Hearts of Iron IV

[frunk]

Am I missing something, or is the air assignments interface really clunky?  It's kind of a pain to find units and shuffle them around or have them do stuff (click on airfield, click on airwing, right click? on region, find airwing in region list, click to give mission).  Carriers also seem to have the same thing going on, except it's sort of a mix of the naval and air UI.  Everything is run through little icons all over the map, then somewhat randomly located windows that open.

It's a little, yeah.  The mission choice seems to be sticky though, so if you are just moving to a new region it's not as bad.

[Josephus]

Am I missing something, or is the air assignments interface really clunky?  It's kind of a pain to find units and shuffle them around or have them do stuff (click on airfield, click on airwing, right click? on region, find airwing in region list, click to give mission).  Carriers also seem to have the same thing going on, except it's sort of a mix of the naval and air UI.  Everything is run through little icons all over the map, then somewhat randomly located windows that open.

The interface is pretty clunky all around. Even removing, finding, merging armies seems excessively complicated. If I click on a division from the army screen you would think it would take you to that army on the map--but no, I still have to look at the map and try to find it. I also can never tell when my armies are actually deployed on the ground. There's just, I don't know, some things missing with this game here and there.

[frunk]

On the top right you can click on the army symbols and it will take you to them.  If you want to go to a particular division you can right-click on it in the army list.  The top right buttons also have overviews for air/land/sea that are quite useful.

[DGuller]

I hate to say that I am missing the mini-ledger quite badly.  It makes me constantly go through tabs checking for potential problems.

[crazy canuck]

So I bought this after having a weird cold and I stayed home from work for a couple days because I felt miserable. Figured, why the hell not? I need something to do and their last game, Stellaris, didn't have any real game-breaking bugs and despite having little actual content, seems a solid enough base for an interesting and varied 4X game. Money decently spent, if not exactly a bargain.

I've played Hearts of Iron 4 for many hours now. The first several were just coming to grips with all the new systems and the UI. I've played mostly the United States because I figured it would be a good way to get to know the game. Safe, away from trouble, and the US typically has its hands full with every single one of the game's systems, from diplomacy, war in the air, on the ground, and at sea, and especially the mega importance this game puts on your economy. I like tooling around with supply chains and boy, does this game deliver on that front.

Every single aspect of war in this game is entirely dependent on your economy. What you build, how you set up your factories, the resource supply chain, and the logistics of getting yours tanks and your guns to the front, are all abstracted just enough to not make it feel automatic and therefore boring, but still require enough forethought and skill to make it challenging. Even as the US I feel like I need to produce a hundred different things but I only have enough resources to focus on some of them, to the detriment of others. The technology tree also ties into this; you only have a few slots so what you choose matters as it dictates what you can build, which dovetails nicely into the army division builder.

The division builder follows this same overall concept of "feel just right"  level of micro versus macro. I can easily build whatever the fuck I want, dependent of course on what you have available to you. Regardless of how easy it is, i still feel like the choices I made in the tech tree matter, and when I press the Train button that when my production and supply chains go to work filling out what I designed in the division builder. It's simple in its complexity and once you get it it's so intuitive that I felt like an idiot ever questioning this system at all. Seeing your little armies kitted out in gear you built especially for them and seeing how they fare makes me feel like my decisions matter. That's really, really good in a video game.

The diplomacy is less well fleshed out, and i wish the game would show better feedback in certain areas, like air combat and sea battles, but the system, as a whole, works, and works brilliantly. There does appear to be a bunch of little bugs in the game (for instance, I retooled a production queue once to a new fighter but it still kept on producing the old obsolete fighter) but I know P'dox will fix these. The AI is half challenging and half wonky. Sometimes it appears to have a brilliant time pushing your shit in and sometimes it leaves whole fronts undefended. These are things I also know will be improved upon.

To end, basically this is the most interesting and fully fleshed out AT RELEASE video game P'dox has ever put out. It's engaging. I'm always doing something, whether it's retooling factories or researching technology or browsing the focus tree or assembling armies with an easy to use front and attack order. And I always feel like what I decide matters. This is a far cry from Stellaris which is competent but utterly uninteresting at the moment. Hearts of Iron 4 has actually hooked me in a way a video game rarely has. I foresee countless hours coming up with new divisions and production chains and new ways to push Germany's shit in.

It is a good game. At $30 using the promo code on GMG it's a fucking steal. If you want, wait a couple patches. But buy it eventually.

Thanks for that.  I will get the game based on this and trust Paradox will deal with all the other issues people are talking about.

[Josephus]

It is a good game. At $30 using the promo code on GMG it's a fucking steal. If you want, wait a couple patches. But buy it eventually.
[/quote]

Thanks for that.  I will get the game based on this and trust Paradox will deal with all the other issues people are talking about.
[/quote]

You can't go wrong CC. You've been around a while, you know how it all works. There's a few issues, but it will all be looked at in time (and other issues created )

I've been playing about an hour a day since Monday, and other than some annoying interface issues and some buggy shit, I've been enjoying it

[Zanza]

I played the tutorial with Italy now and conquered Ethiopia and Yugoslavia. I got Albania from a National Focus event. So far so good. The battleplan system works reasonably well although micro-managing seems to help a lot to get encirclements etc.

Not sure if I understood yet how the navy works. Is there a reason why I should not just put all of my ships in a massive stack like in other Paradox games?

Air support is also not particularly transparent. I am not sure how much (if any) effect my fighters and bombers have. You sometimes see a small icon in land battles, but that's about it.

The economy system seems to be much better than HoI2, although I don't understand why I am not able to stockpile oil. I will obviously run out as Italy...

[FunkMonk]

The interface and battle feedback definitely needs some work.

Still, naval battles are fun to look at when they're happening, even if it's just looking at little shapes on the screen move nearer to each other with little arrows showing who is attacking who. I watched USS Washington blow away half the battleship line of the main Japanese fleet by itself and I erupted in a cheer. 

[FunkMonk]

I hate to say that I am missing the mini-ledger quite badly.  It makes me constantly go through tabs checking for potential problems.

I agree. This game really, really needs a ledger.

I miss ledger 

[Berkut]

But, seriously, I'm about to put this game away and wait for a patch.  There are just a bit too many game-breaking bugs or design decisions at the moment.  Having no control over your borders, having clusterfuck borders after some countries capitulate, an AI that just can't figure out how to attack across the straits, it's just so many things that are obviously not working right.  My guess is that this game would be a lot more finished if D-Day happened on September 6.

First Paradox game then?

I think Paradox as of late has actually cleaned up their act when it comes to game releases, and no longer released games in their alpha or beta stage.  But with HOI IV, and from what it sounds like, Stellaris, they took a big step back.

I can't comment on HOI IV since I didn't buy it because of, well, HOI III, but I would not at all agree that Stellaris was in alpha or beta at release. The game was completely playable.

[Zanza]

The user interface is poor. How do I assign a ship to an existing fleet? If I try, it tells me to rebase my ship to the same naval base. Once I figured out how to do that, it told me that I can't join them because they are still not in the same area or whatever. Fuck it.

Adding divisions to armies, finding out where your fighters are etc. is all not done intuitively or easily. The UI really needs work.

[MadBurgerMaker]

For the army divisions, select the division you want to add, then right click on the army.  Then you have to like....assign it to a front (which you shouldn't have to do). 

[Josephus]

Playing as UK. No historical option. I decided no peace in our time and guaranteed Czechoslovakia. We went to war, but there was a coup in Germany. Hitler was killed and Germany got mired in a civil war, which is making the war somewhat easier. Still enjoying it. Italy is holding out. That said, there are, as have said, strange UI issues. Frequently I rebase planes, but can't seem to issue orders to them. Very annoying. For some reason if I upgrade my planes, then any new planes go towards upgrading the old. I have no option of keeping the old ones active (sending them to the

There's other nitty gritty issues. But so far it's fun.

[Josephus]

Couple things I can't figure out.  I can't seem to be able to plan naval invasions . I'm on Malta and want to to attack Sicily. The tooltip says to right click on highlighted area, but the only highlighted ports are ones France, my ally, owns. It wonl't let me naval invade anywhere.

Two; Captured airfields. Why can't I use them?

[FunkMonk]

For naval invasions you have to click the home port from which the invasion embarks, then click the enemy provinces you want to invade. Then the arrow should pop up and you assign divisions to that plan. It should take like 70 days or something like that to fully plan. Also, you need naval supremacy along the sea zones to the target provinces. And you need high enough amphibious assault tech for the number of divisions you assign to the plan. If you have done this stuff though then it's bugged for you.

All of this important info is only available in the game via tool tips, which is dumb.