The Baltic Identity Crisis

[Jays298]

In my Current "historical" USSR game...Finland had a civil war. No unique focus tree, but somehow they have a civil war between fascists and Finland. That created no change.

Estonia went fascist and joined the Axis. Then Estonia went communist (most likely due to Soviet influence focus). While still being in the Axis. USSR has a war goal against them but cannot declare due to non aggro pact with Germany.

Latvia went communist and joined the Comintern. ok.

Lithuania is absorbed by the USSR. Normal actually.

Sometime in March 1941... some of my divisions have no orders. Strange. There's now the Baltic Socialist Republic. It absorbed Estonia.

I guess I'm lucky Estonia didn't absorb Latvia.

But this is all very strange.

 

[sdplissken]

In my Current "historical" USSR game...Finland had a civil war. No unique focus tree, but somehow they have a civil war between fascists and Finland. That created no change.

Estonia went fascist and joined the Axis. Then Estonia went communist (most likely due to Soviet influence focus). While still being in the Axis. USSR has a war goal against them but cannot declare due to non aggro pact with Germany.

Latvia went communist and joined the Comintern. ok.

Lithuania is absorbed by the USSR. Normal actually.

Sometime in March 1941... some of my divisions have no orders. Strange. There's now the Baltic Socialist Republic. It absorbed Estonia.

I guess I'm lucky Estonia didn't absorb Latvia.

But this is all very strange.

I want to know... who requested an estonaia focus tree? like who are these people who clamored for this tree, and why on earth did the devs feel it was important in any way? I simply don't understand

 

[Jays298]

I want to know... who requested an estonaia focus tree? like who are these people who clamored for this tree, and why on earth did the devs feel it was important in any way? I simply don't understand

I guess it provides alternatives? Or they have a player base in those countries.

Playing as them is probably fun...however seems like AI doesn't know how to handle it.

 

[SeekTruthFromFx]

I want to know... who requested an estonaia focus tree? like who are these people who clamored for this tree, and why on earth did the devs feel it was important in any way? I simply don't understand

There wasn't any great clamour for it. The long-term context is that the devs learned from the TfV expansion that the National Focus trees (NFTs!) in each DLC should be in neighbouring countries, so that they can interact with each other. There was great demand for a Soviet rework/DLC, and since each recent expansion has contained two reworks, they decided to rework Poland (since it was on the Eastern Front). Then they needed to add some new NFTs for smaller countries that didn't have them. Who could interact with Poland and the USSR? Obviously the Baltics spring to mind. So choosing the Baltics was a logical consequence of choosing to rework the USSR.

The elephant in the room here is Finland. Many people think that Finland should have been given an NFT as well or instead of the Baltic ones (and I basically agree). But the devs thought that it was better to save Finland for a hypothetical Nordic DLC, which is not an unreasonable viewpoint, especially from Stockholm.

 

[sdplissken]

There wasn't any great clamour for it. The long-term context is that the devs learned from the TfV expansion that the National Focus trees (NFTs!) in each DLC should be in neighbouring countries, so that they can interact with each other. There was great demand for a Soviet rework/DLC, and since each recent expansion has contained two reworks, they decided to rework Poland (since it was on the Eastern Front). Then they needed to add some new NFTs for smaller countries that didn't have them. Who could interact with Poland and the USSR? Obviously the Baltics spring to mind. So choosing the Baltics was a logical consequence of choosing to rework the USSR.

The elephant in the room here is Finland. Many people think that Finland should have been given an NFT as well or instead of the Baltic ones (and I basically agree). But the devs thought that it was better to save Finland for a hypothetical Nordic DLC, which is not an unreasonable viewpoint, especially from Stockholm.

I was shocked Finland wasn’t in NSB, completely disappointed. It really made no sense. Poland, yes understood. Soviets, great, and I even think their tree turned out better than I had thought. But Estonia? Latvia, wtf, why waste time on that.

 

[LordWahu]

I suspect they're specifically saving Finland for a separate Scandanavia DLC
I don't know if it's going to be a BftB style focuses only DLC, or if it's going to be paired with the Diplomatic DLC as part of any "limited war" rules said DLC may contain, but it undoubtedly didn't make it here because they already have it slotted for some time in the future

 

[gunslinger6792]

Poor Italy sitting on its own. No updates since the game was made. I'd really love to flip Italy red and see what happens when Barbarossa kicks off.

 

[sdplissken]

But why…

Personally, I think it had to do with the lead developer being Swedish and having an unconscious bias against Finland and Scandinavia. He probably thought that this history bores him and that it would bore every one else because he grew up with it. But I have nothing to back that up, just a thought. That’s my Freud hat on why it didn’t happen.

 

[aare]

I want to know... who requested an estonaia focus tree? like who are these people who clamored for this tree, and why on earth did the devs feel it was important in any way? I simply don't understand

You should avoid videogames if they make you feel angry/negative. Its about fun you know.
BTW I did wait for it.

Personally, I think it had to do with the lead developer being Swedish and having an unconscious bias against Finland and Scandinavia.

Yes you do need a break

 

[gunslinger6792]

I just hope that with the future italy design I can use mass divisons of bicycle troops like its ww1 in italy. In all seriousness I think the baltic state focus trees allow for a lot of fun with alt history. They also allow the nations to get a bit stronger before Russia swallows them up which maybe helps russia right before the war?

 

[AdjectiveNounNumber]

In my Current "historical" USSR game...Finland had a civil war. No unique focus tree, but somehow they have a civil war between fascists and Finland. That created no change.

Estonia went fascist and joined the Axis. Then Estonia went communist (most likely due to Soviet influence focus). While still being in the Axis. USSR has a war goal against them but cannot declare due to non aggro pact with Germany.

Latvia went communist and joined the Comintern. ok.

Lithuania is absorbed by the USSR. Normal actually.

Sometime in March 1941... some of my divisions have no orders. Strange. There's now the Baltic Socialist Republic. It absorbed Estonia.

I guess I'm lucky Estonia didn't absorb Latvia.

But this is all very strange.

If they went down alt-history path on historical report it as a bug, but I don’t believe you. I think you either forgot to turn historical on or manually selected their path in the game rules

 

[Jays298]

If they went down alt-history path on historical report it as a bug, but I don’t believe you. I think you either forgot to turn historical on or manually selected their path in the game rules

It is a historical game. Everything else went historical and I don't see any sense in "reporting" it since it seems to be a widespread thing in NSB of Baltics doing weird things in historical games. Not so much a bug but a design issue they haven't quite worked out.

Or might be just interrelation between Baltic trees and USSR trees.

 

[Casko]

And I got downvoted to hell and back by fellow forum goes when I complained about no Finland WTF Paradox......

And who asked for Estonia or the Baltics? The same people who asked a Finland and Soviet rework be done together. With Baltics as a side-dish.
Finland is missing however.....

And watch, Finland is going to be part of Scandinavia Pack. And 100% of the time its going to Be Sweden's B*** due to Swedish Bias, as we all know that Winter war was won purely by Swedish Blood. / s
We all know how Gustav V singlehandedly fought off the whole red army doing winter war after all.

...what? you're saying that Finland was part of the WW2 and very important player doing the Eastern front, which if it had been more supportive of the Germans could had easily cut Murmansk railway and further starve the Soviet Lend-Lease????????
You're also saying that this Railway being so important would had made perfect sense to add Finland together with Soviets with NSB????
You're saying that it would had been very thematic to have Finland have decision or focus to try to capture both Leningrad and Murmansk Railway to gain, rather than loose from the Winter war???
Nooo waayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

 

[LastButterfly]

Swedish Bias

Ah yes, HoI4's swedish bias, made obvious by the fact that Sweden didn't get any kind of unique content before Latvia...

 

[sdplissken]

Ah yes, HoI4's swedish bias, made obvious by the fact that Sweden didn't get any kind of unique content before Latvia...

That’s because Swedes hate themselves. Ethiopia is more likely to get a tree before Sweden. And, yes, I am serious. I believe that this is what is happening with Finland and Swedish trees.

 

[Casko]

Ah yes, HoI4's swedish bias, made obvious by the fact that Sweden didn't get any kind of unique content before Latvia...

I thought everyone at these forums knows its a half-joke (or maybe a quarter joke considering how real it is?) about Paradox being a Swedish Company, and generally giving Sweden in almost all their games some kind of big buff under the hood that makes Sweden in some way, either OP, or punch above its weight class, or just have preference compared to other regional powers such as Finland, Norway or Denmark et cetra when it comes to unique event and flavor.

 

[gunslinger6792]

I thought everyone at these forums knows its a half-joke (or maybe a quarter joke considering how real it is?) about Paradox being a Swedish Company, and generally giving Sweden in almost all their games some kind of big buff under the hood that makes Sweden in some way, either OP, or punch above its weight class, or just have preference compared to other regional powers such as Finland, Norway or Denmark et cetra when it comes to unique event and flavor.

Thats definetly true in EU4 but they're beyond lackluster in hoi4

 

[ltccone]

In my Current "historical" USSR game...Finland had a civil war. No unique focus tree, but somehow they have a civil war between fascists and Finland. That created no change.

Estonia went fascist and joined the Axis. Then Estonia went communist (most likely due to Soviet influence focus). While still being in the Axis. USSR has a war goal against them but cannot declare due to non aggro pact with Germany.

Latvia went communist and joined the Comintern. ok.

Lithuania is absorbed by the USSR. Normal actually.

Sometime in March 1941... some of my divisions have no orders. Strange. There's now the Baltic Socialist Republic. It absorbed Estonia.

I guess I'm lucky Estonia didn't absorb Latvia.

But this is all very strange.

The Expert AI mod has 'fixed' this by giving the Baltic states generic focus trees if you play historical.

 

[Easo]

While I as a Latvian understand that Finland of all countries should have gotten focus tree way before us and Paradox should have worked more on some of the wonkiness in Historical some of you guys really need to chill and/or lay off the crack.

 

[Casko]

Thats definetly true in EU4 but they're beyond lackluster in hoi4

I'd argue this is also true in Vicky and ck2 too. but we can all argue on those things and have fun along the way.