Hearts of Iron IV

Rayfer · October 17, 2018, 12:21:25 PM

A lot of it looks good and I am looking forward to the additions. However, I saw a video on YouTube specifically regarding the new USA national focus tree revisions. I didn't like what I saw at all. I wish I could find the link. The focus tree is hugely expanded with all sorts of political decisions to sway supporters in the Senate, and more. I suspect some of you will like it but to me it is an added layer of unnecessary detail.

Found it: https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=hearts+of+iron+4+man+the+guns+youtube&view=detail&mid=679752FE67FD259A574A679752FE67FD259A574A&FORM=VIRE

glen55 · October 17, 2018, 12:58:43 PM

Quote from: Rayfer on October 17, 2018, 12:21:25 PM
A lot of it looks good and I am looking forward to the additions. However, I saw a video on YouTube specifically regarding the new USA national focus tree revisions. I didn't like what I saw at all. I wish I could find the link. The focus tree is hugely expanded with all sorts of political decisions to sway supporters in the Senate, and more. I suspect some of you will like it but to me it is an added layer of unnecessary detail.

Found it: https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=hearts+of+iron+4+man+the+guns+youtube&view=detail&mid=679752FE67FD259A574A679752FE67FD259A574A&FORM=VIRE

I was also completely unmoved by the USA additions, which is unfortunate because I really like to play USA. Yes, it was mostly political, and the part that wasn't political was some farcical BS about a 2nd civil war in the '30s.

I don't play HOI 4 for the politics.

sandman2575 · October 17, 2018, 08:39:01 PM

Have they given any approximate release date for Man the Guns?? They've been working on it for a while now, and they still seem to have a ways to go. Which is fine, I suppose, provided they actually substantially improve the naval side of things in HoI. Just surprised that a DLC seems to be taking them so long.

bobarossa · October 17, 2018, 09:24:13 PM

With a massive rewrite of the naval code (that has been messed up repeatedly over the years and iterations of HOI) I expect it will take a coupld patches to fix the DLC after it's out. Then I'll consider buying it.

solops · October 18, 2018, 12:59:14 PM

I have ALL of the HOI series. I find myself increasingly disappointed with each new version. The HOI2 spinoffs Darkest Hour and Arsenal of Democracy seem to me to be the best of the lot. Both are still being improved and have numerous mods. I have and enjoy them both. Also, the new version of Making History The Second World War has a lot to offer. Although it is now officially released, it is still early days for the game and it is still being patched and improved. I am not sure what kind of historical WWII game it will be, but it is going to be an interesting Game of World War.

SirAndrewD · October 18, 2018, 01:05:03 PM

Quote from: sandman2575 on October 17, 2018, 08:39:01 PM
Have they given any approximate release date for Man the Guns?? They've been working on it for a while now, and they still seem to have a ways to go. Which is fine, I suppose, provided they actually substantially improve the naval side of things in HoI. Just surprised that a DLC seems to be taking them so long.

It's TBA.

In the dev update yesterday, after they talked about the strike force system and when they talked about the Naval combat re-balance, they sounded more like they were still in the concept stage than in actually implementing and balancing the changes.

Since they said they'd be doing further dev diaries when they were farther along, concentrating on various phases of the changes once they had them hammered out, I'd imagine it's not going to be out particularly soon.

It doesn't shock me it's taking this long though. The Naval portion was seriously broken and the latest dev diary goes into the depth of a lot of its flaws.

glen55 · October 18, 2018, 04:43:41 PM

Probably right it's going to be a long time yet. Still, it's very heartening to see that they are going after the actual problems. The previous MTG dev diaries mostly sounded to me like fluff.

If they can actually fix naval combat, maybe they can actually fix the battle planner. Do those two things and they'll have a helluva good game on their hands.

sandman2575 · October 18, 2018, 07:52:01 PM

I'm sure this is a heavy lift for Pdox -- no question naval needs major overhaul. Still, according to Steam, I added Man the Guns to my Wishlist back in May. I frankly wonder if they miscalculated how long this would take to produce and did the press release a bit too early...

Pete Dero · February 07, 2019, 01:12:20 PM

Expansion Man the Guns has a release date : February 28 !

https://store.steampowered.com/app/815460/Expansion__Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Man_the_Guns/
https://www.paradoxplaza.com/hearts-of-iron-iv-man-the-guns/HIHI04ESK0000011-MASTER.html?utm_campaign=mtt_hoi_20190207_rda_no&utm_content=header&utm_medium=email&utm_source=crm

Rayfer · February 07, 2019, 03:31:25 PM

Quote from: Pete Dero on February 07, 2019, 01:12:20 PM
Expansion Man the Guns has a release date : February 28 !

https://store.steampowered.com/app/815460/Expansion__Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Man_the_Guns/
https://www.paradoxplaza.com/hearts-of-iron-iv-man-the-guns/HIHI04ESK0000011-MASTER.html?utm_campaign=mtt_hoi_20190207_rda_no&utm_content=header&utm_medium=email&utm_source=crm

I eagerly await its release, but with trepidation, hoping it is well done and fixes the naval parts of the game. :-\

bobarossa · February 07, 2019, 07:17:17 PM

I'll probably wait a month for the requisite three patches to get the main patch fixed before trying it. Won't buy the DLC for probably 6 months or more.

ArizonaTank · February 07, 2019, 10:01:59 PM

What I really want to hear is that the AI can manage itself given the complexity of naval strategic environment. Can it manage a reasonable Pacific campaign for Japan? the US? Does it make reasonable choices for the Italian and German fleets, given their strategic position against the US and UK? Can it conduct a reasonable effort to shut down the UK's shipping lanes? All of the other versions of HOI had some deficiency in one or more of these.

Ian C · February 08, 2019, 06:11:41 AM

I'm also looking forward to seeing how the game has improved.

Full list of new features:

Patch 1.6 "Ironclad" bugfixes and balancing

The carrier air bug will be fixed!:
Naval battles will no longer have separate air combat; carrier-based planes fight alongide land-based aircraft
Naval Strikes from carriers can be disrupted, like other bombing

Armoured units will have more firepower (as prior to 1.5)

Rebalancing of the vanilla British NF tree to take account of changes since 1.0 (some of the new NFs require MTG)

Curacao will now have a naval base rather than a coastal fort

The suicidal convoys bug will be alleviated by player control over routing (requires MTG)

Revised US NF tree, with more nuanced Great Depression and need to placate Congress

Fixes to unnamed bugs in Scripted GUI system

Generated Admirals will be able to gain traits and experience

Each ship class will have a cap on the number of dockyards that be allocated to the production of any individual ship

All positive diplomatic relations values have been "slashed"

The Macdonald Proposal (ENG exchanges Northern Ireland for Irish entry into the war) will no longer require Norwegian capitulation [implying that Germany still won't invade Norway]

Base research will be speeded up

Research bonuses will now increase speed rather than lowering cost

Ahead of Time bonuses to research now reduce the penalty by years, not percentages

It will be easier to defend against Port Strikes (provincial AA disrupts the aircraft; cooldowns; combat width) because ships will spend more time repairing
Ideology drift National Spirits will now be timed

Large number of Victory Points (VPs) added, particularly in Africa, Caribbean, and the Asia. Every releasable tag should have at least one VP.

The flood of naval combat reports will be managed by an automatic clean-up system

General revisions of naval doctrines; the Trade Interdiction branch has been boosted

The names of US aircraft have been revised based on combat role [removing the convention that aircraft techs are divided into single-engined, twin-engined and four-engined branches]

Some Chinese Achievements no longer require control of European exclaves.

Patch 1.6 "Ironclad" new features

A new fuel system:
It will work similarly to the existing Supply system
Oil resources (which will no longer be linked to Production) will be converted to Fuel at a rate decided by techs and laws
Refineries will create Fuel, not Oil
Fuel can be stockpiled by building/conquering Silos in each State (which use factory slots), Lend-Leased, and synthesized
The Logistics support company will slightly reduce Fuel consumption

Moddable Custom Games Rules for each playthrough, including per-nation historicity settings

Air units will gain experience in combat and lose it through replacements

Overview windows for each Strategic Region (SR) in naval mode

Admirals will now have four skills (Attack, Defence, Manouvre for fleet positioning, and Co-ordination for missions) and earnable traits

Players can customize the names of ships in the production queue

Dockyards must be allocated, and can be prioritized, in order to repair ships (capped by naval base level) in a Repair Queue; convoys do not use this mechanism

Critical hits will have specific effects (interacting with Admiral traits)

Experience (XP) can be used to research all doctrines and some ship module techs

Naval provinces will have terrain types (Ocean, Fjords & Archipelagos, Deep Ocean, Shallow Seas) and terrain features

New mapmodes including terrain

Map changes in South & Central Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, eastern Europe, including 8 new provinces and 22 new states

The Saharan impassable area has been opened on the western side

New naval provinces and SRs

Naval forces now have an order-of-battle:
Theatres are used to hold Reserve Fleets
Fleets (equivalent to Army Groups on land) have Admirals & insignia; they cover several sea SRs
Task Forces (TFs; equivalent to Armies on land) are assigned missions in a single sea SR
Task Forces are constructed/reinforced from the Reserve Fleets using templates that can be defined by the player or automatically

Naval missions have been changed:
Formation Spread is removed from the game
Search & Destroy is replaced by Strike Force (the TF sits in port until required for combat)
Convoy Raiding now causes a weekly reduction in enemy War Support (potentially forcible changing their economic law)
Convoy Escort TFs can cover multiple sea Regions, but they have an Efficiency value that affects how many convoys they can protect
New Invasion Support mission: escorting invasion convoys & providing shore bombardment

Naval combat has had a major overhaul:
it will only begin after completion of a Spotting phase, dependent on aggression settings, Air Superiority, decryption difference, naval coverage, and radar coverage
submarines will sometimes escape Spotting altogether
manual orders will mean Task Forces enter battle will lower ORG
damage should be lower, leading to less decisive battles
ships under air attack will benefit from the whole task group's AA
Naval Strikes by aircraft will focus on capital ships and wounded ships
ships will now be assigned to six areas (incoming, carriers & convoys, battle line, screen, located submarines, hidden submarines); the 2D manouvring minimap & approach time are removed
in surface combat, ships can fire at the nearest enemy area (usually the screen) using their Light Guns; if they have Heavy Guns then the can also fire into the next-but-one area (e.g. attacker battle line to defender battle line)
each side has a positioning value, which penalizes large fleets
ships given manual orders will join battle more slowly
retreating ships can be caught by surface ships, or torpedoed by submarines, during a new retreat phase
submarines have a chance of attacking undetected
Japan's Long Lance NF will now give a bonus to torpedo screen penetration

For those without MTG, the existing naval techs will be replaced by pre-scripted templates and pre-scripted variants (so players have the same choices, but with the new modular system underlying them)

Ships will have namelists, like divisions do

The ideology of subjects can be changed by new Decisions

Towed artillery (including AA and anti-tank guns) battalions will be available as motorized variants which additionally require Fuel and lorries (whereas the existing, horse-drawn, variants do not)

More portrait art for generic admirals.

2D art for each level of the naval ship techs (naval hulls for MTG owners).

21 new Achievements [most require MTG].

"Man the Guns" DLC new features

The British NF tree gains new branches giving choices between decolonization vs colonial development, appeasement vs pre-emptive wars, monarchist (unaligned) vs fascist vs Communist, as well as Imperial Conference Decisions and Events allowing bonuses or the integration of the Dominions

The UK gains four 3D models of ships

Faction members can usurp faction leadership

National Focuses can be canceled after selection

Sea SRs can be marked as Avoid or Banned, which affects trade route efficiency

Docking Rights in foreign countries (as a subset of Military Access)

Countries can clear and lay mines (which add Naval Superiority) with new techs, ship modules, and air missions. They decay after peace agreements. Ships can be degaussed.

New naval Missions:
New Mine-Laying mission (for ships and submarines with the appropriate module) [i.e. mine-laying is a continuous process, not one-off event]
New Mine-Sweeping mission (for ships with the appropriate module)
New Naval Exercises mission (uses fuel, gain XP)

Air Wings can also be trained through a new Exercise mission

Naval Losses window gains new breakdown tab

New releasable tags (10 in Asia, 4 in the Middle East, 11 in the Americas, many many in Africa, 8 in Europe, 1 in the Pacific) plus ENG can be converted to England or to an Imperial Federation

The US NF tree will have new branches allowing Communist or Fascist regimes at the cost of a civil war (with a neutral zone), as well as Decisions to prepare interventions (in either Asia or Europe) and War Plans and to gain support in Congress

The US gains four 3D models of ships

Admirals can have assignable traits

Governments-in-Exile will have a Legitimacy score (very similar to subject Autonomy) providing them with Manpower and unlocking the ability for hosts (Faction Leaders) to train Exiled divisions, air wings, Generals, and ships (all from the Exiled Manpower)

Humans playing as a Government-in-Exile will receive Exiled divisions and Generals from the host AI

New Decisions will allow the UK to create Governments-in-Exile for countries that don't capitulate normally

New Dutch NF tree has branches allowing colonial investment and/or domestic development, rearmament against Britain or Germany, revanchist Fascism (either as an ally of Nazi Germany or of Wilhemine Germany) or Democracy (as a British Ally or forming the EU) or revanchist Neutrality (allowing the restoration of the German monarchy) or Communism

The Netherlands can gain Manpower from Germany if certain NFs are taken

Britain and Germany gain Decisions to gain Trade Influence over the Netherlands; Japan can peacefully acquire resources in the Dutch East Indies

2D and 3D art for the Netherlands, including bicycle battalions

Two new Special Forces battalions, Amphibious Light Tanks and AMTRACs (with generic 3D models and unique models for Germany, Japan, UK, USA, and the USSR)

New Mexican NF tree has branches allowing capitalist or socialist economic development, nationalized or multinational oil corporations, domestic armaments, and alliances with various major powers

New Mexican Decisions about the Church and the political orientation of the military can be used to align with the major world Factions or to create a new one, with diplomatic consequences
2D and 3D art for Mexico

Resource concessions can be granted to foreign powers (initially only for Mexican oil)

Human Faction Leaders and imperial masters can request suitable Expeditionary Forces from faction members/subjects for a particular Army/plan, which will transfer at their current location

New Democratic puppets will be Supervised states, which is the least restricted form of puppet

Decisions related to particular States can now be selected on the map

Ship Designer for creating templates:
The technologies for ship classes are replaced by basic techs for Light/Cruiser/Heavy/Carrier/Submarine hulls and a variety of naval equipment techs (e.g. damage control)
Some vanilla techs (e.g. radar) will enable new naval equipment
Each Hull has a certain number of flexible slots that can be filled with modules of certain types. There are also fixed slots for some modules (e.g. engines).
Modules (not all available for all hulls) will be: AA, aircraft launcher, armour, depth charges, deck armour, deck space (a.k.a. aircraft hangars?), fire control, light/light medium/medium/heavy/secondary gun batteries, mine rails, minesweeping gear, radar, Schnorkel, sonar, torpedoes
Germany gets unique pre-Dreadnought, Panzerschiff & Cruiser Submarine hulls and the Nordic countries get a special Coastal Defence Ship hull
Ships can be changed from one template to a variant of that template, which uses Dockyard capacity (the ships remain on the map and can be captured)
It may be possible to choose the template's icon and 3D model

Nations that were signatories to the London Naval Treaty will face restrictions on naval construction, affected by diplomatic Decisions. Other countries may be forced to join or fight.

A ship can be designated as Pride of the Fleet, giving certain bonuses (and a War Support malus if sunk).

New naval techs giving passive benefits (i.e. improving existing ships as well as new ones).

Four new songs for the UK and the USA.

Source: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/list-of-1-6-ironclad-man-the-guns-features-to-date.1142379/

Gusington · February 08, 2019, 09:50:12 AM

:o

Rayfer · February 08, 2019, 11:27:27 AM

IanC....an impressive list of fixes and changes. The one that bothers me is: "Revised US NF tree, with more nuanced Great Depression and need to placate Congress"...I saw this is a Paradox video months ago and didn't like it at all.