HoI but in Total war style

[Stafroty]

Last thread i made got pretty fast locked, but idea lives on. How bout hoi but with divisions spread over the map bit like in total war series.

free flow movement without province hopping teleportation like in hoi 1-3, when cancelling attacks. when attack halts, troops keep their current position unless counter attacked and pushed backwards or destroyed etc..

 

[paulatreides0]

What are you talking about? Troops don't just teleport between provinces, they have travel times based on the rough size of the province and the terrain.

Troops on the assault are fighting for control of a province, when they stop or fail to do so they can't just stop and stay there, because that would be suicide, they fall back to a position they can reinforce and recover from. Your suggestion only really makes sense if you presume that your divisions' leaders are so incredibly dense that they don't understand they should retreat to safe ground when they stop or fail to breach an enemy province instead of letting them get torn to shreds by enemy fire.

The combat model, for the most part, is perfectly fine as it is. Implementing a Total War style combat system in HoI would be as stupid as if Napoleon had used trebuchets instead of modern cannons.

 

[Viktor_Vertex]

It's become popular to lock threads without giving adequate explaination... I believe your thread got locked because you included a video showing swastikas or other nazi leaders which is not allowed on the forums because German laws.


Ontopic: It's funny how people actually defend the idea that HOI combat system is realistic. Maybe it is realistic in a way that it 'looks and feels' the same as it would to a marshall looking and making plans leaned over a map, but the way combat is modelled is just a very rough approximation
(For example breakthroughs only happen at 50km wide fronts or not at all, combat 'width' exists but not 'depth', stacking penalties and reinforcement rolls making it possible to rout and destroy million-men strong armies with only a small fraction of the force used by the attacker etc...)

That being said, your idea won't work on Clausewitz engine, I believe.

 

[BrotherSurplice]

(For example breakthroughs only happen at 50km wide fronts or not at all, combat 'width' exists but not 'depth', stacking penalties and reinforcement rolls making it possible to rout and destroy million-men strong armies with only a small fraction of the force used by the attacker etc...)

I can't speak for a lot of these, but I'm pretty sure that breakthroughs with a front below the area of a province are represented through battle events. There's even a battle event called 'breakthrough'.

 

[Viktor_Vertex]

I can't speak for a lot of these, but I'm pretty sure that breakthroughs with a front below the area of a province are represented through battle events. There's even a battle event called 'breakthrough'.

It's still an attack bonus, not "our guys retreat into enemy tanks now". And you can't send tanks through a defended province before defeating the whole province. There is also no 'breakthrough' for retreating divisions(for example, a single light tank brigade will capture and destroy dozens of retreating enemy divisions).
Now, I'm not advocating for anything specific, just pointing out that ingame combat does't model 'real' situations in some WW2 scenarios.
It would be more suited to WW1 scenario

 

[Lifthrasil]

It's still an attack bonus, not "our guys retreat into enemy tanks now". And you can't send tanks through a defended province before defeating the whole province. There is also no 'breakthrough' for retreating divisions(for example, a single light tank brigade will capture and destroy dozens of retreating enemy divisions).
Now, I'm not advocating for anything specific, just pointing out that ingame combat does't model 'real' situations in some WW2 scenarios.
It would be more suited to WW1 scenario

It would indeed be cool if at least some of the retreating troops could break out of a pocket or avoid capture. As it is now, troops fight on until they have zero ORG, and zero ORG ingame basically means that soldiers lost ALL will to fight or survive completely. They will just let themselves get captured, or shot, or whatever the attacker does with them, without fighting back, without trying to sneak through the lines.
While in real life, armies retreated BEFORE their ORG was completely drained, in order to maintain a somewhat functioning battle order.

I'm not sure if the player can be expected to do this all by himself, by checking on every(!) division all the time to give manual retreat orders if needed...

 

[ComradeCommissar]

I wonder if it is possible to have breakouts be possible. As it is, if you get pinned and encircled unless your enemy fails the assault and/or you can open a corridor to your troops your encircled troops are dead. You can try to break out, but you'll get that multiple combat modifier, but at least you can save some of the troops.

 

[Aleksi_i]

Does anyone know if the unit move is locked after the some distance is traveled like in EU4?
I don't think i have seen that in any gameplay footage. Maybe because no one ever has one unit selected that long time.

 

[Nicolas I]

...While in real life, armies retreated BEFORE their ORG was completely drained, in order to maintain a somewhat functioning battle order...

You should have explained that to Hitler who lost tens of thousands of soldiers because he never wanted an orderly retreat, elastic defence or delay tactics to the great displeasure of his generals.

The soldiers you lose unnecessarily are not there anymore to fight another day.

 

[Nicolas I]

It's become popular to lock threads without giving adequate explaination...

Here is the explanation added in the OP: video removed - Had a dad

That's rather clear.

 

[nuarbnellaffej]

This has been coming up for years and years, it's not not really feasible. Wars in hoi are waaay more spread out than what you see in total war, with exponentially more troops involved.

The tactical battles would have to be more like company of heroes than total war, and that just doesn't jive with a grand strategy game like hoi.

Hearts of iron > axis and allies

Edit: never mind what I said above, as it does not pertain to the OP.. My bad

 

[The Nothing]

This has been coming up for years and years, it's not not really feasible. Wars in hoi are waaay more spread out than what you see in total war, with exponentially more troops involved.

The tactical battles would have to be more like company of heroes than total war, and that just doesn't jive with a grand strategy game like hoi.

Hearts of iron > axis and allies

He's not asking for a system of real time battle like total war, but something like the campaign map where you can choose where your troops are going freely instead of what we have here. That would not be that bad. At least it wouldn't be bad to make sure your units aren't loosing all of their progress while moving if you just missclick in another province.

And it would allow us to enhance the retreat system. Presently, an invasion force can advance during a fight, when the battle is won, you can then lose the province instantly. Yet your troops will need a huge time to retreat. Makes no sense, at least they should have started to fall back slowly before the province is fully occupied. Yet they have the same movement to do as if they were stationnary during the whole battle and just realised "Aw shit they're behind us !"

 

[Lifthrasil]

You should have explained that to Hitler who lost tens of thousands of soldiers because he never wanted an orderly retreat, elastic defence or delay tactics to the great displeasure of his generals.

The soldiers you lose unnecessarily are not there anymore to fight another day.

And Hitler making some bad decisions sometimes (not ALL the time!) renders my comment on better retreat options useless how exactly?
1) The Wehrmacht did not always retreat in a chaotic way or fight stupidly till breaking point.
2) There where other armies involved in WW2 then the Germans
3) The player should not be forced to repeat stupid mistakes, just because they were historically made.

 

[Hans_Schnitzel]

No thanks.

 

[Råttan]

Dont the Supreme Ruler games have the kind of combat he is asking for?

 

[Nicolas I]

And Hitler making some bad decisions sometimes (not ALL the time!) renders my comment on better retreat options useless how exactly?
1) The Wehrmacht did not always retreat in a chaotic way or fight stupidly till breaking point.
2) There where other armies involved in WW2 then the Germans
3) The player should not be forced to repeat stupid mistakes, just because they were historically made.

You made a general statement about historical armies retreating before all org was lost. I just commented it was not always true (pointing Hitler), not that it was a good practice, quite the contrary. So there should be a better retreat system, influenced by general and doctrines (with Hitler giving a malus).

 

[Lifthrasil]

You made a general statement about historical armies retreating before all org was lost. I just commented it was not always true (pointing Hitler), not that it was a good practice, quite the contrary. So there should be a better retreat system, influenced by general and doctrines (with Hitler giving a malus).

Ah, misunderstanding then. Seems like we are actually at the same page on this

 

[nuarbnellaffej]

You made a general statement about historical armies retreating before all org was lost. I just commented it was not always true (pointing Hitler), not that it was a good practice, quite the contrary. So there should be a better retreat system, influenced by general and doctrines (with Hitler giving a malus).

While this would be a nice AI feature if done properly, it seems like it could be hard to implement, and cause major frustration, if for example the linch pin of your line retreats a day before reinforcements arrive to save a bit of org.

As human players we can easily tell when a battle is a lost cause and it's better to save org and manpower for another day, for the AI this isn't such a clear thing.

 

[Adonnus]

I wonder if it will be possible so that provinces are slightly less definitive, and that the control a nation has over a province is relative to how many troops they have vs the enemy, so there can be multiple units in one "area" which functions as a province, but they move freely and aren't locked into moving province by province but rather wherever you click.

 

[CptWilly]

At least the OP isn't asking that players initially can only play as US, UK, USSR, Germany, and Japan, with all other countries locked off and sold as (possibly day-one) DLC. Total ick.

Sorry for the non-sequitur, but I honestly have no idea what the OP means in terms of movement, aside from eliminating provinces which would completely impede the notion of development, infrastructure, industry, supply, etc on a province level.