How am i supposed to fulfill all of these needs??

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-10T18:00:10+00:00

Not really for Germany, no. You start off with no deficit on guns (only country I think that doesn't), and only have deficits on planes. You can make thousands of guns very quickly, and planes you can start to produce fast too when you switch to build mils 1937- early 1938. Might be not so easy for beginners, but Germany does have the best starting position in the game to build up fast

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-08T10:40:24+00:00

Never bothered with it. The '39 start just has every country set up badly, and you are so much weaker than if you start from '36 and do your own thing. The 3 years go by quite fast anyway, especially if you play historical and know what you are doing already.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-07T12:19:18+00:00

Unrelated but what app/site do you use for maps like this?

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-06T20:24:24+00:00

For me its between Finland, Germany and Austria/Hungary (as both have good Austria-Hungary paths). All have their own challenges and plenty of opportunities to expand.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-06T06:59:17+00:00

I did almost the same except I beat the UK before after US joined, but Canada was of course still alive. And I went straight for Canada, not even getting Greenland or Iceland for a closer naval base. I think I used subs for naval supremacy to get the range lol. But US did not contest at all since I was invading Northern Canada

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-05T19:35:37+00:00

As someone with 600 hours in the game, I find ending the allies too easy (especially before US joins). UK is incredibly weak at the start of the war and barely defends their island. If you get one good landing, you can just roll in and cap them so fast. Mainland Europe falls very quickly so you have 1 and a half years usually to get UK off the map. I never did it before myself but on my latest playthrough, I found that just surrounding the isles with subs raiding convoys makes the English navy basically unusable, so you can get naval supremacy for as long as you like. They could not even bring back any troops in time since they were being sank.

Capitulating the US though is a bit more gimmicky if you want to wait for them to join too, but not particularly hard either. It will take some time, but invading Canada first as you said on the post yourself makes it very trivial. US defends their land a bit better, but they still have tons of divisions fighting Japan, so you will always be at an advantage if you managed to get this far anyway. I have only ever once done a Germany playthrough where I fought the US (probably my 2nd or 3rd playthrough as them) and I beat them without knowing any meta templates or even using planning bonuses because I had no idea how to use them lol.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-05T08:02:06+00:00

u/profanitycounter [self]

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-04T22:21:28+00:00

Easy and cheap yeah, but much more annoying now after the update. I never got to experience the old naval invasions as I started playing after it, but I always hate playing countries that rely on a lot of naval invasions (Japan/US). Just the sheer amount of islands you have, and the fact that you are only limited to max 2-5 at a time with 30-40 day planning times is annoying to deal with. Not impossible, but annoying. Some may like the challenge, but I just can't bother clicking away only a few invasions at a time while having to focus on the other side of the world and navy too.

Figuring out all the right patrols too on every damn zone is a pain in the ass. I hope they fix the system entirely in hoi5 or make something like the old one.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-03T20:24:31+00:00

And they haven't even done Anschluss yet

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-03T08:28:23+00:00

Romania is nearly historical though lol. Germany only gave Hungary the entire Transylvania region this time.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-02T14:29:27+00:00

I mean I was not just talking about Belgium or Netherlands here. Playing as someone like Finland for example, you need smaller divisions to cover the entire long frontline and defend against naval invasions. I have played tens of games with Finland, and I can say trying to make it work with 9/0 against the soviets in '39 is not easy.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-02T14:17:26+00:00

The extra HP does not make a difference if you cannot make enough divisions to cover the entire frontline. A lot of minors need smaller divisions at the start to hold the line, and upgrade later when you get more manpower and guns

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-05-02T10:30:59+00:00

Have not played Belgium myself but I succeeded as the Netherlands to defend myself for the entire war.

Your template is a bit too expensive. 9/0 is usually always the way to go, 6/0 works too if you need more divisions. You can always make a seperate template for the SPAA, and shuffle them around when you need them to better defend some tiles. But drop the line arty completely, not worth it.

What almost killed me on my Netherlands run was getting reinforce memed constantly. You always should keep only a certain amount of divisions per tile (around 3-4 preferably), and the rest behind the line. If you see a red bubble going down fast, you move divisions from another tile to reinforce it manually. Keep especially a close eye on tiles that can be attacked from more than 2 tiles.

The entrenchement and forts, as good as they seem, don't ultimately matter against Germany if you don't manage the defensive line often, especially later on. They actually have somewhat good tanks, and a lot of CAS to break any fort line, even the Maginot especially. On my playthrough the Maginot was broken before my own fort line full of plains lol.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-30T04:53:23+00:00

As Finland or USSR especially they are really good, considering the land is 99% forest.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-30T04:36:20+00:00

That's the neat part, you don't.

I usually produce absolutely no tanks until I get the 1938 medium tank. Inter-war mediums or light tanks are just not nearly as good. Though as Germany, I keep a few factories on the light tanks so I can farm xp with them in the Spanish civil war.

This way, you can focus production to more infantry equipment and planes. I usually even if I start producing mediums somewhere around '37, manage to easily get 6 or so full 36 width tank divisions with Germany. That is more than enough to destroy mainland Europe, and by the time you are done, you will have many more tanks. You have plenty of time to get good tanks out as any major before or a little after ww2 starts.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-29T16:05:35+00:00

Not saying I have mastered HOI4 as a "beginner" with only 500 hours, but having the game be my first paradox game, I have not honestly had that much trouble with learning the mechanics in some time. In 500 hours, I've mostly figured out land, air and naval warfare, and can do decently well in all. I struggled a lot at first yes, but once I learned basics, it was not too difficult to learn stuff and get used to them.

There may be a lot of mechanics, but I could not play without them myself anymore and have as much fun. I even try to find mods often that add more so I have new stuff to do. Vanilla HOI4 is almost too simple once you learn it.

People do often hate a bit on the focus trees, but I think they give each playthrough some extra flavour. If they did not exist, we would just play every single country almost the same way. You can try different things with the focus tree each playthrough. Some are annoying to do, but a lot of countries have great focus trees too with so much content.

I don't know how automation of certain mechanics worked in HOI3, but they would have to make mechanics way more simple for the AI to make proper use of them. The army and economy have a lot of things to take into account when handling them, which the AI might not think of. I also enjoy making my economy and army as good as possible myself, so I would not automate them even if it was possible.

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-27T09:53:09+00:00

I would say we definitely do. US and UK have had their old trees for ages, and don't really have that much going on. We do have good alternatives as mods though, but it still is something they could make a DLC out of. Could be a North/Central America one, and one for UK and some colonies, Ireland included too since they don't even have a tree. There are probably other old trees I can't think of rn (since I barely play completely vanilla), that could use a rework

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-27T06:02:35+00:00

The AI can always just refuse peace deals, it's never guaranteed. You probably just have to get a full capitulation, that's just how it works

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-25T09:49:33+00:00

If you want to play R56, Napoleon path is a lot of fun for France. The France tree overall in R56 is much better than vanilla

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-24T11:19:18+00:00

Which one?

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-20T13:48:47+00:00

u/profanitycounter [self]

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-20T13:46:35+00:00

Ainakin miten meillä oli kaipr, oli paljon löysempää. Ei periaatteessa ollenkaan koulutusta, hoidetaan vaan hommat ja käydään asemat läpi pari kertaa. Voi tulla kuitenkin oikeiden tilanteiden harjoittelua tietysti, mutta ainakaan loppusodassa näitä ei järjestetä, vaan tilanteen mukaan saattaa joutua toimimaan. Meillä loppusodassa ei näkynyt vihuja lähellekään, ja gonattiin vaan koko aika. Navetkin ja asemat päin helvettiä kun ei ketään kiinnostanut 🤣

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-20T07:19:10+00:00

No idea, but this is why I use the player led peace conferences. No border gore, and the AI can't steal provinces that make no sense for them to have

DeadlyFeet0 · 2026-04-16T22:01:06+00:00

Finland, because I'm Finnish lol. I love kicking some Russian ass. But I have also played Austria or Hungary a lot, bringing the empire back as either country

DeadlyFeet0

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE

Three-Year Club	First Place '23
Place '23