The Disapointment of HOI3

[jju_57]

Then there is this laughable bug, which by the way will probably never be fixed:

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?521991-True-Effects-of-Defensiveness

Defense doesn't work lol. This terrible blunder by the developers will take so long to properly fix and balance they probably are just going to leave it in the game. Paradox has no intention to fix a huge bug in the game but they're going to try to sell us an expansion.

It might help if you actually read things. PI has indicated that FTM will fix and address this bug. Also, the bug was so suttle that no one spotted it. The rreason was because the game was balanced and hence covered for the bug.

It just helps your rant if you state facts.

 

[jju_57]

It should be fixed in a patch, though. I don't mind to pay for features, (I bought SF and DI: G after all) but I shouldn't have to pay to have a major bug fixed.

It's a war game. If combat is broken, the game is broken.

Hey CFP, its not really broken. See the game balanced the units to where it acted like there was no bug. What the bug ended up doing is remove the need to research defense and toughness. The combat results and fighting ended up being where they would be if the misses actually happened. So it's really not a broken game. If with the bug you suffer 10% strength losses and without the bug you suffer the same 10% the game ends up being the same to you.

What the bug really ended up doing is giving human players the knowledge that some techs are useless to research. Many of the moddlers ended up making them prereqes for other research to it had close to zero impact. Besides as a human you could still research them to be fair to the AI.

I understand the reason for not fixing it outside of FTM. The reason is the workaround unbalanced INDIVIDUAL unit types. Overall the tests showed the results tended to be the same but unless you rebalance every single unit including planes and ships you are better off with the bug. Is it what we want? No. But to be completely honest no one knew of it and even all the combat related formulas on the WIki never spotted it. Initial tests couldn't see it. Only when someone raised it to 1000 and then set it to zero did they notice that it had no impact.

 

[Affenklaus]

The first released version of HoI3 was *horrible* (I'm glad PI seems to have learned from that, though - Victoria 2 wasn't perfect on release either but it was perfectly playable).
Now with the expansion and newest patches HoI3 is playable, too, and I do think it's a good game but to be honest I don't have nearly as much fun playing it as I have when playing HoI2, not to speak of AoD. I can't even really say why it's like that - HoI2 has many little things I miss when playing (military control over allies, better modding possibilities in some areas f.ex.) but that's not all.
Well maybe FtM will convince me, although none of the features mentioned in dev-diaries so far are 'must-haves' for me (having minister pics back like in previous HoI games is great, though, but obviously no reason to switch from AoD to HoI3).

 

[cfp]

Hey CFP, its not really broken. See the game balanced the units to where it acted like there was no bug. What the bug ended up doing is remove the need to research defense and toughness. The combat results and fighting ended up being where they would be if the misses actually happened. So it's really not a broken game. If with the bug you suffer 10% strength losses and without the bug you suffer the same 10% the game ends up being the same to you.

What the bug really ended up doing is giving human players the knowledge that some techs are useless to research. Many of the moddlers ended up making them prereqes for other research to it had close to zero impact. Besides as a human you could still research them to be fair to the AI.

I understand the reason for not fixing it outside of FTM. The reason is the workaround unbalanced INDIVIDUAL unit types. Overall the tests showed the results tended to be the same but unless you rebalance every single unit including planes and ships you are better off with the bug. Is it what we want? No. But to be completely honest no one knew of it and even all the combat related formulas on the WIki never spotted it. Initial tests couldn't see it. Only when someone raised it to 1000 and then set it to zero did they notice that it had no impact.

Just because something is "fixed" in a mod doesn't mean the vanilla game should ignore it. That's poor policy.

We can agree to disagree. I doubt I'll be buying FTM.

 

[jju_57]

Just because something is "fixed" in a mod doesn't mean the vanilla game should ignore it. That's poor policy.

We can agree to disagree. I doubt I'll be buying FTM.

Sorry if I came across the wrong way. I was trying to give you some history on the bug and its real impact. As for FTM in a post they implied that defensiveness and toughness would be changed and might work differently from vanilla/SF. If this is true then that could explain why they wouldn't issue a patch. There was only a one line response from Darkrenown on this topic so not much is really known on how they plan to address it in FTM.

As for buying FTM or not that was beyond my comment and each person makes that choice for themselves.

 

[Sirveri]

My guess is that the fix for the Def/Tgh bug will also make it into the final SF patch. If I remember correctly once they get FTM ready for launch they'll release a final patch for SF to basically bring it in line with all the corrections they made for FTM that aren't extra content.

on edit: nevermind, it looks like it might not be backwards compatible. Still pretty easy to fix yourself though.

 

[Chromos]

My guess is that the fix for the Def/Tgh bug will also make it into the final SF patch. If I remember correctly once they get FTM ready for launch they'll release a final patch for SF to basically bring it in line with all the corrections they made for FTM that aren't extra content.

on edit: nevermind, it looks like it might not be backwards compatible. Still pretty easy to fix yourself though.

What does not backward compatible mean? Who wants to play HOI3 without SF?
(As it is again 70% off at GG..)
They wrote in a dev diary of FTM that they will fix it for FTM and that they also will provide it for SF..

Regards,
Chromos

Edit: Here Def Diary 3.. Cklick link.. DD3-Misc stuff

 

[cfp]

Sorry if I came across the wrong way. I was trying to give you some history on the bug and its real impact. As for FTM in a post they implied that defensiveness and toughness would be changed and might work differently from vanilla/SF. If this is true then that could explain why they wouldn't issue a patch. There was only a one line response from Darkrenown on this topic so not much is really known on how they plan to address it in FTM.

As for buying FTM or not that was beyond my comment and each person makes that choice for themselves.

No problem. I wasn't offended or anything. Just have a different opinion on this bug (and several others) and didn't want to go into a lengthy discussion about it.

Besides. If it's as simple as changing those two numbers, then why would it require re-balancing? Being told to "fix it yourself, it's easy" and then being told "we can't fix it - takes too long to balance" is a bit contradictory, wouldn't you say?

I don't purchase products so that I can fix them myself. This is the only dev I've purchased from with that attitude. It's disappointing. I like their games, but..

Sad thing is I'll likely miss out on all the DI:G patches, despite having paid for it as well, as they will be developed for the FTM expansion.

 

[Affenklaus]

What does not backward compatible mean? Who wants to play HOI3 without SF?
(As it is again 70% off at GG..)
They wrote in a dev diary of FTM that they will fix it for FTM and that they also will provide it for SF..

Regards,
Chromos

Edit: Here Def Diary 3.. Cklick link.. DD3-Misc stuff

The issue with Japanese supply in China will be fixed for SF and FtM but *not* the (a bit embarrassing but rather minor) Def/Tgh bug Sirveri was writing about.
With "not backwards compatible" Sirveri probably refers to THIS post by podcat.

 

[jju_57]

Besides. If it's as simple as changing those two numbers, then why would it require re-balancing? Being told to "fix it yourself, it's easy" and then being told "we can't fix it - takes too long to balance" is a bit contradictory, wouldn't you say?

I've argued that it is not a simple fix to get it RIGHT. I agree with you on this point and PI does a disservice to itself when they claim all you have to do is change two numbers. While that does enable the misses it doesn't balance anything.

PI even says they won't backport this for SF.

imo its not a major flaw. most people never noticed because it wasnt a big deal, however it does touch many many parts of the game which its less likely to get back ported because you need to rebalance and change a lot of stuff that is pretty intertwined with FTM now (unlike the supply fixes which will come in a beta patch pretty soon, eg this week or early next).

I'm for being 100% honest.
It is a game breaking bug? - NO
Should you just change these two numbers? - NO
If you change the two values will this cause other balance issues? - PROBABLY
Can you have a great game and fun with the bug? - YES
Should the fix be in a patch for SF and/or HOI3? - Only PI knows what the did for FTM

So PI is partially correct in saying that it had little VISIBLE impact on the game. But they are dishonest in claiming that changing two values removes the bug. Technically it does but the units may be unbalanced and no one did any testing on how it impacts naval or air combat.

 

[Chromos]

The issue with Japanese supply in China will be fixed for SF and FtM but *not* the (a bit embarrassing but rather minor) Def/Tgh bug Sirveri was writing about.
With "not backwards compatible" Sirveri probably refers to THIS post by podcat.

Ah,
sorry guys, I stay corrected, was the wrong link. o
I still think they had also written already that they will bring that one for SF too.


Kind regards,
Chromos

 

[Darkrenown]

So PI is partially correct in saying that it had little VISIBLE impact on the game. But they are dishonest in claiming that changing two values removes the bug. Technically it does but the units may be unbalanced and no one did any testing on how it impacts naval or air combat.

It's hardly dishonest to make a factually correct statement.

 

[loki100]

I've argued that it is not a simple fix to get it RIGHT. I agree with you on this point and PI does a disservice to itself when they claim all you have to do is change two numbers. While that does enable the misses it doesn't balance anything.

I did a very short 2 week test with the 'quick fix' (due to the way I'm writing my current Soviet AAR I have voluminous back records of the original game), so I chose a relatively contained sub-section of my original game (put the rest on AI) and as far as possible reran the original sequence of attacks (it was a major Soviet offensive and the Germans on that sector were clearly on the defense). Looking at the final casualties with the new values, any difference (for both sides) is well within the normal margins of variation (I think Soviet losses wre around 15,000 as opposed to 16,000 and German around 22,000 as opposed to around 21,500) for land combat. What happened that was different was losses due to air bombing dipped from about 6,000 Germans to around 2,000.

So my strong suspicion is that the in-game values are perhaps the reason why sustained airstrikes in SF can be so damaging (not just to your vital support brigades). I offer no view as to which should be correct, but my feeling is that airpower should do bad things to organisation and movement speed (incl advance/retreat in province) rather than be a major cause of direct casualties.

In effect, this returns us to where the debate has always been on these two numbers. Its clearly not what was intended but then the entire game (esp the combat) system has evolved around those values as currently set. Change them and it probably will over a longer game, with a greater variety of combat interactions, and by changing the air-land dynamic, seriously change how the game plays out, but from my little test, its pretty easy to see how no one went looking for the problem that was wrecking the combat system (as it simply wasn;t).

 

[unmerged(190349)]

You can download a couple of very good mods from the mod section of this forum. For free.

This has been a very good game ever since it was released, although there were surely a couple of serious problems with it. These were fixed by free patches however. HOI3 vanilla patched up to 1.4 is very much playable now, so there is no need to buy any new expansion if you don't want to in order to be able to enjoy the game.
SF did a lot to improve gameplay, but also added a couple of new features warranting PI to ask you to pay for it.
Mods are free by definition, DLC's are optional and you don't need either to be able to play the game properly.

To be honest I don't understand what people want if they still complain about the game. HOI3 + SF + DiDay's ICE mod is by far the best game I've ever played.

I love the game and I don´t see the moment to have all my troubles solved. I have HoI3 1.04 + SF 2.04e, and DiG, but, where can I download Diday's ICE mod?
Thanks

 

[HMS Enterprize]

Slightly random question here but will I need to buy SF to gain the full benefits of FTM or could I just go HOI3-FTM?

Also, even if you can go HOI3-FTM does SF have any features that wont be accessible if you can just get the base game and the FTM expansion?

Cheers.

 

[comsubpac]

Slightly random question here but will I need to buy SF to gain the full benefits of FTM or could I just go HOI3-FTM?

Also, even if you can go HOI3-FTM does SF have any features that wont be accessible if you can just get the base game and the FTM expansion?

Cheers.

as always you need the base game and all expansions for a new expansion.

 

[kdr]

It's hardly dishonest to make a factually correct statement.

Well, it's nice to read that developers have a good sense of humor. But could you, or podcat, officially declare whether a decent fix (by 'decent' I don't mean changing just 2 values in defines.lua) for that will be available in SF patch? It's kinda important to me.

 

[jju_57]

Since 2003 I've had official responses to my posts only twice.

It's hardly dishonest to make a factually correct statement.

Kinda interesting that the second official response was this. That really sounded like a politician. I used the word dishonest because unless you know all the facts you can easily be mislead into thinkg that it is actually fixed. I'm leaking oil from my car and the mechanic says that they technically fixed it. I find that they used tape around the leak. So they technically stopped the leak but they didn't actually fix the cause. See below for why.

I did a very short 2 week test with the 'quick fix' (due to the way I'm writing my current Soviet AAR I have voluminous back records of the original game), so I chose a relatively contained sub-section of my original game (put the rest on AI) and as far as possible reran the original sequence of attacks (it was a major Soviet offensive and the Germans on that sector were clearly on the defense). Looking at the final casualties with the new values, any difference (for both sides) is well within the normal margins of variation (I think Soviet losses wre around 15,000 as opposed to 16,000 and German around 22,000 as opposed to around 21,500) for land combat. What happened that was different was losses due to air bombing dipped from about 6,000 Germans to around 2,000.

So my strong suspicion is that the in-game values are perhaps the reason why sustained airstrikes in SF can be so damaging (not just to your vital support brigades). I offer no view as to which should be correct, but my feeling is that airpower should do bad things to organisation and movement speed (incl advance/retreat in province) rather than be a major cause of direct casualties.

In effect, this returns us to where the debate has always been on these two numbers. Its clearly not what was intended but then the entire game (esp the combat) system has evolved around those values as currently set. Change them and it probably will over a longer game, with a greater variety of combat interactions, and by changing the air-land dynamic, seriously change how the game plays out, but from my little test, its pretty easy to see how no one went looking for the problem that was wrecking the combat system (as it simply wasn;t).

I participated in many of those conversations. The issue is that bombing for a number of the tests resulted in less losses. But see MP was balanced based on the higher losses. So this has the potential to cause an out ob balance for countries like the SU. If they don't lose as many troops to air theat means they build even more troops and might easily crush AI Germany.

Not to mention no tests were ever done on air combat or naval combat. Some speculated that the smaller ships would get sunk in one hit with the higher damage multiplies. This gives less of a chance for the ship to disengage and survive with say 30% strength.

Finally, you might have used the 5.0 damage multiplier but there were dozens of posts where some claimed 4.0, 4.2 4.5 and 4.8 were better. Others also used 60% miss instead of 80%.

So my conclusion is that changing the two values adds back misses. PI is correct in saying that. But they are incorrect in saying that it fixes the entire issue. No one has conducted enough tests to check all the differnet areas where the def/tough bug had impact. In my opinion it is better to play with the no miss bug than it is to change the values. Others my differ but who knows what the results are over the entire course of the war.

 

[podcat]

just to clarify, it technically "fixes" the game by changing the two values, but you wont get results like before. all units need to be modified also and some techs and other stuff

 

[InnocentIII]

My test is this: how many hours do I get out of Paradox games for how much money? The only person who comes close is Sid, and the only way to do better is to go way back in time and get a refrigerator box as a gift.

Paradox games can be a bit disappointing on release, but their support over the long haul is amazing. I had fun with HoI3 early on, Vicky2 was fun right out of the box for 40-50 game years (and beyond that for a bit, if you like killing commies). I'm looking forward to playing the Polish government-in-exile in FTM, I can't imagine any similar anticipation of anyone else's games.

Seriously, do the math. Add up what you've spent on Paradox games/expansions/DLC, even the ones you didn't like, and approximate how many hours you've played them. I'm at 10-20 cents an hour, and there are hundreds of hours left in the games I own now.