One of the most important things in the game will be the Western Allied AI

[svennnnnnnnnnnn]

So the question is, do we want the AI so simulate how the Wallies would have acted in real life or do we want them to keep things interesting? I find it hard to believe that the Americans or British can actually challenge the Axis after a victory on the eastern front, especially since they have access to a decent amount of Russian and French factories. Naval invasion penalty+distance from home+vulnerable supply situation+difficulty matching force buildup. The only reason Johan kept it interesting was because Germany was invading Asia at the same time, and Daniel wasted resources on some stupid stuff and had to shift industry after he took control.

 

[Rommel41]

It's one reason I've always front-loaded as Germany for a 1940 Sealion.

Carriers, landing-craft (assault transports are an expensive luxury for '40), a few marines and paras. I've done it since HoI because the Wallied AI never invaded or was poor and the Luftwaffe could keep my skies clear.

My recent game had Brazil lose 200k men in Indonesia and the US threw-away 225k (mostly armored divisions -led by Patton ) invading Vichy-French south-west Africa.

Best thing at that point is to crush the US Navy with a massive carrier build-program and land 3 million combat-troops on the east cost. June 4-6th, 1944 is the best time. Great weather.

Best part is...the Japanese AI doesn't know what to do once it has India, Australia, China, and the Pacific. So it's sea-to-shining-sea for Germany baby! Pump the US up with whatever resources and manpower they need! The Wehrmacht needs experience!

 

[Adonnus]

So the question is, do we want the AI so simulate how the Wallies would have acted in real life or do we want them to keep things interesting? I find it hard to believe that the Americans or British can actually challenge the Axis after a victory on the eastern front, especially since they have access to a decent amount of Russian and French factories. Naval invasion penalty+distance from home+vulnerable supply situation+difficulty matching force buildup. The only reason Johan kept it interesting was because Germany was invading Asia at the same time, and Daniel wasted resources on some stupid stuff and had to shift industry after he took control.

Well at least in regards to distance from home, USA can use Britain as a base of operations as they did in reality. I agree it'd be tough but I still want the AI to give me a run for my money for once.

 

[svennnnnnnnnnnn]

Well at least in regards to distance from home, USA can use Britain as a base of operations as they did in reality. I agree it'd be tough but I still want the AI to give me a run for my money for once.

It took them til 1943 to win in North Africa, despite most german resources being directed elsewhere and sinking of axis supply convoys.

But I am gonna stop being a negative nancy and try to problem-solve instead, what we want is specialised AI behaviour for beating a player that has control over most/all of Europe. These tactics needs to be even more elaborate than what is needed to attack europe during historical 1943-1945 circumstances, since the player is probably far better prepared than the Germans were. Not sure to which degree this should be hard-coded because I have no idea how AI-design works. Alot of these have been written already, but here are my suggestions of special behaviors for this very occasion that could work:

1. Attack through a neutral country (sorry Portugal)
The advantage is obvious, how can those nasty krauts defend something they don't occupy, unseasoned portuguese divisions with 1936 rifles can be swept aside much easier than panzer battalions with veterans soldiers, allowing a foothold to be established while the player curses her timidity and respect for national sovereignty . It would also be helpful if the AIlies could make ultimatums to force neutral nations to enter the war on their side of face the consequences.

2. Attack through a relatively weak axis member/occupied territory
The soft underbelly of europe! (I realise this didn't actually work, but hey, the AI-lies should simulate the actual allies). Plus attacking the balkans or italy or spain (if they joined axis, otherwise see point 1

3. MASSIVE strength buildup
As someone mentioned (OP I think?) the allies did dniepr raid stuff but rarely did massive invasions, the AI-lies need to actually prepare a large force, and it has to be LARGE, not medium. If it's medium size force they end up loosing 10 divisions instead of 3. Their invasion needs to be kind of an all-in for it to have a chance for working. Also ridiculous amounts of air support needs to be employed.

4. Different targets from usual
High value should be placed on seizing ports and positions that would allow them to defend their bridgehead.
This might seems obvious but the AI needs to value getting a solid defensive position and getting access to ports much higher than they would under normal combat operations, and they need to be very ruthless when it comes to securing these places ("A kill zone you say? Well Ultra intercepts suggest they will run out of bullets before we run out of troops, so charge!")

5. Disruption
The AI-lies should try to combine their invasion efforts with coups, partisans and paratroopers to confuse the player. Both before, during and after initial landing. Beyond the obvious value of not having to assault the beaches and whatnot, this could help in other ways. For example, a coup in Romania will distract troops that were headed to defend Greece. A coup in Spain could convince the player the AI will be landing there when they were actually headed for Norway.

6. Fake plans
Ok so I read somewhere that if you have the right techs and/or luck you can get a hold of enemy war plans and vice versa. So there should be a focus or tech or decision or event or whatever that makes it so you can plant false plans, thus confusing the Player. They should also actually perform decoy invasions so that the player has to guess where the main strike is coming.

7. Mulberry Harbour(s)
Without the Mulberry Harbours the invasion of France could very well have failed, or atleast stalled. The Krauts, being ever so sneaky, destroyed harbours as they retreated (I can only assume a clever German player will do the same), forcing the Allies the rely on giant harbour-ships called mullberry harbours. The 2 harbours erected on the beaches of normandy would continue to be the main allied port in the west for 6 months, and it was used for 10 months in total. According to wikipedia some 2.5 million men and 4 million tonnes of supplies passed through it during that time. No harbour = no western front, no western front = Stalin whines even more about having to do all the work.

8. Higher degrees for mobilization
So historically the allies mobilized ALOT of their resources, but they never really went as close to total war as the Germans or Soviets. This is especially true for Americans since they didn't need all of their massive industry or manpower pool to do their part. For example (wikipedia once more) in 1944 the US barely outproduced the Germans in terms of AFVs, with 20357 vs 18956, and the German production included some 5000 panthers or tigers that were very expensive to produce compared to most american tanks.
However, with no other challenger to Germany in sight, an AI-merican dead-set on invading Europe needs to go all in, so that their massive industrial capacity and manpower reserve can compensate for the other unfavorable conditions. Perhaps a special focus only available after the USSR has been defeated?
The brits could get a similiar focus that allows them to draw on their colonies and the commonwealth (indian manpower?)

So if the AI-lies can do all these things, they might be able to put up a fight, or atleast go down in a blaze of glory.

 

[Lifthrasil]

I don't see why the US needs a special NF to gain control over the Allied forces.
What if you play as the US? Or as the UK? Then it would be either OP or frustrating for the player.
I think the AI should have the possibility to assume joint control withing their faction if certain conditions are met. It doesn't really matter WHO has the control (since AI = AI), but if it does so, then it should be the faction leader (logically).

The player doesn't really need control over allied forces, as he has already an advantage over the AI. Nevertheless the player should be able to
a) request and send expeditionary forces (exists already)
b) give his faction members some "prioritized targets", to simulate joint war effort. If the AI follows your orders could depend on conditions like your warscore (nobody follows an idiot), your relationship towards them, certain NF or the general situation.

 

[GermanPower]

I noticed a few people saying invasion in different points and I really don't think that's a good strategy I watched it fail as I've watched it fail over and over again in the HOI series. A strong successful invasion is provided by a single point of contact and maybe a few secondary areas in which the army groups can meet up. A successful invasion is built upon the backs the ability to have superior firepower for months on end. The issue with multiple point invasion is you will quickly loose troops and points and hold others. Every lost point of invasion is a large loss of pressure. While the benefit of keeping in a single point means you have total ability to use your fullforce while it takes the enemy a much longer time to muster the forces needed in order to stall a offensive. Your goal in the end is to establish a healthy amount of supplies and be capable of providing enough troops to either hold the ground or push forward.

My point is a bundle of sticks together is strong. Apart it's weak. Germany regardless of what's going on has to. HAS to defend multiple areas. Because any giant stack by the Allies will instantly provide a threat if they concentrate forces. The idea I'm talking about is Germany doesn't know where someone is going to attack..and if they leave open any space..they might as well kiss their chances of a quick invasion ended.

Example in-game. Italy. It was undefended for the most part and German troops were spread out. It was the only real large concentration of allied troops I saw.

 

[svennnnnnnnnnnn]

I noticed a few people saying invasion in different points and I really don't think that's a good strategy I watched it fail as I've watched it fail over and over again in the HOI series. A strong successful invasion is provided by a single point of contact and maybe a few secondary areas in which the army groups can meet up. A successful invasion is built upon the backs the ability to have superior firepower for months on end. The issue with multiple point invasion is you will quickly loose troops and points and hold others. Every lost point of invasion is a large loss of pressure. While the benefit of keeping in a single point means you have total ability to use your fullforce while it takes the enemy a much longer time to muster the forces needed in order to stall a offensive. Your goal in the end is to establish a healthy amount of supplies and be capable of providing enough troops to either hold the ground or push forward.

My point is a bundle of sticks together is strong. Apart it's weak. Germany regardless of what's going on has to. HAS to defend multiple areas. Because any giant stack by the Allies will instantly provide a threat if they concentrate forces. The idea I'm talking about is Germany doesn't know where someone is going to attack..and if they leave open any space..they might as well kiss their chances of a quick invasion ended.

Example in-game. Italy. It was undefended for the most part and German troops were spread out. It was the only real large concentration of allied troops I saw.

Agreed, multiple simultaneous invasions will most likely fail, if you divide your strength equally. This is foolishness, it was done on www and while one invasions made progress another was stomped, and then suddenly the first invasion was facing 2v1

However there is still a case for decoy attacks, to confuse the deployment of strategic reserves. If during an invasion á la d-day, if the defender ever has more forces available the attacker starts loosing, and if you don't have enough ground to fall back on, you loose bad. Attacking the balkans, france and norway at the same time would be silly and probably doomed to fail . However attacking France while having a decoy attack the others with enough push behind them to get a decent bridgehead could yield results. The enemy airforce would be split into all theatres since they don't know which threats are real, the troops that would get re-assign to contain/destroy the incursion would be split. By the time you realize the balkan attack was hollow, you already sent a third of your reserve by train to Greece, buying the allies precious time to build up strength in Normandy. By the time those troops get re-re-deployed the d-day force is hopefully strong enough to withstand them. This particular strategy helps to decrease the speed at which the enemy can deploy reserves from other areas (Germany, Russia, Balkans, Scandinavia etc). It wasn't necessary in real life because it entailed a large cost of life and the enemy had few available reserves anyway.

tl:dr
Bundle of sticks = strong.
Bundle of sticks except one stick that you poke the enemy in the eye so he cant see the bundle coming = stronger.

 

[Yaem]

Example in-game. Italy. It was undefended for the most part and German troops were spread out. It was the only real large concentration of allied troops I saw.

I think the only reason Italy was as successful as it was is because they managed to capture Sicily with only Italians defending, meaning they could push them out and establish a beachhead, after that the natural geography of Italy pretty much forced the Germans to spread out heavily on a very short frontline. making it possible for the allies to stack up forces behind the already established frontline. Making the German numbers count for nothing in such a narrow chokepoint.

All in all, I think that invasion seemed to reach a stalemate, with casualities actually higher on the allied side. Nevertheless it tied up Axis troops to a very much needed front. After that beachhead was secured perhaps they should've gone to liberate Iberia, choking the axis along the Pyrenees. The same later to be done in Scandinavia using Denmark as the bottleneck.

 

[CharlieFox]

Perhaps joint command is simulated via sending expeditionary forces? In the stream it seemed that the AI was much more likely to send expedicionary forces than in Hoi III (Devs said AI will send you forces If they think you can make better use of them)

I know it's not a perfect solution but is something

 

[Axe99]

On the multiple invasions thing, it's worth keeping in mind I think the Allies originally planned to launch Operation Dragoon (the invasion of Southern France) at the same time as Overlord, but lacked the amphibious ships for it so had to postpone it for bit. Not saying it would have worked out, mind. Japan also got some mileage from multiple simultaneous invasions when it hit the Phillippines (although clearly that was a good deal less heavily defended than your average Nazi-occupied Europe).

 

[BraveMustang]

I would just like to point out that in terms of US ai invasions, at the end of the japan www stream he looked at the us and there were what looked like multiple invasions being planned/implemented at that moment.

 

[mursolini]

I`m always at loss as to why do people ignore 1943 invasion of Italy when they discuss allied landings in Europe.

 

[Sharp163]

Perhaps this could be implemented for the AI the western allies could act under a single AI, instead of multiple, so they make unified decisions and their plans can cooperate and coordinate, simulating the role of the unified supreme allied command force in ww2

 

[Praetonia]

Bear in mind that you will be able to play countries other than Germany!

Historically invading Europe after a successful Barbarossa would have been extremely hard. In past versions of the game, I think it would have been extremely hard even with human US and UK.

 

[Dominican923]

If the Devs are seeing this I would like to know how they have changed the AI to give more of a fight towards Germany

 

[BBBD316]

Well I have always found that the RN doesn't seem to do a lot, it seems far too easy for German player to move it's limited fleet around and take the RN out piecemeal, I think if the AI can use the RN to try to wipe the Axis fleets out and then focus on carrying out raids on the Axis coast this might cause the player to have to be on their toes.

So I think we need to hope:

• Soviets hold out as long as possible and try to be so much of an issue that the Germans spend ages on them
• The Wallies work together and are able to hit points of least resistance. So if the AIs bombers see that Sicily is not defended it will get an invasion force together to seek to engage.
• The RN works its fleets together better to focus on sinking European Axis' naval power to achieve complete naval dominance.