I returned to try HOI after a year or so away to see if 1.06c had made it better and to limber up for HOI2. I found a raft of problems and wonder if those have been fixed in HOI2.
I decided to play as England for a nice quiet game messing about in boats.
Playing again I remembered how annoying the pop up messages were. I do not in the least care about Chile influencing Brazil but I would very much like to know that the SU has just won a provincial battle versus Finland. I know I can switch off the diplomatic stuff, which would not be available irl, but am I able to switch on news of military victories which would of course be known irl?
During the Battle of France I retreated the BEF through areas shortly to become Vichy. Once it was declared, my troops, as in earlier releases, became frozen unable to move into other Vichy areas i.e. to the ports for my escape. My old trick of lending my troops to either Vichy or Spain enabled them to escape (one Corps marched to Gibraltar!). Is this better in HOI2?
I next discovered that Vichy had only inherited 2 infantry Divisions whilst France still had over 100! I searched the map for these 100+ French Divisions and found one group of 60+ starving in Cayenne and another of 40 odd in the middle of the Sahara Desert, isn’t teleportation a marvellous tech skill!!! Looking at an earlier save, I think these were forces that had sat in the Maginot line. It is possible that the program was confused with my English troops messing about in Vichy and the Germans who had sat on Vichy itself so that province was not even allocated to Vichy. Obviously the formation of Vichy is a complex event but hopefully that will be better in HOI2.
It seemed time to lend the French a hand so I took military control and managed eventually to move the Cayenne force to more useful locations although the Sahara lot died of thirst before I could get them to supplies.
As France had a big army to support I thought I had better help them conquer some territory. This proved difficult as they only had 2 transports, so I had to lend them some English ones, the picky French would not ride on English craft so the transport fleet had to be formally loaned to France. Unfortunately, once loaned, I seemed to lose the “Unload troops” button. It was replaced by a return control button in the same place rather like merging fleets with CV aircraft. I found that, if I positioned the transports by the country to be invaded, then returned control the troops would march ashore. Hey ho – is this any better in HOI2?
I sorted out Italy in Africa and waited for the Germans to attack the SU. I had heard that the SU is much stronger in 1.06c so my plan was to let them and Germany get really stuck in and I would watch and if SU was winning I would attack them. The dissent might be a problem so I geared myself up with loads of supplies ready for a big dissent hit. I had sunk all the German ships, does the AI not understand the concept of a “fleet in being” strategy for a weaker power, so Norway was not seriously attacked although DOW’ed and I positioned some forces there to liberate Finland from SU oppression (my moral case for war!). I sent a couple of air squadrons North from Bergen to Narvik and then went off to do some other moves. I subsequently found these two squadrons parked in the white area above the map screen! They seemed unwilling to return to Bergen, although still claiming to be based there. I had to open the save file and modify their location which was set at zero – a bug perhaps?
Meanwhile the Japanese foolishly went to war in Asia bringing the US in on my side. I had good strength in Malaya, partly the rescued French army, so was able to fend them off with no great worries. The US appeared to be doing nothing other than sending some ships to stooge about aimlessly.
It seemed that the SU was getting the upper hand over Germany so time for my DOW to draw some of their forces off. Hmmmm 40% dissent hit – well I was ready for that with lots of IC’s for consumer happiness whilst I fended off the SU forces based in Finland. My tactic seems to be working as Axis and SU still killing each other in Poland.
I am not sure that dissent works the way it used to. I seemed to get a dissent hit whenever I changed a relevant minister and his dissent effect (e.g. –3) was added rather than subtracted! I am inclined to think that dissent should be allowed to build up a positive balance – after all when Tony Blair took us (I am a Brit) to war versus Iraq shouldn’t we still remember the marvellous New Millenium party he threw for us (at our expense) in that most useful Dome building – oh well bad example, but the idea of a government building up a “fund of good will” could have some merit.
However, I got bored with waiting for my dissent to come down and decided to try military control of the US to see what on earth they were doing. The answer is – I have no idea! They had zero org ships and men dotted all over the place and no obvious strategy to attack the Japanese. My experience previously was that the US has a fairly useless AI and that seems no different in 1.06c but is it better in HOI2?
Taking military control of a big operation, such as the US, is not really made easy by the interface. There are no helpful summaries to show me where the units are and what their org might be. The page up/page down cycle through units does not include militarily controlled units etc. Again is this any better in HOI2?
I have not played this scenario any further yet as I am not sure I really want to have to control the US with such poor facilities. I thought I would post this and see if I got any comments about features that I might have missed which might make it easier or perhaps a suggestion that it will be better in HOI2 and I should wait for that.
I am afraid a lot of this post sounds quite negative, however, I am potentially a huge fan of HOI and hopefully HOI2. It is because it has such great potential that I have tried to point out where it could be better.
Regards
Mike
I decided to play as England for a nice quiet game messing about in boats.
Playing again I remembered how annoying the pop up messages were. I do not in the least care about Chile influencing Brazil but I would very much like to know that the SU has just won a provincial battle versus Finland. I know I can switch off the diplomatic stuff, which would not be available irl, but am I able to switch on news of military victories which would of course be known irl?
During the Battle of France I retreated the BEF through areas shortly to become Vichy. Once it was declared, my troops, as in earlier releases, became frozen unable to move into other Vichy areas i.e. to the ports for my escape. My old trick of lending my troops to either Vichy or Spain enabled them to escape (one Corps marched to Gibraltar!). Is this better in HOI2?
I next discovered that Vichy had only inherited 2 infantry Divisions whilst France still had over 100! I searched the map for these 100+ French Divisions and found one group of 60+ starving in Cayenne and another of 40 odd in the middle of the Sahara Desert, isn’t teleportation a marvellous tech skill!!! Looking at an earlier save, I think these were forces that had sat in the Maginot line. It is possible that the program was confused with my English troops messing about in Vichy and the Germans who had sat on Vichy itself so that province was not even allocated to Vichy. Obviously the formation of Vichy is a complex event but hopefully that will be better in HOI2.
It seemed time to lend the French a hand so I took military control and managed eventually to move the Cayenne force to more useful locations although the Sahara lot died of thirst before I could get them to supplies.
As France had a big army to support I thought I had better help them conquer some territory. This proved difficult as they only had 2 transports, so I had to lend them some English ones, the picky French would not ride on English craft so the transport fleet had to be formally loaned to France. Unfortunately, once loaned, I seemed to lose the “Unload troops” button. It was replaced by a return control button in the same place rather like merging fleets with CV aircraft. I found that, if I positioned the transports by the country to be invaded, then returned control the troops would march ashore. Hey ho – is this any better in HOI2?
I sorted out Italy in Africa and waited for the Germans to attack the SU. I had heard that the SU is much stronger in 1.06c so my plan was to let them and Germany get really stuck in and I would watch and if SU was winning I would attack them. The dissent might be a problem so I geared myself up with loads of supplies ready for a big dissent hit. I had sunk all the German ships, does the AI not understand the concept of a “fleet in being” strategy for a weaker power, so Norway was not seriously attacked although DOW’ed and I positioned some forces there to liberate Finland from SU oppression (my moral case for war!). I sent a couple of air squadrons North from Bergen to Narvik and then went off to do some other moves. I subsequently found these two squadrons parked in the white area above the map screen! They seemed unwilling to return to Bergen, although still claiming to be based there. I had to open the save file and modify their location which was set at zero – a bug perhaps?
Meanwhile the Japanese foolishly went to war in Asia bringing the US in on my side. I had good strength in Malaya, partly the rescued French army, so was able to fend them off with no great worries. The US appeared to be doing nothing other than sending some ships to stooge about aimlessly.
It seemed that the SU was getting the upper hand over Germany so time for my DOW to draw some of their forces off. Hmmmm 40% dissent hit – well I was ready for that with lots of IC’s for consumer happiness whilst I fended off the SU forces based in Finland. My tactic seems to be working as Axis and SU still killing each other in Poland.
I am not sure that dissent works the way it used to. I seemed to get a dissent hit whenever I changed a relevant minister and his dissent effect (e.g. –3) was added rather than subtracted! I am inclined to think that dissent should be allowed to build up a positive balance – after all when Tony Blair took us (I am a Brit) to war versus Iraq shouldn’t we still remember the marvellous New Millenium party he threw for us (at our expense) in that most useful Dome building – oh well bad example, but the idea of a government building up a “fund of good will” could have some merit.
However, I got bored with waiting for my dissent to come down and decided to try military control of the US to see what on earth they were doing. The answer is – I have no idea! They had zero org ships and men dotted all over the place and no obvious strategy to attack the Japanese. My experience previously was that the US has a fairly useless AI and that seems no different in 1.06c but is it better in HOI2?
Taking military control of a big operation, such as the US, is not really made easy by the interface. There are no helpful summaries to show me where the units are and what their org might be. The page up/page down cycle through units does not include militarily controlled units etc. Again is this any better in HOI2?
I have not played this scenario any further yet as I am not sure I really want to have to control the US with such poor facilities. I thought I would post this and see if I got any comments about features that I might have missed which might make it easier or perhaps a suggestion that it will be better in HOI2 and I should wait for that.
I am afraid a lot of this post sounds quite negative, however, I am potentially a huge fan of HOI and hopefully HOI2. It is because it has such great potential that I have tried to point out where it could be better.
Regards
Mike
