seriosuly over/underestimating forces

[themousemaster]

GER can build a "modest" navy and do surprisingly well with it, as long as they operate within range of land-based aircraft. If you venture too far out, the RN carriers will make life miserable for your fleet, unless you develop and build your own CTF and CAGs.

I've used those two old WWI "battlewagons" to tie up the RN long enough to perform a landing on the UK coast, without building a single ship other than a group of 3 transports. Once you've got an airfield and a port, the UK is pathetically easy to take out of the game: I've done it in one game as Italy and even once with Hungary with only 3 TPs for the actual invasion and a sub as a spotter (although in that instance GER joined the invasion around the time I already had London and 2/3 of the British Isles under control). Taking out the British Isles with Germany is so simple in HOI3 that I avoid it (as an obvious exploit) until after I've crippled the RN to the point where it can't even muster a ship to threaten the landing.

Yes, veterans of the system can take advantage of AI weaknesses to smack the bejezus out of it. I've conducted landings on mainland JAP with just NATCHI's single starting transport before ;p.

But the OP is saying he's not even familiar with large scale troop deployment or, really, the naval aspect in general (not just by personal admission, but he also built a full run of both DD and CL). So I didn't want to give advice on how best to exploit poor AI (poorly/undefended UK isles, for example), I just wanted to give him the heads-up on what will happen when he does what he said he was planning to

 

[grumphie]

well, turns out it all worked out pretty well. apart from me forgetting to fire blitzkrieg and missing out on that bonus and manpower >_>. derp.

attacked poland early may '39, france fell in late july, which could have been a lot faster if i'd not have waited for most of the eastern troops to reach the border. as it turns out, i problaye have made at least 20 infantry divisions too much. at least they'll be usefull in barbarossa.

with mainland europe taken out, im now trying to figure out a good way to invade the english or at least neutralize their airforce and wether its worth it to take out repiblican spain. i don't want them starting trouble once im off in the east, but their heigh national unity mean i'd have to occupy practically all the VP, and slows down any focus i can have against the east and the UK. while the SU doesnt really have a strong army yet, they do have plenty of armor. i have plenty of cas, but i can't defend an entire front with them alone. fighting a war on three fronts isn't something i fancy.

for england i was thinking of getting a few panzer divisions and a bunch of infantry, load them on my boats, capture a port with paratroopers then rebase there and pray they dont get dunk while my airforce tries to cover them as good as possible. would that work? if i can just land a sizeable force on mainland UK they should pose much of a problem to mop up, and significantly reduce the danger of naval invasions.

due to the posts here i didnt actually did a full run of both escorts - only a few days of IC spend on those. went with destroyers because those were already halfway done.

for now im mainly waiting for my mobile infantry divisions to complete and troop movements to complete. my OOB is a mess after the shifting of troops between fronts so i'll clean it up for barbarossa.

 

[Kovax]

All you need to do is grab a port, and then you can send Transports which will immediately unload, rather than sit there in the adjacent sea province for days. An initial amphibious invasion leaves your transport fleet hanging out there as a tender morsel for the RN to snack on (they WILL prioritized the transports), unless you can use your own navy to intercept them in the provinces BEFORE they reach your transports.

Once France falls, the UK gets the "Their Finest Hour" decision, which makes their airforce close to suicidal to face for the next 6 months or so. I'd suggest either waiting 6 months to launch "Sealion", or else trying to do the job with minimal reliance on air power. Paratroopers can grab a port, yes, unless your TRA get shot down in the process of delivering them to the drop zone. As with the navy, you can send a distraction to draw off the offending UK interceptors, then send the TRAs with Paratroopers. That operation should put the UK home isles out of the action, although they may still exist as an exiled power in India and other places. As long as you don't leave them with anyplace to base their navy in the Atlantic, you should be in great shape.

 

[themousemaster]

That operation should put the UK home isles out of the action, although they may still exist as an exiled power in India and other places. As long as you don't leave them with anyplace to base their navy in the Atlantic, you should be in great shape.

They always just go to Bermuda Island for that. May want to take that rock of land first... also a great place for your own Atlantic operations.



Once again grumphie, the heads-up: the instant you take a VP-province on the UK isles, the USSR will DoW *you*. Be ready for it.

 

[grumphie]

right now im still reorganising my OOB, sending all my forces not participating in sealion to the SU front. there hasn't been a winter war or occupation of bessabaria yet, so romania isn't in the AXIS yet.

i know about the english decision, but i actually doubt that even with that decision they can contest my air superiority right now. i have a technological advantage, and have been thrashing their fighters and bombers since the war started, so their air force really is a mess right now. as far as both my intel and expierience shows theyre down to only about 6, most of which are pretty damaged. my NAV bombers didnt get much damage when they attacked a fleet that tried passing the channel at the very least. so im hopefull my transports will get through mostly unhindered.

im more worried about the SU. my infantry divisions can't do too much against armor, consisting of 3INF-1ART, while the SU does run a significant amount of armor. mainly light armor and armored cars, but stilla significant number of it. should my technological advantage prove too small that mgith turn ugly very fast. where my othe rbattles have been practicallyw ithout support brigades or armor until now, the SU actually does have those, combined with awfull infrastructure in a lot of places, which should make my advance a little less easy than it has been till now. at the same time - wouldnt waiting a few months just make this problem larger? now i at least have a good advantage in the skies and all my essential techs are either up to date or ahead of time.

 

[Forster]

Move your armor east. You can land a corps in Britain, but supply can be a problem. The rest should be sitting in the east. You can start building some anti-tank to add to a few of your divisions. With France out of the picture and Britain collapsing, you should only need a small reaction force left in the west in case the ai gets dumb and invades with British/other allied units. Once London falls, they will be out of supply.

 

[grumphie]

well, i took london.

no DoW. don't know it that means im going to wait a few months(it's now the end of august), and if i might want to take some troops to take the balkan.

didnt even have supply problems in england. i simply dropped my paratroopers on dover, supported taking down the garrison with some bomber while ignoring the fighters trying to shoot them down, then simply steamrolling over the english. if you can bring in supply through 2 lvl 10 you can field a suprising amount of units there, which made taking southern england a breeze. right now im just pushing everything into northern england as the AI cannot form a front against all those units.it was a bit anticlimatic really - so far the polish were the only ones offering any semblance of resistance.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Once again grumphie, the heads-up: the instant you take a VP-province on the UK isles, the USSR will DoW *you*. Be ready for it.

That is simply not true. It's a variable. You can trigger SOV DOW when you take some VP's, though often it requires taking London. However, if you have sufficient troops on the border, the SOV AI will not DOW you unless it has sufficient superiority in numbers.

 

[themousemaster]

That is simply not true. It's a variable. You can trigger SOV DOW when you take some VP's, though often it requires taking London. However, if you have sufficient troops on the border, the SOV AI will not DOW you unless it has sufficient superiority in numbers.

Indeed? Guess I'm horribly unlucky then, as I'm 9 for 9 getting DOW'ed upon my first VP province in UK isles, with varying degrees of border coverage.

 

[grumphie]

i know why it didnt break - right now the agresiion pact requires 200% brigades to break until august 1940, and i have 85% of their brigades on the border( i don't think that equation adds up though - if i count them i very much have a numeric advantage, or at least match their numbers)

ofcoursem, that leaves me time and recources for the balkans and spain. so it's actually a pretty good situation for me. by the time they can declare war i should have most of the balkans under my control which would help supply. or i could puppet it(so i dont have to police it with my troops) and instead have their brigades support me - any suggestions for what nations to puppet and what to conquer?

 

[unmerged(715229)]

IMVHO I would not take Spain.

I always only try to get them into the axis (you have to take gibraltar first) and thats it.
When circumstances allow it I may later(1942-43?) call for their assistance to conquer some western parts of Africa.
That gives them time to build up their forces before they get into the heavy fighting.

One time I had them on my side in Southern America after 1944 and they were very useful then.

In contrast conquering them gives me only a very long coastline and some oversea territory in Africa which is hard to maintain and control for me (manpower-wise).
Conquering and then puppeting them will disrupt their forces, they have a smaller army afterwards.

BTW same goes for portugal, once you have spain in the axis portugal will usually follow.

IMVHO as usual. ;-)

 

[grumphie]

i could still puppet them - its not like their army would pose much resistance. they got a few brigades tops, and i don't really ahve any other major millitary operations going on.

 

[Kovax]

Annexing Yugoslavia gives you ports on the Med, and makes a good jumping off point for taking the Suez if Italy doesn't manage it. Puppetting them becomes a problem if/when Italy needs help in Greece, because Yugoslavia's supply and transportation techs leave something to be desired, and it's a long way across mediocre infrastructure from the Austrian border to Greece. I often build up an improved infrastructure path to the nearest port, and sometimes boost a few of the bottleneck provinces between there and the Greek border.

Romania can be brought into the Axis willingly in most cases, particularly after the SU demands Bessarabia, although that "window of opportunity" may only last until Germany enforces Hungary's claims on the territory handed over to Romania after WWI. After that, they usually drift toward the Allies and require brute force "Influence", or a sudden application of lead travelling at high velocities, to drag into your corner. One might expect that the oil would have some use, but it's essentially irrelevant in this game unless you go with a massively ahistorical all-motorized or all-mechanized German army.

Bulgaria isn't worth the effort it takes to garrison, and they're a LONG way from joining any other faction, so if they won't join, simply ignore them unless you've got ventures into Turkey in mind for some odd reason.

Denmark closes off the Baltic to the UK, thanks to the straits, so controlling that reduces your amount of vulnerable coastline by a few ports. You can safely annex to get their limited amounts of IC and Leadership for practically no garrison cost (just move your garrisons from Germany's northern coast to Denmark with no net change in manpower/divisions), but they'll usually go GiE, which really doesn't make much difference in the overall scheme of things.

As pointed out, Spain has a LOT of coastline, poor IC and Leadership, and not much reason to take them over besides painting the map in your chosen color. Doing so, whether you annex or puppet, means that you've got to garrison all those ports, because they're incapable of putting up a credible defense on their own. The mountainous terrain and poor infrastructure means that it takes WAY longer than would seem reasonable to conquer it, the revolt risk means that the resources and IC are heavily reduced, and then you have to spend all of that and possibly more just to garrison it properly. No thanks.

 

[Forster]

Yes, but if he has already occupied Great Britain and Ireland, that coast line becomes much less of a danger and it makes the capture of Gibraltar much easier. Usually, when I take Denmark, I try to send two units to invade Iceland and then Greenland so they don't get taken by the US. Garrison them, build up the ports and build airfields and radar. Wonderful fixed aircraft carriers, great invasion step off points, and subs can be based there too.

 

[grumphie]

.....

i just enforced conquer on england. as a result, not only did i get a bunch of puppets, i also got a boatload of territory all over the planet. italy was doing fairly well in egypt so they got most of that, and japan got large swathes of indonesia, but it's still a gigantic amount of lands. heck, i even got a front with what's left of the allies - south africa, canada, new zealand and australia. and japan is already doign a good job fighting them. what do i do now? ship around troops? puppet/conquer the few independent nations left? do i worry about revolts everywhere now?

basicly: what do i do now. i expected the english to go abroad and fight on from there - not have the allies fall apart. i could probaly open an extra front on the USSR through persia now. or puppet the chinese and have them overrun siberia. but it's all so LARGE. where do i even start?

 

[21oliver]

I have amphibbed the UK more times then i can count. In TFH it is definitely a random % in regards to the Soviets DOWing Germany. I have taken all of the British Isles and had as little as 20 divisions on the Eastern Front and not incurred a Soviet DOW before. Othertimes simply landing in the UK Ive been DOW'ed. The Soviets have DOW'd me at times even with no border between us (I didnt take Poland yet). I wouldnt even say London is the key anymore as I have often taken London with no response by the Soviets. Im not sure what the formula is but it is definitely different and random in TFH as opposed to clear cut in past versions.

 

[Opanashc]

I have amphibbed the UK more times then i can count. In TFH it is definitely a random % in regards to the Soviets DOWing Germany. I have taken all of the British Isles and had as little as 20 divisions on the Eastern Front and not incurred a Soviet DOW before. Othertimes simply landing in the UK Ive been DOW'ed. The Soviets have DOW'd me at times even with no border between us (I didnt take Poland yet). I wouldnt even say London is the key anymore as I have often taken London with no response by the Soviets. Im not sure what the formula is but it is definitely different and random in TFH as opposed to clear cut in past versions.

function P.ForeignMinister_ProposeWar(voForeignMinisterData)
	-- If we are pat of the Comintern then process this
	if not(voForeignMinisterData.Strategy:IsPreparingWar()) then
		if voForeignMinisterData.FactionName == "comintern" then
			-- We will not consider DOWing Germany if we are in a war already
			if not(voForeignMinisterData.IsAtWar) then
				-- Make sure we control Moscow
				if CCurrentGameState.GetProvince(1409):GetController() == voForeignMinisterData.ministerTag then
					local loAxisFaction = CCurrentGameState.GetFaction("axis")
					local loAxisTag = loAxisFaction:GetFactionLeader()
					local loAxisCountry = loAxisTag:GetCountry()
				
					-- Make sure we never surrendered in the past
					if not(loAxisCountry:GetFlags():IsFlagSet("su_signs_peace")) then
						local loAlliesTag = CCurrentGameState.GetFaction("allies"):GetFactionLeader()
						local loAxisAlliesRelation = loAxisCountry:GetRelation(loAlliesTag)
						local lbSealion = P.SealionCheck(loAxisAlliesRelation, loAxisFaction)
						
						-- Can we DOW the Axis Leader
						if lbSealion then
							if math.random(100) < 40 then
								voForeignMinisterData.Strategy:PrepareLimitedWar(loAxisTag, 100)
							end							
						else
							local lbDOW = Support.GoodToWarCheck(loAxisTag, loAxisCountry, voForeignMinisterData, false, true, true)
							
							if lbDOW then
								if voForeignMinisterData.Year >= 1942 then
									if math.random(100) < 10 then
										voForeignMinisterData.Strategy:PrepareLimitedWar(loAxisTag, 100)
									end						
								end
							elseif voForeignMinisterData.Year >= 1942 then
								-- Poland Check if we can go through them
								local loPOLTag = CCountryDataBase.GetTag("POL")
								local loPolandCountry = loPOLTag:GetCountry()
								lbDOW = Support.GoodToWarCheck(loPOLTag, loPolandCountry, voForeignMinisterData, false, true, true)
								
								if lbDOW then
									if math.random(100) < 30 then
										voForeignMinisterData.Strategy:PrepareLimitedWar(loPOLTag, 100)
									end
								end
							end
						end
					end
				end
			end
		end
	end
end
function P.SealionCheck(voAxisAlliesRelation, voAxisFaction)
	-- Check for Sea Lion and if so lets get involved before its to late
	local laProvinceCheck = {
		1964, -- london
		2250, -- plymouth
		2135, -- bornmouth
		2021, -- dover
		1790, -- lowestoft
		1616, -- grimsby
		1524, -- hull
		1255, --newcastle
		1128, -- edinburgh
		894, -- aberdeen
		604, -- scapa flow
		2018} -- bristol
	
	if voAxisAlliesRelation:HasWar() then	
		for i = 1, table.getn(laProvinceCheck) do
			loProvinceFaction = CCurrentGameState.GetProvince(laProvinceCheck[i]):GetController():GetCountry():GetFaction()
			
			-- Is the province controlled by the Axis
			if loProvinceFaction == voAxisFaction then
				return true
			end
		end
	end
	
	return false
end

Here is the formula.

 

[21oliver]

It appears pre-42 a random number less then 40 = a DOW, 1942 and later its a random number less then 10. Is that correct? doesnt appear to indicate any provinces in the bottom half so London is irrelevant? Is the check done only once at the time of the invasion?

 

[grumphie]

well, i think im going to start over at this rate. suddenly owning half the planet is a bit of a problem - revolt risk anywhere, no fleets or the like to send away, no garrisons to put there, and i don't even get any recources from ti because i'm not buidlign transports and the like. i tried releasing puppets but those are ofcourse fairly useless, having no army of any decent size, and my inability to release large swathes of africa as puppets just makes me want to release france and the UK - which feels really weird. at least i know how to do stuff now. maybe i'll give the SU another go and see if i don't get overrun at vladivostok this round.

 

[Pugmak]

For inf, I tend to go 2x inf, 1x art, 1x at. That's not the most perfect, but I don't like having to micro which inf div/corps is where to face specific issues.

For OOB, I tend to go full count. 5 divs per corps, 5 corps per army, etc. When I set up for war on a front, I put a full inf corps per province. This way, I can attack straight forward with with 4 divs on 3 ajoining provs to force a break in the line, with one div from each prov flanking that hole. That gives plenty of force but doesn't overstack and leaves 4 divs on each flank without attack delay and one div per the 3 breakthrough provs to advance into the hole.

I make the breakthrough holes 3 provs wide to prevent counter attacks on the central prov in the hole so's I can send my armor through there without getting tangled up. The 1 inf div per 3 province hole advance immediately prior to the armor (which is one prov behind the front at start) to hit anything that had been backing up the front on the enemy side. The 4 divs on the flanks can either get sent into the side provinces of the hole and then used to start wrapping up the enemy flanks and "rolling up" the line, or advance to widen the hole, or if there's much enemy force behind the first line of provinces, push through the gap and start tangling with them to keep them from trying to reseal the hole.

Again, not the best way, but works for me.

As to logistics, I tend to run Log Wiz trait from Theater down to corps. Some long wiz's have good combat traits too. I put them at corps or army. The exception is Army Group. That's a skill 5 or better. If he has log wiz too, then gravy.

Nothing sucks worse to me than having a good army and a good plan but get stalled out due to lack of log. Hate that with a hatey hateness.

So I also put effort into upping the techs in the Theory tab that deal with lowering supply tax and increasing throughput. I also make sure to have an administrator that increases through put.