The next expansion and maybe hopefully dealing with unit spam

[Vlad123]

Maybe factories should take manpower?

It could be balanced to give interesting choice trade offs while playing. It is historical too: That was why the USA didn’t deploy 200 divisions - they made a conscious choice that they couldn’t do that and build everything they wanted to build at the same time, and realized with the Soviets holding on, they didn’t need to.

It’s not very realistic to expect any of the changes on the scale discussed in this thread in HOI4, but maybe in 5?

also because in the USA military service was "voluntary", maybe democracies (and if you have elections) can you only use volunteers unless you are invaded in your core territories?

I'll try and add it to my mod. Let's start with 500 manpower/factory.
Edit:
Doesn't work.

Can you explain better?

 

[porta80]

Can you explain better?

I just tried to apply manpower cost to buildings, but game didn't take it. Does not seem to work.

Therefore I did add the conditions to be either fascist or commies to unlock the last 2 manpower laws. I think the second last I will only allow for majors if possible.

I managed finally the ai to field some nice medium tanks for ger and sov in barbarossa.

 

[Harin]

also because in the USA military service was "voluntary", maybe democracies (and if you have elections) can you only use volunteers unless you are invaded in your core territories?

The USA had a draft/conscription law enacted in October 4th, 1940, over a year before it entered the war. The country knew it was unprepared for war and with France defeated and the UK on the back foot, the USA began to rise from its pacifist slumber.

The USA registered about 50 million men, but only inducted about 10 million. Another 6 million volunteered for a total of 16 million in uniform.There was a deliberate decision to give industry and its production priority. Fielding hundreds of divisions was an option, but the world needed the USA's production to stay in the fight. If Russia had been defeated, it is probable that production would have been reduced as the USA geared up to field hundreds of divisions.

It was a gamble to field so few divisions, but the Allies made it clear that the greatest strength the USA brought to the alliance was its production ability.

The 90 Divisions Gamble

 

[Secret Master]

Maybe factories should take manpower?

They do now. You just don't think about it.

If you boost conscription to Service By Requirement, you lose factory efficiency. It's a 10% penalty. I want you to think about that for a second: every factory loses 10% efficiency because you increased conscription. It's worse if you raise it higher.

If that's not a manpower cost to factories, I don't know what is. You want more manpower for the military? Past a certain point, it costs you production. (Which is the point of tying manpower to factories)

You might argue it's not enough of an effect, or the laws are too generous in giving manpower, or that the mobilization laws are too generous in terms of consumer goods (which we concluded in our MP mod), but let's not pretend that there are no hits to production for conscripting too much manpower.

I also won't pretend that the "free" manpower from NF trees and left branch of Mobile Warfare isn't a factor as well. But I've already gone on record as not liking that stuff.

 

[SophieX]

every factory loses 10% efficiency because you increased conscription

Does that mean:
- arms factories will lose 10% of its actual output?
- civil factories will lose 10% of its actual construction speed?
Are dockyards and refineries affected in the same manor ( i.e. output ) ?

 

[Secret Master]

Does that mean:
- arms factories will lose 10% of its actual output?
- civil factories will lose 10% of its actual construction speed?
Are dockyards and refineries affected in the same manor ( i.e. output ) ?

It's a -10% modifier to MIC, CIC, and NIC. The modifier is stacked similar to other modifiers on those things, like IC techs and whatnot, so in the final equation, that -10% won't have the same impact in 1936 as it will in 1945, but Service by Requirement more or less costs you a level of IC techs.

It doesn't affect synthetic plants as far as I know, but it will certainly impact the construction of new ones once implemented.

 

[SophieX]

It's a -10% modifier to MIC, CIC, and NIC. The modifier is stacked similar to other modifiers on those things, like IC techs and whatnot, so in the final equation, that -10% won't have the same impact in 1936 as it will in 1945, but Service by Requirement more or less costs you a level of IC techs.

It doesn't affect synthetic plants as far as I know, but it will certainly impact the construction of new ones once implemented.

Thank you for this helpful explanation ( The word "modifier" makes things clear for me )

 

[Secret Master]

Thank you for this helpful explanation ( The word "modifier" makes things clear for me )

You are quite welcome.

 

[Takethe3]

Just to add to this given I have finally got around to reading Daniel Todman's Britain's War:
'At the start of 1941, it was calculated that each division of 18,000 men required another 23,000 soldiers behind the lines'

Maybe this sort of ratio is what could really eliminate spam.

 

[tazaaron]

Unit spam will never be fixed because it's WAD. They want every nation playable and only letting Canada have 10 divisions like they should you can spam many more to make it more fun for a player playing a minor.

Minors should be minors, they should only be in the game to support a major or die. Paradox own figures show most people play majors yet they waste all these man hours on minors but hey we got a better Mexico yet Soviet Union sits for years with no development. Makes no sense when your own figures support players playing Majors.

Majors could be 3x more fleshed out by now but instead some sit behind Mexico. Spam won't be fixed in till minors become minors.

 

[brantodb01]

I like the idea of a (generous) Division/battalion cap that is determined by a policy but also uses some civilian factories (troop wages and such).
So more industrialised nations can support more troops at a time, which is balanced and makes sense.
This also plays into quality vs quantity as keeping you cap low would mean you have more civilian factories to make military factories (which in turn are free to make more valuable equipment), airfields, AA guns.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Can somebody explain why "unit spam" is considered an issue when supply limits already exist in the game? It's not like anyone can put an infinite number of divisions on the frontline, since they'd lose all their equipment to attrition. I'm pretty sure the AI doesn't even ever use supply companies or the -20% supply FM promotion, so it's very easy to get a huge leg up on the late-game AI even if they have twice as many troops as you. This is to say nothing of how easily modern tanks + 1944 CAS can melt through practically any defensive position later on, even if they have to chew through 30+ infantry divisions per tile.

With that late of tech you can get ~90% hardness divisions with great attack, easy overruns even if they have AA. Nukes can also put down infinite division counts with almost anything attacking them.

It's a problem when they're your allies and they're eating your supplies.

This isn't a division spam problem per se' though, it's a (serious) AI problem. You can get it with relatively small division counts too.

And supply limit can easily rise so much that there are a lot more troops than frontage available, meaning that every province is a long grind with the defender rotating its units probably several rounds before being defeated

Extended fighting by itself will damage infra though, and bombing will make it faster.

 

[Iskulya]

Just to add to this given I have finally got around to reading Daniel Todman's Britain's War:
'At the start of 1941, it was calculated that each division of 18,000 men required another 23,000 soldiers behind the lines'

Maybe this sort of ratio is what could really eliminate spam.

I think some kind of logistics rework and upkeep as you mentioned should be part of the solution, but the issue goes beyond that.

With the current system, as long as the AI has free manpower, then it will just keep pumping out more and more divisions. It has no concept of keeping a reserve of manpower to tap into for battlefield losses. Still less does it have any concept of living within its means as far as outfitting divisions with equipment and replacing battlefield losses of equipment.

It does seem like there needs to be some sort of 'upkeep' which makes going beyond a certain number of divisions(no doubt influenced by your economy and population) deeply undesirable and which the AI also respects. Simply increasing the manpower requirement of divisions to reflect logistics won't actually change that issue, plus there's an issue where if you increase the manpower of a division it will take more losses. This is not good considering losses in combat are arguably already too high and the logistical people shouldn't be on the front line fighting in the first place. There will need to be some kind of comprehensive rework to how divisions in the game work and are implemented by Paradox to allow for non-combat manpower to be represented well.

I'd agree with The Me In Team that it is *mostly* an AI issue. It isn't entirely because it's very easy to make a large number of garrison divisions that will not ordinarily see combat, and there is currently no cost to this other than the opportunity cost of not having directed that IC towards combat divisions/materiel. Given how much the games combat system stacks things in favor of the defender, especially when we're talking about amphibious invasions, there should be more than simply an opportunity cost to maintaining massive coastal garrisons. There should be an actual material cost that is beyond the simple opportunity cost of having X number of rifles, support equipment, and artillery sitting on a stationary division.