The Hearts of Iron Megathread

So, some of the Polish Focus Trees for the new base game HOI 4 update seem a little... weird. To say the least.
As a Polish history student I must say that they aren't weird, the're just totally bonkers.
You can do updates the TNO way, adding in-depth internal mechanics which show the complex political, economic and social factors at play in different states

Or you can do it the Paradox way, adding meme paths which butcher a country's history and ignore it's entire potential.
 
Base game. Meme mod. Dead horse. WHY THE FUCK CAN'T PARADOX MAKE GOOD FOCUS TREES?
 
As a Polish history student I must say that they aren't weird, the're just totally bonkers.
You can do updates the TNO way, adding in-depth internal mechanics which show the complex political, economic and social factors at play in different states

Or you can do it the Paradox way, adding meme paths which butcher a country's history and ignore it's entire potential.

It's amusing that the equivalents to Focus Trees they've been adding in their other games are more closely aligned with history than those in HOI4. The EU4 mission trees represent the general historical ambitions of the country in question, while the HOI4 focus trees go down every conceivable ideological path, no matter how unjustified.


I'm mostly pissed that every time a new patch comes out, the base gets made a bit more bare.

As someone who hasn't been able to get the new expansion for each new game, it makes me not even want to play as I'm missing the "intended" experience. At least HOI4 mods are generally safe from needing the expansions to work properly!
 
honestly i could care less about focus tree insanity when they're adding trens
 
BTW what I have heard is that, while Burgundy is getting a rework, it's "just" a facelift to make it easier to play without a working knowledge of A̴̮̖̬̰͚͕̖̫̯̰̭̮̱͂͠Ŗ̴͔̖̯͎͎͙̫̘̤̙̋̑̈́̈́̽̊͊͂̐̔͊̐̀͘͜͝͝Y̵̢̧̪͔̲̫̹͙͕̼̭̯̣̽ͅA̴̧̢̰̪͍̮̪̰͕̬͖̯̺͛͋̀̈́͆̽ͅN̶̨̝̣͎̬͓̄̌ ̸̰͈̯͔̺̪̹͕̅̄͑̉̌̅̂̇̂̃̚͠͝B̴̡̟͈͕̟̀̓̉́͒́͗͌͊̒́L̷̖͐̑̒̿̉̉̓͋͘͝A̷̧͇̝̰̜̜̤̝͕̱͕͉̬͇͊͐͂͗̍̕C̵̮̘̟̺̯͙̜̪͎̳͕̹̳̺͑̒K̶̖̙̠͚̰͇̝͙̖̅͒̽͌͆̑̆͜ͅ ̶͎̺̫̪͉̬̠̯̹̈̏̓̈́͒M̶̡̧̡̨͚̝̘͈͚̯͓̙̻̩̹͉̏́͆͛͆̏̑͌̚̕ͅĄ̴̗͖͕̬̳̞̥́́̉͐͑̃̑̍̋G̶̛̟͉̾̃͆̎͊͊̚͘͝͝͝Į̵̧̢̛̛̩͓̺͔̗̈͂̋̎̀̽̈́͑̚͠͝C̸͖̠̲̜̦̳͉̳̤̰̃̃͆̑͜͠.

The lore and shape of Burgundy is staying intact AFAIK. Just less Galaxy Brained mechanics.
 
What's so bad about map-painting, anyway? The only major Paradox line that isn't fundamentally about that is CK.

(Victoria no longer counts as "major" and will continue to not count until 3 comes out.)
 
By the way, the next major EaW update, "The Two Eagles", has dropped. It features a revamp of Wingbardy, a multi-stage revamp and additions to Republican Aquileia, focus trees and events for Francistria and Tolouse, and a new country called "Tarrin" with its own focus tree and events that can break away from Francistria.
 
I'll believe that when I see it. Yeah, they'll be announcing a new PDS game, but people wanting it to be Vicky 3 doesn't mean it'll be Vicky 3.
 
What's so bad about map-painting, anyway? The only major Paradox line that isn't fundamentally about that is CK.

(Victoria no longer counts as "major" and will continue to not count until 3 comes out.)

A lot of people (including yours truly) like the roleplay aspect of Paradox games. Sure, you could probably conquer the entirety of Europe in EU but why would you when acting realistically provides more of a challenge and is more interesting?
 
Yeah, I'm a fan of roleplaying stuff much more. Map-painting is for when I get bored of the story I'm improvising in my head. Usually I have some goal, like making some alternate history empire (e.g. Byzantine Empire survives in EU, Ottomans in Victoria, etc).
 
Yeah, I'm a fan of roleplaying stuff much more. Map-painting is for when I get bored of the story I'm improvising in my head. Usually I have some goal, like making some alternate history empire (e.g. Byzantine Empire survives in EU, Ottomans in Victoria, etc).

Same. As an example, having communism liberate the world (with tanks, the well known tool for consensual liberation. :V) is only fun if there's actually, like, at least a bit of narrative to it.
 
That's why Divergences of Darkness was fun. It gave a lot of events and decisions to each nation that made them feel unique. There was a goal to your conquests and influence, and once you accomplished that goal the game remarked on it. Plus there was a lot more multicultural states with their own flavour. Forming the Franco-Italian Empire, aka Transalpina, is one of the more unique experiences in Victoria 2. It's great.
 
I mainly like the political aspects of it. Probably why the CK series and Vic2 are my favorite paradox games. I play Hoi4 a lot, obviously, but only for the politically detailed mods.
 
So question, realistically speaking how stable and sustainable with the One State from Red Flood actually be? Could a state that's literally hellbent on destroying individuality and turning people into some machine like collective realistically last that long?
 
So question, realistically speaking how stable and sustainable with the One State from Red Flood actually be? Could a state that's literally hellbent on destroying individuality and turning people into some machine like collective realistically last that long?

With the amount of control the State wants to hold over their citizenry, it would be nothing short of a miracle that it either doesnt collapse or Gustav doesn't get assassinated or couped for longer than a year, let alone last longer than that or apply itself on all of Russia. Even the state Gustav's project is based off of, the One State in the book We, only controls a single city that is on the brink of collapse by the end of it. Not to mention that Yellow Russia is an unstable powder keg to begin with.
 
So question, realistically speaking how stable and sustainable with the One State from Red Flood actually be? Could a state that's literally hellbent on destroying individuality and turning people into some machine like collective realistically last that long?
As a general rule, virtually all the right-wing countries in Red Flood would be completely nonfunctional basket cases because they're run by people who operate on moon logic and magical thinking and very often are run by people who have active severe mental illnesses such as vivid hallucinations or clearly defined separate personalities that have no continuity of memory between them. And even the mentally healthy ones tend to have ideologies that are the stuff of absolute crankery with the scale of sanity starting at "even the Iron Guard would side-eye this" and descending into "F A S H P R I M G A N G".

The sanest path for France is basically the SS' wet dream of an agrarianist fascist neopagan state and everything gets unspeakably worse and more esoteric from there.
 
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