Occupation of territory by minor nations

[germanGrenadier]

There is one thing that bothers me since i started playing hearts of iron and i recently saw it again in the dev stream. In that particular example germany started to ivade the soviet union through baltic countries which it was allied with. So the provinces taken whilst attacking from them was ouccupied by them. This is largely ahistorical and it looks so bad that, in my eyes, i never really make alliances to avoid that problem. That given I really wish the devs change it so that eg. the whole soviet union is occupied by germany.

 

[Lorymat]

I don't quite understand why such a thing bothers you and it's not really ahistorical per se.

If, for example, a Romanian corps starts an offensive operation on a sector and pushes back the enemy, it's obvious that the first units that arrive and secure the sector will be Romanian.

After the initial occupation, the German/Romanian/Hungarian/Slovak/Italian divisions would move on following the invasion plan while the reserve units and supporting units of said divisions or seperate battalions would remain in the occupied sector,secure the major infrastructure and suppress any local resistance. I don't understand why something so simple bugs you so much

 

[Chosrau]

You're making it sound easier then it actually is. It isn't always clear-cut whom a occupation should go to.

Should it always go the nation who first occupies the province? Have fun looking at colourful pattern of disconnected provinces when a front is being pushed by a multinational army.

Should it always go to the faction leader? Then you can have a situation like Turkey joining the axis, pushing the brits out of the middle east all by their own and then happily handing it all over to Germany, even though they actually want the land themself. Or a Japan pulling off a invasion on the US west coast which promptly turns to german occupation.

Should it always go the owner of the province from which the occupying army came from? As you yourself said, this can also lead to very weird situations, like Lithuania occupying half of the soviet union, conquered for them by the german army.

As you can see, they all got their own downsides. There is not much point in crying about one without having a better proposal.

 

[Anichent]

This was a problem in HOI3 where not just minors, but allies in general could occupy territory and then owned whatever they occupied come peace time making maps unrealistic, messy, and just silly.

This is completely solved in HOI4. You may not like how it looks, but just because their country controls it does not mean they get it in peace time and there are decisions to change who controls it during wartime if I recall correctly. You can give or ask for control.

 

[GsusNSV]

I would also say don't sweat this, but a problem, that may appear, is in regards to peace conferences.

[...]We actually track casualties now and that will also factor into your participation score. Most important however is actually conquering enemy territory.[...]

So if Lithuania really ends up with controling half of the SU, they would get maybe to many points for the conference.

 

[Lorymat]

You're making it sound easier then it actually is. It isn't always clear-cut whom a occupation should go to.

Should it always go the nation who first occupies the province? Have fun looking at colourful pattern of disconnected provinces when a front is being pushed by a multinational army.

Should it always go to the faction leader? Then you can have a situation like Turkey joining the axis, pushing the brits out of the middle east all by their own and then happily handing it all over to Germany, even though they actually want the land themself. Or a Japan pulling off a invasion on the US west coast which promptly turns to german occupation.

Should it always go the owner of the province from which the occupying army came from? As you yourself said, this can also lead to very weird situations, like Lithuania occupying half of the soviet union, conquered for them by the german army.

As you can see, they all got their own downsides. There is not much point in crying about one without having a better proposal.

There is a difference between a expeditionary force of one nation being under the command of another nation (like Slovak corps that were attached to the German 17th Army in the initial offensive during operation Barbarossa) and a force that is under command of a German ally.

Most axis allies put their own divisions,corps and armies under German command as it was easier to command them and prepare offensives without getting into a downward spiral of organizing dozens of armies each with their own high command.

That being said, I understand that it's not something that can be really replicated in gameplay terms. I don't mind the HoI 3 system, as long as there is a possibility to give occupied zones to other allies.

 

[Lorymat]

I would also say don't sweat this, but a problem, that may appear is in regards to peace conferences.

So if Lithuania really ends up with controling half of the SU, they would get maybe to many points for the conference.

So why not put a modifier that negatively affects your supply lines? The more zones you have occupied, the stronger the strain on your supply and manpower pools. That would eliminate the possibility of minor nations occupying vast territories that they can not support or protect.

 

[Anichent]

So why not put a modifier that negatively affects your supply lines? The more zones you have occupied, the stronger the strain on your supply and manpower pools. That would eliminate the possibility of minor nations occupying vast territories that they can not support or protect.

I would hope the AI is good enough so that if a minor ally in a war controls too much territory, they use the option to transfer control to another ally which I have seen in screenshots. So its not a problem as long as they AI does what seems logical.

 

[GsusNSV]

So why not put a modifier that negatively affects your supply lines? The more zones you have occupied, the stronger the strain on your supply and manpower pools. That would eliminate the possibility of minor nations occupying vast territories that they can not support or protect.

But the control of a province goes like this, you attack a province from your territory, it becomes yours. You attack from a allied countrys province, it becomes the allied country province.
That modifier would just encourage to attack always from your allies. Also how should that work for Germany attacking the SU? You reache Moscow and then have nothing left, because of the malus? That would be plain unfair.

 

[Lorymat]

I would hope the AI is good enough so that if a minor ally in a war controls too much territory, they use the option to transfer control to another ally which I have seen in screenshots. So its not a problem as long as they AI does what seems logical.

AI doing things that seem logical isn't something that the HoI franchise is known for

But the control of a province goes like this, you attack a province from your territory, it becomes yours. You attack from a allied countrys province, it becomes the allied country province.
That modifier would just encourage to attack always from your allies. Also how should that work for Germany attacking the SU? You reache Moscow and then have nothing left, because of the malus? That would be plain unfair.

Then what would you propose? I don't see any way around it tbh, no matter what system you include, there's bound to be an issue. I say ,if that's the case, they should just leave the system as it was in HoI 3.

 

[LordOfWar16]

You can actually ask for controll or give controll over occupied states in the diplomacy screen. Other than that occupation doesnt affect who can demand what in a peace deal as far as i know. That whats matter is your contribution to the war on the grand scheme and demanding stuff that other nations have claimed (not occupied) only costs more for others and less for them. During the conference you can demand whatever you want, but depending on what you demand you maybe get less out of your contribution to the war i.e allied wargoals etc.

 

[GsusNSV]

Then what would you propose? I don't see any way around it tbh, no matter what system you include, there's bound to be an issue. I say ,if that's the case, they should just leave the system as it was in HoI 3.

How about who fought longer in a battle and/or send more forces (Battalions)?
I guess there won't be a ideal solution for this.

 

[germanGrenadier]

How about who fought longer in a battle and/or send more forces (Battalions)?
I guess there won't be a ideal solution for this.

That actually isnt that much of a bad idea. It also could be scripted four some regions like france or russia to be occupied by german when taken by an axis member. And if you eg as italy really want to control a certain region you can ask for it.

 

[General WVPM]

This is why they added the changecontroller cheat to HOI3

 

[paranoidsteve]

It isn't a problem, when the war is won , you and your allies split up the captured states with the land grab amounts gained balanced with the contribution of each allied member. He who does the most gets the most.

 

[Anichent]

@LordOfWar16 Do you think thats only for wartime? Or for both war and peacetime?

I hope its both or else the game is missing something :/

 

[LordOfWar16]

@Anichent since at peacetime you dont have occupied territory i highly doubt that it will work outside of wars. If i recall correctly the tooltipp for those buttons says occupied states and not owned states.

 

[Adonnus]

You're making it sound easier then it actually is. It isn't always clear-cut whom a occupation should go to.

Should it always go the nation who first occupies the province? Have fun looking at colourful pattern of disconnected provinces when a front is being pushed by a multinational army.

Should it always go to the faction leader? Then you can have a situation like Turkey joining the axis, pushing the brits out of the middle east all by their own and then happily handing it all over to Germany, even though they actually want the land themself. Or a Japan pulling off a invasion on the US west coast which promptly turns to german occupation.

Should it always go the owner of the province from which the occupying army came from? As you yourself said, this can also lead to very weird situations, like Lithuania occupying half of the soviet union, conquered for them by the german army.

As you can see, they all got their own downsides. There is not much point in crying about one without having a better proposal.

How about whoever has the highest % of troops in a sector? That was if Germany sends 100 divs through Lithuania and Lithuania sends 1, Germany occupies the land. But if Germany sends 30 and Romania sends 40 both through Romanian territory, Romania occupies the land. Sound fair? But, if Hungarians for instance are attacking SU through territory that is already German occupied, the land should be still German for continuity.

 

[TheDerpyBeagle]

In the HOI3 Black ICE mod there was a decision you could enact whenever Romania captured Soviet territory past Odessa that transferred that territory to your control, so if they implemented something like that, it would work.

 

[Surimi]

It strikes me as a decent way to avoid broken, disconnected patches of occupied land, which looks okay in games like EU4 but here would look awful because occupation expands national borders rather than just covering regions with hashes, so you could easily end up with an incomprehensible mess.

Since it seems like the actual business of dividing up territory takes place at peace conferences, the occupation borders are temporary anyway. I'd guess it merely reflects who is currently administering the occupied territory, which logically would default to whoever occupied it first. Likewise, any advantage is potentially going to be temporary unless your contribution to the war is great enough to guarantee you get all the concessions you want.

I guess one way to solve it would be nice to have something like the provinces of interest system from EU4, where you can designate areas you would like to occupy and allies who want to stay on your good side might respond by transferring occupation to you.