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Hearts of Iron IV - The Ultimate WWII Strategy Game
- Thread starter GarfunkeL
- Start date
Vaarna_Aarne
Notorious Internet Vandal
I don't really see reason to start worrying about popamole just yet. At least so far most of the changes they've talked about have been pretty logical and ones that do improve things. And of course, in terms of released games EU4 was still a LOT less popamole than EU3, not just feeling like Baby's First Pdox Vidya Gaem but a game that could actually stand on its own two feet. Speaking of which, has anyone checked if CK2 still brings in more cash than EU4 (my wager is yes)?
I really like what this company has done, I mean they are basically the only grandstrategy game company left which is GOOOOOOOOOOD for someone like me, but for god's sake I'm sure HoI3 is a great game but anytime I fancy playing a WW2 grancampaign I still roll out HoI2, I don't need anything more for my strategy needs.
Can't paradox widen their grand strategy scope and do something new?
For example:
Sengoku Jidai Japan
A "CKish" Mongol Expansion centered game.
A CK in space seting inspired or based on the Dune universe by Frank Herbert.
A dawn of civilization game.
A Modern world grand strategy "ala" Superpower (but well done
)
There is just so much more to explore than HoI FOUR
Can't paradox widen their grand strategy scope and do something new?
For example:
Sengoku Jidai Japan
A "CKish" Mongol Expansion centered game.
A CK in space seting inspired or based on the Dune universe by Frank Herbert.
A dawn of civilization game.
A Modern world grand strategy "ala" Superpower (but well done
)There is just so much more to explore than HoI FOUR
Corporate_Jew_Master
Arcane
They could get down to the business of making the Supreme Ruler series actual games.
But no. Innovation is paramount to treason. Johan will be sent to diversity camp.
At least I am somewhat positive about Hearts of Iron 4. The Division Commander mechanic worries me a bit but, as a modder, having to put in 1000 commanders per faction is such a big chore that it sometimes destroys all entusiasm.
But no. Innovation is paramount to treason. Johan will be sent to diversity camp.
At least I am somewhat positive about Hearts of Iron 4. The Division Commander mechanic worries me a bit but, as a modder, having to put in 1000 commanders per faction is such a big chore that it sometimes destroys all entusiasm.
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They already made Sengoku, but it plays like CK2 without the interesting bits.
I really like what this company has done, I mean they are basically the only grandstrategy game company left which is GOOOOOOOOOOD for someone like me, but for god's sake I'm sure HoI3 is a great game but anytime I fancy playing a WW2 grancampaign I still roll out HoI2, I don't need anything more for my strategy needs.
Can't paradox widen their grand strategy scope and do something new?
For example:
Sengoku Jidai Japan
A "CKish" Mongol Expansion centered game.
A CK in space seting inspired or based on the Dune universe by Frank Herbert.
A dawn of civilization game.
A Modern world grand strategy "ala" Superpower (but well done
There is just so much more to explore than HoI FOUR
Corporate_Jew_Master
Arcane
It shouldn't come as a surprise to you that he hasn't heart of it. It's one of those pre alpha test games about one of the main series, ie. Sengoku -> CK2, March of the Eagles -> EU4
Average Manatee
Arcane
- Joined
- Jan 7, 2012
- Messages
- 15,492
Paradox makes HoI4 and EU4 for the same reason Activision makes CoD 14. Shit sells, and offering minor incremental improvements when you have a lock on the market is far more profitable and reliable than making entirely new games that don't have a proven audience.
I wish EU4 had taken after MotE. MotE had some great combat mechanics, while EU4 did basically nothing to improve on the same EU3/V2 combat which was painfully thin and boring.
I wish EU4 had taken after MotE. MotE had some great combat mechanics, while EU4 did basically nothing to improve on the same EU3/V2 combat which was painfully thin and boring.
My main issue with the combats in those Paradox games is they have all these complicated mechanics with events and unit specific tactics and such but they are really obfuscated and don't seem to matter much anyway (especially CK2).
Brayko
Self-Ejected
There's nothing complicated about a Paradox game. It just takes some time for everything to soak in.
After MoTE I suspect that Paradox in fact does create new games sometimes since, as was said before, new combat mechanics from MoTE weren't introduced in EU4. They reuse assets, obviously, mainly engine and core mechanics but calling Sengoku or MoTE demos is a bit too much. Small games is more accurate.
I know why I happen to be butt hurt - I have higher expectations of Paradox than of other big developers because I care about their games. Perhaps its the same case of tough love.
Average Manatee
Arcane
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- 15,492
The only Paradox game I distinctly dislike is EU4. I'm highly cautious about HoI4 because Paradox just released EU4 and can't stop talking about it. And yes, I want their games to be good because I know they can make good games.
Vaarna_Aarne
Notorious Internet Vandal
To me it's seemed like they speak of CK2 all the time even after EU4's release.
Going back to to the earlier mention of what I'd like to see, I'll say again that I am THIS BUTTHURT about the fact East vs West didn't come true.
Small experiments is probably the most accurate term. EU Rome is another example of such a game, though Rome is probably the most succesful and biggest out of the more experimental games.
Going back to to the earlier mention of what I'd like to see, I'll say again that I am THIS BUTTHURT about the fact East vs West didn't come true.
Average Manatee
Arcane
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EvW was a shame. Still, it was a community mod group Paradox hired. Those deals end up going to shit 90% of the time, so the final outcome isn't entirely unexpected.
Vaarna_Aarne
Notorious Internet Vandal
Yea, it wasn't really unexpected, but I had hopes for it. At least those guys went out gracefully, unlike a certain someone from Portugal.
Space Satan
Arcane
Hearts of Iron IV - Development Diary 5 - Production Lines
It's time for another Hearts of Iron IV Developer Diary, and this time I'm going to talk a bit more about production; specifically the Production Lines and How Things Get Built. All military equipment is made on Production Lines in HoI IV, so players will need to be familiar with how they work if they want to maximize their war machine.
But before we can talk about the production lines themselves, we should cover how Industry has changed in HoI IV.
First of all, we have separated industry in Hearts of Iron IV into 3 types:
Civilian industry - Used both for "Consumer goods" and building infrastructure and other buildings.
Dockyards – Used for building ships.
Military factories - Used for production of military equipment such as tanks, weapons and airplanes.
This kind of separation allows us to balance different countries' industrial strengths (the capacity to make ships is not the same as the capacity to make luxuries), and gives the player a more interesting selection of targets for strategic bombing.
Moving on to the actual means of Production, Factories no longer need Metal/Energy/Rare Materials to run. Requiring the player to gather several different types of resources in order to manage factories did not necessarily add anything interesting to the mix. Being short on any of them had the same effect no matter what you were lacking (your Industrial Capacity would shrink) and it didn't entirely make sense that you couldn't build things like Militia if you didn't have access to Rare Materials.
We have simplified the inputs to "Raw materials" which factories use to run. Raw materials act as a limit on your total Industrial Capacity. However that is not the whole Production story. Equipment also has a Strategic Resource cost, without which it takes much longer to produce. Strategic Resources are not accumulated in pools. Instead, they represent the potential flow of resources into your factories. For example if you have 10 Iron you can be building stuff that costs up to 10 Iron at any one time.
A Production Line is a standing order for a factory or group of factories to make a certain piece of equipment. Each piece of equipment has an IC (Industrial Capacity) cost and a Resource cost. The IC cost determines how much equipment each factory can produce per week, while the Resource cost determines how many resources are needed for the line to operate at full speed.
As a totally made up example: An Advanced Medium Tank may cost 2 IC and require 1 Iron and 1 Tungsten. Each Factory produces 10 IC, so if you assigned 1 Factory to this Production Line, you would produce 5 Advanced Medium Tanks per week. If you assign 10 factories you would get 50 tanks/week. At the same time you would need to have 5 Iron and 5 Tungsten in the first case, and 50 Iron and 50 Tungsten in the second. (Again, these numbers are all purely made up, focus on the idea and not the values here.) You can only assign up to 15 Factories to any given Production Line, so you won't be able to build, say, a Battleship in one week by assigning 100 Factories to build it.
Also, do note that simply building Equipment is not the same as training and equipping a unit, but we'll cover that in a future dev diary.
Production Lines also have an Efficiency value which affects how much value you get out of your IC at a factory. Your efficiency starts out fairly low but increases as items are produced - slowly at first to represent the retooling of the factories, then it begins to increase at a linear rate until tapering off after a certain value (an S curve). You can change what a Production line produces, of course, and this normally means all your Efficiency is lost, however there are some exceptions. If you change to a modified version of the same equipment (for example, the same tank but with a larger gun) you keep most of your Efficiency. If you switch to another variant of the same chassis (e.g. you switch from Pz IIIs to StuG IIIs) you keep half your Efficiency. And if you switch within the same family (e.g. Basic Medium Tank to Improved Medium Tank) you keep a small part of your Efficiency.
Efficiency means that you will be able to produce more once your factories are humming along. So long as you can keep your workers on task and supplied with what they need, you will be able to have assembly line production that properly reflects the might of an economy dedicated to the war effort.
Our larger hope is that Production Lines and efficiency will offer players some interesting choices when it comes to deciding what to build. Should you go for a large number of weapons you can already churn out, or take a short term hit on production in favor of making a smaller number of higher quality ones? Sure, your new T-43 tank is better than the T-34, but is it really enough of an improvement to lose much of your Production Line's Efficiency when you switch over? Your PzIII tank may be obsolete, but perhaps instead of canceling their production entirely you could convert the Line to make Tank Destroyers or Self-Propelled Artillery on the PzIII chassis. Preserving efficiency in some of your factories could lead to a more diverse and interesting combination of units, and allow you to discover some parts of the game you might have ignored if you just constantly upgraded.
It's time for another Hearts of Iron IV Developer Diary, and this time I'm going to talk a bit more about production; specifically the Production Lines and How Things Get Built. All military equipment is made on Production Lines in HoI IV, so players will need to be familiar with how they work if they want to maximize their war machine.
But before we can talk about the production lines themselves, we should cover how Industry has changed in HoI IV.
First of all, we have separated industry in Hearts of Iron IV into 3 types:
Civilian industry - Used both for "Consumer goods" and building infrastructure and other buildings.
Dockyards – Used for building ships.
Military factories - Used for production of military equipment such as tanks, weapons and airplanes.
This kind of separation allows us to balance different countries' industrial strengths (the capacity to make ships is not the same as the capacity to make luxuries), and gives the player a more interesting selection of targets for strategic bombing.
Moving on to the actual means of Production, Factories no longer need Metal/Energy/Rare Materials to run. Requiring the player to gather several different types of resources in order to manage factories did not necessarily add anything interesting to the mix. Being short on any of them had the same effect no matter what you were lacking (your Industrial Capacity would shrink) and it didn't entirely make sense that you couldn't build things like Militia if you didn't have access to Rare Materials.
We have simplified the inputs to "Raw materials" which factories use to run. Raw materials act as a limit on your total Industrial Capacity. However that is not the whole Production story. Equipment also has a Strategic Resource cost, without which it takes much longer to produce. Strategic Resources are not accumulated in pools. Instead, they represent the potential flow of resources into your factories. For example if you have 10 Iron you can be building stuff that costs up to 10 Iron at any one time.
A Production Line is a standing order for a factory or group of factories to make a certain piece of equipment. Each piece of equipment has an IC (Industrial Capacity) cost and a Resource cost. The IC cost determines how much equipment each factory can produce per week, while the Resource cost determines how many resources are needed for the line to operate at full speed.
As a totally made up example: An Advanced Medium Tank may cost 2 IC and require 1 Iron and 1 Tungsten. Each Factory produces 10 IC, so if you assigned 1 Factory to this Production Line, you would produce 5 Advanced Medium Tanks per week. If you assign 10 factories you would get 50 tanks/week. At the same time you would need to have 5 Iron and 5 Tungsten in the first case, and 50 Iron and 50 Tungsten in the second. (Again, these numbers are all purely made up, focus on the idea and not the values here.) You can only assign up to 15 Factories to any given Production Line, so you won't be able to build, say, a Battleship in one week by assigning 100 Factories to build it.
Also, do note that simply building Equipment is not the same as training and equipping a unit, but we'll cover that in a future dev diary.
Production Lines also have an Efficiency value which affects how much value you get out of your IC at a factory. Your efficiency starts out fairly low but increases as items are produced - slowly at first to represent the retooling of the factories, then it begins to increase at a linear rate until tapering off after a certain value (an S curve). You can change what a Production line produces, of course, and this normally means all your Efficiency is lost, however there are some exceptions. If you change to a modified version of the same equipment (for example, the same tank but with a larger gun) you keep most of your Efficiency. If you switch to another variant of the same chassis (e.g. you switch from Pz IIIs to StuG IIIs) you keep half your Efficiency. And if you switch within the same family (e.g. Basic Medium Tank to Improved Medium Tank) you keep a small part of your Efficiency.
Efficiency means that you will be able to produce more once your factories are humming along. So long as you can keep your workers on task and supplied with what they need, you will be able to have assembly line production that properly reflects the might of an economy dedicated to the war effort.
Our larger hope is that Production Lines and efficiency will offer players some interesting choices when it comes to deciding what to build. Should you go for a large number of weapons you can already churn out, or take a short term hit on production in favor of making a smaller number of higher quality ones? Sure, your new T-43 tank is better than the T-34, but is it really enough of an improvement to lose much of your Production Line's Efficiency when you switch over? Your PzIII tank may be obsolete, but perhaps instead of canceling their production entirely you could convert the Line to make Tank Destroyers or Self-Propelled Artillery on the PzIII chassis. Preserving efficiency in some of your factories could lead to a more diverse and interesting combination of units, and allow you to discover some parts of the game you might have ignored if you just constantly upgraded.
Vaarna_Aarne
Notorious Internet Vandal
Yea this stuff definately looks promising and like a good addition.
Makes me 
even harder.
Looking good. Now I can properly simulate the US having several production lines of P-40s running until the end of the war for no fucking reason.
even harder.Looking good. Now I can properly simulate the US having several production lines of P-40s running until the end of the war for no fucking reason.
Average Manatee
Arcane
- Joined
- Jan 7, 2012
- Messages
- 15,492
Ehh, consolidating resources into raw materials sounds like a really bad idea. Simulating the Axis lack of certain (hard to find) materials was a rather important part of HoI3. With a generalized resource model there is essentially no reason not to attack everyone and steal their resource deposits.
The strategic resource deal is a cool concept, but I hope the resources are generalized enough that the game doesn't end up too railroaded. One of the nice things about HoI3 is that you can choose different strategies. Germany can go naval heavy and invade the UK first. Germany can forgo tanks entirely and focus on infantry with supreme air support and strategic bombing. Germany can go 100% blitz with light armor that captures Moscow before the Soviets have even mobilized. If the strategic resource system is too constraining to the point where Germany can never have more than 10 tank factories/6 aircraft factories/4 ship factories running (and doing anything less would be shooting yourself in the foot), that's going to kill a huge amount of the variety in the game. But this is more of a balance issue than a mechanic issue, so if its problematic it can be fixed later.
Civilian/dock/military factory distinction sounds good, though I hope that the civilian factory is strong enough to give you ample choice in 1936 whether to become a naval power or a land power. Otherwise the same railroading issue as above.
The strategic resource deal is a cool concept, but I hope the resources are generalized enough that the game doesn't end up too railroaded. One of the nice things about HoI3 is that you can choose different strategies. Germany can go naval heavy and invade the UK first. Germany can forgo tanks entirely and focus on infantry with supreme air support and strategic bombing. Germany can go 100% blitz with light armor that captures Moscow before the Soviets have even mobilized. If the strategic resource system is too constraining to the point where Germany can never have more than 10 tank factories/6 aircraft factories/4 ship factories running (and doing anything less would be shooting yourself in the foot), that's going to kill a huge amount of the variety in the game. But this is more of a balance issue than a mechanic issue, so if its problematic it can be fixed later.
Civilian/dock/military factory distinction sounds good, though I hope that the civilian factory is strong enough to give you ample choice in 1936 whether to become a naval power or a land power. Otherwise the same railroading issue as above.
Last edited:
XenomorphII
Prophet
- Joined
- Jan 23, 2011
- Messages
- 1,198
Have they said yet if we will finally be able to ship equipment to allies/friendly neutral powers? Because this sounds like we might actually be able to have the US be the Arsenal of Democracy.
I really, really hope so. Shermans, Shermans everywhere.
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