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Got HoI4 on sale and started with the USSR. don't have to worry TOO much about the Navy. But wondering if that is the best starter nation? I do check out Youtube for help but was wondering if there was a better choice? Any feedback or advice welcome!
İ Remember i starter with Turkyie. But that was before every country became a focus free Nightmare.
It still Is a country Where you can for most of the game "be passive" and only enter the war late.
Personalità havent tried. But many people Say Romania. As you get tò do Barbarossa and some africa stuff while beeing coveree by Germany and Italy.
And of course Germany (historical) as your pretty much decide the game. You can even avoid doing Barbarossa until your conquered all of africa or even the UK if you get overwhelmd.
Classic advice is Brazil to learn the ropes of basic building. You look like an old hoi veteran though, so you could just hop into Germany or something. There you can master the 'Goldilocks' of building not too much or too little, but just right. It takes repeated attempts though, where you might even lose against Poland or France. Not ashamed to admit I couldn't beat Poland in my first hoi Germany game, long ago.
I'm going to go maybe against the grain and say USSR is not a good first pick. Their focus tree and special mechanics are a bit complicated for a first run and normal German AI is no slouch. You'll be spending a lot of time on defense and might even lose if you don't know the game. If that actually sounds fun, then of course have at it.
My first was Germany. They're pretty simple and you get to pretty much set the pace of the game, so that's nice. It's a major player, though, so not everyone is going to feel comfortable with it.
I might recommend Italy. They do kinda suck but you start the game at war, which introduces you to those mechanics nice and early. Then there's special "missions" from the Duce, which are pretty good at giving you concrete goals to stay on track. They do require some focus on Navy though so that's kind of a negative.
UK is a good one as the theatres tend to be one at a time and you can choose where and when to fight. Eg fight in France, or not. Fight in Africa or not, fight in Asia or not.
The navy is strong enough to allow mistakes, the economy is powerful enough to go in whatever direction you like and again mistakes don't hurt so much.
I started with Italy, went bold by forming my own faction (huge mistake), got destroyed when Germany Declared on me. Then tried again in axis and got my butt kicked by Yugoslavia.
There's a new guide out (for the base game) that recommended Italy as a starter.
Also I'd personally say USA because your actual role is tiny compared to your power.
It depends on what you want to learn because you will make errors and learn but for most nations those are very costly.
USA has nothing to lose but Philippines.
With USSR, you probably aren't up to the task of managing such a shortage of equipment.
Got HoI4 on sale and started with the USSR. don't have to worry TOO much about the Navy. But wondering if that is the best starter nation? I do check out Youtube for help but was wondering if there was a better choice? Any feedback or advice welcome!
Honestly? Germany is the easy mode for this game or War Thunder LOL.
Soviets require you to be super defense minded, plus Stalin mechanics are unique to them and must be dealt with ASAP or lose way too many good generals. In other words you need to know the tree paths to go down and when or you'll have Uncle Adolf kicking your shack doors in.
Britain is a crazy scramble on many fronts, you need a massive navy you won't really get in time, and lots of air
France is pain and you need to trade some colonies and go ahistorical to hold, nice navy but no fuel for it
US is a pain until they get their economy fixed but you can play around because your navy is so big it can hold off japan. Lots of fuel and can play around.
Italy and Japan require a bit of nuance or you're doomed and you need fuel to make those navies matter, Italy is even moreso about closing the Med or just get ready to lose your navy. Japan has to crush China before the US is in or will lose to the US eventually.
China is all tree to bail themselves out by the time you can do anything other than that the game is in the late 40s
The minors are gimmick minors and mostly don't matter or exist to get wiped historically.
If you don't build a single ship, UK's starting navy is plenty big enough to last the entire war. With lots in reserve.
The many fronts are one at a time and you can just put your armies there ready, and you don't even need to bother with most of them unless you feel like it.
Air is largely set it up and forget about it, apart from army support but then you can just attach whatever air force you want to the army you want to fight with and again forget about it.
Also, if you have the Man The Guns (MtG) DLC, you can also gain control of defeated nation's navies. Free France, Norway, Netherlands and Poland all give you their fleet upon request (though Netherlands sometimes refuses). Even without MtG operation Catapult after France falls now and then gives you the entire Vichy France fleet. In my current game I'm in Late 1941 and here is my navy, the heart and star fleets are all reserves to rotate damaged ships into, as you can see I currently have 173 vessels in reserve (though I am about to form a Pacific Fleet plus reserves out of these).
Though in this game I set out to build plenty of dockyards and really go for building a large navy, and also every single fleet I requested I was given, including Catapult. So this is about as large a navy as I've ever had.
Thank you for all the advice. As normal for me things went weird. The USSR is now at war with Turkey and Romania. Not even sure how that happened. But I am learning about how battles, land and air and sea, work. Along with building, trade, intelligence, and other parts of the game. If nothing else I am learning.
Nationalist China imho is one of the better starting nations, if not the best.
it's the crash course in production and land warfare with a clear focus: Defend against japan.
It's still a major: You have some economy and a great potential. Most minor's can't produce much and unless you know what you are doing it's difficult to make them powerful. The learning process should also be fun, you should be able to explore, try things, major's have a lot more options
an active but not essential participant. A lot of different things in different theaters depend on you when you're another major, China has 1 goal, 1 theater.
Low expectations: Losing quite some territory and 5 million Chinese isn't a bad result. You have the buffer.
You can ignore spies, naval, and air. land warfare, supplies and production is what matters
It's short: Japan will attack within roughly 18 months. You will make mistakes but you will learn from them. Other nations you might be building up for 3 or 4 years and if it goes wrong it's difficult to learn what you did "wrong". In a Nat. China run it's easy to connect the dots.
It has a clear goal: Defend vs japan. You might not be able to the first run but once you do manage it will feel great
You are the defender, defending is much easier then attacking.
Limited frontlines: The coast and the northeast.
You have manpower to spare and time is, mostly, on your side. Unless Nazi-Germany crushes the USSR, and even then. Northern China mountain range is the longest front in the world that's the easiest to protect.
Some small tips to get you on your way
Army XP is vital: Try to get the Defensive boost + army XP guy with your first 100 Political Power, secondary goal is increasing PP gain directly and indirectly by increasing your stability.
In the focus tree getting executive Yuan quickly is good since it boosts your PP gain which you will need for the following
Subjugate the warlords, this will let you integrate the warlords peacefully with PP, giving you their generals, armies and territories. GuangXi is the priority, they have the resources and industry you need.
Don't switch to 1939 infantry equipment until you have GuangXi and a strong economy. When switching gear you lose efficiency, which you can't afford if you are already low on the amount of guns. In addition it costs +50% metal; Something you don't have. A lot of china runs fail because people switch to early.
Terrain: The north is worthless deserts and mountains. Just give up the desert and defend in the mountains where you do have supply. Any japanese division that wanders into the desert will have no supplies, won't be able to attack, esp into mountains and for a very cheap price you extend the japanese front, are in an even better defensive position and occasionaly cutting of those japanse forces and wiping them out will dwindle the japanese army fast.
Put one Mill on trains at the start.
Trainnetwork is vital for groundwarfare, connecting your supplyhubs and ports is essential. A lot of newer players focus on what's the most powerful in combat but it doesn't matter what you have if it doesn't have supplies. Knowing your supplies lets you see where you should give ground, like the northern dessert, where you can attack with overwhelming force and where your opponent will be weak. If you know logistics you don't even need to change the chinese starting unit templates to win vs japan. But without knowing logistics you can build the "perfect" unit and still lose badly.
Good Luck
Ps: One additional bonus: Once you're comfortable with production and landwarfare, naval and air are the next major components; Italy is a good starting nation for this purpose but a close secondary is Japan. And if there's one thing that helps with starting strong as japan its knowing how to fight in china.
