Post War Germany Should be able to do democratic focuses.

[FeliciaDarkvoir]

I recently played a game with a Germany player who was particularly inexperienced with managing Majors in Hoi4. Losing to the allies in late 1940 and having Germany capitulate, instead of us restarting the game I used focus.nochecks and autocomplete commands and put him on the re-establish free elections focus. Focuses like Danzig for gurantees got automatically bypassed, and the post civil war rebuilding and repairing policies could hardly be more apropriate for a Germany that loses the war. Furthermore, Germany is in a perfectly reasonable scenario to be worried and lead actions against the soviets which is the primary focus of the democratic tree. Germany leading a new faction so early may be a little sureal, but it till seems far better for Germany to be on this focus path post war than remaining on the fascist one post war.

It seems like this would be a very simple change (kaisereich does this sort of thing all the time) to me and could greatly improve Quality of gameplay for those wishing to take the game later... or bad enough to lose on Germany XD.

 

[squid_hills]

I think this is a good idea for any nation that has alt-history political paths. If Germany loses to the Allies, West Germany gets access to the Democracy branch of their tree. If Japan loses to the USSR, they get put on the Communist branch of their tree. Certain focuses should get bypassed and National Spirits should be deleted if inappropriate. Of course, countries that don't have alt-history branches (Italy, USSR) or lack certain political philosophies (Germany has no Communist branch) should get slapped with the generic tree after getting puppetted to avoid having situations where democratic Italy is stuck twiddling it's thumbs because all of its political focuses are fascist.

 

[Iskulya]

Nah, it would be really nonsensical to implement this.

Germany's Democratic branch revolves entirely around building up an anti-communist alliance to prepare for war with the Soviet Union.

If AI Germany exists as democratic in a historical game, it's because it lost WW2 and has been puppeted, thus rendering the point of Germany's democratic focuses entirely null and void. If it was the case that Germany had focuses that revolved entirely around its domestic politics without going into foreign affairs and war, then there would be a much better case for it, but this isn't the case. Democratic Germany really only has two focuses that aren't directly related to anti-communist warmongering: the focus that switches you to democratic in the first place("The Monarchy Compromise") and one giving you an extra research slot("Reverse the Brain Drain"). Literally every other Democratic Germany exclusive focus is directly related to leading its faction and preparing for war.

On the point of national spirits causing ideology drift being deleted upon being puppeted by a master of a different ideology, I absolutely agree that should be implemented. In fact, a number of years ago the Devs said they were going to make all national spirits that caused ideology drift temporary, preventing this issue. When they released Man the Guns, they backpedaled on this and still even in La Resistance and the new DLC coming out tomorrow we see permanent ideology drift national spirits.

It can be a tremendous problem if you're playing as fascist or non-aligned Britain, for instance. When you flip ideologies, the dominions break away unless you occupy them, and they are able to bypass the normal focus tree requirements and start going fascist or communist even if they had previously stayed loyal. However, after beating them in a war and puppeting them once again, not only do some of the ideology drift spirits making them fascist/communist remain in effect permanently, sometimes they get permanent autonomy gain allowing them to inevitably break free. Really frustrating issue that evidently beta testing entirely missed.

As non-aligned Britain at least, you can bypass this issue by instigating a loyalist uprising, which spawns a new tag that loads in with the pro-Britain part of the focus tree enabled, but you cannot do this for South Africa and India, and for fascist Britain the huge PP requirements make it unfeasible since you do not have access to a silent workhorse advisor.

Honestly, it kind of surprises me that some of these issues escaped testing. I noticed it my very first time playing through as fascist Britain.

 

[Sublime Sultan]

Alternatively, I would like to see East & West Germanies just a bit tweaked to add some generals. small unique focus tree, and advisors from the original GER tag.

 

[FeliciaDarkvoir]

Nah, it would be really nonsensical to implement this.

Germany's Democratic branch revolves entirely around building up an anti-communist alliance to prepare for war with the Soviet Union.

If AI Germany exists as democratic in a historical game, it's because it lost WW2 and has been puppeted, thus rendering the point of Germany's democratic focuses entirely null and void. If it was the case that Germany had focuses that revolved entirely around its domestic politics without going into foreign affairs and war, then there would be a much better case for it, but this isn't the case. Democratic Germany really only has two focuses that aren't directly related to anti-communist warmongering: the focus that switches you to democratic in the first place("The Monarchy Compromise") and one giving you an extra research slot("Reverse the Brain Drain"). Literally every other Democratic Germany exclusive focus is directly related to leading its faction and preparing for war.

I think you are missing the fact that you can aquire all of the repair the nation focuses from the centre tree in your considerations but nonetheless, Germany is not always puppeted (or at least it doesn't have to work very hard to get free) and I hardly see having a generic focus tree involving things like tank innovations as something a post war germany would be up to. My point is that at present you could give west germany or just germany half of the focus tree they already have an have a much more enjoyable player experience for those who want to continue at this point. Sure, it might be ahistorical for them to lead a faction against the soviets after losing the war, but in fairness, they can still do fascist aggresive tree moves if you don't shift the tree so it isn't actually allowing something ahistorical/unrealistic you couldn't otherwise acheive.

Yes, many of the focuses are faction related, but at least you get your shared non aligned/democratic tree and a couple of fun focuses + if you lose the war super early is it so ridiculous for a democratic germany to begin protecting europe from the bear? I don't think so

 

[squid_hills]

Maybe the devs could create a special post-ideology switch puppet NF tree that is used by all countries that have unique trees after they get puppetted by a nation with a different ideology? Something similar to the vanilla tree, but smaller, with 4 generic branches that correspond to the different ideologies. If you are a new Communist puppet, you get put on the commie branch and have to stay the rest of the game there. If you are suddenly Fascist, you get put on the fashy branch and spend your remaining game time there. Ditto for Democracy. There should be a focus or two for increasing autonomy, but none for changing your ideology (your controlling country wouldn't allow that, realistically). This would avoid the wackiness of postwar, puppet Germany building a faction of minor nations to punch the Soviets, while its master looks on in horror, unable to stop the coming fustercluck. Also it would avoid the shenannigans of puppet Democratic Japan starting a war against Manchuria just because the US didn't have enough war score to puppet them, too.

Of course, there would also be the ability to have your original, unique tree restored to you if you manage to break away from your puppet and switch ideologies back to where you started.

 

[Dlin369]

For some countries allowing them to switch focus tree branches when puppeted makes sense, but German’s Democratic tree revolves too much on being an independent Constitutional monarchy.

With any luck East and West Germany will get a small tree in the future focused on reconstruction and denazification. Ideally they’d have cores on each other as well

 

[Mr_Dimento]

One day post war content will be added. It’s just a matter of time after these three expansions:

USSR
ITALY
WONDERWAFFEN

 

[Emperor_Napoleon]

One day post war content will be added. It’s just a matter of time

I wish I could share your optimism, but I can't. Much more highly demanded things like reworked peace deals have been requested for over four years and Paradox haven't done anything about it.