The Restoration of The Austrian Empire mod
I hope that you will really like my mod. It is a small addition, but can be quite fun and challenge for every Hearts of Iron II player. The mod is made to run on HoI 2 Armageddon v1.1. I'm not sure if Doomsday is still compatible with this mod, but you could try out.
Installation
Just extract the rar file into your Hearts of Iron (Doomsday) folder. I have already made the correct paths for the files in the right folders, so you can overwrite the files when asked. Alternatively you could download the Jonesoft Generic mod enabler from the following site: http://www.users.on.net/~jscones/software/products.html
Installing the easy to use Jonesoft Generic mod enabler will enable you to safely install any files without making backups, because this program will make the backups for you and enabling or disabling a mod is just as simple as one mouse click. This will make installing and uninstalling the mod much easier if you would wish to.
After installation just select Austria in the Return of the Emperor scenario and you are ready to play this mod.
Features
Watch the Trailer
The mod itself is about the restoration of the Habsburgs in Austria and the recreation of the once mighty Austrian Empire. It begins in 1936 when a coup takes place in Austria. A lot of people are scared of a Greater German Reich described by Hitler in his Nuremberg Rallies and they turn to drastic measures to counter this treat. Seeing that the fascist government tries, but can’t prevent it, the army, which still consists mostly out of World War I commanding officers, decides to stage a coup that will make it possible for the Habsburgs to return to power. This coup places Otto I von Habsburg as head of state and a member of the Habsburgs, Joseph August von Osterreich as the head of the government. Furthermore a large series of events will put Austria in a really good position to become a World power once more. You will get many choices how to guide your nation to victory and will get the ability to forge deals with Germany and Italy by event in a very realistic way. I have tried to make this mod very realistic and fun, although you could argue about how realistic it would be to see the Habsburgs return to power in a fascist Austria. Many new events will flavor the game and represent new problems for Austria, while others could remove the problems as well. Furthermore I expanded Austria's military in form of leaders, ministers and equipment. So you will not have those dull standard divisional pictures for Austria anymore, but a collection of Austrian (searched for myself), German and Hungarian pictures.
The mod contains:
- Many new events for Austria
- Many new leaders/ministers for Austria
- New divisional and brigade pictures for Austria
- A new scenario, which features the mod
- Some new techs for those who like
- Medium and light tank brigades that simulate infantry tanks
- And above all, lots of hours of fun
Note: you will not lose the historical 1936 scenario by installing this mod, because I have made a separate scenario called Return of the Emperor, which contains the standard 1936 scenario with the additions of this mod. You will be able to play the normal HoI2 The road to war scenario without having to uninstall this mod (look at one of the screenshots).
In short, this mod is ahistorical, but at the same time a very realistic mod. You could say an alternative WW2 scenario.
Some extra screenshots of v1.3
About the modding
The mod itself replaces a small number of files and adds a lot of new leaders and ministers for Austria, as well as new event pictures that are used in the new events. From version 1.2 onwards I have made separate event files that solely contain the normal HoI2 events, but also the events that I have made. The Return of the Emperor scenario uses these events plus the files which I haven’t altered.
Changelog v1.4
- Improved some of the old events, including removal of a lot of spelling errors
- Added some extra Austrian military and political leaders, including the famous WW1 u-boat commander Georg Von Trap and Royalist Emil Fey
- Added some extra Austrian events, especially for allied support
- Changed the benefits from antibiotics and the field hospital techs
- Added new techs for military police doctrines, which includes: Military Police, Feldgendarmee and Political Officers
- Improved the tech pictures of Antibiotics and Infrared Equipment techs
- Changed the brigade system completely towards an Additional Equipment model, now brigades will no longer require manpower to simulate the extra equipment added to the division
- Added a new brigade model: elite training, with additional events that will give you these special divisions
- Changed the AI, now in most cases you will not get a chain of war declarations and furthermore improved the Soviet AI into more defense and aggression accordingly to frontline situations (if you wait with Barbarossa until 1942 the Soviets will fight back a lot better)
- Made new AI files for Austria, now AI controlled Austria will prepare and declare war accordingly
- Added AI files that trigger the Soviets and Germans to build more mechanized divisions instead of Panzer divisions once decent Mechanized techs become available
- Added the Stalinline in the Soviet Union as a weak but broad defensive line
- Added new Soviet AI files that should prepare the Soviet Union better for a defensive war
- Romania will now extent the Ostlinien inside its territory or build defensive positions
- Added new divisional pictures and unit model descriptions.
Changelog v1.3
- Improved some of the old events
- Added some extra Austrian military and political leaders
- Added some extra Austrian events
- Improved the AI handling of the situation where Italy would declare war on Greece and Romania declared war on Italy, causing Poland to declare an early war on Germany and starting WW2
- Added a lot of Historical death or retire events for some Austrian generals
- Added some extra tech teams
- Added some new divisional and brigade pictures
- Added the ability to have “medium” tank brigades
- Added the division of the Soviet Union between Austria and Germany after a successful Bitter Peace
- OPTIONAL: Added some extra techs in addition to the standard HoI 2 tech tree, these techs will be Antibiotics and Infrared Night Vision equipment. You will have to download the correct file if you want the tech tree extras (see below).
Changelog v1.2
- Increased compatibility by separating the events files from the normal HoI2 and event files from this mod
- Added a new propaganda picture for Austria in the startup menu
- Improved some leader/minister pictures
- Added new tech teams for Austria
- Improved some events so they now work (fire) correctly
- Added events that represent the defeat of Austria by the Allies or the Soviet Union
- Added the possibility for Austria to grand independence to Montenegro by event
- Added some new events
- Made a separate scenario called Return of the Emperor for HoI2 so you can play with Habsburg’s Austria immediately
- Added some new divisional pictures.
Changelog v1.1
- Added Brigade and Divisional pictures to better represent the Austrian Imperial army
- Added extra new events
- Fixed the problem were you would get no event pictures for some of the events, if you use the overwrite option after unrar
- Fixed some events, like anschluss were you would get a change in government by choosing the join the axis option
- Altered the amount of national provinces for Austria in Yugoslavia to a more realistic setting (everything east to Budapest isn’t a national province anymore)
- Altered to requirements for firing the claiming Yugoslavia event
- Changed to startup army stats, first you would have to reinforce two Austrian divisions, this is no longer required
- Changed to start technologies for Austria, now you will have all the primary naval doctrines available to be able to get the fleet ready for combat faster
- Changed to amount of slider movement of the closed and open society slider when some events fire (now far less slider change per event)
- Altered the color of The Austrian Empire to white instead of “ugly” brown
- Altered the Claiming Czechoslovakia event, it will now give Czech provinces as cores too
- Made it impossible for the player to keep Polish provinces when annexation of Poland and Molotov-Ribbentrop pact occurs while Austria is allied with Germany, except for the provinces of Stryj, Cracow and Przemysl.
- Added some additional leaders for the Austrian air force and navy
- Changed the Basic Medium Tank to Turan I and the Improved Medium Tank to Turan III just like the Hungarians in vanilla HoI2
- Altered Partitioning of Czechoslovakia event will now give you a new techteam: Skoda
- Changed the lobby music to play Gott erhalte Franz dem Kaiser (only played in lobby).
Suggestions and questions
If anyone has any suggestions, questions or comments, please send a Personal message to Van Diemen. If anyone has made extra events that he/she believes to be a good addition to this mod, please inform me (Van Diemen) about it and I will look if these event or additions can be used in newer versions.
I would like to thank Lord Finnish for his excellent AAR, that has inspired me to make this mod.
Download link:
The Restoration of the Austrian Empire mod v1.4 (only with extra tech available)
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