1633

About China not building divisions, the latest patch notes (https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/hoi4-ironclad-1-6-2-beta-patch-checksum-b3b2.1160282/page-24) have:

  • The Chinese AI will no longer try to reserve rifles for the showdown with the hated enemy no.1 (Nationalists/Communists) while at war with hated enemy no.2 (Japan)
1634

OK plan thus far before game start (will update with bold as I come to new decisions that I make):

Focus Tree:

2. Finish the Five Year Plan
3. Armament Effort
4. Stalin Constitution
5. Positive Heroism
6. Progress Cult
7. Socialist Science
8. Extra Research Slot
9. Socialist Realism
10. Improve Rail Network
12. Aviation Cult
13. Transpolar Flight
14. Great Purge
15. Rehabbed Military
16. Military Rehab
17. An Ocean Going Navy
18. Found the PCDI
19. Anti-Fascist Diplomacy
20. Improve Stalin Line
21. Lessons of War
22. Research City Experiment
23. Diversify the Program
24. Closed City Network
25. Switch to Construction Engineering Focus (or should I do a different continuous focus at this point)?

Research Order:

  1. Construction I
  2. Basic Machine Tools
  3. Electronic Mechanical Engineering
  4. Mechanical Computing
  5. Concentrated Industry
  6. Excavation I
  7. Radio
  8. PM M1910
  9. BT7 LightTank
  10. Construction II
  11. Concentrated Industry II
  12. Anti-Tank Gun
  13. Improved Machine Tools
  14. Excavation II
  15. Interwar Artillery
  16. T-32 Medium Tank
  17. Improved Equipment Conversion
  18. Maintenance Company I
  19. Logistics Company
  20. Fuel Refining II
  21. Land Doctrine - Superior Firepower
    22. DP & RM-38
    23. Computing Machine
    24. Improved Infantry Equipment I
    25. Air Doctrine - Operational Integrity

Military Law & Govt:

1. War Economy
2. Captain of Industry
3. Stalingrad Tractor Factory
4. Free Trade ??? (skipped as unsure)
5. Tula Arms Factory
6. Okmo Heavy Tank
7. MiG Design
8. Rokossovsky

Civ Factory:

Will make 40 Civ factories after trade available. Then switch to make 5 Docks (to increase convoy production), then switch to military factories.

Military Factories:

  • 11 to infantry
  • 3 Support
  • 3 Towed Artillery
  • 3 Light Tank
  • 3 Motorized
  • 5 Fighter

Docks:

  • 4 to convoys (increase to 7 when new docks are built)
  • 1 to Destroyers to general reserve
  • 1 to Subs to general reserve

Other:

  • Blocking trade ports to Black Sea, Baltic Sea, and Bering Sea.
  • Trickling in 200/month infantry & 10 units/month biplanes to Spain
  • Sent volunteer troops to China
  • Began lend-lease of 100/month infantry and 10/month planes to China.
1635

As the USSR, I’d set your entire dockyard production to convoys and otherwise just let it be. You’ll have several hundred by the outbreak of war and so long as you didn’t declare early on Japan, you can just forbid the naval zones in the west and let supplies come in via Vladivostok – well out of reach of U-Boots.

I’d also consider moving the purge up in your list to immediately after the extra research slot. If you get unlucky with Germany declaring an early war before you’re able to complete Lessons of War during your conflict with Finland, you’ll still be hip-deep in serious penalties as panzers roll across Ukraine.

1636

Oh wow that’s cool! So how do I do this? What do you mean by early war? Do they sometimes attack before mid-1941? Also just updated to latest beta. Thanks @MikeJ

1637

Instructions: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/hoi4-dev-diary-naval-access.1114924/

Provided you have ‘historical’ mode on, they’ll generally follow the correct timeline but it’s not a guarantee. Plus, it’s pretty easy to screw with things such that the AI might take a different choice somewhere.

1638

Yep I always play with historical. Maybe after I win as all the major powers I will then go ahistorical. Ok loading things up to give a run! Thanks for all the help. So excited! I’m sure you all may spot some bad very decisions I make along the way. I’ll save for each major change I do, so if I really screw something up in build or research order I can go back and fix it.

BTW how much do I need to ban for them to ship stuff to Eastern ports of Russia? Like every single Black Sea, Baltic Sea, and Bering Sea port zone? Or even more outside of the ports?

1639

How you do strike-through text in this forum?

1641

< s > text < / s > (Minus the spaces)

Text

1642

Should I be going concentrated or dispersed industry?

1643

Concentrated. The Germans aren’t big on strategic bombing and you want every scrap of productivity out of your factories.

1644

Cool thanks! Things are well underway. Spanish civil war going a bit rough.

If you see a mistake in my research order as I do them, please let me know. I’m crossing off ones I finish and bolding the ones I’m researching.

1645

Some numbers from my UK game:

Country Losses Losses to UK Kills of UK Manpower Policy
Italy 5.76M 5.2M 160K 500K All Adults Serve
Germany 5.37M 4.1M 117K 3M All Adults Serve
Nat. Spain 3.33M 3.1M 82K 59K All Adults Serve
Japan 1.24M 926K 33K 6.5M Scraping the Barrel
Vichy France 555K 430K 24K 400K Service by Requirement
Axis Total 16.35M 13.8M 416K

Allied losses total 1.66M. The UK has 885K manpower with Extensive Conscription in effect.

Italy and Germany aren’t as close to manpower collapse as I’d hoped, and even then they would certainly have many more divisions than I can field. Where are you, USA?

1646

Should I take Free Trade or leave it at Export Focus? Hard to tell if you come out ahead with Free Trade or not, especially since that’s a lot of political points to go that route then have to switch back.

Also, not sure if I’m interpreting this wrong, but does Improved Equipment Conversion speed up how fast you adapt to making new weaponry and stuff when you replace old stuff with the new version in the production window?

1647

I believe that’s solely for conversion between equipment variants, like Medium Tank 2 to Tank Destroyer 2/SP Artillery 2, or Fighter 3 to Fighter 3 mk2 (with whatever historical-ish names they have).

1648

OK that’s quite a bit different than I thought.

How can I quickly get their strength back up (the little orange bar)?

20190328195040_1

1649

Crap, the forum says I maxed out the number of edits I can do in my post further up above. So I guess I will have to continue it here:

Research:

  1. Land Doctrine - Delay
  2. Radio Detection
  3. Air Doctrine - Fighter Baiting
  4. Encryption
  5. LAGG-3 fighter
  6. M1940 107mm Artillery
  7. Construction III
  8. Concentrated Industry III
  9. Engineer Company II
  10. PPSh-41
  11. Excavation III
  12. Advanced Machine Tools
  13. Anti-Air upgrade
  14. Anti-Tank upgrade
  15. Recon Company II
  16. Air Doctrine - Low Echelon Support
  17. Improved Computing Machine
  18. Decimetric Radar
  19. Land Doctrine - Integrated Support
  20. BTR M1941
  21. Encryption - Cyclic Permutations
  22. Air Doctrine - Dispersed Fighting
  23. T-34 Medium Tank
  24. Land Doctrine - Regimental Combat Teams
  25. DS-39 & 82-PM-41
  26. Improved Artillery Upgrade I
  27. Improved Decimetric Radar
  28. Maintenance Company II
  29. Air Doctrine - Operational Destruction
  30. M-8-6 Rocket Artillery
  31. Land Doctrine - Mechanized Focus
  32. Construction IV
  33. Concentrated Industry IV
  34. M42 45mm Anti-Tank Gun
  35. M1940 25 mm AA
  36. Air Doctrine - Fighter Veteran Initiative
  37. Excavation IV
  38. Land Doctrine - Centralized Fire Control
  39. Improved Artillery Upgrade II
  40. Improved Anti-Tank II
  41. Improved Anti-Air II
  42. Rocket Artillery Upgrade I
  43. Improved Infantry Equipment II
  44. KV-1
  45. Advanced Computing Machine
  46. Air Doctrine - Naval Strike Torpedo Tactics
  47. Engineer Company III
  48. SG-43 Goryunov & 120-PM-3
  49. Land Tactics - Forward Observer
  50. Encryption - Pulse Code Modulation
  51. PTRD
  52. Improved Anti-Air II
  53. Improved Anti-Tank II
  54. Rocket Artillery Upgrade II
  55. Air Doctrine - Infiltration Bombing

Politics:

  1. Boris Shaposhnikov (Military Theorist)
  2. Mikhail Kalinin (Popular Figurehead)
  3. Kilment Voroshilov (Army Drill Specialist)
  4. Konstantin Verhsinin (Ground Support Expert)
  5. Ivan Konev (Concealment)
  6. Aleksander Vasilevsky (Army Regrouping)

Focus:

  • An Oceangoing Navy instead of Lessons of War due to date
  • Found the PCDI
  • Anti-Fascist Diplomacy
  • Lesson of War
  • Research City Experiment
  • Diversify the Program
  • Closed City Network
  • Improve the Stalin Line
  • Construction Engineering “Continuous Focus”
1650

AFAIK, it takes just a few days if you have the equipment/manpower and a supply route large enough. But then, I don’t see it get down so consistently across an army if those are appropriate.

1651

Note that when you are about to confirm changes to a division template if you hover it will tell you how much equipment this will require. This information is also available when switching some divs to a new template.

1652

Ohhh I never hovered to check before. Will do that. Thanks!
This is how Production/Construction look right now (July 1938). See any mistakes in here?

20190328202349_1
20190328202349_1.jpg1700×1074 659 KB

…and Logistics breakdown:

20190328202624_1
20190328202624_1.jpg533×787 145 KB

1653

Damn you frog. You’re making me install this game again. :D