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HOI IV Dev Corner | Romanian Crossroads

Aug 18

Greetings, generals! We are Alex, Norrman and Marijn211, modders of the game and now cooperating with Paradox, and today we’re showing you tidbits of a future DLC for… Romania! As explained below we won’t go into too much detail yet as not everything is finalized, but this also means that we can optimally incorporate your feedback.

Two weeks ago we showed the International Cooperation mechanic that is intended to be the main mechanic shared between all political branches. Everything is subject to change of course, and we’ll keep in mind your feedback like not wanting to constantly maintain it, only to be repaid with insignificant rewards.

Most of you will know of course that Romania’s allegiance changed during World War 2 when its dictatorship was overthrown in 1944 and it then aided the Allies. But, just like other countries in the region, their stance looked very different in 1936 and Romania notably starts out the game very friendly with France and Poland.

As you take focuses that change who you are cooperating with (it can be a combination of countries quite opposed to each other), some focuses will unlock decisions to take full advantage of your cooperation.

Now to other focuses, here’s a few important areas, we look forward to your thoughts.

Romania’s military industry was pretty non-existent in 1936 but quickly expanding, so the army branch has a few focuses to help build it up.

Will we prioritize our strengths or focus on industrialization?

Romania has a different kind of Carlism.

Which fascists will take over Romania?

The communists can slowly build support, or start a 3-sided civil war, unique icons pending.

That’s it for now, we’ll of course show you more of the content at a later point.

Edit to add:
--- A clarification based on some comments and questions I'm seeing ---

Alex, Norrman and Marijn211 have been and are working with us, all of us, to bring you a very cool DLC. This will be a Focus Pack, meaning it's one country, in this case Romania. Adding to that: contracts are signed, and modders get paid (so show them your support when the time comes ;) ).

"Why are you only asking us questions every week, and not telling us anything?"
This is the nature of Dev Corners. When we only did Dev Diaries, we got very solid feedback that at that point it's too late to give us real and usable feedback. Dev Corners solve this. Their purpose is to give you all the chance to give us early feedback while we can still make changes, adapt. That doesn't mean we can take all your feedback into account, but there is some flexibility. The answers will come as we get closer to release.
Hope that clears things up. /Per

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HOI IV | Open Beta SE™ Update 2

Aug 12

Generals!

Hello, I’m Pdxen, Tech Lead for Hearts of Iron and I want to welcome you to the second update of the Summer Open Beta. In this update we are changing the topic from balancing to updating the tech stack of the game.

A lot has happened with computers since Hoi4 was released. Back then, new CPUs used to have 4 cores and around 8 hardware threads, and all of those cores were heterogeneous. All but the lowest end CPUs have more cores and hardware threads today, and not necessarily homogeneous cores anymore. In this update we’re updating the threading libraries used in HoI4, with the aim to improve performance on some machines. Considering the fundamental change with this update and the wide variety of machines that people are playing the game on, we appreciate your help to verify that there is no unforeseen deterioration for specific hardware configurations before we push the changes live for everyone.

In addition, we made some MP hardening to host operations such as kicking and banning players in MP, to prevent some of the malicious interactions that you have reported on the forums.

Thanks for reading, and for helping us make the game better.

/Pdxen

Hello, I’m Zwirbaum, Game Designer for Hearts of Iron, and I want to add that I’m back from vacation. We’ve gotten a lot of feedback (on behalf of our game designers: thank you, we appreciate all the feedback) . While this week's update will not contain any of the balance changes, or new ‘experimental’ changes, they will resume in the very near future. Until then, farewell!

/Zwirbaum

PATCH NOTES

Updated the threading libraries used in HoI4 to work better for some more modern hardware configurations
Increased MP hardening to host operations such as kicking and banning players in MP

Friday, August 14th Update

Generals!

Hello again,
Another update to the Open Beta (Summer Edition). Yes, two times in one week! You were lightning fast in providing us with some good feedback which allowed us to produce another update to address it.

With this update, we are both restoring all the balancing changes that were in Open Beta SE Update 1 and addressing the more critical findings from the technical update. We appreciate your input and help in making it possible for us to deliver these improvements to the game.

/Pdxen

Ps. Balancing still isn’t forgotten. As Zwirbaum mentioned earlier this week, more info will be coming soon enough from the man himself.

Patch notes

Restored the balancing changes from the summer open beta.
Front lines now split correctly again.
Updated multiple parallel computations to better utilize the new threading library (performance gains).
Fixed an OOS introduced when migrating to the new threading library.
Fixed a graphics bug where borders could get pixel level difference between runs.
Fixed a CTD from an emergent race condition.

How to join this Open Beta:

This beta client is Operation Postern v1.19.2.0.910f (eb93)

To install Open Beta client, follow the instruction below:
Right-click the game in your library
Select Properties from the drop-down menu
Select Game Versions & Betas
Select the beta branch called open_beta

If you are already on the Open Beta client, you should get an update automatically.

Finally, to report any issues you find, in relation to this beta, please use the bug report forum[forum.paradoxplaza.com] and make sure to include the version you’re using. That way our Jira won’t go nuts trying to figure out what bug report belongs to what.

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HOI IV Dev Corner | Army Quality and Expertise

Aug 11

Hi everyone, Jamor here again. I want to thank you for good, informed feedback and suggestions in the previous airborne dev corner. I hope I can benefit from the community’s collective insight once more.

Up to this point, unit quality across the board in HOI has been fairly uniform: units from different countries level up at a broadly equal rate, and have similar limits on the XP they can gain from pre-deployment training and on-map exercises. Historical differences in military aptitude are largely modeled by static national modifiers, which don’t always allow for broad player choice and alternate history outcomes. Casualties are replaced with fully green personnel, often making sustaining a highly elite unit a futile hope. While this approach simplifies game balance, it doesn’t really facilitate the emergence of the sort of rare, legendary units that won such fame in this war of all wars.

So, what I would love to hear from you all is this:

What are the shortcomings of the current system of unit experience and casualty replenishment?
How would you feel about a system where there were trade-offs between army size and quality?
What would you like to see in a system intended to make the system more interesting and varied?

I’ll see you in the comments!

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HOI IV Dev Corner | National Focus Flavor

Aug 4

Hello all!

Today we're kicking off a new round of Dev Corners, this time turning our attention to a project we haven't touched on yet. We'll start with some early questions around ideas we have in mind, while future Dev Corners here will get a lot more specific about the country and content drafts we'd like your opinions on.

Let’s start with some general design questions, just to see what kind of focus tree styles you liked and what you would want to see more of:

Do you think focus trees of different countries should interact more with each other, and what sort of focuses? Shared branches are one way to achieve this of course, but perhaps there are focuses that are country-specific that you still think should synergize that currently don’t.
When focus trees have optional focuses with political flavor, do you mainly prefer: national spirits that grant bonuses that fit your regime, unique country leaders and traits, or perhaps flavor events?
Do you think there are underrated mechanics that focus trees don’t always interact with? (We’ve heard license bonuses for example).

Now, let’s have a look at one of the ideas for a country-specific mechanic that’s in the works, which makes it possible to get bonuses from cooperating economically with countries as if they are companies.

Let us know what you think!

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HOI IV Dev Corner - Military Production

Jul 28

Hello, I am Zwirbaum, Game Designer for Hearts of Iron, and it is once again the unfortunate for you my time in the dev corner spotlight.

Anyways, without further ado, let’s get started with today’s topic - Military Production. And once again I will resort to acting a bit mysteriously, while asking some questions.

Military Production operates on an abstracted pool of the factories, which means that you can always re-assign your factories to produce something that you need, and regardless of what is happening to your industry, your highest priority of production will be going offline last.
- Do you like that system? And if so, what do you like about it? Likewise, what do you not like about it?
All Factories are pretty much equal to each other, and they can build whatever they want and whatever they like.
- Do you like that universal system of production, where each of the ‘military’ factories is completely interchangeable?
How does physical location influence your decision of building the factories? Does it matter whether you place them closer to your enemies or are you trying to put them as far as possible from the potential enemies? Or do you not care at all, and just try to max out the local construction boosts, like Dams or Infrastructure?
- Do you think that this is already enough of the decision making, or would you like to see more considerations taken into account?

And that’s all from me this week, thanks for reading, and until next time, Farewell!

/Zwirbaum

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HOI IV Dev Corner | Civilian Economy & Consumer Goods

Jul 21

Hello, I am Zwirbaum, Game Designer for Hearts of Iron, and uncharacteristically for me, instead of writing an entire wall of text, I am just going to ask a couple of questions that are very much tied to the ‘Economy’ side of the gameplay.

And those are as follows:

How do you feel about the ‘Civilian Economy’ that currently exists within the game - as in anything that relates to the building construction, using civilian factories for trading, laws etc.?
- Is there something missing when it comes to the ‘Civilian Economy’?
- How do you feel about the current depth of it?
- Do you feel that the current system fulfills your immersion of what is/and or should be the Civilian Economy, also in an appropriate timeframe?
What and how do you feel about the Consumer Goods as they are right now?
- Do you think it does fulfill its role, narratively, and in gameplay terms?
- Do you feel like there is something missing when it comes to the Consumer Goods?
- How do you feel about the fact that Consumer Goods are purely ‘negative’, and it is always better to lower their %-demand in-game?
What do you think about current Economic Laws?
- Do you like them,and their effects?
- Do you like the fact that higher mobilization is (ALMOST) always a better choice?
- How would you react if there would be some more nuance or considerations between adopting different Economic Law?

And this is it all from me today, thanks for reading, and until next time, Farewell!

/Zwirbaum

Good to know: The difference between a Dev Diary and a Dev Corner
By now (most of you) you will know that we have two main types of Developer post:

Developer Diaries

Start appearing closer to release
Give you more detailed insight into content that’s more or less finished and is being polished
Will generally include a plethora of images and screenshots
Give you a chance to ask our developers questions, and perhaps even let us know if there’s anything glaringly obvious we missed
(and may still have time to either fix quickly, or already start planning to include in a future Patch; being a Day-x, Hotfix or a War Effort.)

Developer Corners, like this one, serve a different purpose.
They:

Need your feedback, specific to the Dev Corner
Should be short and to the point
May or may not include any images
May generally give you some idea of something that might come in future content, but it’s not guaranteed
Are not usually planned far ahead. Instead, if at any point any developer has something they want to get feedback on, we’ll pick an upcoming weekly slot, usually a Tuesday or a Thursday

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HOI IV Creator Interviews with Leadership

Jul 15

Generals!

High Command is aware that certain war correspondents have, in recent days, taken it upon themselves to question senior staff. Studio Manager Gorion and Game Director Batya were located, escorted without incident down to the Bunker, and placed before the cameras for a thorough round of questioning regarding the future conduct of this campaign.

Four dispatches have been filed. Review them ASAP.

Dismissed!

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HOI IV Dev Corner | Warfare in the Third Dimension - Airborne Units in HOI

Jul 14

Hi all, it's time for the next Dev Corner.

I'm Jamor. I started as a producer on Stellaris, Imperator, and other games back in 2017, and now I'm happy to be back as a designer on HOI. Hearts of Iron 2 was my first PDS game, and I've had a lifelong obsession with the story of this most fascinating time period in history. It's an honour to be able to contribute to something so close to my heart.

One of my goals for a future release is to improve airborne troops in HOI. Although they’ve been in the game since launch, they have a number of practical issues that limit their use:

Airborne jumps are queued up by a number of tedious manual steps, from separately planned operations, the finicky process of getting jump capable troops to the same place as their transports, then the rather nebulous process of waiting for the right amount of air superiority to accrue so they will finally jump. Then, you leap completely blind into the unknown.
Airborne units teleport on to their objectives, in such a subtle way that it's quite easy for both attacker and defender to not notice it has even happened.
Airborne troops take such ruinous damage and disorganization that they are incredibly feeble once landed, being generally only suited for the sort of highly gamified VP sniping attacks that gets them widely restricted in many multiplayer groups.
And the final straw for me, that a unit like the 101st Airborne, an ultra-elite division of 10,000+ men containing the cream of the army and famous for numerous high profile battles IRL, can be deleted outright by a single bad drop. Kinda anticlimactic and disheartening to see Capt. Winters, his men, 26 other rifle companies plus all the divarty, engineers, and everything else in that awesome division just disappear in one tick because of a mechanically limited system.

Let’s tackle this in two parts:

What issues with airborne troops would you add to this list?
What would you like to see changed or added to improve the HOI airborne experience?

Please let me know in the comments!

Good to know: The difference between a Dev Diary and a Dev Corner
By now (most of you) you will know that we have two main types of Developer post:

Developer Diaries

Start appearing closer to release
Give you more detailed insight into content that’s more or less finished and is being polished
Will generally include a plethora of images and screenshots
Give you a chance to ask our developers questions, and perhaps even let us know if there’s anything glaringly obvious we missed
(and may still have time to either fix quickly, or already start planning to include in a future Patch; being a Day-x, Hotfix or a War Effort.)

Developer Corners, like this one, serve a different purpose.
They:

Need your feedback, specific to the Dev Corner
Should be short and to the point
May or may not include any images
May generally give you some idea of something that might come in future content, but it’s not guaranteed
Are not usually planned far ahead. Instead, if at any point any developer has something they want to get feedback on, we’ll pick an upcoming weekly slot, usually a Tuesday or a Thursday

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HOI IV - Open Beta SE™ Update 1

Jul 13

Generals!

Hello, I’m Zwirbaum, Game Designer for Hearts of Iron, and I want to welcome you to the first update of the Open Beta SE™ (Not really trademarked). To avoid writing too much, and boring everyone to the death, as I am fairly sure - you will likely skip to the patch notes section anyways.

For those that are not skipping immediately to the patch notes, I want to say thanks everyone for sharing your feedback and opinions, and engaging in discussions with me, that was incredibly helpful!

Now this update may contain even more of the highly experimental changes, so stay tuned, and look through the patch notes to look for them. They will likely (if I will not forget) be either mentioned in the developer commentary in regards to them, that they are experimental changes, or directly next to it. Anyways, that’s it for this update.

Thanks for reading, and until next time, Farewell!

/Zwirbaum

How to join this Open Beta:

This beta client is Operation Postern v1.19.2.0.4cba (a448)

To install Open Beta client, follow the instruction below:

Right-click the game in your library
Select Properties from the drop-down menu
Select Game Versions & Betas
Select the beta branch called open_beta

If you are already on the Open Beta client, you should get an update automatically.

Finally, to report any issues you find, in relation to this beta, please use the bug report forum and make sure to include the version you’re using. That way our Jira won’t go nuts trying to figure out what bug report belongs to what.

Open Beta SE™ Update 1 Notes

Developer Commentary: In this section I will write what has specifically changed since the last update:

Gameplay

(EXPERIMENTAL) When switching Subdoctrines you retain now 25% of the invested mastery in that Subdoctrine, into the new Subdoctrine.

Developer Commentary: This is one of the new experimental features. As we have heard that the new doctrine system as opposed to our intention turned out to be a bit more rigid in how switching of the Subdoctrines turned out to be, we are now experimenting with new base value of 25% of retainment (on top of the reserved bank if you had any). There is also a new modifier related to it, that can increase or decrease the amount of retainment. Base Value is set in the 00_defines.lua. The new strings and modifiers are only localized in English for now - as this is an experimental feature that is not guaranteed to stay.

Fixed Superstructures now also prevent from putting one category bigger guns on the Amphibious Tanks. E.g. Light Amphibious Tanks can no longer mount Medium Cannons.

Developer Commentary: This means that Amphibious Tanks should follow the same restrictions their land family members have to adhere to. This may have some negative effects on your game, if you already were using such a combination, HOWEVER unless you re-open it, they should work and once again SHOULD NOT cause any crash.

Balance

Experimental Facilities now benefit from the Infrastructure bonus for the construction speed
Experience bonus to combat for Land Units has been reduced by 5%. Green Divisions now have -15% Combat Penalty, Trained have 0%, Regulars have +15%, Seasoned +30% and Veterans have +45%.

Developer Commentary: This should be the final step in adjusting the stacking modifiers from the experience for now. However this doesn't mean we won't be looking in the future when it comes to how the experience is gained by land units, how much they lose, and how easy or hard it is to retain any meaningful amount of experience in the units.

Secondary Turret HMG now provides also -4% Soft Attack Penalty
Secondary Turret Small Cannon now provides also -5% Soft Attack Penalty AND -5% Hard Attack Penalty.

Developer Commentary: This effectively means that the more secondary turrets you will install on your tanks, the less benefits you will be drawing from your multi-turreted monsters. Also because it is a multiplicative penalty it means that the more the game progresses, the less effective those turrets will become.

Breakthrough Penalty on the Heavy Howitzer, Rocket Launcher and Improved Rocket Launcher reduced to -2 from -4.

Developer Commentary: This change is to make sure that no equipment has a negative (by easy combination of modules and chassis) breakthrough, which then counterintuitively anything that was increasing breakthrough would also increase that penalty, and anything penalizing breakthrough would lower penalty.

Reverted Self-Propelled Artillery Combat Width Change (It is back to 2)
Reduced Self-Propelled Artillery Soft Attack bonus from +15% to +5%
Reduced Self-Propelled Artillery Hard Attack by 10%
Reduced Self-Propelled Artillery Soft-Attack Progression from Artillery Technologies (Anything more than 5% was reduced to 5%, 5% boosts became 2.5%)
Tank Destroyers Piercing bonus got reduced from 15% to 5%
Tank Destroyers Soft Attack reduced by 10%
Tank Destroyers and Tank Destroyer Regimental Support Progression from Technologies got reduced, including Bofors Technology.

Developer Commentary: This together with reverting combat width change to the Self-Propelled Artillery is a slightly different approach when it comes to trying to balance out the armor variants and their regular counterparts. While this will reintroduce some power back, it should not have overbearing impact

Massed Strike Air Spirit - Air Superiority Effect has been increased from +10% to +15%
Helicopter Logistics Company base Supply Reduction has been increased to -15%
Helicopter Logistics Company Supply Reductions from Technology have been increased to -15% per technology. Using Helicopter Logistics at maximum level will now provide -60%
Engineer III - Flame Tank bonus to attack in the Urban Terrain reduced from +10% to +5%
Engineer IV - Flame Tank bonus to attack in the Urban Terrain reduced from +10% to +5%
Engineer IV - Assault Engineers bonus to attack in the Urban Terrain reduced from +15% to +10%
Armored Car Equipment Cost reduced from 3.5 / 5.5 / 7.5 / 8.5 IC, to 3 / 4.5 / 6 / 7.5

Doctrine Balance - Land Doctrines

Infiltration Tactics Adoption Bonus increased from +5% Planning Bonus to +10% Planning Bonus
Infiltration Tactics 3 Reward, Daily Command Power Bonus increased from +0.01 to +0.1.
Desperate Defense can ALSO be adopted if a country has at least 10% Surrender Progress AND at least 50% War Support. In other words additional options to adopt this Subdoctrine have been added. Further tweaks to this adoption requirements will likely happen in the future
Flying Batteries 1 Reward: It now also gives +5% Soft Attack and +10% Breakthrough to the Units previously affected by this milestone
Flying Batteries 5 Reward: It now also gives +5% Soft Attack and +10% Defense to the Units previously affected by this milestone

Doctrine Balance - Naval Doctrines

Anti-Aircraft Cruiser Adoption Bonus: Reduced Naval AA bonus from +20% to +10%. Added +10% Armor Bonus to Heavy Cruisers
Anti-Aircraft Cruiser 4 Reward: Bonus to Destroyer Anti-Air reduced to 10% and Light Attack to +5%
Patrol Boats 2 Reward: Bonus to Torpedo Attack reduced to +10%
Torpedo Primacy 1 Reward: Bonus to Torpedo Attack reduced to +10%
Torpedo Primacy 3 Reward: Bonus to Depth Charges for Destroyers reduced to +10%
Torpedo Primacy 4 Reward: Bonus to Sub Detection to Destroyers reduced to 15%
Torpedo Primacy 5 Reward: Bonus to Sub Detection to Heavy Cruisers reduced to 10%
Hunter Killer Groups 1 Reward: Bonus to Sub Detection increased to 20%
Hunter Killer Groups 3 Reward: Bonus to Depth Charges increased to 20%
Light Task Forces 3 Reward: Bonus to Destroyers for Light Attack and Light Piercing reduced to +5%

Increased the strength ratio when the AI decides it should send it to be set at 75% instead of previously 65%. This means AI should hopefully be able to maintain a healthier balance between when their fleets and taskforces are operating and when they should be sent for repair. We will continue to monitor the situation on the naval fronts.

Open Beta SE™ Aggregated Notes

Developer Commentary: In this section, you will be able to find a total set of all changes.

Gameplay

Battalion Adjusters now scale with the Equipment and Manpower status of the Sub-Unit. E.g. Super Heavy Artillery with Siege Artillery Sub-Doctrine no longer gives Army wide Soft-Attack Bonus due to the sheer force of will and imagination.
Added Essential (Equipment) Blocks for the following units: Heavy Weapons Company and Motorized Heavy Weapons Company, Light Flame Tank, Medium Flame Tank, Heavy Flame Tank, Headquarters Staff, Engineer Staff, Reconnaissance Staff, Military Police Staff, Maintenance Planning Staff, Hospital Group Staff, Logistics & Service Staff, Signal & Intelligence Staff, Naval Liaison Staff, Forward Air Controller, Special Operations Coordination
Adjusted Essential (Equipment) Blocks for the following units: Helicopter Med-Evac, Helicopter Transports

Developer Commentary: First change should fix the unintended player behavior when adding certain units for their Battalion Adjusters, like Super Heavy Artillery and then turning off the usage of such equipment and still getting the benefit of the modifiers from Siege Artillery. And even if players did not intend to abuse the system, any losses suffered from combat/attrition would not apply any effect to that Battalion Adjusters. Second change is that there were quite a number of units that because they lacked essential equipment defined that would result in them not scaling their modifiers and effects due to the potential lack of equipment. Tank Crews riding in pretend Flame Tanks will no longer confer the sense of bravery and invincibility that would let them attack enemy fortifications or cities at ease.

NEW NOTE(S)

(EXPERIMENTAL) When switching Subdoctrines you retain now 25% of the invested mastery in that Subdoctrine, into the new Subdoctrine.

Balance

Superior Tactician Admiral Trait now provides +15% Positioning Bonus instead of +25%
Surface Detection Impact on the positioning has been reduced from maximum +25% to +15%
Admiral Maneuver Skill impact on the positioning has been reduced from +2.5% per level to +1.5% per level.
Admiral Maneuver Skill impact on naval retreat speed has been increased from +1% per level to +2% per level.

Developer Commentary: Positioning while exists as an interesting concept, in practice it was way too easy to counter-act massive doom stacks by just various plethora of the modifiers providing a lot of positioning benefits. This should give a bit more of a breathing space for the natural positioning penalties to occur and happen in-game. As the Naval Combat is already quite deadly, and retreating ships have hard time to disengage from the combat, increasing the speed with which ships can retreat could help save a couple ships here and there. This change is of a more experimental nature.

Combat Bonus from division experience decreased from 25% to 20%. Green Divisions now have -20% Combat Penalty, Trained have 0%, Regulars have +20%, Seasoned +40% and Veterans have +60%.
Combat Bonus from division experience decreased from 25% to 15%. Green Divisions now have -15% Combat Penalty, Trained have 0%, Regulars have +15%, Seasoned +30% and Veterans have +45%.

Developer Commentary: Experience bonus to the Land Units resulted in a massive boost to their combat capabilities as all modifiers during combat are multiplicative with each other depending if they belong from 'different source' that 75% bonus could result in a massive sway of the effective stats. This is a relatively modest reduction, but we may explore squishing that effect a bit or reworking it to have non-linear progression in the future.

Air Crew Surveys Air Spirit Mastery gain for individual tracks got combined into Air Doctrine Mastery gain Factor.
Dive Bombing Air Spirit CAS Design cost reduction got replaced with +15% Strike Aircraft Mastery Track gain Factor.
Material Destruction Air Spirit Medium Airframe Design cost reduction got replaced with +15% Medium Aircraft Mastery gain Factor.
Industrial Destruction Air Spirit Heavy Airframe Design cost reduction got replaced with +15% Heavy Aircraft Mastery gain Factor.

Developer Commentary: The goal of changing the Design Cost reductions on them is to replace: pay the air XP in order to potentially save some air XP down the line when designing more planes. However with the current amount of air XP incoming from the combat and missions, there is rarely a situation where as a player you feel starved out on the Air XP - in order to make a design, and if you really can't make a design, then paying those 50 Air XP upfront isn't helping with that goal either. Hopefully giving them a more dedicated and focused effect on the specific mastery track will make them somewhat more competitive. I will monitor feedback on this one as well - so depending on the feedback we may see doing further adjustments or going back to the original one.

Increased naval targeting values for naval bombers for fully screened capitals from 10 to 15
Increased naval targeting values for naval bombers for fully screened carriers from 10 to 25

Developer Commentary: One of the changes we did with the No Compromise, No Surrender release was to equalize the base weights for all ships when it comes to being picked as targets by the Naval Bombers, when screening value is 100%, and the old prioritization would be kicking in when the screening efficiency depending on how much screening was missing. While targeting would also take into the account strength of the ships (their HP, making Battleships even with equal base weights technically being a bit more of a viable target than 'Early Destroyer') - the result, especially with the meta depending on spam of the masses of the destroyers, would make them rarely targeted. The old behaviour where Carriers and Capitals ships being almost always prioritized with full precision, was not ideal either. Hopefully with this change, or a couple more tweaks, we will still have a possibility where all damage is NOT focused on big ships, but also isn't fully soaked by the screens either, resulting in a more spread out damage across the fleets and the taskforces. Carriers performance and their planes during naval battles should also hopefully get better results.

Continuous Strike Air Spirit - Air Support Efficiency bonus has been reduced from 25% to 15%.
Massed Strike Air Spirit - Air Superiority Effect has been increased from +5% to +10%
Massed Strike Air Spirit - Air Superiority Effect has been increased from +5% to +15%
Support Artillery now has -50% to Soft Attack, Hard Attack, Defense and Breakthrough from previous -40%
Support Rocket Artillery now has -50% to Soft Attack, Hard Attack, Defense and Breakthrough from previous -40%
Support Anti-Air now requires 24 equipment pieces from the previous 20
Motorized Anti-Air now belongs to the Anti-Air Unit Category
Anti-Air Unit Category has been renamed to Anti-Air Artillery Support & Line

Developer Commentary: This renaming will be only localized in English for now, if we will go further with these changes, we will localize it properly for all the languages.

Anti-Tank 1940 Technology no longer provides randomly Motorized Anti-Tank with +10% Piercing and +10% Hard Attack
Light, Medium, Heavy and Modern Self-Propelled Artillery Combat Width increased from 2 to 3
Naval, Land and Air Facilities cost has been lowered from 12000 to 10000. Scaling cost per facility has been increased from 5000 to 6000. This means that the first and second will be cheaper (10000 and 16000 vs 12000 and 17000). The third one will have the same cost, while starting with the fourth of the same type, they will become more and more expensive. This should make entering the world of Special Projects easier for smaller & less well developed nations. Nuclear Facility will remain at the current premium cost for now.
Improved Amphibious Designs now reduce Amtrac production cost by 10% instead of 15%
Helicopter Brigade and Helicopter Logistics now will have a proper Fuel Consumption instead of having -100%

NEW NOTE(S)

Experimental Facilities now benefit from the Infrastructure bonus for the construction speed
Secondary Turret HMG now provides also -4% Soft Attack Penalty
Secondary Turret Small Cannon now provides also -5% Soft Attack Penalty AND -5% Hard Attack Penalty.

Breakthrough Penalty on the Heavy Howitzer, Rocket Launcher and Improved Rocket Launcher reduced to -2 from -4.

Developer Commentary: This change is to make sure that no equipment has no negative (by easy combination of modules and chassis) breakthrough, which then counterintuitively anything that was increasing breakthrough would also increase that penalty, and anything penalizing breakthrough would lower penalty.

Reduced Self-Propelled Artillery Soft Attack bonus from +15% to +5%
Reduced Self-Propelled Artillery Hard Attack by 10%
Reduced Self-Propelled Artillery Soft-Attack Progression from Artillery Technologies (Anything more than 5% was reduced to 5%, 5% boosts became 2.5%)
Tank Destroyers Piercing bonus got reduced from 15% to 5%
Tank Destroyers Soft Attack reduced by 10%
Tank Destroyers and Tank Destroyer Regimental Support Progression from Technologies got reduced, including Bofors Technology.

Massed Strike Air Spirit - Air Superiority Effect has been increased from +10% to +15%
Helicopter Logistics Company base Supply Reduction has been increased to -15%
Helicopter Logistics Company Supply Reductions from Technology have been increased to -15% per technology. Using Helicopter Logistics at maximum level will now provide -60%
Engineer III - Flame Tank bonus to attack in the Urban Terrain reduced from +10% to +5%
Engineer IV - Flame Tank bonus to attack in the Urban Terrain reduced from +10% to +5%
Engineer IV - Assault Engineers bonus to attack in the Urban Terrain reduced from +15% to +10%
Armored Car Equipment Cost reduced from 3.5 / 5.5 / 7.5 / 8.5 IC, to 3 / 4.5 / 6 / 7.5

Regimental Support Companies Balance

Heavy Weapons Company and Motorized Heavy Weapons Company Organization has been increased from 20 to 30.
Heavy Weapons Company and Motorized Heavy Weapons Company Max Strength has been increased from 0.4 to 0.6
Infantry Guns and Rocket Battery Equipment needed was increased from 4 to 6
Infantry Guns and Rocket Battery stat adjustments have been normalized and are now -75% to Defense, Breakthrough, Soft and Hard Attack. (Previously it was (-80%, -60%, -70%, -60%)
Anti–Air Battery Equipment needed was increased from 12 to 16 and Manpower needed from 120 to 180
Anti-Air Battery Breakthrough, Soft Attack and Hard Attack penalties were lowered to -60% from -80%
Anti-Tank Battery Manpower needed was increased from 120 to 180
Soft Attack penalty from Anti-Tank battery has been lowered from -80% to -60%
Light, Medium, Heavy and Modern Tank Destroyer Regimental Support units are for now excluded from the 'Tank Destroyer' category. They still benefit from the Tank Destroyer Regimental Support category.
Light, Medium, Heavy and Modern Tank Destroyer Regimental Support units now require 15 Tank Destroyers instead of the previous 10. For now I will refer to them as TD-RS (Tank Destroyer Regimental Support)
Light, Medium, Heavy and Modern Self-Propelled Anti-Air Regimental Support units are for now excluded from the 'Self-Propelled Anti-Air Artillery' category. They still benefit from Self-Propelled Anti-Air Regimental Support category
Light, Medium, Heavy and Modern Self-Propelled Anti-Air Regimental Support units now require 15 Self-Propelled Anti-Air instead of the previous 10. For now I will refer to them as SPAA-RS (Self-Propelled Anti Air Regimental Support)
TD-RS and SPAA-RS: Fuel Consumption for them has been increased from 33% of the equipment to 40% of the equipment
TD-RS and SPAA-RS: Armor Value reduced from -33% to -66%
TD-RS and SPAA-RS: Defense lowered from -25% to -50%
TD-RS and SPAA-RS: Soft-Attack lowered from -33% to -66%
SPAA-RS: Air Attack reduced from -15% to -25% and Hard Attack from -33% to -66%
TD-RS: Hard Attack reduced from -33% to -50%
TD-RS and SPAA-RS: Artillery Technologies impact on them for Hard Attack and Air Attack has been lowered by half after the full tech tree progression (From +30% Hard / Air Attack on them lowered to +15%)

Developer Commentary: Regimental Support Companies have been vastly overperforming when it comes to both their contribution in the pure stats, and especially compared to their low economical requirements. After this balance they should feel less overpowered and be closer in-line with what should be expected out of them. This doesn't rule out any further tweaks to them. Also for the time being the armored regimental support companies will be excluded from the main Tank Destroyer and Self-Propelled Anti-Air unit categories to make sure that the buffs aimed at those regimental support companies will be adjusted and tweaked separately, giving more control over what and in what magnitude each buff is applied to. Main Categories will likely be renamed to indicate that they refer to: Battalions, or 'Line Units'.

Infantry Guns no longer get benefits from Infantry Support Weapons research, and instead get their benefits from Artillery tech tree improvements.
Infantry Guns and Rocket Battery scaling effect with technologies has been reduced. (+5% Soft Attack for the Infantry Guns per Artillery Technology, +10% Soft Attack for Rocket Batteries from Rocket Artillery technologies, and +5% Soft Attack from the Improved Guidance). Infantry Guns no longer have Defense boost from the Technologies.

Line Artillery Balance

Artillery, Motorized Artillery, Rocket Artillery, Motorized Rocket Artillery, Truck Drawn Rocket Artillery, Anti-Tank, Motorized Anti-Tank, Anti-Air, Motorized Anti-Air Max Strength increased from 0.6 to 0.8
Artillery Equipment I stats have been adjusted to provide following stats: Soft Attack +1 (from 25 to 26), Defense +1 (from 10 to 11), Breakthrough +4 (6 to 10)
Artillery Equipment II stats have been adjusted to provide following stats: Breakthrough +6 (from 7 to 13), Hard Attack +1 (from 2 to 3), Piercing +2 (from 5 to 7)
Artillery Equipment III stats have been adjusted to provide following stats: Breakthrough +8 (from 8 to 16), Defense +1 (from 18 to 19), Hard Attack +2 (from 2 to 4), Piercing +4 (from 5 to 9)
Rocket Artillery Equipment I stats have been adjusted to provide following stats: Defense +1 (from 12 to 13), Breakthrough +8 (from 9 to 17), Soft Attack +2 (from 30 to 32)
Rocket Artillery Equipment II stats have been adjusted to provide following stats: Defense +1 (from 15 to 16), Breakthrough +8 (from 12 to 20), Soft Attack +2 (from 38 to 40)
Motorized Rocket Artillery Equipment stats have been adjusted to provide following stats: Defense +1 (from 15 to 16), Breakthrough +8 (from 12 to 20)

Developer Commentary: This is our starting point to increase the viability of the Line Artillery. We have heard and thought about various different approaches for making them more viable, including lowering their Combat Width from 3 to 2. However in the current environment where Regimental Support Companies, and all the various imbalances did exist, and the excessive 'stat' bloat as it was called was present - we have decided for now against taking that step. To make the presence of the Artillery - be a more viable tool in providing the combat stats other than Attack values (mainly Breakthrough), which should make Infantry supported by the Artillery a little bit more viable on the attack. We will continue working and tweaking on the Line Artillery to find the right spot for it.

Doctrine Balance - Land Doctrines

Mobile Infantry 1 Reward: Cavalry Recon now receives bonus 10% to Defence and Breakthrough
Mobile Infantry 3 Reward: Lowered Soft Attack Bonus to Infantry Guns and Rocket Batteries from +15% to +10%, now also increases Defense and Breakthrough by 5%
Mobile Infantry 5 Reward: Motorized Heavy Weapons Company gets +10 Organization from +5
Defensive Postures 1 Reward: Heavy Weapons Company now also receives +0.2 Entrenchment
Defensive Postures 4 Reward: Soft Attack bonus to Infantry Guns and Rocket Batteries reduced to 10%
Assault Infantry Adoption Bonus: Bonus to Support Artillery attack has been increased from +10% to +20%
Assault Infantry 1 Reward: Bonus to Infantry Guns removed
Assault Infantry 2 Reward: Bonus to Anti-Tank Battery and Anti-Air Battery reduced from +10% to +5% (Hard Attack, Piercing, Air Attack)
Mounted Infantry 4 Reward: +0.05 HP to Mounted Infantry unit category was replaced with the battalion adjusters to the Cavalry Recon to give +5 flat HP to the Mounted Infantry
Mounted Infantry 4 Reward: Reduced the Speed Bonus to Cavalry Recon and Cavalry to +40% (for a total of 8 kph instead of the previous 8.4 kph)
Mounted Infantry 5 Reward: Increased Speed Bonus to Artillery, Anti-Air, Anti-Tank and Rocket Artillery to +100% (for a total of 8 kph)
People's Militia 2 Reward: Infantry Guns Soft Attack bonus reduced from 15% to 10%. Infantry Guns now get +10% Breakthrough
People's Militia 3 Reward: Now requires 50 Mastery like the other rewards in this doctrine.
Great War Infantry 3 Reward: Support Artillery now provides +10% Bonus to Breakthrough to Leg Infantry from previous +5%
Great War Infantry 3 Reward: Infantry Guns and Rocket Battery now provides +10% Soft Attack bonus instead of +20%
Great War Infantry 5 Reward: Now also provides +5 Max Entrenchment
Fire Concentration Adoption Bonus: +5% Defense bonus to Line Artillery changed to +10% Breakthrough bonus
Fire Concentration 1 Reward: +5% Defense bonus to Line Artillery changed to +10% Breakthrough bonus
Fire Concentration 3 Reward: +10% Breakthrough Bonus to Line Artillery and Support Artillery changed to +10% Defense Bonus and +5% Soft Attack Bonus increased to +10%. Bonus to Infantry Guns and Rocket Batteries removed.
Fire Concentration 5 Reward: Bonus to Artillery and Rocket Artillery removed. Infantry Guns and Rocket Batteries now get +10% Defense and +10% Breakthrough
Anti-Tank Frontline 1 Reward: Bonus to Anti-Tank Battery brought in-line with Line Anti-Tank. Anti-Tank Support now also receives the same bonus.
Flying Batteries 1 Reward: Motorized Heavy Weapons Company removed from the reward
Flying Batteries 3 Reward: Armored Signal Company now provides +0.2 Strength (from 0.8 to 1) to Line Artillery.
Air Cavalry 2 Reward: 0.03 HP bonus is now being replaced with Maintenance Company Battalion Adjuster to the Helicopter Support Companies, giving +0.5 HP to each
Mobile Recon and Support 5 Reward: Breakthrough bonus to TD-RS and SPAA-RS changed to +5% Hard Attack and +5% Air Attack respectively
Self-Propelled Support Adoption Bonus: Soft Attack bonus reduced to +5%, Air-Attack bonus reduced to +5%
Self-Propelled Support Reward 2: Soft Attack bonus provided by Recon units reduced to +5%
Self-Propelled Support Reward 3: Speed Bonus reduced to +10% from +30%
Self-Propelled Support Reward 4: TD-RS and SPAA-RS now get +5% Hard Attack and +5% Air Attack respectively, and +5 Organization
Siege Artillery 2 Reward: Plains Movement bonus to Super Heavy Artillery and Self-Propelled Super Heavy Artillery replaced with 0.1 Recovery Rate
Siege Artillery 4 Reward: Urban Bonus Attack reduced from +20% to +10%, and added Urban Defence Bonus of +10%. Soft Attack bonus to Infantry Guns & Rocket Battery reduced from +10% to +5%
Armored Spearhead 3 Reward: SPAA-RS Organization bonus reduced from +10 to +5
Armored Infantry Support 2 Reward: Piercing Bonus removed for TD-RS
Armored Infantry Support 5 Reward: Air Attack reduced to +5% and removed Organization Bonus
Mobile Defense 3 Reward: Air Attack for SPAA-RS removed
Mobile Defense 4 Reward: TD-RS Organization bonus increased to +10, other benefits to TD-RS removed
Tank Destroyer Force 5 Reward: TD-RS other benefits than the Organization were removed for them.
Mission Type Tactics Adoption Bonus: Daily Command Power gain has been increased from +0.02 to +0.2

Developer Commentary: This is likely just a start of tweaking the doctrines. We may see doing a bigger balance pass or some redesigns moving forward, depending on the feedback received for them.

NEW NOTE(S)

Infiltration Tactics Adoption Bonus increased from +5% Planning Bonus to +10% Planning Bonus
Infiltration Tactics 3 Reward, Daily Command Power Bonus increased from +0.01 to +0.1.
Desperate Defense can ALSO be adopted if a country has at least 10% Surrender Progress AND at least 50% War Support. In other words additional options to adopt this Subdoctrine have been added. Further tweaks to this adoption requirements will likely happen in the future
Flying Batteries 1 Reward: It now also gives +5% Soft Attack and +10% Breakthrough to the Units previously affected by this milestone
Flying Batteries 5 Reward: It now also gives +5% Soft Attack and +10% Defense to the Units previously affected by this milestone

Doctrine Balance - Naval Doctrines

NEW NOTE(S)

Anti-Aircraft Cruiser Adoption Bonus: Reduced Naval AA bonus from +20% to +10%. Added +10% Armor Bonus to Heavy Cruisers
Anti-Aircraft Cruiser 4 Reward: Bonus to Destroyer Anti-Air reduced to 10% and Light Attack to +5%
Patrol Boats 2 Reward: Bonus to Torpedo Attack reduced to +10%
Torpedo Primacy 1 Reward: Bonus to Torpedo Attack reduced to +10%
Torpedo Primacy 3 Reward: Bonus to Depth Charges for Destroyers reduced to +10%
Torpedo Primacy 4 Reward: Bonus to Sub Detection to Destroyers reduced to 15%
Torpedo Primacy 5 Reward: Bonus to Sub Detection to Heavy Cruisers reduced to 10%
Hunter Killer Groups 1 Reward: Bonus to Sub Detection increased to 20%
Hunter Killer Groups 3 Reward: Bonus to Depth Charges increased to 20%
Light Task Forces 3 Reward: Bonus to Destroyers for Light Attack and Light Piercing reduced to +5%

Doctrine Balance - Air Doctrines

Developer Commentary: Tweaks to Air Doctrines will happen next time

Bugfixes

The Light Tank Destroyer Regimental Support unit now has the Soft Attack penalty as the rest of TD Regimental Support Units.

NEW NOTE(S)

Zwirbaum forgot to mention last time that the Armored Engineers now provide a proper amount of the breakthrough (5+% to the armored units, instead of a paltry 0.05).

NEW NOTE(S)

Increased the strength ratio when the AI decides it should send it to be set at 75% instead of previously 65%. This means AI should hopefully be able to maintain a healthier balance between when their fleets and taskforces are operating and when they should be sent for repair. We will continue to monitor the situation on the naval fronts.

As you were!

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HOI IV Dev Corner | Questions about Civil Wars

Jul 7

Hello all!

First of all I want to be extra clear - we are not talking about a rework for civil wars. What I am after is understanding how you’ve enjoyed content with civil wars, what feels good, what doesn’t feel good.

So!

When you start a game with a country that has a civil war, and you intend to play as that new nation, whether that be fascist UK, Communist Japan - what do you as a player do before the civil war starts?

Some questions that may help you along the way:

How do you feel when you start progressing down the focus tree?
Do you try to rush down the civil war path, do you do common branches?
What do you do with your military? (the starting nation)
What do you do with industry? (the starting nation)
What annoys you with this type of playthrough?
What is it that makes the civil war feel rewarding/worth doing?
Do you ever feel like it's emotionally/narratively rewarding even though you're objectively weaker afterwards than if you just did 'normal' playthrough? And if so, why?

I will read your answers with great interest, it will be helpful with upcoming content....

/pdx_berthier

Good to know: The difference between a Dev Diary and a Dev Corner
By now (most of you) you will know that we have two main types of Developer post:

Developer Diaries

Start appearing closer to release
Give you more detailed insight into content that’s more or less finished and is being polished
Will generally include a plethora of images and screenshots
Give you a chance to ask our developers questions, and perhaps even let us know if there’s anything glaringly obvious we missed
(and may still have time to either fix quickly, or already start planning to include in a future Patch; being a Day-x, Hotfix or a War Effort.)

Developer Corners, like this one, serve a different purpose.
They:

Need your feedback, specific to the Dev Corner
Should be short and to the point
May or may not include any images
May generally give you some idea of something that might come in future content, but it’s not guaranteed
Are not usually planned far ahead. Instead, if at any point any developer has something they want to get feedback on, we’ll pick an upcoming weekly slot, usually a Tuesday or a Thursday

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