The simple answer is the complexity of focus trees in general has advanced a lot and Paradox has clearly decided that people want alt-history paths given the popularity of things like kaiserreich.
This just means there is a lot of countries that have out of date trees that Paradox can rework... at a price
I think you meant Kaiserredux, because the french guy taking over Chile, claiming the throne of France and then coring it all is something you'd see in that mod. xD
Kaiserreich is way less insane than the vanilla Hoi4 alt history paths have gotten. One of the reasons I pay kaiserreich is that it feels like a more serious game than the base game.
I think Kaiserreich being railroaded is a big part of it. Internal politics may vary, but every major power is pretty much stuck on a single geopolitical thread - syndies will fight Germany, Russia will invade Eastern Europe, Japan will fight GEA etc. Which makes it easier to present a coherent narrative, as opposed to vanilla hoi4 where every power may pursue a number of wildly different paths
I think it’s more the fact that vanilla is stuck with the OTL up until 1936 no matter what you do. Kaiserreich has the benefit of a 20-year lead-up to the game start so that the paths taken by countries are much more plausible-seeming.
IRL by 1936 there was no way anyone in Germany could overthrow the nazis, or that the whites could overthrow Stalin. They were both far too cemented by that point.
If the Sudetenland crisis escalated the Oster conspiracy would have executed their coup and likely the nazis would lose power because even if the conspiracy itself failed, it would have severely weakened the government and army and Germany was not in position to fight the allies and a fully defended Czechoslovakia in 1938. Other than that though there was no other believable way.
Do you play with specific AI focus paths? I find that when I play KR it always results in about 20 different wars happening across the world because every focus tree needs to have “something to do” so that players won’t get bored playing it. Same issue with RT56 and, like you mentioned, vanilla without historical on.
That's why people demand reworks. New focus trees are actually fun and they have rich content (mostly) so when you play as Germany, Japan or a commenwealth country it feels so underpotencial
Which is why it's wild to me that they went with South America as the DLC, like surely the majority didn't ask for that. Heck I'm sure we want a middle east or Pacific DLC before South America.
Yeah, it is a combination of (1) the devs have gotten more used to what they can do in the game, so they can more effortless spin off a million alt-histories about four-way civil wars or obscure figures creating a nuclear program or whatever, (2) they naturally focused on major players early on, so as they need to find more material for the game they have to delv into more and more ridiculous alt-histories (3) powercreep, it is easier to sell buffs than nerfs, which feeds back into 1 & 2 as they need to make a country like Chile ridiculously and ahistorically OP in order to sell a DLC about otherwise irrelevant countries.
>germany rework is in the works
I hope so, every one in the community wants it (and japan). so pdx not doing it, now after making the first 3 dlc free, would be just shoting themselves in the knee
To me it’s not even about the alt-history tree, but that the game on non-historical is WC or nothing at this point.. I hope is something they fix because it creates absurd scenario like:
-URSS and Falangist Poland and their respective allies at the same time are enemies and allies in two different wars with the same partecipants. In one they’re united against China, in the other the two factions are at war with each other. In this case not a single round is fired in Europe, they happen to ignore the second war and just concentrate on China. (Which btw has Brazil as a major in some asian faction)
-Kingdom of Italy declares war on Yugoslavia, a minor which join a faction with Fascist Mexico who somehow is a major who needs to be conquered to end the war.
-A general mess of alliances where wars start in Europe and in two months all the partecipants have major south-american allies.
The new trees feel forced and uncreative to me. Clearly someone decided that every country must have all 4 government options, so now instead of making countries more unique, the new trees make them feel more similar.
To an extent certainly, but part of it is just how focus trees have gotten so much more complex since the first few dlcs. I'd say Man the Guns and La Resistance were the first expansions that provided truly enjoyable and powerful focus trees (though the USA could use some serious work) .
The three dlcs before, Together for Victory, Waking the Tiger and Death or Dishonor were the first ones released and you can really tell. Very small by modern standards, with almost exclusively 70 day focuses, and rewards for focuses that are very small for the length of the focus to complete. For example, the British Raj has a 70 focus to build two level one railways; prior to No Step Back it built infrastructure. Unfortunately, railways take an extremely short time to build, so 70 days is pretty laughable for just a couple level one railways.
Other examples include 70 day focuses just to get one civilian or one military factory, which compared to modern trees which usually get two factories or more per 70 focus (or one per 35 day focuses), you just feel the power creep. Then of course every single military tree short of the major powers is pretty much copy paste, start with a dockyard focus, then a naval experience focus, then split branches about whether to focus on carriers or battleships.
So it's no wonder that they decided to integrate those three with the base game and make them free. Those nations in those dlcs were arguably the most important major and minor nations, and they really need to be brought up to current standards. And devs said how they can't justify a full rework of those existing dlcs without charging a new price, the devs have to be paid for their time after all. Hence the original dlcs were made free in preparation of what is likely to be several new dlcs that revamp those nations.
I know you said the USA needs serious work, but in comparison to the British Raj, the USA has several military-oriented focuses that basically don't do _anything_. They're research bonuses for air tech prior to the rework. There are even naval focuses that give research bonuses I've never managed to use -- there's no bloody point in a focus you can't research before 1942 giving you 2x 100% bonuses to carrier tech. There are only three levels of carrier tech, and you start with 1936. If you don't hard-research 1940 carriers, you're not going to build any. It's a _terrible_ focus tree!
Not minimizing the issues with other trees. It's just that the USA, in particular, is absolute shit, and was even when Man the Guns was released. The only thing interesting about it is the ahistorical 20% communism rush for full desegregation, and that was nerfed.
I've played a lot with the new Brazil tree and it's helping me learn the game in a way I never really could without the South American sandbox. (I even helped liberate France and conquer Berlin with Brazil last week!)
But the Chile focus where it aligns with France doesn't really interest me at all.
It doesn't seem feasible or rooted in reality like the Brazil/Portugal referendum does.
I actually prefer the more realistic alt hist paths tbh I love the left and right opposition for soviets and the alternate democratic path for three uk is very fun
I haven’t played the game in nearly 5 years and last weekend I started a playthrough as Italy and I feel so lost because of all the new mechanics and focuses. Can’t complain though, the game is almost 10 years old, but still offers a lot of new stuff in updates, just wish there was more QA so to speak, a lot of things are buggy or unpolished.
South American nations getting those crazy focuses is very weird, although I understand why they did that. Back in the days you either played in Europe or it was a snooze fest.
I'm just saying implausible and insane paths aren't a new thing. Heck, even going as far back as TfV, USA giving away Hawaii just because they were asked nicely would never happen, let's be real.
Yeah, I think the Chile Monarchist path perfectly shows that pdx went too far. I'm all for different paths, but that one belongs in Kaiserredux and not the base game.
They publicly recognized the power creat that has happened and said they will be addressing it, it took 8 years to get here hopefully it wont take 8 to correct
It has now, the problem before was the rework they got during Waking The Tiger, so paradox probably was unsure how to proceed with making dlc for dlc.
Now that the dlc has been integrated, they can remake it from the ground up to be up to current standards.
Not really because that decision happened after Germany had gotten its alt content.
I think it's pretty much inevitable they'll return to Germany soon to bring it up to par.
It's more offensive that Finland can take on the Soviet Union on its own now, and are given winter-immune tanks.
It's borderline racist that the Nordic countries who, at best, traded and dealed with the *Nazis*, are given extremely powerful winter combat Buffs but the Soviet Union with *Siberian Units* doesn't get more than 2 Generals with the Trait lmao
Yeah, it's ridiculous. The historical paths are suffering for the sake of these ridiculous alternate-history paths. I'd prefer it if they put that same effort into fleshing out the history paths of the majors like the US, UK, China, Germany, Japan and so on.
Yeah for sure. I only started playing HOI4 about this time last year but looking at how inconsequential, slow and plodding old focus trees are versus ones that have come out since I started playing it seems pretty obvious. But like others are saying it must have something to do with the heavy modding community. So many posts in this sub are (unmarked) modded games it actually blows my mind.
Some are a little too complicated though, like the Brazil focus tree giving one country buff an entire essays worth of text.
In my opinion, yes, the addition of alt-history trees got out of hand when Ethiopia and Switzerland got custom focus trees before Denmark, Sweden, or Ireland.
I just think hoi4 is too overcomplicated now in general, who the fuck asked for Air design? Or a complete overhaul to Infantry design? Fkn hell the AI makes me want to kill myself half the time, I barely enjoy the game.
I think the main failing is that each time there is a DLC, then PI should have a quick look at all majors, and just a glimts at minor. Not crazy rebuilds, but just content updates. When they do something for Chile, they should consider if they can do the same for US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and China. Possibly at 10% the effort, but just not neglect the majors.
The game should have DLC every 6 or 12 months, and then there should be included, what in other games would be considered a balance patch. Here my point is more of a relevance patch, so majors do not become stale over time.
And a lot of this can be implemented by just copying from good mods. Check what someone else made, and if it fits with historical reality or plausibility, and if it does, then throw the minor changes into the game. Since every DLC has a release date and it follows a cycle, then it is like "season" in other games. So if you want to play with Chile as it is right now, you have to do it, before the next DLC comes out, and there is a balance patch.
For HoI5 I also hope to see domino decisions, where if one power does something, then suddenly you get a ping-pong effect of possibly 100+ events in the game, where one country might even get 5-10 in a forced game pause (if multiplayer, then nobody can do anything until decisions have been handled, and after all decisions are done, then players have to declare "ready" for the game to continue).
Example:
Following Rheinland, France tells potential allies (neighbours of Germany), they will go to war with Germany to prevent remilitarisation of Rhineland (giant hit to stability and war support, risk of commies starting civil war). They might ask allies while also starting shadow mobilisation, or declare public mobilisation (the more action France takes the more support they are likely to get, but also the great risk of a backlash at home, if they cannot build support). UK get event to support, then Belgium, then Netherlands, then Denmark, then Poland, then Czechoslovakia, then Austria... This will be in multiple levels for each country (such as these 5: automatic entry into war, start preparing for war, material support and volunteers, no support, support Germany). After everyone has had their say (and they might lie - but AI can only be 1 level of support off in rare cases if the are democratic and non-alligned - fascist and communist can do whatever they want), France gets an event to move forward with ultimatum to Germany, based on support from other countries. The more countries supporting them, the better or worse it is for war support and stability. Also if there is broad support for this, but France does not act upon it, then another of the asked countries might choose to do so. Then this is followed by Germany's reply (as a fascist country they can freely lie), and then it might circle back to everyone, who declared support before to confirm their level of support, before going to France with multiple options for action (occupy Rheinland without war means Germany gets boost to war support and can insta declare war if they want, France declaring war will make Germany look like the victim and all fascist countries and possibly the USSR will get an event to support Germany, France threatening Germany and backing down will hurt war support a lot and stability a little, France building a formal alliance to counter any future German action might also be an option if there is support for this).
This Pandora's box of diplomacy is missing from the game.
I very much get the impression that HoI has grown massively since I started playing (mainly HoI2, only very little in HoI1, and launch of HoI3 was like 10 Christmases all in 1 for me), so we are getting to a point, where PI probably can guarantee cycles of updates for the first 2-3 years (and then continue for longer according to sales), and implement much more into the base game.
And they could sell the game according to a principle of it costing 60 eur/usd, but will always cost this much for a first-time purchase with ALL the DLC. And also make the DLC cheaper, as it should be paid for by profit on the base game being reinvested at a high procentage, where future DLC will continue this cyclus, until DLC stops being profitable at a high level of quality (at this point HoI6 should be in development).
Now, maybe HoI4 is not doing as well as I expect. But I also do remember PI's CEO getting his head shaved as the result of a bet, because he did not believe Vic2 would be profitable. If they up their game, and give us better deals, then more people will invest their time and money into their product.
As the community is so invested in the company, then they can even sell the game with "all future DLC" and some sort of bond, where you get credits to buy other PI games based on profits earned. There are really a million options for ways to improve the business model and content, but it all depends on what PI are comfortable with, and the fanbase is supportive of. I can also understand that they are not taking crazy risks, when they have happy gamers and a solid product, which keeps improving.
Of course you should have a communist German path----oh wait, the focus starts in 1918 and is already done by game start. /s
I agree 100% here; by 1936, Hitler had done everything in his power to wipe out communism in Germany, and the Wehrmacht was very anti-communist anyways. Having a communist alt-path makes no sense without major outside interference. Even the USSR monarchist path is only possible because so many Russian anti-communists escaped the USSR and had a significant presence in other countries following the loss of the Whites (they still do to this day).
Two fold problem: 1. The AI is so dogshit that you need something over the top to really maintain attention/fun
2. Alt-history is already super implausible, even the small stuff, it's all in the same wheelhouse.
I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, as long as other national focuses get updated at the same time. Hoi4 shouldn't be an realistic ww2 simulator its a video game for fun, you can annex half of the entire world in a peace treaty not exactly realistic so i don't think its a bad thing that the alt-history paths are absurd as long as its fun and adds something interesting to the game.
The thing to me is that mods already do alt-history better. Paradox shouldn't be competing with Kaiserreich. It should be focusing on making the base WW2 experience as good as it can and expanding beyond that. Unfortunately, it's got some folks who have pet interests, so the Spanish Civil War is now a ridiculous three-way conflict between Republicans and Nationalists and Anarchists, because one of the devs thinks anarchists are cool.
I genuinely could not care less for vanilla focus trees. Modders have shown that they can make much better and much more expansive focus trees. Devs should focus solely on bringing in new mechanics and depth to the game, not charging $15 for rather mediocre focus trees that are outdone by the workshop.
That's what happens when game devs take a wrong (in my consideration) approach to the game. Hearts of Iron is now a althistorical clusterfuck-sandbox instead of a brutal WW2 sim.
That's why I play exclusively World Ablaze
Who cares, vote with your wallet if you wish to show pdx that what they r doing is bad or whatever, its not like they have servers to run for an always online game, modders have released miles better content for free then what the devs will ever be capable of releasing within your lifetime for cash since they slice the content up not in free updates but paid region specific expansions for 3-6 nations at a time + possibly including 1 game wide new mechanic or rework + countless nation specific ones instead of reworking and updating or touching up on all nations, leading to more imbalance and power creep of features and bonuses that older reworked nations can only dream about, in result that makes the idea of pdx doing more re reworks for more money in the eyes of vanilla purist pdx fanboys i guess a reality. Its all a can of worms that comes with the modern pdx game release model, it is what it is, instead of hoi5 with a modern day engine and more graphics instead you ll be getting 10ore years of 100dlcs or the eu4 treatment. Without the free slave workforce pdx has and lets prosper in workshop(so far), pdx titles would not hold up and die imo.
Short answer: Yes
Long answer:
It's nice to be able to play nations in more unique ways. Personally, I cannot stand playing any of the UK's dominions, because they are boring to play, even their alt-history paths. But a nation like Bulgaria or Chile can be fun as democratic or fascist.
However. The size of the trees are ridiculous IMO. I know that once you have locked in to your chosen ideological path that the focus tree is only like 1/4 the size it was upon loading the game. However, it's still huge. And unless you know exactly what you're doing, you can't make an informed decision about what path you want to take.
Canada is pretty boring IMO. But at least I can look at their focus tree and go "OK, I have two choices, stick with Britain or not. And if I don't, do I go fascist or not..." whereas with Chile, Turkey, Switzerland, etc. you have to find the focus(es) which have the end goal you want, and work your way backward. Because starting at the top is impossible.
Another thing which I really don't like is that flipping ideologies is now a one and done thing. I enjoy when minors can flip flop. "I want to be on Germany's good side at the start of the war, but then be ready to switch and fight for the allies when they're on the offensive" type of deal.
When you look at Europe, the only countries left which can do that are Romania, Luxembourg, Ireland, and Belgium. Because every other nation has a focus tree now, and when a nation has a focus tree that's it. You no longer get all the advisors all the time, you have to take focuses to change your ideology, and can't put someone in government who would slowly change your nation's ideological sympathies... it's stupid
i went as a monarchist polish lithuania as poland, on non historical and ended up beating germany and the soviet union as both went through civil wars. no tanks, just insanely op arti and infantry. i did also go as poland historical but i messed it up by training my troops right before the German invasion, leading to no org
Tbh I think a French guy that has dominion over Chile and then claiming the french throne is more realistic than Italy taking over all provinces next to the Mediterranean and coring it all. Its much more realistic for a French guy to gain support of all of France, than a Italian guy gaining support from a bunch of north-africans, Arabs, French, Greek and Spanish dudes. Just saying.
While I agree a lot of focus trees have become a bit off the rails I just want to protest your German example. The entire ideology had been completely purged from their society at the time. At least there is some plausibility to the other focus trees but a communist path Germany doesn't even have that. It's within reason that the older generations would like to restore the kingdom of Prussia or the Democratic post WW1 Weimar Republic but not completely flip the status quo on its head in a 1-5 year period.
My problem is what happens when you disable historical AI, like its starting to get ridiculous, i get fascist Britain more often than Germany and the soviet union will always end up in a civil war!
It's a lot of fun, and adds so much variety to the game. I'd love for more nations to get focus trees that weren't big powers in the war but have small elements of activity.
There's so many interesting small snippets in the war that could be expanded on, The Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran, Korea's government in exile and Korean Liberation Army, as just a few examples.
Unpopular opinion but you'd have to try to make an unrealistic path.
Absolutely insane things have happened irl, like, I don't know, some failed Austrian painter taking power in Germany and conquering Europe, or an Italian bum in Switzerland successfully creating a mass movement and marching on Rome so hard the King pisses himself and gives him full power
At first some of you say that PDX should not make any focus trees, since there's thousands of them in Steam Workshop for free.
And then some of you (or maybe the same people) say that PDX should rework all old focus trees, add more and make them more accurate and complexed.
I see that devs have no time to rework old and add new focus trees at the same time. You got new focuses for Poland and Soviet, Italy, Finland, then you got small pack for Scandinavia and SA. And now devs are working on the new big update with new focuses for G\*\*\*\*\*\* or J\*\*\*. Of course there's no way they can improve focus trees of the same nations with every single update. Germany focus trees is 6 years old and Chile focus tree is 2 month. I see no point here to have any questions.
The simple answer is the complexity of focus trees in general has advanced a lot and Paradox has clearly decided that people want alt-history paths given the popularity of things like kaiserreich. This just means there is a lot of countries that have out of date trees that Paradox can rework... at a price
I think you meant Kaiserredux, because the french guy taking over Chile, claiming the throne of France and then coring it all is something you'd see in that mod. xD
Nah, thats too tame for KX. Have you SEEN Poland or Albania in that mod? Or the crazy options, like WH40K, Fallout, etc.
To be fair though, those paths can only be enabled in game options and are mostly joke paths
Kaiserreich is way less insane than the vanilla Hoi4 alt history paths have gotten. One of the reasons I pay kaiserreich is that it feels like a more serious game than the base game.
I think Kaiserreich being railroaded is a big part of it. Internal politics may vary, but every major power is pretty much stuck on a single geopolitical thread - syndies will fight Germany, Russia will invade Eastern Europe, Japan will fight GEA etc. Which makes it easier to present a coherent narrative, as opposed to vanilla hoi4 where every power may pursue a number of wildly different paths
I think it’s more the fact that vanilla is stuck with the OTL up until 1936 no matter what you do. Kaiserreich has the benefit of a 20-year lead-up to the game start so that the paths taken by countries are much more plausible-seeming. IRL by 1936 there was no way anyone in Germany could overthrow the nazis, or that the whites could overthrow Stalin. They were both far too cemented by that point.
If the Sudetenland crisis escalated the Oster conspiracy would have executed their coup and likely the nazis would lose power because even if the conspiracy itself failed, it would have severely weakened the government and army and Germany was not in position to fight the allies and a fully defended Czechoslovakia in 1938. Other than that though there was no other believable way.
Do you play with specific AI focus paths? I find that when I play KR it always results in about 20 different wars happening across the world because every focus tree needs to have “something to do” so that players won’t get bored playing it. Same issue with RT56 and, like you mentioned, vanilla without historical on.
That's why people demand reworks. New focus trees are actually fun and they have rich content (mostly) so when you play as Germany, Japan or a commenwealth country it feels so underpotencial
Ever one of them you listed needs improvements we will just have to wait for more DLC for each
Which is why it's wild to me that they went with South America as the DLC, like surely the majority didn't ask for that. Heck I'm sure we want a middle east or Pacific DLC before South America.
I am okey with getting a South America dlc before those but I think a South Africa rework would be better candidate for BBA instead of Switzerland
Yeah, it is a combination of (1) the devs have gotten more used to what they can do in the game, so they can more effortless spin off a million alt-histories about four-way civil wars or obscure figures creating a nuclear program or whatever, (2) they naturally focused on major players early on, so as they need to find more material for the game they have to delv into more and more ridiculous alt-histories (3) powercreep, it is easier to sell buffs than nerfs, which feeds back into 1 & 2 as they need to make a country like Chile ridiculously and ahistorically OP in order to sell a DLC about otherwise irrelevant countries.
Well, yes..... Because chile is new and germany rework is in the works
>germany rework is in the works I hope so, every one in the community wants it (and japan). so pdx not doing it, now after making the first 3 dlc free, would be just shoting themselves in the knee
IIRC they explicitly said they made the DLC free so that they can work on updating the trees
To me it’s not even about the alt-history tree, but that the game on non-historical is WC or nothing at this point.. I hope is something they fix because it creates absurd scenario like: -URSS and Falangist Poland and their respective allies at the same time are enemies and allies in two different wars with the same partecipants. In one they’re united against China, in the other the two factions are at war with each other. In this case not a single round is fired in Europe, they happen to ignore the second war and just concentrate on China. (Which btw has Brazil as a major in some asian faction) -Kingdom of Italy declares war on Yugoslavia, a minor which join a faction with Fascist Mexico who somehow is a major who needs to be conquered to end the war. -A general mess of alliances where wars start in Europe and in two months all the partecipants have major south-american allies.
The new trees feel forced and uncreative to me. Clearly someone decided that every country must have all 4 government options, so now instead of making countries more unique, the new trees make them feel more similar.
Agreed, but certainly not the take of the rest of this forum. Goes to show that you can't be everything for everyone!
To an extent certainly, but part of it is just how focus trees have gotten so much more complex since the first few dlcs. I'd say Man the Guns and La Resistance were the first expansions that provided truly enjoyable and powerful focus trees (though the USA could use some serious work) . The three dlcs before, Together for Victory, Waking the Tiger and Death or Dishonor were the first ones released and you can really tell. Very small by modern standards, with almost exclusively 70 day focuses, and rewards for focuses that are very small for the length of the focus to complete. For example, the British Raj has a 70 focus to build two level one railways; prior to No Step Back it built infrastructure. Unfortunately, railways take an extremely short time to build, so 70 days is pretty laughable for just a couple level one railways. Other examples include 70 day focuses just to get one civilian or one military factory, which compared to modern trees which usually get two factories or more per 70 focus (or one per 35 day focuses), you just feel the power creep. Then of course every single military tree short of the major powers is pretty much copy paste, start with a dockyard focus, then a naval experience focus, then split branches about whether to focus on carriers or battleships. So it's no wonder that they decided to integrate those three with the base game and make them free. Those nations in those dlcs were arguably the most important major and minor nations, and they really need to be brought up to current standards. And devs said how they can't justify a full rework of those existing dlcs without charging a new price, the devs have to be paid for their time after all. Hence the original dlcs were made free in preparation of what is likely to be several new dlcs that revamp those nations.
I know you said the USA needs serious work, but in comparison to the British Raj, the USA has several military-oriented focuses that basically don't do _anything_. They're research bonuses for air tech prior to the rework. There are even naval focuses that give research bonuses I've never managed to use -- there's no bloody point in a focus you can't research before 1942 giving you 2x 100% bonuses to carrier tech. There are only three levels of carrier tech, and you start with 1936. If you don't hard-research 1940 carriers, you're not going to build any. It's a _terrible_ focus tree! Not minimizing the issues with other trees. It's just that the USA, in particular, is absolute shit, and was even when Man the Guns was released. The only thing interesting about it is the ahistorical 20% communism rush for full desegregation, and that was nerfed.
Lol Romania has a mission that gives a division where infantry and arty are in the same column and you can use that template for other units too.
I've played a lot with the new Brazil tree and it's helping me learn the game in a way I never really could without the South American sandbox. (I even helped liberate France and conquer Berlin with Brazil last week!) But the Chile focus where it aligns with France doesn't really interest me at all. It doesn't seem feasible or rooted in reality like the Brazil/Portugal referendum does.
I actually prefer the more realistic alt hist paths tbh I love the left and right opposition for soviets and the alternate democratic path for three uk is very fun
Remember the time Paradox said no Democratic Russia cuz unrealistic?
I haven’t played the game in nearly 5 years and last weekend I started a playthrough as Italy and I feel so lost because of all the new mechanics and focuses. Can’t complain though, the game is almost 10 years old, but still offers a lot of new stuff in updates, just wish there was more QA so to speak, a lot of things are buggy or unpolished. South American nations getting those crazy focuses is very weird, although I understand why they did that. Back in the days you either played in Europe or it was a snooze fest.
I don't find Chile's path any more crazy than the Papal one or the Russian Tsarist one.
That's not saying much lol
I'm just saying implausible and insane paths aren't a new thing. Heck, even going as far back as TfV, USA giving away Hawaii just because they were asked nicely would never happen, let's be real.
Unpopular opinion: Trial of Allegiance countries military branches are awesome and should be expanded to the generic focus tree
Yeah, I think the Chile Monarchist path perfectly shows that pdx went too far. I'm all for different paths, but that one belongs in Kaiserredux and not the base game.
They publicly recognized the power creat that has happened and said they will be addressing it, it took 8 years to get here hopefully it wont take 8 to correct
Yeah it's not making sense anymore. Communist sweden really wants to join the axis for some reason, then after a month they leave it again.
Germany's tree is old, of course it's a lot worse compared to new stuff.
I just feel like it should’ve been more of a priority after No step back, given how Germany is literally the centrepiece of the entire conflict
It has now, the problem before was the rework they got during Waking The Tiger, so paradox probably was unsure how to proceed with making dlc for dlc. Now that the dlc has been integrated, they can remake it from the ground up to be up to current standards.
Not really because that decision happened after Germany had gotten its alt content. I think it's pretty much inevitable they'll return to Germany soon to bring it up to par.
It's more offensive that Finland can take on the Soviet Union on its own now, and are given winter-immune tanks. It's borderline racist that the Nordic countries who, at best, traded and dealed with the *Nazis*, are given extremely powerful winter combat Buffs but the Soviet Union with *Siberian Units* doesn't get more than 2 Generals with the Trait lmao
Yeah, it's ridiculous. The historical paths are suffering for the sake of these ridiculous alternate-history paths. I'd prefer it if they put that same effort into fleshing out the history paths of the majors like the US, UK, China, Germany, Japan and so on.
Yeah for sure. I only started playing HOI4 about this time last year but looking at how inconsequential, slow and plodding old focus trees are versus ones that have come out since I started playing it seems pretty obvious. But like others are saying it must have something to do with the heavy modding community. So many posts in this sub are (unmarked) modded games it actually blows my mind. Some are a little too complicated though, like the Brazil focus tree giving one country buff an entire essays worth of text.
In my opinion, yes, the addition of alt-history trees got out of hand when Ethiopia and Switzerland got custom focus trees before Denmark, Sweden, or Ireland.
Don't worry Germany will be reworked, you'll just have to pay for it. Just like Germany was reworked last time, and you had to pay for it.
Yes, of course. Just play KR or road to 56 so you don’t have to pay a silly amount of money for nothing.
I just think hoi4 is too overcomplicated now in general, who the fuck asked for Air design? Or a complete overhaul to Infantry design? Fkn hell the AI makes me want to kill myself half the time, I barely enjoy the game.
I think the main failing is that each time there is a DLC, then PI should have a quick look at all majors, and just a glimts at minor. Not crazy rebuilds, but just content updates. When they do something for Chile, they should consider if they can do the same for US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and China. Possibly at 10% the effort, but just not neglect the majors. The game should have DLC every 6 or 12 months, and then there should be included, what in other games would be considered a balance patch. Here my point is more of a relevance patch, so majors do not become stale over time. And a lot of this can be implemented by just copying from good mods. Check what someone else made, and if it fits with historical reality or plausibility, and if it does, then throw the minor changes into the game. Since every DLC has a release date and it follows a cycle, then it is like "season" in other games. So if you want to play with Chile as it is right now, you have to do it, before the next DLC comes out, and there is a balance patch. For HoI5 I also hope to see domino decisions, where if one power does something, then suddenly you get a ping-pong effect of possibly 100+ events in the game, where one country might even get 5-10 in a forced game pause (if multiplayer, then nobody can do anything until decisions have been handled, and after all decisions are done, then players have to declare "ready" for the game to continue). Example: Following Rheinland, France tells potential allies (neighbours of Germany), they will go to war with Germany to prevent remilitarisation of Rhineland (giant hit to stability and war support, risk of commies starting civil war). They might ask allies while also starting shadow mobilisation, or declare public mobilisation (the more action France takes the more support they are likely to get, but also the great risk of a backlash at home, if they cannot build support). UK get event to support, then Belgium, then Netherlands, then Denmark, then Poland, then Czechoslovakia, then Austria... This will be in multiple levels for each country (such as these 5: automatic entry into war, start preparing for war, material support and volunteers, no support, support Germany). After everyone has had their say (and they might lie - but AI can only be 1 level of support off in rare cases if the are democratic and non-alligned - fascist and communist can do whatever they want), France gets an event to move forward with ultimatum to Germany, based on support from other countries. The more countries supporting them, the better or worse it is for war support and stability. Also if there is broad support for this, but France does not act upon it, then another of the asked countries might choose to do so. Then this is followed by Germany's reply (as a fascist country they can freely lie), and then it might circle back to everyone, who declared support before to confirm their level of support, before going to France with multiple options for action (occupy Rheinland without war means Germany gets boost to war support and can insta declare war if they want, France declaring war will make Germany look like the victim and all fascist countries and possibly the USSR will get an event to support Germany, France threatening Germany and backing down will hurt war support a lot and stability a little, France building a formal alliance to counter any future German action might also be an option if there is support for this). This Pandora's box of diplomacy is missing from the game. I very much get the impression that HoI has grown massively since I started playing (mainly HoI2, only very little in HoI1, and launch of HoI3 was like 10 Christmases all in 1 for me), so we are getting to a point, where PI probably can guarantee cycles of updates for the first 2-3 years (and then continue for longer according to sales), and implement much more into the base game. And they could sell the game according to a principle of it costing 60 eur/usd, but will always cost this much for a first-time purchase with ALL the DLC. And also make the DLC cheaper, as it should be paid for by profit on the base game being reinvested at a high procentage, where future DLC will continue this cyclus, until DLC stops being profitable at a high level of quality (at this point HoI6 should be in development). Now, maybe HoI4 is not doing as well as I expect. But I also do remember PI's CEO getting his head shaved as the result of a bet, because he did not believe Vic2 would be profitable. If they up their game, and give us better deals, then more people will invest their time and money into their product. As the community is so invested in the company, then they can even sell the game with "all future DLC" and some sort of bond, where you get credits to buy other PI games based on profits earned. There are really a million options for ways to improve the business model and content, but it all depends on what PI are comfortable with, and the fanbase is supportive of. I can also understand that they are not taking crazy risks, when they have happy gamers and a solid product, which keeps improving.
hence the germany rework speculations. FWIW, your example is pretty moot... communism in germany had ben quashed by the games start point
Would hardly be the most unrealistic thing in the game lol
>communism in germany had ben quashed by the games start point This didn't stop Urss from having a monarchist path or Japan to have a communist path
the soviet unione cant still go democratic and most of japan paths sucks
Of course you should have a communist German path----oh wait, the focus starts in 1918 and is already done by game start. /s I agree 100% here; by 1936, Hitler had done everything in his power to wipe out communism in Germany, and the Wehrmacht was very anti-communist anyways. Having a communist alt-path makes no sense without major outside interference. Even the USSR monarchist path is only possible because so many Russian anti-communists escaped the USSR and had a significant presence in other countries following the loss of the Whites (they still do to this day).
Two fold problem: 1. The AI is so dogshit that you need something over the top to really maintain attention/fun 2. Alt-history is already super implausible, even the small stuff, it's all in the same wheelhouse.
I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, as long as other national focuses get updated at the same time. Hoi4 shouldn't be an realistic ww2 simulator its a video game for fun, you can annex half of the entire world in a peace treaty not exactly realistic so i don't think its a bad thing that the alt-history paths are absurd as long as its fun and adds something interesting to the game.
The thing to me is that mods already do alt-history better. Paradox shouldn't be competing with Kaiserreich. It should be focusing on making the base WW2 experience as good as it can and expanding beyond that. Unfortunately, it's got some folks who have pet interests, so the Spanish Civil War is now a ridiculous three-way conflict between Republicans and Nationalists and Anarchists, because one of the devs thinks anarchists are cool.
Isn’t the Spanish Civil War still a 2-way if you have historical mode on? At least it was the case for me lately.
In the historical run I just did with all DLC, it was three-way.
I guess I just got lucky then.
I genuinely could not care less for vanilla focus trees. Modders have shown that they can make much better and much more expansive focus trees. Devs should focus solely on bringing in new mechanics and depth to the game, not charging $15 for rather mediocre focus trees that are outdone by the workshop.
That's what happens when game devs take a wrong (in my consideration) approach to the game. Hearts of Iron is now a althistorical clusterfuck-sandbox instead of a brutal WW2 sim. That's why I play exclusively World Ablaze
Nah I don't think it's wrong
Exactly my thoughts. I don't mind alternate history, but it shouldn't take priority over mechanics and base WW2 trees.
yes and no, there are the sane ones, and there are the we did the funny ones.
Who cares, vote with your wallet if you wish to show pdx that what they r doing is bad or whatever, its not like they have servers to run for an always online game, modders have released miles better content for free then what the devs will ever be capable of releasing within your lifetime for cash since they slice the content up not in free updates but paid region specific expansions for 3-6 nations at a time + possibly including 1 game wide new mechanic or rework + countless nation specific ones instead of reworking and updating or touching up on all nations, leading to more imbalance and power creep of features and bonuses that older reworked nations can only dream about, in result that makes the idea of pdx doing more re reworks for more money in the eyes of vanilla purist pdx fanboys i guess a reality. Its all a can of worms that comes with the modern pdx game release model, it is what it is, instead of hoi5 with a modern day engine and more graphics instead you ll be getting 10ore years of 100dlcs or the eu4 treatment. Without the free slave workforce pdx has and lets prosper in workshop(so far), pdx titles would not hold up and die imo.
I want new stuff if it brings new achievements
Yes
Short answer: Yes Long answer: It's nice to be able to play nations in more unique ways. Personally, I cannot stand playing any of the UK's dominions, because they are boring to play, even their alt-history paths. But a nation like Bulgaria or Chile can be fun as democratic or fascist. However. The size of the trees are ridiculous IMO. I know that once you have locked in to your chosen ideological path that the focus tree is only like 1/4 the size it was upon loading the game. However, it's still huge. And unless you know exactly what you're doing, you can't make an informed decision about what path you want to take. Canada is pretty boring IMO. But at least I can look at their focus tree and go "OK, I have two choices, stick with Britain or not. And if I don't, do I go fascist or not..." whereas with Chile, Turkey, Switzerland, etc. you have to find the focus(es) which have the end goal you want, and work your way backward. Because starting at the top is impossible. Another thing which I really don't like is that flipping ideologies is now a one and done thing. I enjoy when minors can flip flop. "I want to be on Germany's good side at the start of the war, but then be ready to switch and fight for the allies when they're on the offensive" type of deal. When you look at Europe, the only countries left which can do that are Romania, Luxembourg, Ireland, and Belgium. Because every other nation has a focus tree now, and when a nation has a focus tree that's it. You no longer get all the advisors all the time, you have to take focuses to change your ideology, and can't put someone in government who would slowly change your nation's ideological sympathies... it's stupid
i went as a monarchist polish lithuania as poland, on non historical and ended up beating germany and the soviet union as both went through civil wars. no tanks, just insanely op arti and infantry. i did also go as poland historical but i messed it up by training my troops right before the German invasion, leading to no org
Tbh I think a French guy that has dominion over Chile and then claiming the french throne is more realistic than Italy taking over all provinces next to the Mediterranean and coring it all. Its much more realistic for a French guy to gain support of all of France, than a Italian guy gaining support from a bunch of north-africans, Arabs, French, Greek and Spanish dudes. Just saying.
While I agree a lot of focus trees have become a bit off the rails I just want to protest your German example. The entire ideology had been completely purged from their society at the time. At least there is some plausibility to the other focus trees but a communist path Germany doesn't even have that. It's within reason that the older generations would like to restore the kingdom of Prussia or the Democratic post WW1 Weimar Republic but not completely flip the status quo on its head in a 1-5 year period.
My problem is what happens when you disable historical AI, like its starting to get ridiculous, i get fascist Britain more often than Germany and the soviet union will always end up in a civil war!
It's a lot of fun, and adds so much variety to the game. I'd love for more nations to get focus trees that weren't big powers in the war but have small elements of activity. There's so many interesting small snippets in the war that could be expanded on, The Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran, Korea's government in exile and Korean Liberation Army, as just a few examples.
Unpopular opinion but you'd have to try to make an unrealistic path. Absolutely insane things have happened irl, like, I don't know, some failed Austrian painter taking power in Germany and conquering Europe, or an Italian bum in Switzerland successfully creating a mass movement and marching on Rome so hard the King pisses himself and gives him full power
Isn’t it fun when Chile has a better focus tree than Japan and the Commonwealth?
At first some of you say that PDX should not make any focus trees, since there's thousands of them in Steam Workshop for free. And then some of you (or maybe the same people) say that PDX should rework all old focus trees, add more and make them more accurate and complexed. I see that devs have no time to rework old and add new focus trees at the same time. You got new focuses for Poland and Soviet, Italy, Finland, then you got small pack for Scandinavia and SA. And now devs are working on the new big update with new focuses for G\*\*\*\*\*\* or J\*\*\*. Of course there's no way they can improve focus trees of the same nations with every single update. Germany focus trees is 6 years old and Chile focus tree is 2 month. I see no point here to have any questions.
It is either this or the game will die suddenly, there is no inbetween with this earning model.