How to beat Germany as France?

[Dread]

My favorite challenge is playing as France 1936(Vanilla) and try to hold out as France. It seems impossible, but I've done it before but its been a while and honestly it might have been pure luck(Germany pushed south with Italy into a meat grinder from what I remember instead of pushing north). But lately, I've tried nearly a dozen times making it to 1940 and then I'm crushed. My latest attempt, on paper should've been successful but it wasn't at all.

Heres what I did:
By the start of the war should be above 40+ Military factories without conversion.
-Disband all units not in France and change main infantry division to 20 width 7 Infantry+2 Artillery
-Recruit 12 anti-tank divisions with 9 Infantry+3 Anti-Tank as rapid deployment against German tanks.
-Recruit 5 additional mobile truck divisions with 9 Motorized Infantry+2 Mobilized Art

75 Infantry Divisions on French-German border(including Belgium and Luxembourg)
16 Infantry Divisions(12 fully mobile/truck) and 4 Mountineers on French-Italian Border
12 Anti-Tank Divisions behind my main infantry line as rapid deployment if I see German tanks pushing.

What ended up happening is Germans pushed through my line on the former Belgium border and enveloped my armies before I capitulated. The army on the Franco-Italian border was useless, I did find some early success but was taking a lot of casualties pushing to not make it worth it at all. Early success was found against Germany, I had less than 500 casualties to Germany's 70k but it quickly evened out. Once they breakthrough its almost impossible to stop it seems. My units org can't recover quick enough to stabilize positions and its just retreat after retreat. I'm losing dozens of encircled divisions at 0 org but basically full strength. Likewise, it seems that the anti-tank divisions barely hurt the German tanks and in previous games the anti-air had no noticeable effect on air superiority. In my previous attempt, I gave the Germans nearly 900k casualties before losing but this time I just did over 200k. I am going to assume that doing anything less than a million casualties doesn't hurt the German logistics at all.

Hard mode: Don't just build forts on the French-Belgium border

[Gamer Maid]

I posted a guide a long time ago you can try it :

https://steamcommunity.com/app/394360/discussions/0/3203744999878983208/

The differences are that transport planes are much less effective and it's with an old patch.

I didn't buy any dlc since an eternity so I don't have the designer for planes or tanks but the general strategy still works.

[CaptainSpacetime]

you should be able to just turtle up and germany will run out of dudes and equipment eventually. I think I put my forts behind the first river instead of right on the belgian border as a fallback spot.

I never really bothered with anti-tank vs Germany since their starting tanks aren't that good anyway. But haven't played France in a bit so maybe that's changed.

I would say that 12 anti-tank sounds like too many and they'll be garbo against most things since they lack soft attack. And pumping out loads of anti tank guns are wasted factories that could be going to more arty more anti-air.

I'd get rid of the motorized divisions also, like rapid response sounds good but again it's more factories that could just be pumping out artillery.

If you ax the motorized and reduce the anti-tank maybe you'll have enough factories to switch to a load of 9/3 with AA and eng? that might hold out better

[mk11]

You have a very clear defensive position to hold so why are you gimping yourself with a 7/2 division rather than a number of templates optimised for the defensive position?

You make little mention of air and that is one of the most important factors. You need to invest either in air or anti-air. I don't think the RAF alone can counter the Axis airpower.

Why do you have the motorised divisions in the Alps? Are you hoping for an early push into Italy?

Are you banning all fort builds or just avoiding a massive fortified border?

[Brenner]

Just extend the maginot line and wait untill they nuke u.
Valid with ussr too.
Infinite german manpower is a thing in hoi4.

[Dread]

https://steamcommunity.com/id/Destroyer120/screenshot/2013726599804234554/

https://steamcommunity.com/id/Destroyer120/screenshot/2013726599804233703/

Hey guys, I managed to achieve a stalemate as intended(still a win) against Germany. I made it to 1942 before getting bored as the US is now defending my border and UK is finally nearly finished in Africa. The Germans never attack the Soviets because they don't have France conquered but otherwise manage to take Yugoslavia and Greece just fine. I stuck with my 7+2 Infantry Divisions as my main line and doubled down on my mobilized infantry divisions despite the advice here. 9 mobilized infantry+3 mobile artillery were really useful at being rapid deployment when I was losing battles, just send them to any areas I saw units at low org or red battle. I still was getting pushed back but in the screenshot my position stabilized and stayed like that for the rest of the game. For a moment, I thought I had lost again but Germans had 70+ divisions on the Maginot compared to my 24. They destroyed my planes very quickly, but I had 5/5 anti-air on basically every Northern France province and radar up to level 5 by the end of it. Didn't need anti-tank surprisingly, German tanks got destroyed all the same. I'm certain I would not be able to beat Germany as France beyond Regular difficulty. They had 70 divisions on the Maginot inactive and how many more elsewhere.

The next question is how to breakthrough and push the Germans back. Just like I'm entrenched and defending is always easier than attacking, how would I push the Germans back now?

[mk11]

When I did this a few versions ago I built heavy tank divisions and just ground forward. It was fine until I got into Belgium when AI allies used up all the supply and I couldn't control that.

I suspect a better option would be to start a naval invasion somewhere.

Surprising that Germany hasn't tried going through Switzerland.
Also, I hope you are protected against the stab in the back from Spain,

[mk11]

Quite a few versions had a bit of a discussion here how to do this as France on Elite difficulty. Only way that seemed to work was to get allied with USSR.

[Gamer Maid]

I found it to be cheaper and more effective to use one batalion of tanks in the infantry divisions that will push on Belgium because you can push on the all frontline with grand battle plan and the nasty +25% planification you have with France.

But if you didn't make enough planes and tanks, the AA and arty won't be enough or it will force you to stay in a pretty long war.

With red sky and no tanks, I'm not sure what you can do. Maybe just wait for the Allies to do most of the job and just help them to push here and there. They will eat the supply if you don't control the territory anyway.

[Ás Fífldjarfi]

Here is a trick. Everytime you build a land fort level, the next level is more expensive. So build a few levels, 3-5 on the Belgian border, before you use the focus to extend the maginot line. Then you have a pretty good land fort. And you got bonus to entrenchment. Then just dig in and watch the A.i. kill itself.

Oh and get support AA on your guys, the germans like building CAS and AA kills CAS. While the A.I. also builds massive ammounts of airplanes, the rubber scarcity will do the Germans in eventually and the Allies will overtake them.

[JDouglasBarson]

Heavy tanks and air power equals win for France. It's too late to invest in them by 1942. Mechanized for your mobile infantry would help for defense. You get a nice bonus on planning with France along with the infantry bonus on the right side of Grand Battle. A few expense mobile infantry divisions can punch through if you have some air support. If you went largely into mechanized then you could have gone the left side of Grand Battle, which is good for heavy mobile divisions for France.

[luckysyno]

Your line-up mentioned in your first post is not quite optimal. The 20 combat width meta died with NSB. I prefer a 18 width inf-block for defense. 7/2 is very expensive and will trade badly in combat, the only reason to built those is because you want to push and can't afford something decent (e.g. very small nations in the early game). You want 3 support companies on your inf divisions arti, engi and AA. The piercing attack on the support AA is usually enough to pierce the early German tanks. If you want to make sure go for support AT.
You want to hold and core northern Africa for manpower, so hold it by pulling back one or two tiles from the border with Italy and hold it with 2 units per tile. The Italians will be yout of supply when they reach that line and won't be able to push.
In the Alps and the Maginot you want to hold with 3 units per tile. On the border with Belgium you want at least 6 units per tile, if you don't want to give up Lille, building level 3 forts on that border will do the trick. If you don't want to build forts fall back to the more defensible terrain behind Lille. 3 units on Corsica will secure you this province.
Try to get focus that allow sending volunteers to Spain, the additional army XP can be used to get the Static Warfare spirit for the army as well as some Grand Battleplan Doctrines (You should at least aim for the first 3).
Park your navy in the English channel to get the shore bombardement bonus.
If you have military factories, that you can spare, put them either on railway guns (only worth it, if you went for dispersed industry, 4-5 railway guns is enough) or on fighters. Your fighters should be on the interception mission, ideally with some radar stations. Don't try to get air superiority at the start, the German airforce will murder your fighters and the UK won't help a lot with that. The goal is to prevnet German CAS damage. Over time the German airforce will dwindle, while yours grows. At that point you want to go for air superiority and CAS.
Put spies on your border with Germany and infiltrate at least their army and airforce, getting their cipher is always good and breaking it might save you.
You should aim for army offense or army defense as a chief of army. inf expert as a advisor is very nice as well. You want to get the ambusher trait on the generals commanding your defensive inf, ideally you grinded those in Spain.
Once you have a stable line, you can start working towards an offensive force (e.g. Motorized Inf, Tanks) and switch from GBP doctrine towards Superior Firepower or Mobile Warfare.
I consider building level 10 forts, using space marines and rushing Italy not quite hard mode, so I didn't go into those ;)
Edit: Get a fieldmarshal with defensive doctrine and assign your defending armies to him. Research engineer 2 at the start of 1939 to increase your entrenchment

[Gamer Maid]

There is almost no difference between 18 or 20 width in term of efficiency and 7/2 can trade really well. 71 Cloak made a video on that. It's just that there is no real point at making 7/2 in that scenario.

[luckysyno]

I guess you are referring to this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6S7xISuZLc
He was testing performance of templates for a battleplan offensive. He tested several combinations of inf/art as well as 10 width. We are talking about a purely defensive scenario, that makes org regain a lot more valuable than damage output / pushing power. Which imho turns the ic used for adding line arti inefficent. It will just diminish the strength of your org wall and take ic away from your air. In general I think if you have trouble holding, a battleplan offensive is not a viable option to solve that problem. 9 inf worked fine for me as France and is based on this https://www.reddit.com/r/hoi4/comments/rjwo2u/the_best_combat_widths_are_10_15_18_27_and_4145/
I am quite certain there are better combat widths for that specific scenario and a 20 width inf block will work as well.

[Gamer Maid]

That's what I said, there is no real point at making them in that scenario but the template itself is really good for what it does.

[JDouglasBarson]

I rarely use 18 width infantry in the front line with Germany. I usually covert around 30 infantry divisions to motorized to defend border with Germany. 20 width motorized since I add a heavy tank. I play on veteran difficulty iron man as France, and sometimes torture myself on elite. I find the 18 width infantry get overrun against Germany. The 20 width hold the line with few casualties.