Hearts of Iron 2 - Page 3

JTF-2 · #51 (**permalink**) May 13th, 2006, 01:13 PM

I wont be playing anyone for awhile. As it's a lot harder than I thought LOL.

I need lots of practice. I can't wait tho...woohoo

Jaeger · #52 (**permalink**) May 13th, 2006, 02:52 PM

Hopefully I'll get the game on Monday. I have played the original game quite a bit, but the 'new' game seems more fun.

Ron · #53 (**permalink**) May 17th, 2006, 04:53 PM

I think it would be quite difficult to organize a time when any of us can get together to play.
But i'm glad you guys are enjoying the game. Feel free to let loose with any game questions.

Don't be embarassed about asking questions here or in the game's forum...i've asked my share of basic questions...and actually i am still asking questions and i've had this game for almost a year LOL

Hmm some quick hints.
always have an equal amount of capital ships to escorts.
(CV, BB, CA) = capital
(CL, DD) = escort
So 2 carriers should have at least 2 destroyers or light cruisers.

According to the rank of commanders they can only command a certain amount of troops. Say your leader can command a max of 4 units but he is commanding 6. If those 6 divisions get into combat there will be penalties.
Also when battling in one province the highest ranking leader of the units involved takes overall command of the battle.
So if you have 2 leaders attacking province X. Each commander can handle 4 divisions each. If both commanders attack Province X at once there are 8 divisions involved and thus there is a penalty. One of the 2 commanders will need to have a rank capable of handling at least 8 divisions.

If you need to move units quite a ways away, rather than marching them you can use strategic deployment.
Select the unit you want to move, hold down Ctrl, and right click into the province you want to go to. A pop will spring and should giove the option to strategiclly redeploy there (so long as you control that province)
Strategic redeployment is most time faster over a long distance.

You need to declare war or be attacked in order to attack someone.
To ally with someone you probably need to have close to +200 relations.

If you right click on the sliders in the production screen it locks them.

Avoid dissent (your dissent level is the % up top next to the flame icon.)
You lower that by making sure there is enough allocated to consumer goods. Having enough money allocated to consumer goods causes you to make money and lower dissent.

Don't research technology too far ahead of it's stated year. If you research something 1 year and more before it stated date research is slowed.

Wow there's so much...there needs to be a class for this game LOL

[ 17. May 2006, 12:11 PM: Message edited by: Ron ]

JTF-2 · #54 (**permalink**) May 17th, 2006, 08:08 PM

Hey thanks.

I have a question!!

As Canada, I have moved my troops to the UK. I want to attack France (Germany) but they wont' let me...How come?

Ron · #55 (**permalink**) May 18th, 2006, 04:58 PM

Well if you are attacking from the UK you have the channel between you and France.
Just like on D-day you need to load those troops into transports and amphib assault into an occupied coastal province that has a beach. (most coastal provinces have a beach, some don't, click on a province and you should see an icon telling you if it has a beach or not.)
You need 1 transport per land divisions, whether it be infantry, armoured, calvalry etc.

Some things to be careful with amphib assaults.

-Be sure to escort transports, they are very susceptible to any type of attack. If one goes down you loose the transport and whatever was on it permanenantly.

If possible, land at a beach that isn't occupied by an enemy unit.

Use Battleships, Carriers and Heavy cruisers to do shore bombardment if you can. (this is only necessary if the province you are landing at actually has enemy troops in it)

If you attack an enemy province that has an enemy unit a battle will ensue. amphib assaults are pretty tough for the attacker. If you assault with regular infantry you will have penalties. Also if you land more than 7 divisions at once you get severe stacking penalties.
If you attack with marines there are no penalties or the penalties are minimal. If you attack with paratroopers penalties are minimal if any.

If you land marines, infantry or paratroopers make sure you have a fleet with transports available for each land unit attacking the province. If you are defeated the unit will retreat back to the transports and you'll be able to take them home to fisht another day. If however the transports went home before the battle ended all those units will be destroyed.

Any attacker will loose lots of their Organization level while attacking (that green bar on your units) If you have low or no Organization the units will be defeated almost immediatly or retreat. SO as soon as the beach falls try and have reserves offshore to immediatly land in the province when it falls to have fresh troops for defence. If there are enemy troops in the provinces bordering the one you successfully assaulted they probably will counterattack. If you only have the unorganized unit that captured the beach they surely will run away pretty quick.

JTF-2 · #56 (**permalink**) May 18th, 2006, 05:49 PM

wow...ummmm okay....lol

did not know that!!

I should wait a bit...as Canada has very little transports or marines.

Thaks for overwhelming me....lol

Ron · #57 (**permalink**) May 18th, 2006, 06:29 PM

Sorry [img]smile.gif[/img]

It is a bit overwhellming, but after a game or 2 you start getting the hang of things.

I think i learned a lot by playing nationalist China, A game as them provides you quick action, the war is mostly land based (no need for transports etc) so you just need to worry about the army and air force, your first enemies are relatively weaker than you but then you have Japan to take on as a challenge.

Don't be discouraged if you loose. Everyone looses this game at some point and sometimes continue to do so. It's just that the AI is pretty good.

Have fun.

Keep us posted on what happens

Jaeger · #58 (**permalink**) May 18th, 2006, 07:08 PM

Quite different from the first HOI game (thank God, the AI was awful.)

I do however find it difficult to keep tabs on battles. On the HOI it was just to hoover over the fighting units and the results would pop up. Now I have to 'click' them to see whats going on (am I doing something wrong?)

Also if I select units to do support fire, it seems that they defeat the enemy befor my 'strike force' enter the province. I have not found how to track the battle result for the supporting fire units..

In short HELP!!!

Ron · #59 (**permalink**) May 18th, 2006, 08:43 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Jaeger:
Quite different from the first HOI game (thank God, the AI was awful.)

I do however find it difficult to keep tabs on battles. On the HOI it was just to hoover over the fighting units and the results would pop up. Now I have to 'click' them to see whats going on (am I doing something wrong?)

Also if I select units to do support fire, it seems that they defeat the enemy befor my 'strike force' enter the province. I have not found how to track the battle result for the supporting fire units..

In short HELP!!!

I never played the first HOI so i can't compare it myself. i do find it rather difficult to follow battles as well on a large scale. With naval, aircraft and ground units going at the same time battles can get lost.

First of all, when war is on i rarely if ever have game speed faster than "normal." If there is a lot of combat going on i select slow or very slow. Then under options i select the setting that creates a pop up and pauses the game everytime an airunit gets into combat. This way a combat occurs, a pop up comes up i select gio to and there is the battle. Air combat seems to conclude fairly fast and since air units take heavy losses at time you want to be aware of status of units during and immediatly after battle.

I do the exact same thing for naval combat.

For land combat i only have the game pause and have a pop up come up if the enemy attacked me because i want to know immediately where i'm getting attacked and attempt counterattacks.

All the pop ups get a little annoying if you have a lot going on but generally it seems best to me.

I'm not really sure about the support attack problem you have. I don't really see what you mean by "it seems that they defeat the enemy befor my 'strike force' enter the province."

If you attack a province with 2 divisions and support it with 2 divisions then all 4 are engaged in the combat as if you had 4 attacking. the support unit remain where they are however and the attack units move forward. When the battle concludes in your favor combat is finished and now a bit of time has to elapse before your 2 attack units move into the province and the attacked units retreat. The 2 units that supported in the meantime are simply hanging out where they had been.
To follow this battle you can look at the battles screen up top and to the left, you'll see icons of a tank, airplane and i think a soldier face. next to them to the right you'll also see a cloud smoky looking thing. When any battle commences this icon lights up. when it lights up click on it and it will show where combat is. To get a more detailed report of battle click on the rectangle representing the battle.
Once you do this you will see a list of your forces in combat and the enemies, it'll show each unit icon, that units Organization level and stength. Also if you place the pointer over you list of units a small box will pop up showing whatever penalties or bonuses your units have. the same thing can be done with holding the pointer over the enemy units.

[ 18. May 2006, 03:53 PM: Message edited by: Ron ]

Ron · #60 (**permalink**) May 18th, 2006, 08:50 PM

JTF-2

Also try the nofog cheat. It eliminates the "fog of war" aspect of the game. Though the fog of war makes the game more challenging i think it is cheap. After playing the game with fog a few times i came to the conclusion that the computer AI knows exactly where my units are placed all the time anywhere and can do things that i, due to the fog can't or wouldn't do.

So i eliminate it figuring it levels the playing field.

To do the cheat do this:

Open up the game to where you see the world map or provinces and countries etc. You can pause the game if you like.
Press F12
a grey box will appear
type: nofog
then hit enter key
You should notice that all fogged out areas are now visible.
press F12 again to get rid of the box.

Jaeger · #61 (**permalink**) May 20th, 2006, 06:48 PM

Ron

Thank you for the input. I went to the Wikepedia link on one of the first pages of this thread.

I sorted out the combat box issue and knocke down the speed to below normal. The support attack now works fine since I fond that I had to activate the unit symbol to retreive battle stats.

I now play as britain. The shit just hit the fan (march 1940) and I am gering up for combat. Basically stall the germans in France, and capture the med.

A good advice to every learner of this game is to try the scenarios. I particulary liked the Desert adventure. It took me four tries before I got it right. But it was much better than most other scenarios on learning ground combat. Little resources, under gunned out maneouvered etc. I ended up with retreating all the way back to El alamein and put the fighters on Air superiority. Picketed the two provinces in front of el alamein and built a breakout force, and a reeinforcement group. The system has worked fairly well on other scenarios too. Basically I attack from multiple angles, send a reeinforcement unit to hold the new ground and blast on through with the breakout force. (these two groups cannot partake in the initial combat.) Doing this it is possible to rope off units.

JTF-2 · #62 (**permalink**) May 27th, 2006, 01:15 PM

Hey:

I have a newbie question. I started a GC with Canada (of course). But I can't declare war on anyone. NO ONE!! Thats no fun...what do I have to do...to lets say attack the U.S. or Spain, or Western Afirca, or even Brazil?

Thanks in advance

Ron · #63 (**permalink**) May 30th, 2006, 03:42 PM

Hey JTF

you're problem lies in Canada's political stats.
Canada i think is listed as Democratic. Democratic nations can't just declare war on any one they like. Only authoritarian nations can do that. (Germany, Soviet Union, Japan etc)
A nation needs a certain amount of Beligerance(click on a nation and you'll see it's beligerance level) in order for a Democratic nation to attack it. I'm not sure what that level is though.

Being that the US is traditionally an ally it will be hard to declare on them without a cheat.

Check out this website.
http://hoi2.nsen.ch/wiki/index.php/Cheat_Codes

That link will give you cheat codes for various things. For what you want you could try using an "acceptall" cheat that should allow you to delcare war, i think. there is another cheat that allows you to move the political sliders as far as you want, so you could make Canada an Authoritarian society, and then declare war all you want.

and lol, if you feel really goofy you can use the alienattack cheat and land aliens in the US haha!

Explore this website further too, there are other things in it you may find interesting or informative.

JTF-2 · #64 (**permalink**) May 30th, 2006, 04:07 PM

Hey thanks Ron!

JTF-2 · #65 (**permalink**) July 12th, 2006, 02:53 PM

WELL I annexed my 1st country...woohoo.

As Canada..i created a medium size but advanced army..and went to France to help out my buddies against Germany. I sent over about 15 divisions. So I waited...and waited...Germany never came....So I got bored...and attacked Norway...lol. It took me longer than expected..as there navy was bigger than mine..but I got them.
So now I'am going to sit there for a bit..and build up my airfocre more (as I lost some planes) and go after Sweedan..I think...wooho

I don't even know what I'm doing..but..it's a blast.
The game kicks ass

Ron · #66 (**permalink**) July 20th, 2006, 09:10 PM

Cool i'm glad you like it! I haven't played in a little while but the game is so addicting isn't it!

Joe · #67 (**permalink**) September 10th, 2007, 09:10 PM

I once played this game at a friend's house (Aka repulse here), but I did not like it. But, after reading this thread, I realized it was probably because I did not have enugh time to let it 'sink in', and now plan on getting it!

Joe · #68 (**permalink**) September 11th, 2007, 08:21 PM

Thanks to you lot im now £5.98 poorer! I just bought it!

Mussolini · #69 (**permalink**) September 11th, 2007, 08:55 PM

A very well spent 5.38 Pounds I must say!

Joe · #70 (**permalink**) September 12th, 2007, 03:09 PM

It is strange that some of the best games are cheap. Theres this one, and I got most of my games for less than £10.

Mussolini · #71 (**permalink**) September 12th, 2007, 03:41 PM

Well its a few years old i believe. Games go down in price every year.

tikilal · #72 (**permalink**) October 5th, 2007, 08:13 PM

I have this game... I have tried Germany, Poland, France, Japan once, US another time but never China... cant wait to get off work now. I would also be willing to try MP.