HoI3 Released: Broken on Launch (Surprise!)

[CaptHawkeye]

I'm so pissed that the manual isn't available yet. How the fuck do they expect me to operate my country with their incredibly shitty UI?

This has always been Paradox's mantra. Back when they released the demo for HoI 2 they didn't even give the player a fucking tutorial. So you had to have the patience to teach yourself how to play the game. Hint: That's not how you market a demo. But hey, this is Paradox, they're so typical of strong indie developers. They make games for their own sake, not for anyone else.

[Enigma]

Oddly, the lag appears unrelated to how sophisticated your computer is, beyond a certain point (people below the minimum requirements get more jerkiness and lag, but people above them seem to get random levels). In fact, quad-core systems seem to be the number-one people experiencing heavy lag. Perhaps they fucked up their multithreading, or just didn't multithread at all.
<snip>

They concentrated too much on putting just about everything onto the GPU that they forget that we now have multi core processors and they do not need to overburden the video card. If they concentrated on using the multi-core CPUs or compromise (i.e. if the GPU can't handle the stress then let the second\third\fourth core handle the load), then the lagginess would disappear.

[Duckie]

I'm so pissed that the manual isn't available yet. How the fuck do they expect me to operate my country with their incredibly shitty UI?

This has always been Paradox's mantra. Back when they released the demo for HoI 2 they didn't even give the player a fucking tutorial. So you had to have the patience to teach yourself how to play the game. Hint: That's not how you market a demo. But hey, this is Paradox, they're so typical of strong indie developers. They make games for their own sake, not for anyone else.

Manual in PDF format

Not that it helps much, or so I'm told, with the new command stuff that is complex as fuck unless you don't micromanage (which paradox gamers are probably loathe not to do) and instead give the AI Theatres objectives. Apparantly the military AI isn't too bad as far as when you tell it to take Warsaw it in fact attempts to take Warsaw, it's just the diplomatic stuff is so fucked up you end up with Axis Ireland invading Allied Switzerland while Japan and Mexico conduct joint landings in South Africa.

Incidentally for more hilarity- Japan is in patch 1.1 so terrified of the Soviets (even if the soviet army is pulled off the border or is absent) that they station all their continental or even all their troops there, and when they declare war on the Chinese, only a few units will lurch south for a few seconds, then go "OH GOD SOVIETS" and move north again to perpetually guard the border while the Chinese walk north to meet them. If it doesn't, it steamrolls right through China and then over into India just like HOI2 because the only logistical delay in Barbarossa and the Chinese campaign and such is the '30 days of supply unless you wait for your supply line to catch up'

Meanwhile France is so confident the maginot line will hold they move all their troops to guard belgium, letting AI Italy notice, declare war, and walk to Paris.

[MKSheppard]

This is a World War II game designed by enthusiasts of World War II history. Every effort at maximizing both realism and playability has been made, and an excellent balance has been found.

Yeah, so enthuastic that you put fucking STALINGRAD in the wrong position.

[Duckie]

They must have had a temp-worker make the map or something. I can't believe a company that's made World War II games twice before can misplace Stalingrad. America I can see, because maybe swedes don't know where NYC is and it's not relevant to WWII, but how could they misplace stalingrad?

[Commander 598]

EDIT: According to the general forums, with picture evidence, it's possible to invade and conquer the United States... in 1939. After all that bragging Johan did about how hard world domination was going to be too. It looks like their is no penalty for length of supply lines. As a result the Germans can sustain a massive invasion force from more than 2000miles away and under constant harrasement from the RN and USN. Details are important in sims people.

IIRC, it was partially a fuckup because ships apparently weren't using fuel in the demo. I can send a fleet all the way from the UK and park it off Italy and the fuel bar does not budge.

Also this game is a whole lot more entertaining when you actually know WTF you're doing. I spent all of today wondering why my AI controlled theaters were fucking usleless. Welp, problem solved.

[Netko]

They completely fucked up the demo. A demo is supposed to show you a taste of something to entice you to buy a full game - this is why they are usually the intro level + sometimes a mid-game point. What Paradox did is throw you right into its complicated mess on September 1, 1939, and then they limit your country selection to just the major combatants + Poland. So you start the demo in a game with a complicated interface in the middle of major combat - a situation that is supposed to be the time when everything you know about the game comes together.

Its just bad - and I played HoI 2 and EU series to death. I was hoping that the full game with a more gentle introduction from 1936, as well as playing a minor the first time, would allow for a good experience, but from what I am reading the game is fundamentally fucked up. Sooo glad I didn't do the preorder thing.

[Vehrec]

They completely fucked up the demo. A demo is supposed to show you a taste of something to entice you to buy a full game - this is why they are usually the intro level + sometimes a mid-game point. What Paradox did is throw you right into its complicated mess on September 1, 1939, and then they limit your country selection to just the major combatants + Poland. So you start the demo in a game with a complicated interface in the middle of major combat - a situation that is supposed to be the time when everything you know about the game comes together.

Its just bad - and I played HoI 2 and EU series to death. I was hoping that the full game with a more gentle introduction from 1936, as well as playing a minor the first time, would allow for a good experience, but from what I am reading the game is fundamentally fucked up. Sooo glad I didn't do the preorder thing.

Well, I'm not surprised they did this. The HoI2 demo was the battle of the bulge, after all. I downloaded that and played it for two days about a year ago before walking away from it forever thanks to a lack of anything like a clue as to how to conduct that battle.

[Gandalf]

Well, it looks like I'll be waiting for the 1.3 patch in a year's time.

[Commander 598]

The 1.1 patch has a lengthy list of changes.

################################################## ##########
# Changes for 1.1 below.
################################################## ##########

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- AI Improvements
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* Misc AI
- The production AI will now fill up the queue with infantry or militia divisions if no other needs and have available IC + manpower.
- AI won't care about spam penalty when it comes to influencing.
- AI may now invite countries currently at war to its faction.
- Japan will no longer declare war on the USA if the usa is in the axis.
- All AI countries in factions will now influence if they can.
- AI should now be a bit smarter about how to spend DI for influencing.
- Bigger countries will no longer spam smaller for debts.
- AI countries will now only mobilise when they have less than 20% between neutrality and effective threat.
- AI will no longer join factions if a stronger neighbour is in a hostile faction.

* Unit AI
- Fixed some movement correction glitches
- Rewrote how reserves are handles by the AI, and it will use garrison type units more for that.
- Improved handling of very damaged units
- HQs no longer counted as "infantry" archetype in force needs
- More focused on seizing VP provinces
- Use of expeditionary forces between AI nations outside the regular diplomatic framework
- Substantial rewrite of inter-area allocation of troops, taking into account more factors.
- Very safe pathfinding (used by the AI) will now avoid provinces under attack
- Fixed some problems with troop allocation in puppet/master areas
- Fixed a problem that prevented some fleets at sea from ever moving again
- Fixed a problem causing unit ping pong effects.

* Garrison AI
- Improved initial unit selection, with more efforts at a stable garrison force, and more logical troops will be used.
- Adjusted France vs Low Countries border prios
- Fixed a problem where zero prio provinces were still being added to the garrison province list (causing odd garrisoning of borders with friends)
- Rewrote a function to choose more logical troops
- Adjustments to emphasize coastal provinces
- Fixed a bug with return of garrison divisions to fronts
- Fixed a bug that might have affected front distribution a bit
- Will no longer pull divisions from lower prio provinces to garrison higher prio ones (caused a lot of shuffling when some units had to stomp partisans etc)


* Front AI
- France should be more prepared on the Belgian border
- Fixed a slight distance bug
- Adjusted stance org thresholds
- Fixed a "Parkinson" bug
- Fixed a bug with attack orders sometimes being cancelled at once
- Fixed an issue with overestimation of current strength and org for both friendly and enemy units
- Will now consider army experience
- Many improvements to breaking out of pockets
- More aware of dig in factor
- Better handling of multiple fronts in the same theatre with few total divisions
- Improved some distribution code
- Will now be more intelligent about troop distribution around encircled enemy provinces
- Added a bunch of missing modifiers to odds calculations

* Air AI
- Fixed a bug in Logistical Strike missions
- Fixed an issue with constantly splitting and merging MR and Interceptors
- Fixed some more issues with carrier bases being used for the wrong air types
- CAGs will now properly be used to pound enemy units when invading
- Tactical bombers will prioritize invasion targets if they are in range
- Support for flying bombs and rockets
- Added support for nukes
- Added logistical strike missions
- CAGs should no longer get mixed up with other air types
- Fixed a bug with tactical bombing targets
- Day/night and weather checks
- Paradrop AI: Fixed a bug with it forgetting its intended target

* Naval AI
- Optimized rebase checks
- Proper patrol missions added
- Fixed an issue with inter-theatre submarine allocation
- May now take patrolling or convoy escorting fleets for Naval intercept missions
- Adjusted naval superiority checks to make the AI less scared of naval missions
- Will no longer patrol with unescorted capital ships
- Fixed an issue with obsolete orders not being cleared correctly
- More legal move checks
- Fixed some issues with fleets getting "stuck" due to no valid path
- Fixed a problem with rebasing of submarines to their correct theatre in the absence of actual enemy targets
- Fixed an issue with damaged fleets getting stuck at sea
- Improved convoy raiding checks
- Fixed an issue with fleets in combat or retreat not correctly being recalled to base on damage

* Transport AI
- Fixed a bug with one invalid route (no path) locking up all transportation
- Fixed a bug with the best embarkation port selection
- Will not be as particular about hogging transport ships if they are not needed
- Will never use mot/mech/arm to garrison islands
- Should reset the transport target of armies on detachment from a hierarchy
- Fixed a problem with "shuttle transportation" (transporting some units before the rest have reached the embarkation port)

* Invasion AI
- Fixed a bug with single divisions not conquering a whole island even if it was undefended
- Player directed targets will now receive the needed divisions from the theatre main area if at all possible (not in combat etc)
- Fixed a problem with invasions not launching due to waiting for escorting fleets that had already joined
- Should now target port provinces only
- More prone to respect player set invasion beaches
- Adjusted "needed divisions" check for invasion targets
- Reduced the division needs in non-warzones to make more units available for invasions



-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Gamebalance Changes
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* Units
- Implemented individual officer ratios per unit type.
- Units will now get starting experience depending on laws if nothing is scripted in the oob.
- Support for officer needs at naval and air units added.
- Increased practical gains for non capital ships.
- Engineers are now much faster.
- Tweaked marines, engineers and bergsjaegers combat abilities in various terrains fitting their capabilities.
- Armor, Heavy Armor and Super Heavy Armor are now worse in bad terrain.
- Planes will now always repair at midnight GMT, combat and in air won't stop them.
- Reserves no longer get an extra bonus on lesser manpower rotation.
- Reworked reserve status to be per brigade, to make it easier for the player.
- Starting manpower is now properly reduced in scenarios when wars have been ongoing for a while.
- Retreating units ignore fuelstatus for movement speed now.
- Rebasing fleets take supplies and fuels directly from capital now.
- Ships in non-friendly ports that can't move will not be sunk.

* Combat
- There is now an auto pushback damage event when a province is taken by a new controller.
- Increased basic terrain penalties.
- Increased penalties from combat on weather.
- Dropped xp gain for airunits dramatically. (almost a factor of 10)
- Rewrote shatterlogic and how reserve units gets reinforced. Now shatter percentage is compared to highest strength that unit has had, and not maximum possible.
- Runway cratering is now a bit more lethal.
- Added in proper restrictions for pathfinder to not allow entry where a unit can't attack.
- Breakthroughs and Delays now impact attack delay.
- Retreat province now less likely to be a front province
- Airunits will not automatically intercept airunits at the airbase unless they have the order for it.
- Reduced damage to convoy raiders a bit, and increased damage on convoys a bit.
- Fixed some penalties for cavalry in some terrains.
- Correct default penalties for attack for terrain is now used.
- Attack delays are now reduced every hour during a battle to a minimum of one.

* Weather
- Rewrote temperature impact on combat to be a more sliding scale.
- Recoded how lowpressurezones are scripted, so that they can be seasonal.

* Production
- Reduced prices by 50% on metal, energy & rares, and by 25% on oil.
- Fuel is now at crude oil prices.
- Units are now deployed into theatres properly if auto-deploy is on.
- Added a modifier for global resource production for a country.
- Practicals are now applied at finish properly for all building types.
- Highest threat now reduces consumer goods from mobilised troops.
- Reinforcements and repairs are now slightly faster.

* Politics
- A few laws now modify the resource production negatively when IC is modified negatively.
- Revised some ministers to modifiy resource production instead of IC.
- Tweaked occupation policies to be harsher on IC.
- National Unity is now always capped between 1 and 100.
- Tweaked strategic warfare a bit to be less easy to win by just bombing another country and have a 2 to 1 supremacy.
- Strategic warfare impact is only valid at offenses to liberate own territory, not just any adjacent to it.
- A government in exile now loses most of its officers, manpower and constructions.
- Elections can now happen at any day within a month if scripted that way.

* Technology
- Theories are now cheaper to research.
- Revised all naval technologies for a better balance.
- Tweaked starting techs generation to always go for cheapest.

* Diplomacy
- Surrender logics changed to surrender to the one occupying most of the country instead of the faction leader.
- When the all members of a faction is a GiE, it will surrender again to be annexed or puppeted.
- Increased intervals between alignment movement.
- Increased impact of threat & ideology on aligment.
- Decreased repulsion impact on alignment a bit.
- Target countries neutrality is now impacting how easy it is to influence them.
- Only one country in each faction can influence a target country.
- Joining or Inviting to a faction is now free from DI costs.
- Neutrality is now capped at 100%.
- Reduced impact of relations on trade, and increased chances when fighting wars together, or having friendly agreements.
- Puppets can now initiate trade with their masters
- Countries in the same faction or allied will never be considered "highest threat" for a country.

* Intel
- Higher differences in intel now gives more info on the map.
- You can no longer get province details on buildings without decent intel.
- Infrastrucutre map details are now limited by intel.
- Radio is now negative on encryption instead of decryption.

* Misc
- The start of the spanish civil war will no longer cause you to lose more than the set amount of troops.
- There is no longer 15 dissent at start of spanish civil war.
- Splitting troops now cap the amount of landtroops that can go over to the set amount of percent.
- The split_troops effect now splits the manpower as well.




-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Interface Improvements
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- A diplomatic message is now only shown for a week.
- Officer needs is now shown in the build interface.
- Added tooltip to continuous checkbox for airmissions and disabled time widgets when checked
- Building effects are now relative.
- Counter values now update at every start of a day.
- Best possible law instead of next possible law is now shown in the alert.
- Changed layout in ledgerpiecharts to fit better
- Added the tooltip for soft and hard attack in the airbuilder screen.
- Improved the election interface.
- Added a message whenever a country gets annexed.
- Unit recruittime is now properly colored.
- Clarified the tooltip for neutrality when declaring war.
- Clarified names of intelligence levels.
- It is no longer possible to ask for debt allowing when a debt is already allowed.
- Invite to faction button no longer visible when target allready in faction
- Now possible to stop aligning to faction leader
- Fixed the interface for allowing and revoking debt
- It is no longer possible to open brigade details window for a unit that already have that screen up.
- If game paused by opening menu, closing it should now unpause it
- Changing options in frontend now tell you what happened only once
- Bad username or password for bonus content now tells you so
- Only one way to change messagesettings from the settings menu now

- Reworked alot of messages to eliminate all tpyos of bad spleling swedes.



-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Bugfixes
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* Restart/Reload Issues
- Airintercept orders are no longer broken at a reload.
- Fixed a problem which caused some combats to become invalid after a reload.
- Fixed a few issues with save games not being setup properly when loaded.
- Fixed a calculation error for offier ratios at start of scenarios.
- Fixed another reason for out of synch.

* Interface
- Fixed the aircombat goto button.
- Fixed a display issue for technology abilities.
- It is no longer possible to get duplicate convoys through the interface.
- Peace messages are now shown properly again.
- Fixed a glitch with attrition tooltip.
- Fixed a mismatch in toggling auto-resource and auto-supply buttons.
- Research alert now deactivates properly when under ai control.
- Fixed an issue with flickering reserve icons.
- Shift-clicks can not be used to get out attack delays.
- Reinforcement needs can no longer wrap around to negative numbers.

* Units
- Range check on move for naval units added.
- Airunits can now actually raid convoys.
- Fixed a bug with naming of serial brigades.
- Can no longer rebase to neutral bases.
- It should no longer be possible to merge invalid units (cags from different carriers etc).
- Units will no longer leave being a bomb target until they actually LEAVE a province.
- Fixed an inversion of efficiency on repairs in naval/air bases.
- Fixed a few bugs where combats couldn't be selected properly
- Convoy raiders should now be sunk properly if they are damaged for <0strength in a convoy attack.
- Illegal convoys are now tagged as inactive even when autocreation/destruction is off.
- Fixed a problem where naval sorties and intercepts would find units it had no intel on.
- Inactive leaders should no longer be assigned to units through auto-assign.
- Range checks now from base, and not current location.
- Convoys and escorts are cheaper now
- Targetfleet is now saved and loaded in navalintercept orders.
- Supply needs are now calculated properly even when a country is out of supplies.
- Returning expeditionary force no longer requests confirmation of returning party and returns unit after one month
- Nationalist rebels are now separate depending on which country they are aiming to reform.

* Misc
- Alot of compability issues have been tracked down and dealt with, improving general stability for users.
- Influences now end if the target is removed.
- Fixed some issues with liberating countries.
- Puppets are represented more accurately (no embargoes between puppets and overlords etc)
- Calling allies to arms in a limited war should now cost influence as advertised
- Improved and fixed some of the events commands
- Listening stations and escorts are now properly enabled by their techs only and not randomly.



-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Database Changes
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

* Country/Province Setup
- The Dutch capital is now setup correctly in later scenarios.
- Changed the color of Nationlist Spain so that it can be distinguished from Republican Spain more easily
- Positioned some of the naval/air/radar bases more correctly
- Increased the number and level of forts in the later scenarios giving a much better historical setup.
- Added more suitable traits for some of the ministers

* Orders of battle
- Made some adjustments to the senario setups for USA, Japan, France, GC, Germany, Italy and the UK for a more historical and
balanced setup.
- Reworked the historical setup for cags so that they are represented more accurately

* Wars and Diplomacy
- British puppets (Oman, Bhutan and Yemen) are now properly joining the allies in 1939
- Rearranged the victory points in the Soviet Union to give Germany a bigger advantage
- Made some adjustments to the Sino-Japanese War
- Mongolia joins the war in 1941

* Technology
- Made some changes to the tech setup to provide better balance and historical accuracy
- Replaced some of the tech pictures with better alternatives.

* Events
- Reworked some of the decisions and surrender events so that they are better balanced.

[Psychic_Sandwich]

Its just bad - and I played HoI 2 and EU series to death. I was hoping that the full game with a more gentle introduction from 1936, as well as playing a minor the first time, would allow for a good experience, but from what I am reading the game is fundamentally fucked up.

Fair is fair; Crusader Kings was much worse than this on release, and they fixed that. Paradox might be worse than Creative Assembly when it comes to releasing broken games, but they also stay around and fix them come hell or high water.

There appear to be two properly game-breaking bugs, those being the glacial speed and the broken consumer goods calculations. I don't know how hard the speed will be to fix, but the consumer goods bug is apparently an artifact of the 1.1 patch, and caused by each active brigade being counted more than once in the CG calc. A four brigade division counts as 16 brigades, for example, meaning that nations with large armies are crippled on game start. Presumably, all they need to do is go and restore the relevant code to it's pre 1.1 state.

It really does look like there's a genuinely good game under all the bugs, though.

[Vympel]

*deletes game from his purchase list until it's patched to be playable and non-retarded, and modded to get rid of their bullshit date-based penalty for researching tech*

[TC Pilot]

At least this time around the game functions on release. Back when the first HoI came out, it froze, without fail, on December 7, 1940 in the pre-patched version.

In any case, I'm definately not buying this. It won't work on my computer. Which is kinda funny, considering how hideous it and its 3D-map predecessors are.

But at least with HoI3 out of the way, hopefully they go about making a game the PI community actually wanted in the first place: Victoria or Crusader Kings 2.

[CaptHawkeye]

I'm getting CTDs every 5-minutes or so. This is Creative Assembly level stuff.

[Duckie]

*deletes game from his purchase list until it's patched to be playable and non-retarded, and modded to get rid of their bullshit date-based penalty for researching tech*

What, you should be able to research jet fighters in 1936 and just focus on it and be able to do it? There's materials science, engineering, and other requirements that are abstracted in the year date. The dates at least make research spread out rather than researching all the way to electronic computers in 1936 for the research bonus, then all the way to 1948-era machine tools for the industrial bonus, etc.

It's not a perfect system but it works better than "no bullshit date-based penalty for researching tech". Some things about Hearts of Iron are pretty dumb but the tech system's "bullshit dates" is hardly one of them, unless you can suggest a better way to prevent the AI and me from researching all the way to electronic computers in 1936.

[TC Pilot]

The first game's system worked fine. It wouldn't be feasible to get computers, rockets, nukes, or jet engines in absurdly ahistorical timeframes, because the tech times for the various component parts, etc. simply take that long to be researched. If, taking my Soviet WC for example, one focused solely on infantry and tank development (because air power was practically worthless when playing against an AI), you might expect to get T-34s by '39 or AKs by '45.

In the HoI2 system, you may as well not bother trying, because researching so much as two years ahead of the "historical year" would take nearly as long as just waiting and researching when the game wants you to.

Edit - actually, iirc, it took 180 days to reach the next research "tier," and 90 days to reach each subset, not including research on individual component parts.

[Duckie]

True, but if HOI3 is anything like HOI2 it won't work without restrictions on tech blitzing, because it still doesn't even approach HOI1 levels of tech complexity needed to advance a 'level' of technology (no researching suspension for your tanks or winter boots or such).

They could probably lighten them some, and the new 'theory vs practical experience' values might actually help- the soviets should [at least for game mechanics] get fast at infantry research if they're cranking them out and using them a lot, and might be able to get stuff like AK-47s by 1945, while tibet should lag behind in practical experience with amphibious assault doctrines. If they did the system right at all and made it so, for instance, tibet should take forever to learn how to build modern aircraft carriers while america should be researching them far faster.

Which is doubtful now, but maybe by 1.4 or so. Or the first expansion, seeing how Paradox seems to work.

[Duckie]

After some false starts blaming the weather engine (which is also incidentally hi slariously bad, having permafrost in poland in may and north african snowstorms and not remembering the southern hemisphere's seasons are different) someone found out the source of much of the lag: The touted moddable LUA AI files? Paradox's set up for diplomacy, trade, and spies is this:

Each hour, check to see if something spyworthy is able to be done, tradeworthy, and diplomacyworthy. Do it. That's for 200 countries. 24 hours a day.

The game doubles or triples in fps (although interface lag isn't fixed) if you limit the AI to 1 diplomatic, trade, and spy status update per day according to people testing it.

Apparantly with that simple change it runs at HOI2 speeds, or at least significantly faster. I'm not sure if that's hillariously bad or an honest mistake anyone could make, considering even I (albeit with hindsight) can see the problem inherent in making 200 'look up numbers and calculate stuff' functions run every second of the game.

[Thanas]

Yeah, I'll not be buying this one either.

What a piece of crap. One would think they'd at least get the map right....

[CaptHawkeye]

You're honestly better off just staying with HoI 2 for now. Even with the manual's help I still can't conceive how to control HoI3's military formations. The manual recommends I just let the AI do that. So yeah that's cool, I should tell the AI to just play the game for me.

It's really funny because HoI 2's command system was JUST FINE.

[Vympel]

What, you should be able to research jet fighters in 1936 and just focus on it and be able to do it? There's materials science, engineering, and other requirements that are abstracted in the year date. The dates at least make research spread out rather than researching all the way to electronic computers in 1936 for the research bonus, then all the way to 1948-era machine tools for the industrial bonus, etc.

And what abstracted material science/ engineering/ other requirements are preventing the adoption of AK-47s (and myriad other weapons) in 1941?

Absolutely nothing. My problem with the system is that this abstract 'in this year this random thing happened and so there's no way you could research it earlier without a huge penalty' is an after the fact contrivance. There's no evidence or reason to believe you couldn't design and build an AK-47 if you issued the requirement for it in 1939, nor is there any reason to believe that you couldn't have '1948-era machine tools' in 1940 if you put serious time and money into it - they just assume that the year the thing was introduced is the 'proper' time for it and penalize you for trying to get it early.

Well fuck that, really. I thought I was in charge of what my fucking nation was doing, and why should there be abstract things going on behind the scenes at all? The research system should encompass everything that's going on, and the player should be in complete control.

Where's the damn fun in playing WW2 if you're hamstrung to using the exact same quality/ standard of weapons (give or take a few months at best) as the real thing?

I bet they've got their bullshit Soviet purge penalty from HoI & HoI2 still there too.

[MKSheppard]

Duckie, LOL, that's the kind of retard-level thinking that drove me away from Paradox games eventually.

I bought HOI1 long ago when it was just new; and I actually did create one of the first "cool" mods for it; Shep's TechMod, which got incoporated into some nice full featured mods.

I also bought Victoria, later on.

But what eventually burned me out on Paradox beginning with HOI2 was:

1.) HOLY BUGGED RELEASES BATMAN! No game's perfect upon release; but Paradox is in a class by themselves for buggy releases. They're no EA, since they actually do *eventually* fix most of the bugs. But it's still pretty annoying that they're willing to release hideously broken games.

I mean come on, how the hell is it their beta testers missed the big glaring obvious bugs, like the Consumer Goods Bug, and SLLOOOOOOOOOOW game speeds?

2.) Stubbon sticking to obsolete design decisions. Like for example:

A.) HOI's Axis/Comintern/Democracy system was okay, for a first try. But keeping it for round two and three? WTF? That just ensues the game diplomatic and military alliance engine is only capable of handling conflicts narrowly limited to historic 1941-1945 WWII types.

B.) Lets Simulate all 24 hours in a day! Okay for a first try; but by HOI2, they should have been asking themselves: "Do we really need to simulate all 24 hours? Can't we just divide it into four six-hour pulses, instead of our present twenty four one-hour pulses? That would retain all of the granularity we need for WWII conflicts, with night bombing, and semi-around the clock fighting; while not straining the computer too much.

C.) Aircraft Carrier Brigades. A good improvement done beginning with HOI2, but still limited in HOI3, in that you can only buy composite brigades made up of predetermined units; instead of specifically saying: "I want three brigades of F4Us and one of TBFs to make up my fast carrier air wings"; you get stuck with buying composite brigades. Which is real puzzling considering their extensive expansion of the Division engine for HOI3 to allow separate regiments/brigades for land units.

D.) Refusal to consider certain game events like Holocaust or area bombing. I know that paradox doesn't want to approach the holocaust, because of european sensibilities; but, hell, in all of their games, they let you do Stalin's great multiple purges, which killed a lot of people, but somehow oppressing minorities is bad, especially considering how oppressing this minority led to a reduction in research brainpower (a lot of smart scientists fled Europe), and took away vital military needs (in 1944, as the Soviets approached poland, the SS monopolized railroads, shunting vital troop and ammunition trains to sidings to wait, while they fast-tracked expresses full of jews being 'evacuated' from areas soon to be liberated so they could kill them in germany.

A simple "oppress jews Y/N?" event that fires in 1933, and a few additional "increase oppression? Y/N" which reduces germany's brainpower, takes away a few IC to account for oppression costs, and reduces germany's diplomatic standing in the world would work pretty good, while not being incredibly controversial and tasteless, like "Build Extermination Camps Y/N? This will reduce your IC by 5 and POP by 10."

[MKSheppard]

Where's the damn fun in playing WW2 if you're hamstrung to using the exact same quality/ standard of weapons (give or take a few months at best) as the real thing?

Well, If I was modding the game, I'd remove the year costs for a lot of items, but for some core items, like turbojet engines or advanced piston engines, I'd add a requirement for "advanced materials research", which would require a LOT of investment.

I wonder if there are certain technological flags which can be used that trigger research only after you've been in combat for a while? I mean, the world's first assault rifle was invented in 1905 or so by a Russian, and the US had a few designs in the 1920s which would qualify as one technically, but nobody saw the need to give the infantry automatic weapons with most of the handling qualities of a SMG, but much better range and accuracy until 1944-45 and a lot of experience in war.

There should be some kind of penalty for deploying AK-47s en masse early, to simulate the military leaderships' objection -- which did make sense, does giving regular soldiers an automatic weapon dramatically increase their combat effectiveness?

Yes, but not enough to outweigh the huge costs of making and shipping all that ammo to them now that their ammunition expenditure has quadrupled.

I bet they've got their bullshit Soviet purge penalty from HoI & HoI2 still there too.

You mean the "Stalin does not purge everyone, thus Soviet Dissent rises by 25, proving that all those people really were wreckers and enemies of the state?" event. Yup. That kind of logic is probably why they don't want to do any Oppression of the Jews events; because there is no way in the design of the game that they can't penalize the player for doing ahistorical diplomatic/historical events other than raising dissent costs.......

Hey Paradox, perhaps you should instead add a "victory value" modifier, like if you decide to NOT purge the generals and everyone else as the USSR in the 1930s, your final "victory score" gets subtracted by 100 points or so, for following a "ahistorical easier path".

[Vympel]

You mean the "Stalin does not purge everyone, thus Soviet Dissent rises by 25, proving that all those people really were wreckers and enemies of the state?" event. Yup. That kind of logic is probably why they don't want to do any Oppression of the Jews events; because there is no way in the design of the game that they can't penalize the player for doing ahistorical diplomatic/historical events other than raising dissent costs.......

It's hilarious, that's the message they're sending - Stalin was right to carry out the Great Purges!

I always modded that out personally when I was playing the previous games anyway, but it's still annoying they insist on it.

Oh well, I won't get this game until it's been out for fucking ages, has been thoroughly patched, and then I'll mod it to fix stupid crap like that up. Oh, and delete their historical penalty research thing. It fucking sucks, it sucking fucks, and I don't like it.

[TC Pilot]

D.) Refusal to consider certain game events like Holocaust or area bombing. I know that paradox doesn't want to approach the holocaust, because of european sensibilities; but, hell, in all of their games, they let you do Stalin's great multiple purges, which killed a lot of people, but somehow oppressing minorities is bad, especially considering how oppressing this minority led to a reduction in research brainpower (a lot of smart scientists fled Europe), and took away vital military needs (in 1944, as the Soviets approached poland, the SS monopolized railroads, shunting vital troop and ammunition trains to sidings to wait, while they fast-tracked expresses full of jews being 'evacuated' from areas soon to be liberated so they could kill them in germany.

Part of the reason, I think, is Paradox's market. For instance, all three HoI games are banned in China because the various warlords/Nationalist China/Taiwan, which isn't a problem since China isn't a market for their games. Yet they ban swastikas not only from their games, but from their website (when posting pictures with the swastikas modded in, they have to be censored) entirely. They even, I think, intentionally misspelled Hitler in the German release of HoI, because their German and European markets are far more important.

The Purge event is pretty much indefensible. It may have been an attempt to hurt the Soviets so that they don't just steamroll over everything with their uber-stacks of doom, but they generally only kill off the 1-skill mj. generals. The only good general the event offs is Tukhachevsky.

On a completely unrelated note, any of you interested in a MP game? Whether EU2, Vicky, HoI, or all three linked in a mega-campaign?