List of recommended nations to play and suggestions how to play them

[Inquerion]

Hi. I was thinking that the list of nations worth to play and what to do with them could be useful for new and maybe even old players. So I compiled some of them here.
List is for Darkest Hour Full without any mods and with 1933 scenario:

Easy to play for beginners:

Italy (You can learn all aspects of the game here: Land, Naval, Air. Reconquer former Roman lands. I also recommend to not destroy Abissynia and their armies, make them puppet instead in diplo tab - in order to do that you will need to control most of their territory without destruction of their divisions, and they have as many as 48 of them.
This divisions will be very useful against UK later on, you can also take some provinces from them and claim them [in order to prevent AI from returning them to Abissynia to early] and spam factories there and when the war will start in early 40s return this now industrialized land to them, they will now be able to sustain huge modern army and produce even more divisions)

USA (Extremely OP nation [insane amount of IC and resources]. You can easily defeat Japan)

Germany (Second most OP nation after USA. Conquer entire World)

Soviets (Third most OP nation. Just spam infantry with artillery or create your own Maginot Line against GER behind some river, eg:. near Kiev)

Japan (Try to conquer China first [pretty easy] and then USA [Difficult, but possible]. Just spam Naval Bombers prepare airports for them and build a lot of Carriers)

Turkey(A lot of manpower for a minor. Reconquer former Ottoman lands. Pretty easy since Germany will help you)

Poland (as Axis member) (Join the Axis with the goal of reconquering former PLC lands [liberate them as puppets during the war against SOV in order to prevent GER from stealing their land from you])

Nationalist Spain (as Axis member) (Significant manpower. Win SCW [very easy]. Take Gibraltar and Suez Canal and then war gets even more easy. Try to reconquer former lands [Philippines, Cuba, maybe even entire America...])


Difficult:

France (Spam forts in order to survive. Look at the Chief of the Army Minister and select Trenches War Expert [he is reducing land fort build time and costs])

China (Bloody struggle against ♥♥♥. After winning against ♥♥♥ you are OP and you can easily conquer SOV)

Netherlands (as Axis member) (Low manpower. Conquer Belgium. Try to control entire Asia. Reconquer South Africa)

Brazil (as Axis or Comintern member) (Significant amount of manpower. Conquer entire South America [relatively easy] and survive USA response [hard, i once surived until 1950s holding in Mexico, but then they outnumbered me by spamming hundreds of divisions)

Sweden (as Axis member) (Surprisingly huge navy for a minor. Good technology. Potential for becoming industrial monster [HUGE steel production], but very limited manpower. Try to conquer all of Scandinavia and Leningrad)

Siam/Thailand (Difficult. Join Axis/Japanese Alliance before ♥♥♥ will puppet you through event. Try to conquer India)

Vichy France in 1941 start (Try to defeat Free France and unite all French lands)

Switzerland (as Allies member (Build forts. Survive until Germany will start to lose ground. Conquer their lands)

UK (as Axis member) (Go fascist and try to do World Conquest. After defeating Aliies, backstab Germany)

Greece (as Axis member) (Yes you have guessed: Byzantium. Low manpower. Use Germans to conquer lands for you)


Hardcore::

Abissynia (Join Allies and then defeat Italy in Africa. Build some transports and try to conquer Italian motherland. Then, after their defeat, leave the Allies [possible only if GER is not allied with ITA yet, so you should be quick], and backstab UK by joining Axis. Conquer all of Africa)

Czechoslovakia (as Allies member) (Spam forts and Anti-Air. I once won that way)

Yugoslavia (Go commie and bring Tito to power and try to survive.)

Persia/Iran (Industrialize and try to create modern Panzer Army, you have huge Oil production in Ahvaz and potential to get even more Oil in Iraq and Azerbaijan)

Republican Spain (Win SCW against Nationalists [easy] and join Comintern in 41 and try to survive against GER [hard])

Mexico(At the border you have your OP friend that took quarter of your country in the 1800s. Try to reconquer these lands. Create modern Panzer Army since you have a lot of Oil and other resources)


Portugal (as Axis member) (Low manpower. Try to keep all your colonial possesions during the war)

Germany in 1945 or 1944 scenario (Try to save your dying empire [try to save your troops stuck in Courland first])


Ultra hardcore:

Poland (as Allies member without preventive war against GER before 1939 and without exploits) (I have never suceeded in defeating both GER and SOV as Allies member without preventive war in early 30s or by doing some weird stuff like spamming 10 lvl forts in the Warsaw area)

Italian Social Republic in 1945 start(Try to survive and save Germany from capitulation)

Do you guys have any other suggestions ?

[eahaas73]

Austria-Hungary, 1914. Normal/aggressive. Tech, Tech teams, economy, military and industry is poor. Industrial tech and capacity needs to be built up to supply, reinforce and upgrade the military. AI Germany has to help you and you have to help AI Germany.

[Gnubbolo]

with Germany I have failed to conquer the world too many times. I always miss some islets in Central America.
I waste time on ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ instead of being aggressive, and then I'd have to throw out the puppet states and allies to color the whole map gray. full gray is difficult. sincere congratulations to those who have succeeded.

[Gnubbolo]

i wrote a guide for Poland. without fortresses you cannot win.

[Inquerion]

Originally posted by Gnubbolo:

i wrote a guide for Poland. without fortresses you cannot win.

Hi, do you have a link to that guide? Would like to check it out:)

[Gnubbolo]

before Poland try this opening for Japan vs USA. I developed it very well.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xuvdQAlRIPf4WR5SdaubumM80Bcjan3G/view

[Gnubbolo]

Democratic Republic of Vietnam
spark the revolution in Indochina by raising dissent, changing ministers many times in a row :)
save and re-enter the game with the newborn Republic of Vietnam and try to resist with a couple of divisions and conquer Siam. then attempts an alliance with the USSR. if the USSR wins vs Germany you can conquer nationalist China. the course of the game is quite random.
the communist adventure for me ended in 1961.

[Inquerion]

Originally posted by Gnubbolo:

before Poland try this opening for Japan vs USA. I developed it very well.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xuvdQAlRIPf4WR5SdaubumM80Bcjan3G/view

Interesting scenario! I started it today. I declared war on the USA immediately and landed in Seattle. For now, USA offers no resistance. Im worried about Soviets and China though, they look very powerful and you set game difficulty to furious. Normally I play on Normal/Normal. German AI surprised me, because they landed in Norfolk and are moving towards Washington ;)

EDIT: Weird stuff going on around the world. I suspect "Furious difficulty" is the reason. Italy attacked Russia, Russia attacked Poland. Poland formed independent alliance with Nat. Spain and Romania. Total chaos. Germany is having difficulty defeating France, since half of their army is in America and they are also fighting against SOV. I will probably need to abandon Korea.

EDIT2: Practically won the campaign by 43. I would put this scenario in "Difficult" category, mostly because of "Furious" difficulty setting which leads to random wars around the world.

Thank you for that save and if you have any other interesting scenarios like this you could add a link here ;)

[jaxjace]

Finland as axis, hold out until barborosa and hope you killed enough soviets for the germans to win the war.

[BanDHMO]

For new players, I'd go with mid-range Allies countries, like Canada, Australia, or Brazil(join ahistorically). They are capable of research and production needed to form a modest expeditionary corps and/or small navy. You can then participate in a theater of war as AI fights it, but without having to manage hundreds of units by yourself.

[primus]

Impossible countries to survive with: Denmark, Luxembourg, Albania. Best for beginners who just want to learn the game: Canada.

[Mr Nich]

I have invaded the entire world as Poland, took a few attempts. Poland begins in 1933 with a large army, Germany begins with no army. Therefore, as you say launching a "preventative war" will see you just walk over Germany for zero opposition. Once you have done this the big challenge is the USSR. Your large army is tiny compared to theirs, you also have a much lower industrial base, and probably really high disruption. You then have the impossible task of trying to catch up with the USSR when they are already ahead of you, this is impossible unless you get a puppet Germany to build an army for you, and then joining the allies and getting France to fight for you too.

[Gnubbolo]

NO. no chance of attacking Germany if interventionism of Poland is low.
( and it is not the first time that I have read some wrong things from those who hide behind a private account )

[Ultradad]

China is actually quite fun. They have strengths, but very different strengths from the traditional powers (even compared to say Italy). It's quite a different style of play.