Land warfare - A review and analysis of the system and a look at the future

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Neigel

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Sep 5, 2017
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Hello Paradox and Hoi4 players,

I have been a lurker here since day one but now I find it is time that I get my thoughts and opinions out here. Some of you will agree as I have talked with several people in the community about this, while some will not. I also hope that maybe someone at Paradox sees this, so I want to start of by saying thank you for this amazing game.

My background is not one of a computer developer so this is just the opinions of a long time and aging gamer. I am a avid computer wargamer and I have owned and played most of the games out there, including every Hearts of Iron game. I love this game and what it will become but every game, even the best ones, has flaws and after my 1500 hours I want to outline the biggest ones I deal with and what my armchair developer solutions to these issues are.

My analysis will come from the perspective of a german attacking the Soviet union on hardest difficulty, with max sliders. While I play MP, This will be made from a SP perspective as that is where I and I believe most players spend most of their time. The game is in my opinion way to easy to the point that I have mostly stopped playing for the moment. I want to note that I no longer min-max, I purposefully make "bad" random width "historical" divisions, I make mixed tank divisions, sometimes I even play without reserach and the war just ends in a matter of months either way. It makes me sad that even when handicapping myself I can't get even close to a hard eastern front anymore. And yes, I have tried Expert AI, while it is a great mod I do not find it enough.

While the game has improved in many ways and in tons of area I feel a big flaw that I still see as unresolved is also the biggest part of hoi4, the land warfare. I will addressing these issues in four seperate sections and are the following: (1)Frontline (2) Sieges and Cities (3) Supply (4) Weather. Under each section I will explain my thought process and a proposed solution.


(1) Frontline

A huge improvement to the old system but it also has a big problem, this will not be a topic of front line shifting as this have been covered countless times already and has been improved by the developers. My thoughts is that the current system has huge flaws as there is no depth and it becomes more apparent then ever on the eastern front. The frontline system means 99% of the AI troops will be on that frontline, meaning the fighting will be the hardest at first. During the onset of the Ger-Sov War the hardest fighting is the first weeks/months, after the first breakthrough and following encirclements the war is over, there are no troops defending behind, it is just a straight line to Stalingrad, or Moscow (hence the road to moscow "meme"). There are no units in reserve, no depth, noone defending the rear or VP's or important areas. Penetrating deep has to have downsides and meet resistance. The war should not go from hard => easy, but easy => harder. By the time you reach even close to Moscow or stalingrad on any difficulty the war is already over.

My proposal to improve this system comes in 2 variants (A and B) and will be shown with my amazing paint skills. I call the solution reserves.

(A) Reserve line

Reserve 1-2.jpg


This solution calls for 1, 2 or more reserve lines that are a fixed distance from the front line that you assign troops to in the same way to attach them to the frontline. These move fluidly as the frontlines shift and will always stay at a certain distance. Please ignore the fact that it is Germany that has these and pretend that it is the Polish army that will invade Germany. If a breakthrough is made, they can not drive straight towards Berlin with a truck. They will meet line 1, and if they manage to breakthrough that, line 2. This will halt the one breakthrough and drive to the capital meme. This also gives the feel of a defence in depth and make driving too deep of a spearhead without support difficult and risky. Could be customised with choosing how many lines of reserves and how many tiles back.

(B) Reserve zone.

Reserve 1.png


This is similar to the first idea but instead of a line that units stay at you instead have a reserve line X tiles back, you then assign units to reserve and they fill the entire area between that line and the frontline, maybe prioritising checkerboard pattern and VP's.

I believe this type of system would work best for defenders like the SU and while I forgot to take pictures from that perspective, I believe this gives you the general idea. Any variant of these ideas could make a system that would give warfare a bigger edge. I hate having a breakthrough and that only thing stopping me from driving straight to Moscow is my own choosing.

(2) Sieges and Cities

The solution to the easy war is not one that ends just with reserve lines. This problem goes hand in hand with the current system. Like I have stated by the time you reach Moscow, Stalingrad or Leningrad the war is already over and 90% of the time you have no huge siege, no devastating fight that drains your manpower, at most you fight a small division that gets crushed in an hour. My proposal to this is a system that forces the AI to defend certain VP's and the area around them. Maybe when in a defensive war they will automatically spawn at these areas at the cost of the stockpile ( Not a great fix, but easy to do).

Garrison .jpg


My idea works as following; The AI would in this case put 5 divisions on the capital of Prague, and 1 on each tile surrounding the area. This way there will ALWAYS be a fight for the big cities and is another way to prevent the "one breakthrough and drive a truck to Moscow situation". I would also combine this with giving defenders higher modifiers or attackers bigger debuffs ( and let them lower for the defenders as the sieges drags on ) so that well defended cities don't fall to one tank division 1/20th of its size of the garrison in a few days.


(3) Supply

I know this has been talked about and the developers are aware of the issues around it but I feel I have to mention it. At the same time I must also admit this is the one thing I have no idea of a solution to and I would love to hear anyones thoughts or solution to it. But to put it short, you never really have an issue with supply or think about it in the SU and even if you do, you just pull some divisons back. It does not matter if you are in Moscow or the urals, supply always gets you unless you get encircled. I believe we need some system that prevents and slows down rapid expansion into foreign territory. This would also delay the war and make it harder the further you progress into the Soviet Union. I have thought about a railroad system or drastically lowering supply limit and the time it takes reinforcements to reach you by X range from the capital but I can't decide or come up with a good enough idea to present. I however believe this issue needs to be resolved in some way.

(4) Weather

In the current system right now weather does not matter that much. Outside Moscow in the coldest day of the year? is barely noticable, just attack anyway. Weather affects need to have a more brutal affect on troops and combat, the idea of spring offensive does not exist here. Along with higher debuffs this system could work together with and affect Supply. Soldiers could lose moral due to the extreme cold, could lose equiptment or even manpower. Winter could lower supply limit, or increase the supply needed by units.

Conclusion

In conclusion I think the combination of a reserve system to promote deeper defending, together with VP's having garrisons/defenders and a supply and weather system that has a higher impact would make the eastern front, and any land warfare more challanging and fun.


Lastly thank you Paradox for this amazing game and I look forward to the years of development. I also want to thank you for your community presence as it is something that many other developers overlook.

From a fellow Swede,
Tack för allt, Neigel.
 
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(1) Frontline

What I would like is for "true" fallback lines : defensive lines that your units will automatically retreat to and assume defensive position there when they're defeated.

(3) Supply

I know this has been talked about and the developers are aware of the issues around it but I feel I have to mention it. At the same time I must also admit this is the one thing I have no idea of a solution to and I would love to hear anyones thoughts or solution to it. But to put it short, you never really have an issue with supply or think about it in the SU and even if you do, you just pull some divisons back. It does not matter if you are in Moscow or the urals, supply always gets you unless you get encircled. I believe we need some system that prevents and slows down rapid expansion into foreign territory. This would also delay the war and make it harder the further you progress into the Soviet Union. I have thought about a railroad system or drastically lowering supply limit and the time it takes reinforcements to reach you by X range from the capital but I can't decide or come up with a good enough idea to present. I however believe this issue needs to be resolved in some way.

An idea I had was for each unit to have its own "bar" of supplies (which would probably be shown next to org and strength), representing X days (with doctrines and logistic companies adding more days) of fighting. Moving would of course use less supplies (with moving into an enemy territory using more than moving between friendly provinces), and standing there doing nothing the least. Units would be periodically resupplied from their supply area (with some way to prioritize specific units). There could also be a "conserve supplies" option which would reduce the fighting power of the unit, but would reduce the supply consumption in combat, and which would be activated automatically when the unit is low on supply (with the possibility to disable this behavior when you want to make sure they kill something with their last bullets).

The idea is for prolonged offensive operation to be unsustainable, requiring the troops to pause to recover. If we want to get fancy, there could be an option to stockpile supplies in an area in preparation for an offensive (this would naturally reduce incoming supplies for the other areas). You would mark the areas in which to assemble supplies in, and the area you're planning to fight in (so that the supplies flow there once you start advancing). Such preparation should be detectable by the enemy's intel effort, so that he can prepare his defense if his spies are good enough to give a warning (and while we're at it, there could be a spy mission to make fake preparations. You could also make real preparations as a maskirovka if you're so inclined).

Some other considerations, which are not necessarily tied with the above proposition :

First have a cap on the max level of infrastructure in a state, depending on the slot count (or something else, but such a modifier can easily be added to slot count).

Second have attrition be more severe and frequent : everything except for standing there doing nothing in good supply with good infrastructure should cause some attrition. Not necessarily much, but some.

Third slow down infrastructure repair (and maybe increase how much damage they take, but it's not necessarily needed, as heavy combat already wreck infra pretty well)

Edit : On winter, while it should have severe effect, at the same time it should still allow something like the Soviet winter offensive of 41-42.
 
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One thought about reserves:
- real life: front troops entrench, reserves swap in and out and use the existing entrenchments.

- HoI4: front troops entrench, reserves swapping in have 0 entrenchment cause for some reason they don't use existing ditches
--> the more you use reserves the less combat efficiency you have as a defender
 
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One thought about reserves:
- real life: front troops entrench, reserves swap in and out and use the existing entrenchments.

- HoI4: front troops entrench, reserves swapping in have 0 entrenchment cause for some reason they don't use existing ditches
--> the more you use reserves the less combat efficiency you have as a defender
I disagree. That might apply to ww1, but even slight shifts in defensive lines, change of enemy behaviour or the result of own recon mean new entrenchment needed. Fire support coordination, ranging in, reserves, Mine fields, all that is not permanent and will be changed. Troops need not only to enter existing ditches but be able to navigate them, get to know the lay of the land and reconnoitre to know what they are facing.

Second: if there is one thing that should increase a defender's efficiency, it's reserves.
Overlord would have failed if the armoured reserves reached the beaches. Model used his usually limited reserves to great effect in Demyansk and Market Garden. Reserves are for winners.
 
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I disagree. That might apply to ww1, but even slight shifts in defensive lines, change of enemy behaviour or the result of own recon mean new entrenchment needed. Fire support coordination, ranging in, reserves, Mine fields, all that is not permanent and will be changed. Troops need not only to enter existing ditches but be able to navigate them, get to know the lay of the land and reconnoitre to know what they are facing.

Second: if there is one thing that should increase a defender's efficiency, it's reserves.
Overlord would have failed if the armoured reserves reached the beaches. Model used his usually limited reserves to great effect in Demyansk and Market Garden. Reserves are for winners.

Conversely, France lacked a strategic reserve, which proved fatal when things failed to go as planned.

In game, I feel that reserve in battles should probably have much more effects than simply being in the battle doing nothing because of not enough combat width for them. After all units were held in reserve to be committed to the battle when needed. The simplest way is to allow divisions in reserve to replace a divisions that hasn't retreated yet but is low on org. This would reduce how often you get 10 divisions being pushed from a province because the enemy attacked only from one province with his two 40w armored divisions. There would probably need some way to avoid inciting overstacking though. Maybe have units in reserve take some org damage.
 
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Maybe you should try the mod 'World Ablaze' on the steam workshop.

Of the top of my head it:
- Makes weather effects harsher
- Splits cities into multiple small tiles to increase the 'slog' of taking a city
- Has units resupplying slower, so sustained fighting causes bigger impacts
- Has a 'reserve division' mechanic for the SU, which helps create a historical result in Barbarossa, of rapid advance and steadily increasing resistance.

Plus a lot of other stuff like new focus trees and unique equipment, but that's not related to your post.
 
My proposal to improve this system comes in 2 variants (A and B) and will be shown with my amazing paint skills. I call the solution reserves.

(A) Reserve line

Reserve 1-2.jpg


This solution calls for 1, 2 or more reserve lines that are a fixed distance from the front line that you assign troops to in the same way to attach them to the frontline. These move fluidly as the frontlines shift and will always stay at a certain distance. Please ignore the fact that it is Germany that has these and pretend that it is the Polish army that will invade Germany. If a breakthrough is made, they can not drive straight towards Berlin with a truck. They will meet line 1, and if they manage to breakthrough that, line 2. This will halt the one breakthrough and drive to the capital meme. This also gives the feel of a defence in depth and make driving too deep of a spearhead without support difficult and risky. Could be customised with choosing how many lines of reserves and how many tiles back.

(B) Reserve zone.

Reserve 1.png


This is similar to the first idea but instead of a line that units stay at you instead have a reserve line X tiles back, you then assign units to reserve and they fill the entire area between that line and the frontline, maybe prioritising checkerboard pattern and VP's.

I believe this type of system would work best for defenders like the SU and while I forgot to take pictures from that perspective, I believe this gives you the general idea. Any variant of these ideas could make a system that would give warfare a bigger edge. I hate having a breakthrough and that only thing stopping me from driving straight to Moscow is my own choosing.

I like that proposal.
That's similar to how you do it when you defend with Infantry against a strong opponent. One line behind the frontline is all filled out with divisions.

This could be done with adding a "frontline depth1" command that would work in the same way as the fronline, only considering the tiles where frontline units would stand as border. (And can be expanded to "frontline depth2" and "frontline depth3")

Another thing would be a garrison order "guard difficult terrain" that puts units into forests, cities, marches and mountains. You could use that as Soviet Union in between the frontline and the Stalin Line.



And I'd like to have a mode for executing offensive Lines in between careful and stopped. The mode would be called "Take only unguarded land".
An Army with that order would never attack enemy units. But if a unit has the possible to walk into a empty enemy tile it would always immediately do so.
Useful to mop up enemy land with no units in it.
 
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Maybe you should try the mod 'World Ablaze' on the steam workshop.

Of the top of my head it:
- Makes weather effects harsher
- Splits cities into multiple small tiles to increase the 'slog' of taking a city
- Has units resupplying slower, so sustained fighting causes bigger impacts
- Has a 'reserve division' mechanic for the SU, which helps create a historical result in Barbarossa, of rapid advance and steadily increasing resistance.

Plus a lot of other stuff like new focus trees and unique equipment, but that's not related to your post.


While I appreciate that you took the time to write a response I must admit that overhaul mods are not for me. Historically I have found them very unbalanced and they more often then not get dropped support and die off. I perfer to play my games in Vanilla where the balance is kept by developers even if it might not be perfect. Cheers :)
 
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I disagree. That might apply to ww1, but even slight shifts in defensive lines, change of enemy behaviour or the result of own recon mean new entrenchment needed. Fire support coordination, ranging in, reserves, Mine fields, all that is not permanent and will be changed. Troops need not only to enter existing ditches but be able to navigate them, get to know the lay of the land and reconnoitre to know what they are facing.

Second: if there is one thing that should increase a defender's efficiency, it's reserves.
Overlord would have failed if the armoured reserves reached the beaches. Model used his usually limited reserves to great effect in Demyansk and Market Garden. Reserves are for winners.

I think you and @seattle are both correct.

@seattle is correct if troops are being brought in from reserves to replace units hard pressed by the enemy. The new units are not going to get to build their own defenses. They are going to utilize the advantages the retreating troops already built first. If there is a lull in the fighting, then that reserve unit will add to those defenses as they see fit.

You are correct that a reserve unit will do the things you described as soon as they are able.
 
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I disagree. That might apply to ww1, but even slight shifts in defensive lines, change of enemy behaviour or the result of own recon mean new entrenchment needed. Fire support coordination, ranging in, reserves, Mine fields, all that is not permanent and will be changed. Troops need not only to enter existing ditches but be able to navigate them, get to know the lay of the land and reconnoitre to know what they are facing.

Second: if there is one thing that should increase a defender's efficiency, it's reserves.
Overlord would have failed if the armoured reserves reached the beaches. Model used his usually limited reserves to great effect in Demyansk and Market Garden. Reserves are for winners.

Isn't that what I wrote though? I claimed that in HoI4 (and Vicky btw) reserves reduce the defender's efficiency contrary to real life.
Ever since the dawn of railways, defenders greatly made use of shufflung troops in their lines beginning in the Prussian-Austrian war and perhaps culminating in the French utilization in Verdun.
 
Isn't that what I wrote though? I claimed that in HoI4 (and Vicky btw) reserves reduce the defender's efficiency contrary to real life.
Ever since the dawn of railways, defenders greatly made use of shufflung troops in their lines beginning in the Prussian-Austrian war and perhaps culminating in the French utilization in Verdun.
Oh, right. The format got me fooled into thinking you had it the other way around!:eek:
 
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