countrys who start with 1 slot are fixed on 2 research slots. These with 2 on 3 and so on. Except they geow in the game.

Finland is a big minor with a high living standart, india is big with low living standarts. So Siam will max have 2-3 teams, and this is mostly
for industry, infantery and airforce. Surely no time, or as "Denkt" says such big projects like nukes.

 

[Denkt]

Everyone can get one extra research slot from national focus tree:

• Majors from 4 to 5
• Minors from 3 to 4

India gets mostly rural development which mean few factories which in turn mean what I have said above.

 

[SchLoTTi]

So i looked into the Minor Decision Tree and found out every minor can get 1! research slot extra at the end of an whole decision tree. (WWW Finland)
So many countrys who start with 1 slot are fixed on 2 research slots. These with 2 on 3 and so on. Except they geow in the game.

Finland is a big minor with a high living standart, india is big with low living standarts. So Siam will max have 2-3 teams, and this is mostly
for industry, infantery and airforce. Surely no time, or as "Denkt" says such big projects like nukes.

That would be at least something.

Everyone can get one extra research slot from national focus tree:

• Majors from 4 to 5
• Minors from 3 to 4

India gets mostly rural development which mean few factories which in turn mean what I have said above.

That again is not very entertaining.

Again ... the problem I see is that there is no place for bad units in mass. Of course you can make them weaker in terms of the division designer, but that is again a limit caused by factories. At least they should link the Doctrines to XP.

 

[Loke]

For me its like this - alot simplified.

Historical mode with plausable options - AI tries to get the majors on its historical sides.
Axis win - is a Europe still in Axis hands say in 1945.

Ahistorical mode with plausable options - China going Axis OR Allies. A German, Italian and Japanese joint Barbarossa.
Axis win - is a Europe still in Axis hands say in 1948.

If people want Romanian armour rolling down the streets of Washington or Bolivia conquering all of south America then maybe HoI is not the game you should play.

 

[Death's toe]

I think you can make a distinction between three historical settings: historic, alt-historic, and ahistoric. Historic is the closest to actual events, alt-historic represents believable outcomes within the context of history, ahistoric represents a complete divergence to historic events with no regard to plausibility.

 

[Oddb@ll]

I just hate it when people use strawman arguments to prove a point.

I don't believe anyone who advocates a historical game actually want 100% accuracy and forced railroading.

 

[Jonas]

People are contradicting themselves here. On one hand You are bending over backwards to convince me technology will have no impact for minors so I should not care about their research slots. On the other hand You keep insisting it will be more fun to play a minor with more research slots because then You can make a greater impact on events. I think You need to make up Your minds.

I can't find anything that say that major countries did enjoy a massive technological advantage over minor countries nor that the technological difference between major and minor grew.

With all due respect Denkt, how hard have You tried? You can start by researching stats of the tanks and aircraft built by Sweden during the period and compare them to American, German or Russian counterparts. You can research the different nations and find there are some which did not develop a single useful military technology throughout the entire timespan of the game. If You want a quicker method You can look at the list of nations in HOI and apply Your common sense to it. You just said Liberia, Luxembourg, Tibet or Nepal should have similar research capabilities as the USA and that they kept up with the technological progress of the USA. Perhaps You should revise that opinion?

When progress is slow, the mechanisms of technology spreading mean nations with less research capacity will only lag behind a bit. When progress is increased through a concentrated and desperate effort, nations with less capacity to use in that effort will lag behind more.

Anyway, thank You for researching and posting that minors cannot get more than 4 slots while majors can get 5. 20 % difference is not insignificant, although it is not realistic by a long shot. I wish Jakob had said that they decided to equalise the research capabilities because it makes a better game, is more fun or indeed just because they feel like it. When he says it is because it is more realistic it severely erodes the credibility of the developers.

 

[Axe99]

I can't find anything that say that major countries did enjoy a massive technological advantage over minor countries nor that the technological difference between major and minor grew.

Minor countries could often keep up in a narrow range of fields, but the big advantage the majors had was that they tend to be able to be advanced in a much larger range of technologies. Sweden kept up with artillery and small to medium ships, for instance, but was nowhere near having a modern (for WW2) fleet aircraft carrier, its tank technology wasn't up to major levels, and there were no Swedish heavy aircraft. I don't know about things like radar or computing, but I haven't heard of Sweden being anywhere near the US/UK/Germany in these fields.

I've used Sweden as an example as, off the top of my head, they were comfortably the most technologically advanced minor nations. If you start using Spain, Greece, Turkey or Brazil as an example, the gap between majors and minors blows out considerably.

Technology wise, I'd personally like to see research slots tied to a base level of 'education and innovation potential' in a nation, that was set at game start based on historic levels. I suspect this'll be easy to mod in by giving national spirits for countries to represent their technological capability - but the idea that minors can develop technology to around 75-80 per cent of the level of a major from a historical plausibility perspective, even for Sweden, is a bit wonky. That said, it does make sense from a gameplay perspective, and I'm totally happy addressing this through mods (even for when I play a minor - I'd rather do well with a minor facing the historical challenges they did, rather than with an artificial buff).

 

[HerrWeltkrieg]

Hmmm I think that devs are orientating more towards multiplayer here and therefore more possibilities for players to choose from if they want to have balanced game ( as balanced as they can ) also as stated in Finnish WWW being crappy in every aspect of the game ( country, not player ) would make gameplay for both minors and majors dull since minors would not stand any chance at all and majors would just steamroll everything. Countries like Czechoslovakia, Sweden, Romania, Spain are few of my European favourites. I would like to see them competitive in the gameplay terms. They were in RL quite up to snuff in interwar periods.

 

[Axe99]

Hmmm I think that devs are orientating more towards multiplayer here and therefore more possibilities for players to choose from if they want to have balanced game ( as balanced as they can ) also as stated in Finnish WWW being crappy in every aspect of the game ( country, not player ) would make gameplay for both minors and majors dull since minors would not stand any chance at all and majors would just steamroll everything. Countries like Czechoslovakia, Sweden, Romania, Spain are few of my European favourites. I would like to see them competitive in the gameplay terms. They were in RL quite up to snuff in interwar periods.

I agree on the gameplay side of things. There's a substantial portion of the HoI (and PDS more generally) fanbase that like to play small countries, but don't want to deal with the challenges those small countries faced (which is cool, I'm not saying this is a bad thing, just not my thing). I don't personally think it wouldn't be fun, because I like a good historically plausible challenge, but again, I don't expect everyone else to want that, nor should they .

That said, from a historical plausibility perspective, while they were definitely up to snuff in some fields, no minors were ever on top of the broad range of technologies a major was, and some were anything but. It's also worth keeping in mind that the current model means minors can do this with ease (even with two research slots (and I'd give three to Czechoslovakia or Sweden) a nation can have a good army and a reasonable air force). I'm not arguing for a stone-age Sweden or Czechoslovakia (Spain really wasn't that advanced relative to the majors - it wasn't competitive in army, navy or air tech), but that Finland, for example, can't research three-quarters of what Germany can.

 

[HerrWeltkrieg]

I agree on the gameplay side of things. There's a substantial portion of the HoI (and PDS more generally) fanbase that like to play small countries, but don't want to deal with the challenges those small countries faced (which is cool, I'm not saying this is a bad thing, just not my thing). I don't personally think it wouldn't be fun, because I like a good historically plausible challenge, but again, I don't expect everyone else to want that, nor should they .

That said, from a historical plausibility perspective, while they were definitely up to snuff in some fields, no minors were ever on top of the broad range of technologies a major was, and some were anything but. It's also worth keeping in mind that the current model means minors can do this with ease (even with two research slots (and I'd give three to Czechoslovakia or Sweden) a nation can have a good army and a reasonable air force). I'm not arguing for a stone-age Sweden or Czechoslovakia (Spain really wasn't that advanced relative to the majors - it wasn't competitive in army, navy or air tech), but that Finland, for example, can't research three-quarters of what Germany can.

Yeah, I can see your point and well, this is easily modded