Suggestions prior to release (and one for afterwards)

[KiwiNoob]

1. Counters need to be bigger in general, the counter icon needs to be bigger proportion of the counter and counters in different provinces need to stay separate for longer when zooming out

Something like this would be nice

The counters are too small at the moment. They contain all the information needed to make good decisions so should be bigger and easier to read.

Currently when a player begins to zoom out the counters almost immediately start merging together and obscure important information about the actual location of units. The zoom level at which grouping begins should be increased and when they do start grouping the counters should be grouped into smaller, more numerous groups.

The counter icon being a bigger proportion of the counter space will be especially important for those people who will prefer NATO style icons (nice compromise btw).


2. Production lines should not be limited to 15 factories.

It's painful watching the production screen at the moment with 3 production lines all producing the same thing. It's a waste of UI and the amount of scrolling that could have been avoided if those 3 lines of infantry equipment was just one is significant.

Multiple lines are necessary as there is clearly a need when a scarcity of strategic resources come into play but it would make the production UI much cleaner to allow more if needed.

Maybe something like this:

3. Please remove the need for a plan to get the planning bonus

Having the bonus associated with the plans is frustrating as it forces players to draw plans even if they don't want to. I imagine that a large majority of plans for minor and micro nations will be drawn up simply to gain the bonus and not for any other reason.

It doesn't matter how easy it is to draw the plans - if the plan is unneeded/unwanted it's still unnecessary busy work and forces the player to do something they might not want to do. Not to mention it adds the possibility for people to forget to do it. As someone who enjoys micro managing units for minor nations I'm going to hate it.

The idea of a 'planning bonus' of sorts is good though so as an alternative I suggest that the bonus simply be made automatic. If a division is stationary and is not fighting then the planning bonus automatically builds up. Then if the division is ordered to attack, regardless if there is a drawn up plan or not it will have it's planning bonus applied.

This means that all the doctrines and researches associated with planning still work. I believe that the planning bonus is already applied per division anyway it just removes the requirement of a battle plan.



4. (And this one is for later) Expand the supply mechanic to be generic and allow additonal flows

You could have multiple items that all act the same way as supply (produced in regions + VP) and then flow to where they are needed, but all flow independently of each other. This would be a simple way for the game to support other very important items such as food. It would also be the ideal mechanic for oil and a good replacement for the current implementation which (in my opinion) is less than ideal.

Edit: Forgot to mention that these 'supply resources' should be tradeable in the same way as 'production resources' such as steel.

This could look like this:

Thanks for taking the time to read.

 

[piscatorcompos]

1. You might be right about this.
2. I think that is an intended game mechanic. It seems to simulate a group of factories that, with time, increases efficiency. If you unlimit the amount of factories per line it will always effect efficiency if you change anything. With the current system you could leave one line untouched and just change another one. So to me this works well. It does however clutter the UI, I agree. Maybe mod this yourself.

3. Battle plans make a lot of sense. If you don't like them then don't use them. You can still micro all you want. With the battle plans you get an advantage as long as your plan works. Seems realistic to me. Again, maybe mod a fixed advantage or remove them altogether by modding the game. But asking Paradox to remove a main feature because you are not fond of the concept is a bit narcistic.

4. Not sure about this. We'll have to see how it plays and if this adds anything to the game.

 

[Sun_Killer]

1. Here i have to support you.

2. I think the 15 factroies per line are ok. don´t want to lose my efficiency with every change or partisan strike or strat bombing.

3. I only think the plans are alitlle bit to strong at the moment. So nerf the boni a little bit and maybe ad a higher supply consumption while preparing for simulating prepositiong of supplies.

4. I would like a fuel system, but this was more or less useless in HoI3, becasue of hindsight, as germany and japan you just stocked up before the war and than more or less got through it. So for the fuel we will see how the current version works and demand changes later on if it is just unplayable or whatever. And for food, could be a nice future for the civlian side of the game, but i don´t really see the need for combat troops, as they are already reciving supplies which should include food.

 

[Gwayne]

3) Be aware that the idea of a planning bonus is that the attack is "planned" people know what to do, they are not telepathic or do things instinctive. Also , it ties in with a possible spy system where others are aware of your plans. If there was no bonus nobody would use them to avoid others to spy op their plans.

 

[KiwiNoob]

2. I think the 15 factroies per line are ok. don´t want to lose my efficiency with every change or partisan strike or strat bombing.

4. I would like a fuel system, but this was more or less useless in HoI3, becasue of hindsight, as germany and japan you just stocked up before the war and than more or less got through it. So for the fuel we will see how the current version works and demand changes later on if it is just unplayable or whatever. And for food, could be a nice future for the civlian side of the game, but i don´t really see the need for combat troops, as they are already reciving supplies which should include food.

2. Efficiency is calculated per factory and not per line. If you have 20 factories running at full efficiency and add another then the overall efficiency would only drop by a very small amount.

4. I see it as good sense for oil/fuel and a real boon to modders for the other things. The other thing I should have mentioned is that these 'consumable resources' would need to be tradeable in the same way as production resources (such as steel)

3) Be aware that the idea of a planning bonus is that the attack is "planned" people know what to do, they are not telepathic or do things instinctive. Also , it ties in with a possible spy system where others are aware of your plans. If there was no bonus nobody would use them to avoid others to spy op their plans.

The spying mechanic was binned because it didn't really add to the game. You also miss the point that currently the plan is pointless. You dont even need to do what was in the plan. You could do anything you want but as long as you had some sort of plan drawn up you get the bonus. I'm just saying do away with the pointless plan.

 

[KiwiNoob]

3. Battle plans make a lot of sense. If you don't like them then don't use them. You can still micro all you want. With the battle plans you get an advantage as long as your plan works. Seems realistic to me. Again, maybe mod a fixed advantage or remove them altogether by modding the game. But asking Paradox to remove a main feature because you are not fond of the concept is a bit narcistic.

Thats not how plans work. You build up a bonus simply for having a plan but you dont need to follow that plan to get the benefit, nor does your plan need to be 'working'.

 

[JoyAndMisery]

I STRONGLY agree with number 4.
Even if they do not add the resources on their own I would like to see the possibility to add such things via mods.
That does mean: Making the resourceflow system modable/adjustable, making the AI realizing the need for its units and producing these "materials"

 

[raindirve]

A "counter" scaling factor would be an excellent option to add if it's not in already.

[edit: I'm of mixed minds] on the factories thing, 15 is enough that it shouldn't be a problem, plus for big counties it lets you grab a decent amount and retool them without having to enter "I want to reassign 15 of these 60 factories". Remains to be seen how the production screen will look and handle for, say, a late-game US with hundreds of military factories, but I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt and possibly show up with more constructive suggestions later.

Also don't think plans will be as underutilized as you do. Someone micro-heavy like Daniel still draws up a general battleplan just as much for the AI push as for the planning bonus, to draw down the tedious portion of micro. This really seems like the kind of thing we could revisit a couple of months after release to see if it's working as intended.

As for supply, why do different systems have to be separate? Supply is already as I understand it the available transport capacity for everything the forces need. If I had spare supply capacity but was full on oil, why couldn't I load up barrels of oil on my supply trucks? If food is full but there's a lot of spare oil capacity, can't I ship out a few tankers full of milk?

 

[KiwiNoob]

As for supply, why do different systems have to be separate? Supply is already as I understand it the available transport capacity for everything the forces need. If I had spare supply capacity but was full on oil, why couldn't I load up barrels of oil on my supply trucks? If food is full but there's a lot of spare oil capacity, can't I ship out a few tankers full of milk?

I see what you mean and agree that each of the items that are supplied would use up a certain amount of the overall transport capacity available. By keeping them separate I was meaning that you can have plenty of some (such as the existing 'supply') but not have enough of another (such as 'food' or 'oil').

 

[Nitan17]

I very heavily agree on the first three points.
1. Yes, yes and yes.
2. Good idea. I think production efficiency is calculated on every factory separately, so that change shouldn't break anything. But perhaps instead of adding a slider/arrows, just add new rows to UI, when all the previous ones are full?
3. I like battle plans. I like the planning bonus. But please, PLEASE, let us turn off AI's assistance. It WILL make micromanagement very frustrating, because you won't be able to tell units to just stay in place - if they have no order (because you want them to stay in place), AI will move them and you would have to tell them every hour to stop attacking (not to mention the fact that those units would constantly lose dig-in bonus). NEVER force players to use AI in running their own country.
So, either:
a) Add an option to turn off AI's help in battle plans.
b) Make the planning bonus separate from battle plans, working a bit similar to the dig-in one - increasing when staying in place, decreasing then moving/attacking.
c) Remove planning bonus altogether and adjust other combat modifiers accordingly.
Thankfully, at least c) will be possible through modding.

 

[potski]

It's painful watching the production screen at the moment with 3 production lines all producing the same thing. It's a waste of UI and the amount of scrolling that could have been avoided if those 3 lines of infantry equipment was just one is significant.

I don't understand this point. You can see about 8 production lines IIRC in the UI without scrolling. Why would you have more than 8 production lines of each type? You either have an enormous amount of factories, or are producing many different models/variants with production lines with 1 or 2 factories each. Even then it's difficult to see this being a big issue. Assuming you stick to the most up-to-date model of plane for instance then the maximum number of production lines is 9.

 

[potski]

If a division is stationary and is not fighting then the planning bonus automatically builds up. Then if the division is ordered to attack, regardless if there is a drawn up plan or not it will have it's planning bonus applied.

How does the system know the difference between units which:
- have stopped moving to dig-in, to form a defensive line
- have stopped moving temporarily to recover org
- have stopped moving as they prepare for an offensive, or the next phase of an offensive
- have stopped moving because they are in a VP city or port and you want them to garrison it

In your proposal, all of these get planning bonuses, even though there is no actual planning.

 

[potski]

Counters need to be bigger in general, the counter icon needs to be bigger proportion of the counter and counters in different provinces need to stay separate for longer when zooming out

You have defeated your own argument by publishing this screenshot:

You can see counters in Japan. They are sized to fit within a province. If you make them much bigger, and don't allow them to merge, then you get them overlapping with each other, and obscuring the information.

 

[KiwiNoob]

How does the system know the difference between units which:
- have stopped moving to dig-in, to form a defensive line
- have stopped moving temporarily to recover org
- have stopped moving as they prepare for an offensive, or the next phase of an offensive
- have stopped moving because they are in a VP city or port and you want them to garrison it

In your proposal, all of these get planning bonuses, even though there is no actual planning.

As long as you take the time to draw up a bogus plan - all the above get the planning bonus as well. It's just removing the need to create the bogus plan.

 

[Bridger15]

1. As was pointed out, you can't simultaneously ask for larger counters and also ask to have them merge less. Larger counters would have to merge sooner to avoid overlapping. I have had no issues seeing the counters. Do you have a low resolution monitor? Are you watching in full screen?

2. I don't see the need for a change here TBH. Your suggestion would fundamentally change how efficiency works and then they'll have to balance it again.

3. What? Using the battleplans are literally "how" you play the game. How would you move your units if you didn't have a battleplan? One at a time across the entire 100+ unit front? What an awful game. *Cough*HOI3*cough*

 

[Kozer]

Do not agree with number 3. The whole point of drawing up the plan is so that your units know what the "plan" is. That is why they get the bonus. Drawing up plans and letting them get the bonus only to draw up another resets the bonus. So drawing up any just to get it would be a waste of time. You only need to draw the plans you want to happen.

 

[KalZakath]

1. Agree totally, but have it scalable between the counter and the sprite (since the sprites are there to stay) - I say this as a somewhat vision impaired person who couldn't make heads or tails most of the time from the WWW sprites/counter size ratio.

2. 15 seems fine to me, but if you want an option window to set the number per line, that's reasonable too.

3. I see Plans as a major boon - instead of being forced to micromanage the entire empire, you can set plans all over the place, sit back, and micromanage when you see the AI make a mistake, and exploit that mistake. Meanwhile, all your other troops can keep doing what you generally want them to do. I'd use them even without the bonus for using them.

4. Mixed on this one - Part of me wants to see the separate resources, part of me is fine with them all being abstracted as 'supplies'.

 

[endimielle1]

I respectfully disagree with the topic starter. As it would be unfair just to click a red cross here are my assumptions in short:

1. The current counters are fine to me. If not >> Mods.

2. Well, I have not tested the game yet, so cannot be sure if 15 factories per line is a big issue (you know - video is not enough to make assumptions). Also your solvation of the problem make UI less "user friendly".

3. Plans are one of the main new features of HOI4. You just can't rip it out and get away with this without ruining the game concept in general. If you really hate the Plans feature - then you need a Mod.

4. Don't really know. Maybe you are right. We'll know it when we really play the game.

 

[KiwiNoob]

3. I see Plans as a major boon - instead of being forced to micromanage the entire empire, you can set plans all over the place, sit back, and micromanage when you see the AI make a mistake, and exploit that mistake. Meanwhile, all your other troops can keep doing what you generally want them to do. I'd use them even without the bonus for using them.

Dont get me wrong - I think plans are a great feature and will be essential for regional/major powers. The planning tools are great too.

The 'planning bonus' is realistic too. Giving your units time to rest and prepare for an offensive should provide a bonus - I'm just saying dont bother tying the 'planning bonus' to plans. Maybe just call it a 'preparation bonus'. This way - even if you're micro managing a few of your divisions there is benefit in stopping occasionally for them to prepare for the next push.

I also think the 'preparation bonus' should accumulate faster than any 'dig in' bonus so that the offensive troops maintain the momentum unless they wait too long and it makes a defense in depth more important.

 

[KiwiNoob]

3. Plans are one of the main new features of HOI4. You just can't rip it out and get away with this without ruining the game concept in general. If you really hate the Plans feature - then you need a Mod.

Never said plans were terrible or should be taken out. I like the new planning system.