War Contribution Romania gains from Lend-Lease is ridiculous

[Dead_Moose]

Hi all.
Today I thought I'd try a Romania game on the new patch. Having denied the Soviets Bessarabia, Stalin foolishly attacked me in 1940 and is now feeling the pain. During the war, I was improving oil techs, doing relevant focuses etc. to the point where I am exporting about 12k fuel daily to the various Axis powers.

What I didn't account for was the insane War Contribution I would get from this!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2874713556

To be entirely fair, I have exported weapons and trucks too, and I have done a respectable amount of combat damage (about 60% of Germany's), but clearly this system is terrible.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2874713579

Having a look at Germany, I can see a clear issue: not only do I gain WC from my lend-lease, I also take away WC from my Allies! To say this feels overtuned is an understatement. Because of this system, Germany's 1 million casualties suffered, the 1.8 million casualties caused by them to the Soviets, and their occupation of land are completely nullified by some simple oil shipments-shipments, I should say, that I can make at no cost, since Romania is an oil juggernaut.

The same story goes for Italy, Hungary and Bulgaria, with the latter 2 countries only requiring 1500 fuel a day each to have their contributions deemed insignificant compared to the might of the Romanian fuel industry.

Evidently there are several issues with the new War Score system, but I think this is the most egregious one I have encountered so far. At minimum, I would suggest that the malus given to countries for accepting lend-lease should be removed to make this even remotely balanced.

[Radene]

Maybe imbalanced but definitely not entirely unrealistic. After all, in the real world, the "war contribution" also ended up being measured by who sent more money/resources rather than who had the most casualties in their fighting.

So yeah, letting others do the fighting, and then swooping in and taking all the credit is...kinda sorta what happened in reality anyway.

[OXKART]

ya i go for them right away.. give me that oil

[Dead_Moose]

Originally posted by Radene:

Maybe imbalanced but definitely not entirely unrealistic. After all, in the real world, the "war contribution" also ended up being measured by who sent more money/resources rather than who had the most casualties in their fighting.

So yeah, letting others do the fighting, and then swooping in and taking all the credit is...kinda sorta what happened in reality anyway.

Certainly Radene, I wouldn't want to downplay the importance of lend-lease in a conflict. (One only needs to look at the USA to see this.) But, insofar as territorial demands would be concerned, I can't see how lend-lease would provide as much clout as is represented in-game.

Perhaps it's dependent on ideology somewhat. I can see, for instance, the USA getting lots of War Score via lend-lease and using it to liberate/supervise state/change ideology in places where American boots were not on the ground. But, fascist Germany acquiescing to Romania over annexing the USSR become of oil lend-lease, even though it's fully occupied by Germany, seems a bit far-fetched.

And for what it's worth, I really don't feel like I "earned" my contribution, so in terms of player satisfaction I do find it a bit lacking. (although this is entirely subjective)

With that being said, I think lend-lease should remain important for War Score, but perhaps brought down a notch.

[Včelí medvídek]

It likely deserve some tweak but actually what I see here is lack of Germany score - like in my germany campaign I accumulated some 150k on East for combat alone where like half was from land combat (easy to see how it comes - AI is not very good in make encircelements/overrun, hence do damage, hence get enough score..)

So for me your 60k would be hit for sure but it would be not so overwhelming.

Also ti is more player action - AI never lendlease so much. In my game I think italy had most in Axis alliance it was below 10k for sure.

optimal would be the AI dont accept lendlease that it dont need but I am afraid it is not realistic expect such rework would go good way.

But hey, at least no longer is half of score for casualties taken or captured land (just becuase you fuel all units through some territory) - in opposite those are almost negligible in formula, whcih in result make overall score calcualtion much better and really about the war participation - either via performance on battlefield or material support.

[Fighteraviator120]

Originally posted by Dead_Moose:

Hi all.
Today I thought I'd try a Romania game on the new patch. Having denied the Soviets Bessarabia, Stalin foolishly attacked me in 1940 and is now feeling the pain. During the war, I was improving oil techs, doing relevant focuses etc. to the point where I am exporting about 12k fuel daily to the various Axis powers.

What I didn't account for was the insane War Contribution I would get from this!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2874713556

To be entirely fair, I have exported weapons and trucks too, and I have done a respectable amount of combat damage (about 60% of Germany's), but clearly this system is terrible.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2874713579

Having a look at Germany, I can see a clear issue: not only do I gain WC from my lend-lease, I also take away WC from my Allies! To say this feels overtuned is an understatement. Because of this system, Germany's 1 million casualties suffered, the 1.8 million casualties caused by them to the Soviets, and their occupation of land are completely nullified by some simple oil shipments-shipments, I should say, that I can make at no cost, since Romania is an oil juggernaut.

The same story goes for Italy, Hungary and Bulgaria, with the latter 2 countries only requiring 1500 fuel a day each to have their contributions deemed insignificant compared to the might of the Romanian fuel industry.

Evidently there are several issues with the new War Score system, but I think this is the most egregious one I have encountered so far. At minimum, I would suggest that the malus given to countries for accepting lend-lease should be removed to make this even remotely balanced.

shh stop, the devs will listen and we wont have fun anymore

[Dead_Moose]

Originally posted by Včelí medvídek:

It likely deserve some tweak but actually what I see here is lack of Germany score - like in my germany campaign I accumulated some 150k on East for combat alone where like half was from land combat (easy to see how it comes - AI is not very good in make encircelements/overrun, hence do damage, hence get enough score..)

So for me your 60k would be hit for sure but it would be not so overwhelming.

Also ti is more player action - AI never lendlease so much. In my game I think italy had most in Axis alliance it was below 10k for sure.

optimal would be the AI dont accept lendlease that it dont need but I am afraid it is not realistic expect such rework would go good way.

But hey, at least no longer is half of score for casualties taken or captured land (just becuase you fuel all units through some territory) - in opposite those are almost negligible in formula, whcih in result make overall score calcualtion much better and really about the war participation - either via performance on battlefield or material support.

Good points there mate! The German AI was absolutely underperforming. (I think all AI has lost a lot of IQ points this patch) For instance, his frontlines were...well...this:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2874713535

If the AI was actually competent, they would gain more War Score, which would make my lend lease less impactful. The trouble is, I don't think the AI will ever be that competent-in fact, it seems to get worse each patch. This makes getting War Score feel too easy in my opinion, especially for a minor nation like Romania. Germany has a much bigger army and industry than me, and still did most of the fighting, yet can demand virtually nothing from the peace deal.

You are also right in saying the AI does not lend-lease so much-even if they did, the player can always refuse lend-lease if they are worried about losing War Score to the AI. But, in this case my AI allies absolutely did require my fuel, because I lowered my export law to maximise my own fuel production. I tag-switched over to Germany and Italy, and sure enough it was my fuel lend-leases which were keeping their supplies afloat.

I guess, then, my complaint is that the current system is too biased toward the player. And hey, maybe people like that, but personally I almost feel like I am cheating without needing to use console commands. I could understand me sitting at 20%, even 30%, for my material contribution, but almost 100% feels both unbalanced and unrealistic.

And yes, I agree that the rebalancing of combat casualties and occupation in the formula is a great change-casualties in particular gave far too much War Score. But, I still do feel like some fine-tuning would be appreciated.

[Dead_Moose]

Originally posted by Fighteraviator120:

shh stop, the devs will listen and we wont have fun anymore

Don't worry mate, I think the chances of them listening to some random dude complaining on the Steam forums are very remote xD

[Dead_Moose]

Originally posted by OXKART:

ya i go for them right away.. give me that oil

Yes!! Who doesn't love oil?? xD

[9BoltVattery]

And to think we wonder why oil giants spend so much money on bribing politicians, it's so they can get all that juicy juicy war participation to annex everything.

Teddy Roosevelt historically hated the oil trusts stealing all his war participation

[hannibal_pjv]

True! USA main contribution was lend lease. So in that sense it is realistic. This maybe need small nerf. But in reality lend lease was really impact-full in WW2, but maybe not this impact full.

[Dead_Moose]

Originally posted by hannibal_pjv:

True! USA main contribution was lend lease. So in that sense it is realistic. This maybe need small nerf. But in reality lend lease was really impact-full in WW2, but maybe not this impact full.

Yeah for sure Hannibal, lend-lease was super important and I do think it should give you a fair amount of War Score.

The thing is, though, by the time the war ended, America also had a massive army and war industry, as well as a financial stranglehold over its Allies (Britain was bankrupt and Europe needed the USA for post-war economic recovery). These all give America a position of strength from which to make demands. I think that if money were added to the game, it would make perfect sense for the USA to gain tonnes of War Score through loans/foreign investment etc.

In my Romania playthrough, on the other hand, I still only had about 50 divisions by the time the Soviets capitulated, and an industry about 1/6 the size of Germany's. I have no 'position of strength' especially since I wasn't occupying any of the Soviet land myself, and would not really have the capacity to fully garrison or defend all my territorial demands.

I feel like I ought to reiterate that lend-lease should absolutely give you a fair chunk of War Score. But, making it so strong that the rest of the Axis can barely demand a single province from the Soviets just feels nonsensical to me.

[Dead_Moose]

Originally posted by 9VoItBattery:

And to think we wonder why oil giants spend so much money on bribing politicians, it's so they can get all that juicy juicy war participation to annex everything.

Teddy Roosevelt historically hated the oil trusts stealing all his war participation

lol, but clearly nobody realised that the true oil giants would be Romanian, they have the entire Axis wrapped around their fingers.

[Mr_Faorry]

Yeah they overdid things greatly, being able to tank your allies warscore and send them from 80% to 0 in a matter of months boosting yours from 20% to 100 is ridiculous.

Thankfully the beta patch nerfs warscore gained by lend-leasing oil by 1000x and lend-leasing equipment by 100x, so this exploit will be fixed real soon.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/open-beta-patch-1-12-4-steam-only-checksum-cb16.1548274/

[Včelí medvídek]

Originally posted by Mr_Faorry:

Yeah they overdid things greatly, being able to tank your allies warscore and send them from 80% to 0 in a matter of months boosting yours from 20% to 100 is ridiculous.

Thankfully the beta patch nerfs warscore gained by lend-leasing oil by 1000x and lend-leasing equipment by 100x, so this exploit will be fixed real soon.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/open-beta-patch-1-12-4-steam-only-checksum-cb16.1548274/

Nice couple of changes. Fix warscore overflow is very important too.

[Dead_Moose]

Originally posted by Mr_Faorry:

Yeah they overdid things greatly, being able to tank your allies warscore and send them from 80% to 0 in a matter of months boosting yours from 20% to 100 is ridiculous.

Thankfully the beta patch nerfs warscore gained by lend-leasing oil by 1000x and lend-leasing equipment by 100x, so this exploit will be fixed real soon.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/open-beta-patch-1-12-4-steam-only-checksum-cb16.1548274/

Thanks for the info Faorry! Those new numbers look a lot more reasonable.