I hate how much reactionaryism is in this game

[Vlad123]

Post 2 says that a game mechanic should be emphasized based on the historical outcome of WW2. In an alt-history scenario where the BEF gets destroyed and the Allies offer a peace after the Fall of France, it could be argued that heroics did play a large role in the outcome. Or if the Pearl Harbor raid were much better planned and executed. (In both cases: if the game involved more elements to produce such an outcome). If you don't like that example, here are some others:

The historical outcome of the historical Eastern front is a pivotal balance point the AI gets designed around. The fall of the Low Countries is taken as a necessity because missing sandbox features (like conditional peace) would stop the game dead in its tracks if Germany can not take them in a frontal assault. Bugs (or shortcomings) of the AI get addressed in a priority order that maintain those historical balance points to the detriment of the more general, sandbox case.

It is a matter of interpretation which things count as alt-history and which as historical, but the point remains that 3x the resources are spent on "history stuff" compared to sandbox stuff.

In all three of these examples the starting point is not a solid 30s/40s sandbox which then happens to be able to produce the historical flow of events as one of its logical conclusions. But instead the historical outcomes serve as a scaffold for sandboxy drapes around it.

I did not intend to warm up the good ol' history-vs-alt-history bashing, I just wanted to illustrate why hoi4 can imho not clearly be called "a historical WW2 game" while it of course has many important aspects of one. In my opinion there appears to be no clear design vision what hoi4 is supposed to be.

the problem of eu4 i think PDX for breack with past hoi have kicked off in the garbage all their experience...and when are said by a user time a go...PDX developer hate much thing have created in hoi4 (especially the horribile peace conference). In a game with Holland i give duch est indies to japan after they start justify for me. I blocked her war make a Non aggression pact via cheat. But this thing and much other,break the magic of immersion!

 

[Spelaren]

They made democracies really bad to play, you cannot do anything, not even tactically, or strategically rather guaranteeing people which is locked behind 25% world tension... Communism is alright but doesn't give manpower like fascism.

 

[Voigt]

If you don't mind me asking, how much do average Germans know about their country before the Nazis? Do they know who Otto Von Bismarck is and what he accomplished? Do they know about the Kingdom of Prussia and Frederick the Great?

To also chip in as a Thuringian German which went to school from 1999 till 2011.

Germany history was:
Charles the Great, Otto I, forming of nation states around the HRE (France, Britian, Russia), reformation, 30years war, peasant Revolts, French Revolution+Napoleon. Frederick II the Great, reformer of Prussia, Age of Enlightment + Enlightend Absolutism of Prussia. Foundation of the Burschenschaften and the revolts for a German State (Frankfurt Germany), then switching to Bismarck, unification of Germany with Wars against Austria and France (Denmark was just a sidenote), his poltics against SPD and Catholics, Bismarck leaves Germany now a new course with Willhelm II competing with British Naval Superioty and demanding colonies, WW1, revolts and formation of Weimar Republic at the end, golden 20s, Hyperinflation, stock exchange crash, Hitlers rise to power, lots of Hitlers rise to power, short WW2, talks about Holocaust, then continuation with formation of both Germany's, FDR joining Nato and EU, GDRs economic problems and political supression, Stalins Note for early unification, very very short Mauerfall and Two Plus Four Agreement.

Around German history we also had pre-history of the Stone Age, then the old empires of Egypt and Rome. Also quite a bit of general live in the medieval ages and stuff, but this was more european history, less so german history.

 

[theJ]

So tell me, old dogs, reactionaries, those from a more civilized age, with your pickhaulbes and finely combed facial hair, as you long for the way things were and for the rabble to learn their place, why? Why are you so enamored with turning hoi4 into militarized Vicky 3?

...
BECAUSE I JUST REALLY REALLY MISS VICKY OKAY?
/Runs off crying

..
On a more serious note, I think it's a simple case a romanticism.
Yes, the thirties and fourties are better suited for the various isms, but the playerbase is from 2020. In 2020, the isms are no longer new nor exciting; We know where fascism and stalinism will lead, and it's not a place we'd like to revisit - so why would we pursue those paths?

This is why I always used to play democratic back in the day, even though the gameplay was godawful, and I'm pretty sure that's why I'm so fond of the Spanish Anarchist route; because it's an exciting new possibility yet unspoiled by the harshness of reality. Personally, I am less fond of the reactionary "return to old" paths, but I suspect they are ultimately popular for similar reasons; because to a lot of people, they represent an unspoilt dream that may yet blossom into a better tomorrow than the one we ended up with.

Or, I could be completely mistaken.

 

[DicRoNero]

formation of Weimar Republic at the end, golden 20s

Gosh, do they still use this term for real? But now they at least specify for whom exactly those 20s were 'golden', don't they?

 

[Voigt]

For us it was called Goldene Zwanziger, so Golden 20s. I think in America they say roaring 20s?

Either way what we learned with Rentenmark and the American Credits rolling into the country the economy growths. But more so the consumption. People became "free" in the sense no waf anymore, no rations, but also not conservative empire anymore. Everything is new and different, party hard.

Meabwhile all those wounded former soldiers are roaming the streets, either with physical or psychological problems, but the consumption happy people just ignore those and indulge in their new freedom and happines.

Till the Black Thursday/Black Friday came.

 

[Zauberelefant]

Gosh, do they still use this term for real? But now they at least specify for whom exactly those 20s were 'golden', don't they?

Women's rights, labour rights, democracy, cultural openness, new art, architecture and music in the Mainstream, better perspectives for racial minorities, film with sound, civilian flight, motorization, breakthroughs in sciences and engineering - if you fancied that stuff, the 20s had a certain...promise, at least.

 

[Frozen Yakman]

I dunno... democracies don’t go on conquest sprees, communists do so more in a political sense - and isn’t every GSG ultimately a map painter? So the only “real” alternative to fascism, which in many cases was indeed inspired by glories of old, has to be monarchy?

What? The largest empire of all time was a Democracy and they didn't get ahold of their territory with polite words.

 

[Vin55]

What? The largest empire of all time was a Democracy and they didn't get ahold of their territory with polite words.

Well "democracy" right^^? The british Empire was never a democracy in the modern sense. Imagine selling to the UK today that you will fight for some town 10000miles away. (One of the reasons for the decline).
It was more or less a aristocratic democracy. Were the politics was set. When the house of Lords became less important than the house of commons was when it started to become more democratic.
Also most of the British wars where the trade companies, so even more confusing imagine Amazon declaring on Canada for more office space in Vancouver.
But I agree that you should be able to declare War earlier especially France and UK, maybe with a limitation of not being able to have war propaganda and that you get limited experience prior to having the spirit of first world war eliminated. But even so it should only be able to change government and puppet as democracies at that time. (US should not have this ofc with their curse)

 

[Zauberelefant]

What? The largest empire of all time was a Democracy and they didn't get ahold of their territory with polite words.

Yeah, no. Open ballots, frequent corruption, exclusion of 50% of population, a non elected Chamber of Parliament are not exactly screaming democracy.

 

[Xerberous]

This is a concept that has eluded me for years now. Why would I buy a historical WW2 game and then turn right around and turn off the historical focus?

If you ask me, HOI4 is no "historical WW2 game" and never was a "historical WW2 game". It is a grand strategy game in the WWII era.

P.S.
Although I play non-historical most of the time I totally support the idea that if you select the "Historical AI focuses" checkbox, the AI should actually behave historically, which is not really the case by now.

 

[Tomray94]

I've felt this way for a while and I think it's essentially a given that the game will forever have 'reactionary' paths open to countries. So here goes:

When I mean reactionary, I do not mean fascist/nazi (from now on, I will consider Fascism to an umbrella term, like in the game). To me, those ideologies are a combination of progressivism and reactionaryism. More importantly, fascism, like communism and sort of democracy, is young and full of energy. None of those ideologies will be extinguished permanently in the 20th century. Reactionaryism, that is, the ideology of old-school absolutism is on its last legs by 1936. The Kaiser has been dethroned, the King of the UK is just a figurehead, the Tsar is gone, the Emperor of China is gone, the other Kaiser is gone, the king of Spain is gone. There are "kingdoms" in the Balkans, but the idea of "nothing by the people, everything for the people" is years away from being wiped out completely, led alone the idea of a country being one man's personal property. Yet time and again, the devs have created paths for most countries to turn back the clock to the 19th century and re-crown an absolute monarch. It often isn't especially realistic, but considering hoi4 is a sandbox game that's a pretty minor qualm.
My main issue is that it is out of place in a game post-ww1. The world has moved on and there are really cool ideologies to fill the gap. This is the ONLY game we get to experience Fascism in, apart from the last fifth of vicky 2. And now it has to share the spotlight with an ideology that you most of EU4 trying to reach. While Democracy and Communism have bigger impacts in Vicky, this era is their golden age - the era of trying to create either a world revolution or a free planet. These ideologies are all more modern, more relatable, and I think more advanced considering they're younger. And yet France just HAS to have the option of going bonarpartist. God forbid they live in THIS CENTURY!
Don't get me wrong though, I enjoy absolutism and the politics of the 18th and 19th century. My username and pic were not mistakes. It's just that they are out of place in a ww2 game, just as making conversion early to Christianity something easily done would be impropriate in Imperator.
Clearly though, few players share my thoughts on this matter. Every DD which allows yet another country to go back in time is applauded, and the immense popularity of Kaiserreich and the Great War mod only further proves my point. I expect many to disagree with the sentiment expressed here.
So tell me, old dogs, reactionaries, those from a more civilized age, with your pickhaulbes and finely combed facial hair, as you long for the way things were and for the rabble to learn their place, why? Why are you so enamored with turning hoi4 into militarized Vicky 3?

Honestly I can understand your sentiments to a degree but I just don't see the issue here. Greece was leaning towards absolute monarchy or Franco-style monarchist dictatorship. One of the main groups in Germany that were secretly anti-hitler (the ones that almost killed him in a few occasions in fact) were old German reactionary monarchists. Hungary was already a monarchy in name, it would only be logical for a king to be crowned there sooner or later. Yugoslavia and Romania had relatively strong monarchies. One of the most significant factions within the nationalists in Spain were the reactionary Carlists who longed for the return of the "right line of kings". All of these are historical movements that existed back then and were either already in power or had many very powerful and very wealthy backers seeking their return. Reactionism had its time to shine back then, despite having failed in our historical reality.

You bring up France, I can agree that in this case it would be almost impossible for a Bonapartist regime, but for the majority of Europe, a reactionary rise is not that historically implausible. As for the cool and new ideologies, They should be at the spotlight but you can only play "generic fascist country" and "generic communist country" so many times before you get bored. This problem can only be fixed if we get a rework of sub-ideologies so that they'll play a bigger role in how countries are ruled and have meaningful differences between them, so we can have a game where a trotskyite Mexico won't function in the same manner as a Stalinist Germany or a Leninist Spain.

 

[Secret Master]

Because turning historical focus on enables (much more) hindsight. A historical choice should also have a historical amount of uncertainty in my opinion.

You aren't wrong, and it's one thing that made really early Paradox titles a bit odd to play. The old Crimean War event from Vicky is a good example of the worst of both worlds. It was a hardcoded historical event that Russia would get, but it also completely ignored historical circumstances, so it might as well have been a completely random event, like turning Japan communist in 1936.

But I also see the problem from the other side. We had to mod our MP game so that AI nations wouldn't take the game off the rails even with historical focuses turned on. We would end up in weird situations like Poland caving on Danzig or the Finns caving in to Stalin's demands or, my personal favorite, the time AI Romania decided to fight the Soviets over Bessarabia after joining the Axis.

Due to how game mechanics function, and our desire for certain kinds of balance in the game, we ended up forcing certain AI countries to be 100% historical in their choices, with the understanding that rules would prevent abuse of the historical choices. In these situations, we want the uncertainty to come in the form of real choices the players have to make, not "Well, AI Romania just called all the non-human members of the Axis into a war with the Soviets, so now the Soviets will either annex it all or both sides will pointlessly lose equipment just to get Soviet claims."

 

[celethiel]

Well for one, restoring thrones sells...
however to be devil's advocate if nothing else about these "absolute Monarchist" paths...
And what good did Tossing these Absolute Monarchs out do many of these mentioned Countries. You mentioned the Tsar, the Kaiser, the King of Spain, and the Emperor of China.

Kaiser: After being Tossed out because his generals took over and screwed the country then blamed him. The Country was Ruled by one of Said Generals until he was old and decrebid and Hitler/the Fascists took over. Germany wasn't An Absolute Monarchy in the Style of Bourbon France in the 1700's anyway.

Tsar: A Bloodbath Followed by a regime that lasted for 70 years and killed of Huge swaths of their own and other nation's Peoples.... leaving a legacy in the form of the modern and in many peoples (at least outsiders) view Broken Russia.

King of Spain, several civil wars and a legacy of Debt that lasts to this day, (similar to portugal) As for restoring the Spainish Monarchy, Spain is in 2020 a Constinutional Monarchy... put that way by a Fascist.

The Emperor of China... Let us be honest the Chinese Monarchy never worked the way 1700's Europe did, the Emperor Ruled in name but the Beuacracy ruled in fact, most often. These People overthrew a 12 year old boy ended up in multiple civil wars, almost being taken over by Japan, and being forced into a Bloody Communist Dictatorship that still exists.

And you mentioned France, and said god forbid France live in this century...
Has anything you have ever seen in French modern History, told you that idologically they live in this century... they still claim the power and prestige of Napoleon the First as it is, even though they haven't won a war against a Power since Napoleon. (and in some cases against minors)

These "reactionary" paths, there is actually a significant portion of each of these countries populations that want the monarchs back in power (at least as a symbol in their heads, similar to Communism, Socialism or Fascism they don't know what getting it entails) Especially at the time of World War 2. A return to the Monarchy is just like Fascism in peoples minds is about a return to a time of Glory and prestige for your people, even more so than Fascism is Monarchism is.

I, for one, like returning Monarchs to power, i don't see a problem with having that possible path. You don't HAVE to play that way, you can move towards Democracy with these countries or Fascism, or Communism. Certianly i don't see that one needs to throw out what almost seems like an angry Rant over it. Do you have anything you'd like to see replace these branches that you'd like to see ripped out?

 

[Vityviktor]

Completely agree. The whole thing with restoring old monarchies and empires is going out of control, and it's ridiculous. I mean, I thought this was a game about WW2, even if it's not historically railroaded and it's more like a sandbox. But most of these Alternate History paths are just cringe, and seems to be made for the memes or to pander certain sectors of the community. And maybe because it's easier to sell the Kaiser, the Austro-Hungarian Empire or the Ottomans than Fascist regimes, even if it's in WW2.

Also, I think the terribly limited and simplistic political system is to blame too. I understand the priority is the warfare, and moving divisions, and ships all over the map, factories, etc, and I'm not asking for a full, Victoria 2 type political system... but we need something better than that. A new system capable of diferenciating between Heads of State and Head of Government, ministers and government composition, and a limited parliament system (for democracies at least) would be so much better in order to reflect things like Fascist Italy (the whole thing with the Fascist Regime and the King, and overall the clash between Monarchism and Republicanism) or Imperial Japan (the oversimplification of the way Japanese politics work is painful).

 

[Me_]

I've felt this way for a while and I think it's essentially a given that the game will forever have 'reactionary' paths open to countries. So here goes:

When I mean reactionary, I do not mean fascist/nazi (from now on, I will consider Fascism to an umbrella term, like in the game). To me, those ideologies are a combination of progressivism and reactionaryism. More importantly, fascism, like communism and sort of democracy, is young and full of energy. None of those ideologies will be extinguished permanently in the 20th century. Reactionaryism, that is, the ideology of old-school absolutism is on its last legs by 1936. The Kaiser has been dethroned, the King of the UK is just a figurehead, the Tsar is gone, the Emperor of China is gone, the other Kaiser is gone, the king of Spain is gone. There are "kingdoms" in the Balkans, but the idea of "nothing by the people, everything for the people" is years away from being wiped out completely, led alone the idea of a country being one man's personal property. Yet time and again, the devs have created paths for most countries to turn back the clock to the 19th century and re-crown an absolute monarch. It often isn't especially realistic, but considering hoi4 is a sandbox game that's a pretty minor qualm.
My main issue is that it is out of place in a game post-ww1. The world has moved on and there are really cool ideologies to fill the gap. This is the ONLY game we get to experience Fascism in, apart from the last fifth of vicky 2. And now it has to share the spotlight with an ideology that you most of EU4 trying to reach. While Democracy and Communism have bigger impacts in Vicky, this era is their golden age - the era of trying to create either a world revolution or a free planet. These ideologies are all more modern, more relatable, and I think more advanced considering they're younger. And yet France just HAS to have the option of going bonarpartist. God forbid they live in THIS CENTURY!
Don't get me wrong though, I enjoy absolutism and the politics of the 18th and 19th century. My username and pic were not mistakes. It's just that they are out of place in a ww2 game, just as making conversion early to Christianity something easily done would be impropriate in Imperator.
Clearly though, few players share my thoughts on this matter. Every DD which allows yet another country to go back in time is applauded, and the immense popularity of Kaiserreich and the Great War mod only further proves my point. I expect many to disagree with the sentiment expressed here.
So tell me, old dogs, reactionaries, those from a more civilized age, with your pickhaulbes and finely combed facial hair, as you long for the way things were and for the rabble to learn their place, why? Why are you so enamored with turning hoi4 into militarized Vicky 3?

I agree and feel like it's a bit of a cop-out to have so many alternative paths be just "restore X", sometimes multiple "restore X" for single country without much alternative paths to build something new (from the perspective of 1936), be that new thing good or evil.
I feel like part of this is the lack of proper WWI game (so the fans come to HoI4 and try to relieve it in the 1940s) and part is typical unicorn-filtered nostalgia.
Some argument could be made for lack of creativity, but there are cases of interesting non-nostalgic concepts being present - Anarchist Spain, Mexico leading Latin America, the (real but never realized) concept of Międzymorze showing that there is plenty of possibility space to fill. If really the alternative paths are to be alternative, they should be less about let's bring up something from WWI and more of let's bring up some political concept that did not manage to succeed and see what happens if it does succeed.

I will bet you that Romanov restoration is in the Soviet Union DLC...

I fell like it's entirely possible there will also be a Rurikovich patch as well. Probably also involving some "Viking" armies.

 

[Emren]

What? The largest empire of all time was a Democracy and they didn't get ahold of their territory with polite words.

In the time frame of HOI4, I meant. And I suppose the word 'Democracy' in HOI4 terms is not strictly the same as democracy in real world history.

 

[Manst]

Basically, there's a lot of sub-par alternate history focuses branches that end with a big "and then what?"

You know the answer to that, it's "just conquer everyone near you, then the world, unitl you get bored. That is, if you didn't fall asleep following your boring AH focus tree doing nothing for an hour"

 

[Telenil]

Also, isn't it ironic that the only major who SHOULD be an absolute monarchy: Japan... is "Fascist".

I've wondered about that as well. As far as I understand, the Kodoha were even more fanatic and violent than the faction that defeated them. That path also makes Japan attack the USSR without creating a faction, meaning they can easily end up in the Axis. That sounds "more fascist-ish" than the Japanese historical path.

 

[Gurkhal]

And you mentioned France, and said god forbid France live in this century...
Has anything you have ever seen in French modern History, told you that idologically they live in this century... they still claim the power and prestige of Napoleon the First as it is, even though they haven't won a war against a Power since Napoleon. (and in some cases against minors)

I feel that I must disagree with this. France has won wars against the powers since Napoleon I. They won against Austria in 1859, against Russia in the Crimean war and against the Central Powers in the First World War.

I know its popular to bash and trash talk the French, but while I agree with the rest your post, this part is just wrong.