• We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
Sorry - no. Just everything else:( IC and infra has the same build system as always (for all the newbies out there, I'm getting to that;)).

- Lighthearter

In that case the AoD team lied to us a few months ago! All lies!
 
About military salaries - AFAIK it works like the military maintanance slider in EU3 (yeah, playing that one a lot lately, not finiding time for AoD:()
basically, if you reduce it, your units's organization will decrease
and i think the cost is lowered during wartime (not sure)
 
Alright everyone - sorry, but I have to say this.:(

I have too much to manage right now. I'm running A World of Difference, Yes we have no bananas, The AARsenal of Democracy, 1/2 of Red Sun Rising In The East, The Red Alert Mod and the TutoriAAR. Couple that with me behind on my studies, my real novel(which I prioritize over AARland - sorry:() and massive RL complications that came up over the weekend, and I'll have to let some stuff go.

The TutoriAAR is on that list.

Sorry, but I had WAAAY too much even before I started this. Now, I'm planning on getting through the basic lessons, ramming a combat primer down your throats:)D), tossing in some links to the wiki and inviting anyone to take over when I leave off. Then I'm outta here. Once again, sorry:(

- Lighthearter
 
Good evening. This will be my last lesson for a while. I will cover the conclusion of the Production Screen and the Diplomacy Screen.

Serial Runs

If you press the + button on the side of the "Serial Run" section of the build unit interface then you add another sequel unit. Clicking the - will remove one. Hence -

screensave50.png


You will note the little arrows next to the tiny 0/2. We said that the LEFT arrow decreased - but what happens when you go minus more then are queued?

This:

shutdownd.png


The line is now on hold - the benefit is that you will not have to go through retooling time when you initiate more constructions.(see below what's right below).

Some will wonder what the little plus means. Well, since the model of unit I queued up is obsolete(we have researched a more advanced model) I can chose to upgrade the production line to produce the latest model. However, this will cause the line to go down for retooling(see below).

Retooling - it is a period of time when a line is queued up or upgraded that must be spent getting the line configured. This is the main benefit of unchecking the "close line immediately" checkbox on the end of the unit construction panel. If you leave the line already retooled you gain anywhere between three weeks and three months on enemy production.

New IC and Infrastructure can be queued up by clicking the gray factory or rail/road icons on the province menu respectively.

Gearing occurs when you have a serial run - for every unit that is produced, the factories get a little more efficient, resulting in faster production. Certain technologies can increase the maximum gearing bonus.

Diplomacy -

screensave38.png


You guessed it - we're breaking it down.

nations.png


This panel shows you all global nations. Click one to see details.

usax.png


This panel shows you your own nation. "Social Liberal" or whatever else is there represents your ideology. Belligerence is increase by declarations of war and annexations, as well as certain events. Democracies can only declare war on a country if the target country has passed a certain Belligerence(Belli) threshold. It will go down over time. The main panel shows any special diplomatic relations.

ministers.png


These are your ministers - the important figures in your country. They all provide benefits.

Head of State and Head of Government - The main ministers. The only ones that you cannot change on a whim. The Head of State is the leader of your nation in name and usually deed as well. The Head of Government is usually an aide and adviser, but in countries like the UK and Japan the Head of Government is the real ruler. Either minister could provide benefits/detriments to anything, really. Events and ideology changes affect who occupies these positions.
Foreign Minister - In charge of international relations. Gives bonuses and detriments to Diplomacy.
Armaments Minister - In charge of Industry. Gives bonuses and detriments to Production.
Minister of Security - In charge of managing Dissent. Provides benefits/detriments related to that, and sometimes to other things as well, such as the amount of IC/Manpower you can use in occupied territory(KaiserMuffin will probably brief you on that later).
Head of Intelligence - In charge of Intelligence and provides effects related to that.
Chief of Staff - Provide generic military benefits/detriments.
Chief of the Army - Provides land military/production benefits/detriments.
Chief of the Navy - Provides sea military/production benefits/detriments.
Chief of the Air Force - Provides air military/production benefits/detriments. Also the "Naval Aviation" minister type boosts the power of Carrier Air Wings, increasing the power of aircraft carriers.

ideas.png


These are your National Ideals. The three categories indicate different outlooks on the meaning of life, and different combinations can translate to different real-world ideologies.

sliders.png


These are your National Sliders. They represent your nation's ideological views. Usually both ends grant benefits, just in different areas. The notable exception is Left vs Right, which serves only to adjust your ideology.

Democracy vs Authoritarian - The closer to the LEFT the more democratic you are, the closer to the RIGHT the more power is controlled by the ruler. The more democratic, the higher the dissent raise from war declarations. However, it has its plus sides.
Left vs Right - Communist vs Nazi, essentially, though there are many other steps along the way.
Open vs Closed - Representative democracy vs class system.
Free Market vs Central Planning - The further LEFT the more lasseiz-faire your economy, the more RIGHT the more state-controlled.
Standing Army vs Drafted Army - High Standing Army gives detriments to Gearing, but enhances standing units, I.E. decreasing upgrade time and cost. High Drafted Army does the reverse.
Hawk vs Dove - Dove(RIGHT) gives no real benefits. Hawk(LEFT) gives manpower increases, among other things.
Interventionism vs Isolationism - The more Isolationist you are, the bigger the Dissent raise when you declare a war, and the more Belligerence your target must have for you to declare it(if you are a democracy). If you have passed a certain threshold of Isolationism, you cannot join nor found an alliance. Interventionist moves decrease these penalties.

To change a slider, click the icon to the LEFT to move it to the LEFT, to the RIGHT for the RIGHT. So, if I were to click to the LEFT of the Interventionism vs Isolationism slider . . . .

movedslider.png


I would get this. You can shift your sliders every year. Technically you can move them every few days, but dissent rises exponentially for every move, depending on how long it's been since the last move.

screensave41.png


This is the screen you will get when you select another nation in the nations tab. You can see you relations with them, represented by a number from +200 to -200. Obviously, + numbers are positive relations, - numbers are negatives. Also, you can see all of that nation's special relations, as well as their ministers, ideas and sliders.

Also, you can see to the RIGHT of the selected nation all the diplomatic actions you can take:

Declare War - Self-explanatory.
Influence Nation - Raise relations.
Offer Trade Agreement - Works like the Trade tab.
Open Negotiations - Trade resources, provinces, divisions and technological blueprints(speed up research) on a one-time basis.
Offer Non-Aggression Pact - Promise not to attack them if they won't attack you. You cannot declare war on them if you have such a pact, but the reverse is also true. If relations drop low enough they will cancel the pact and perhaps even attack you. Canceling such a pact is worth -50 relation points. AI is EXTREMELY unlikely to EVER accept such, even from an exponentially more powerful nation.
Offer Alliance - Offer a military alliance to the nation is question - any wars one of you is involved in or becomes involved in will become both of your wars.
Join Alliance(NOT VISIBLE) - Only visible when the target is leader of an alliance. Request to join their existing alliance.
Send Expeditionary Force - Only available to allies. Send one of your units to fight under their command. Only really useful in multiplayer.
Expeditionary Forces(NOT VISIBLE) - Chose not to accept any expeditionary forces from this nation. You can repeal it at any time.
Ask For Military Access - Ask for your troops to be allowed to travel through the target nation's territory. Cannot declare war on a nation you have such a pact with. AI will ALMOST NEVER accept such an agreement.
Revoke Military Access/Cancel Military Access.(NOT VISIBLE) - The first repeals the military access another nation has in your lands, the second cancels your access in another nation's lands.
Guarantee Independence - Raises relations + decreases the amount of Belligerence you require to attack a nation that attacks the target nation.

Now, to change a minister or an idea, simply click the portrait to get this screen(I mentioned you can't change Heads of State and Heads of Government like this, right?):

ministerchange.png

(For ministers, of course. Ideas use the same basic format, however.)

Study the benefits to your heart's content, then either select your replacement or click the "cancel" button to, well, cancel. EVERY MINISTER CHANGE ADDS ONE DISSENT. EVERY IDEA CHANGE ADDS SIX DISSENT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

You should see this if you select MacArthur:

macarthur.png


The little clock tells you that it will be two weeks(from your choosing him) until he takes office. Leaders have the same stipulation(KaiserMuffin will take care of that discussion to, I think:D)

That's it for me - the basics are now covered. Direct any further questions to KaiserMuffin. Muffin, you're on air!:D

-Lighthearter, saying you've been excellent students:cool:
 
I have loaded the 'Gathering Storm' Scenario, (1938) and selected to play as Germany. The only difference from the vanilla ship of the game is that I am using a custom flag for Germany, and a different skin. These will affect the game only graphically and minimally at that and you should not worry about them. Now. Smile children...

ACHTUNG PANZER!

Ladies and Gentlemen. Your easy days are OVER!
You have been enrolled by Lighthearter into 'Guderian's Military Training Simulation.'

guderian1.jpg

I am Watching you!


So, upon loading you will be presented with something resembling THIS!

guderian2.jpg
Notice the bars, buttons and stuff. In true Military Tradition, lets KEEP IT SIMPLE, STUPID!

guderian3.jpg

This is me. Don't I look dashing?

I direct you to regard the little tiny clock by my chin.

guderian4.jpg

Basically, I'm not here yet. You can see this message whilst leaving your mouse hovering over my delightful image. Lt. General is my Rank, which allows me to command a certain amount of divisions, which is conveniently listed directly beneath, the breakdown is as follows.
  • Mj. General = 1
  • Lt. General = 3
  • General = 9
  • Field Marshall = 12

Skill is a numerical indicator of my ability to command, the higher the number the better the modifier I give my troops. Experience starts at 0 and goes to 100, before resetting and giving me a new skill point. Some poor sods have 0 skill, whilst others are blessed with something like 9. If you were to promote me to general, I would lose any experience and a skill point. It also takes longer to (re)gain skills and experience the higher your rank.

The lines 'Offensive Doctrine, Trickster and Panzer Leader' indicate my specialities, which give bonuses to my troops in certain situations in some cases (for example me leading tanks on an offensive) and some are general bonuses (Trickster).

There is a probability that a general without a speciality could gain it in certain cases (Urban Specialist, Desert Fox, Jungle Rat, Mountaineer). Note these are terrain related. Others such as my 3 and such things as 'Old Guard' and 'Defensive Doctrine' you're born with.

guderian3.jpg

There is a lot of information contained in this tiny segment of the main image. Prepare for info dump.

Below my chin is the speed at which the corps can travel given perfect conditions. It is NOT the speed at which I am running toward my new command post. (I drive.)

Right. So, the icon of the half filled circle indicates that this corps is in supply, from the listed location. The box with the green icon indicates that I am in Nuremberg, which is a national province (the green thing). The icons indicate the resources generated in the province.

The two bars of blue and brown indicate the stored supplies and fuel of this division. These will become important if we are ever encircled :)rofl:) or advancing ahead of the ability for our military engineers to repair the captured infrastructure :)cool:).

ESE stands for 'effective supply efficiency'. Somewhere along the line, for whatever reason, we're losing 23% worth of use from supplies. This can be due to bad infrastructure, enemy partisans or lack of combat supplies.

Below that are the divisions I command, 1. Panzer and 1. Leichte Divisions. They're both light tanks, but 1. Panzer is a newer model and better because of it and denoted by the II as opposed to the I.

The brown bar is the Strength of the division, an integer between 1 and 100. Think of it as a percentage. The green bar is the Organisation of the division and also goes from between 1 to 100 (in theory). In reality the upper limit is dependant on the land doctrines researched by your government. Because we're tank-drivers, we need fuel. The little drop of liquid (as mentioned previously) is O-I-L. Without that, our tanks go 1km/h and are rendered pretty near useless.

I don't want to go on, so I'll be brief, the numbers are as follows and are numerical indicators of the effectiveness of Soft Attack, Hard Attack, Air Attack, Defensiveness and Air Defense. Soft Attack is the units strength against Infantry and other 'squishy' things whilst Hard Attack is the strength against Tanks and other 'hard' units.

That concludes your first lesson.
 
Last edited:
theconfusedone : "hey buddy, the new teacher's kinda mean, you wanna give em a welcome prank?"
random lurker : "Uhh he's kinda scary thou, and I had been wandering why the generals had clocks on their chins, we should thank him"
theconfusedone : "thank him? where's your teen spirit? We should... Wait. You talk?!?"
random lurker : "uh.. ummm... uh.." <disappears into thin air>
theconfusedone : "wait don't go away! I need a mate to..."
Guderian : "to what? MR. <looks at nametag> Guderian sucks?"
theconfusedone : "nothing sir, I was just..."
random lurker : <reappears> "he was just planning a prank on you" <disappears again>
theconfusedone : "Oh, come on!"
Guderian : "Mr. Guderian sucks, principal's office, now"
theconfusedone : "yes sir" I thought he was going to eat me or something
Guderian : "Mr. sucks, I've been wondering. Do you taste better grilled or deep-fried? Come for dinner. We'll talk about that later. Tatah!"

:D
 
Welcome back. It's been about 16 hours since I last posted, and nobody has raised questions. That said I will be answering questions for the entire Syllabus at any point, so if you're a new reader, feel free to ask me anything.


guderian1.jpg

Right, now back to your desks students!

Let's go back to the main image we started with previously. Get used to seeing it, because as I mentioned earlier, there is a LOT of information on it.

guderian2.jpg

You will notice that I use Counters as Opposed to Sprites. This is because I am a military hardass, and I don't like Sprites. You can play with your little walking men and cutesy tanks on your own time.

So, Counters 101.
guderian5.jpg

This slide was made by an incompetent student as a homework project, using the above image. The First unlabeled Czech counter is the icon that denotes Cavalry. In this day and age, men still fight on horseback! Pffh. They have their uses however.

The second one is your homework. We shall return to this later.

The imagelist above is by no means exhaustive, however the counters list on this post (with exceptions that I shall explicitly point out) is essentially everything you would need to know about the specifics of counters.

You will also notice that I have shown you the reason why you see what are fractions on your screens. They are NOT fractions, rather they are individual unit types. Naval Units will not appear listed in a provincial unit count when they are docked in a harbour. The first integer is always 'Air Units' We shall return to those another lesson. The second integer is land units. In this case, we have 3 units of Infantry in the area as well.

guderian6.jpg

Again, the incompetant student strikes. This slide explains what other icons are likely to pop up during your training on the simulator. Coastal Fortifications are missing, but since every other thing on your map has been identified for you you should be able to spot them. A tour of duty in Finland will give you first hand experience of such facilities.

To complete the example (which was left unanswered) Prague is Capital of the Czech Republic (the red dot), an airbase (which we assume is empty due to lack of military intelligence) and an antiair emplacement.

guderian7.jpg

I realised I forgot to discuss the buttons at the bottom of the division selector. Mixing up ones lecture notes is a frustrating occurence that happens occasionally, so lets proceed.

The star (which is currently crossed out) indicates that the armygroup is prioritised. As you can see, Herr Hitler has decided not to make us first order, for some odd reason. The second is whether the division gets reinforced. I would recommend leaving this alone, and unless your situation is particularly bad. The third (the bullseye) is whether we're allowed to recieve upgrades. This is mainly used by veteran players to skip the rather less effective rocket pulse jet engine planes and upgrade through to the more effective turbojet models at less IC cost. Again I recommend leaving it alone for the moment.

The 1st Icon of the pair on the right with the green arrow is the 'Offensive Supply' order. It essentially increases your ESE by 20% or so for a month, regardless of the conditions such as terrain, infrastructure, etc. The second icon is only active when you have more than 1 division in an armygroup. This is the 'split' command. This creates a new armygroup which you can then assign a divisions and a leader to.

Similarly when selecting multiple armygroups with no combat mission in the same area which are all from the same country, they can be 'merged' in a similar manner.

The second row are NEW FEATURES to AOD. Which we like. A lot. The first is 'Scorched Earth' Policy. As made famous by the Soviets. It slows retreat times, but reduces the infrastructure of the province as you tear it up behind you as you leave.

The second is 'Victory or Valhalla'. Essentially this is the sacrifice of one army to save others, or to hold the line until reinforcements arrive. It does cause significant dissent however. Right now, they're both turned off, and will probably stay that way.

guderian8.jpg

3 points.
  1. Troop Numbers have increased on the Czech border because of movement orders given by OberKommando des Heeres (circled here)
  2. The circled icon is the AoD representation of a Headquarters, in line with Nato symbology, as opposed to the HQ of the HoI2 era.
  3. One such movement order is still in Progress, as demonstrated by the giant green arrow on the landscape when we select Lt. General Jacob. It will slowly fill up with lighter green until he arrives! The tiny skull indicates that for some reason he is experiencing attrition. It's not that cold outside!

This concludes the basic briefing. As for your homework, using the required reading linked to previously and here, you are to identify the rogue Czech counter in this image.

guderian5.jpg

You have until the next update to make a submission.
 
So yeah. My life has gone tits up over the weekend. I can't cover this. Sorry to all who were reading.

The best tutorial is experience. Go play, you know enough of the basics really, the rest was just gonna be me squishing the czechs.
 
I'm interested. I might learn some small things I've missed while playing, and it's fun to read these tutorials, and I like your writing style :)
 
Do want more ;), nice stuff about generals didnt know there is difference in xp gain in diferent ranks ;/

personaly i would like to know more about good division+brigade combinations and about air warfare ;)