The AI force attacking is a good thing. It destroys their equipment and as seen the Soviets already couldn't resupply their troops. Them doing that basically destroyed those divisions. My question is: Does the AI merge units together to put them back to full strength?
Well i tried just holding out, and in 43 their ground forces were really mangled, but their air was absolutely crazy and eventually halted my push. So just attack ASAP.
They delete division to allow other division to get equipment sometimes, but I never understood what is triggering this behaviour. Sometimes they just don't do anything, sometimes you see their division number drop by 50 or 70 with no offensive on any direction.
Well, I tend to think that the forced attacks were a programmed AI weakness, because if AI was deffensive and not killing itself off, it would be more difficult, and boring. Sometimes I have built forts out of neccessity, AI stopped attacking, and I got stuck.
@@falkherbst5019 They force attack to relive an encirclement. Romania gave up beserabia and the AI thought they got encircled so they tried to free the land. (Even tho there wasn't any divisions there)
You dont need to get an aircraft designer early anymore. Simply upgrading your plane once whenever you do decide to pick it up post research is enough to transfer the bonus to your planes. That means you can start building them ASAP, upgrade them to max engine to get the bonus and then refit your planes when your efficiency is high.
It is worth it for the 15% research speed. Pair that up with Industry Liaisons spirit which gives another 15% and you can significantly reduce plane research speed.
First time I tried got both achievements. I think that the motorized tactic that you used actually made the game like 60% easier since its so much easier to encircle enemy divisions and you can rush the victory points.
I don't know... in my game allies were nonexistent (in Europe), and Axis were having 6k fighters I was not able to counter (+2k CAS + 1k Tac), and somehow after 18 months of unhinged nonstop attacks on all the front from Netherlands to Mukačevo they still had no lack of manpower, oil, resources or material, and whenever I have made a breakthru, there were 4 fresh divisions behind to counterattack... In such scenario I think less but armoured divisions would do a better job.
Man i just started playing HoI4 couple of months ago with my friends, and i have to say that you are by far the best channel on YT. Most of the other guys just abuse the game too much and don't properly explain some stuff that are not so clear to noobs like me, but you cover it all. Thanks for all of your hard work man!
If you do Lithuanian activist front before rooting out the iron wolves you will get 1% more recruitable pop the rest of the game. Also, VERY important, do not do rejoin railways until you have both poland and the other baltic states. If you wait it adds 1 infrastructure to all states cored... That being said, get royal reform while waiting on poland support and get the air designer first for faster research and better planes. Use the polish troops to take the other baltic states and then go to work on your economy and military buildup. It is ok to delay taking the baltic states a little, you want them to do the extra focuses to get more civs. If you move your capital be sure to check your railways and supply. If you go with the allies you can get negative % civs. Just lol You can justify and take Finland while pushing back the Soviets. They will join comintern on historical due to communism >30%. When you go after Germany green air is the key. I found having atleast 10 factories on both fighters and CAS while fighting the soviets and then increasing that to 20 each for Germany is enough. Without green air Germany will be difficult. After beating Germany, you should be able to puppet most of the Balkens, Germany, and Italy. Take the states you need. Then start justifing on Sweden. Guard Denmark against the Allies and do not call your allies into the war. During Peace deals makr sure you are puppeting states on your land borders. This makes it so you do not have to defend them later.
Any way to avoid fighting the allies over Sweden? I’m not very good at blitz and are worried I can’t take Norway and Sweden at the same time. Thoughts now is any chance you could join ally while at war with axis? That way maybe could, after puppet Germany and Italy, take over faction lead?
I tried that exact motorised template (the early version you showed, with no AT in the fifth support slot) with Germany, and it's really surprisingly good when combined with the Mobile Infantry branch of Mobile Warfare. It took some sacrifices and efficient management to keep everything supplied with fuel (in my case, I opted to do a No-Tank Germany), but two full armies of that template plus three armies of 9-1 infantry and CAS completely crushed the soviet union without a Panzer it sight. It couldn't directly face Soviet tanks, but that didn't matter much when I could just go around and quickly encircle all the tank resistance the motorised divisions ran into.
Did it twice so want to share some tips too 1) You can get *Lithuanian Activist front* before rooting out Iron wolf to get bonuses to manpower form that, each danger stage takes 100 days and this 70 days focus will drop the stage 2) You need only Latvian capital, but not Estonian 3) Don't bother with raising monarchist above 80, don't send any guns, they'll win almost instantly 4) Don't sleep on the *Forest Brothers* focus! It's +10% to everything in your core territory, but after uniting with Poland your cores will reach even into Ukraine, making the most important moments (initial holding and first pushes) easier 5) If you have some spare PP, advisor that gives non-core mp also makes Soviet wargoal longer to make, thus giving you time to build stuff, train more troops and take short focus (it changed from something like 230 days to 280, varies on world tension) 6) If you're struggling with holding back all soviet troops, when annexing Latvia leave the part on your border with SOV as your puppet 7) If Axis intervene, try to steal as much occupied territory from them as possible (temporarily join Axis to request territory transfer, don't join their wars), will make the next core focus (where you need to hold a bits of Germany easier). I also created different puppet states around my cores to make Axis stuck in the east or block them from me (like Moldova puppet blocks a big part of your lands from Romanians)
The Soviet war goal isn't too much of a concern since they'll probably do they "Send an ultimatum" focus, but it's indeed useful in the case they don't do it. Another big help would be making Supply Planes, people underestimate how OP they are if you have air superiority
@@satanhell_lord 1) You only get ultimatum when wargoal is about 95% ready, every time. AI is acting weird. 2) Planes were already nerfed in beta and probably will be nerfed again, plus it's not that easy to get air superiority against major, and later won't be much as needed
On point number 6 - do not do this - I think I staved off the war with the soviets for a bit by having a greater mass of troops on their border than bitter, but while I was waiting for Soviets to attack I realised around Feb 1940 that my puppet was gone and the soviets had a nice little dent into Latvia before the fighting had even begun. All the other points seemed to work well though.
When you're expanding early on like that, it's better to wait to do the first industry focus, because it'll give you 1 infrastructure in every single state you own (all of the baltics and poland)
Did it according to your guide, works perfectly with some of the comments on holding the industry focus. In the middle I was torn between going down German Investment focus for the +1 infra on all cores, or continue the politic focus for the consumer goods, but seems no biggies. One thing I did notice is there is a chance of not fighting the Allies to get the Baltic coast. Take Finland in the war with USSR (the Germans will do the heavy lifting from Norway). The Ally will invite you every 4-6 months since you start the war with Axis (oddly they don't accept applications), decline till you take Denmark and Norway. Hold Denmark and don't finish the war, and naval invade Oslo or build supply hub in the middle of Norway so you could push down the tile and get the whole thing. Once you joined Allies, not only any Democratic country you took will be liberated to them, you also somehow lose trade influence with British Malaya so you can't get any rubber! After you took both and there's only Sweden left, join the Allies and declare on Sweden. No one could kick you out and Sweden will join the Axis. Timing is essential though, since justify does expire and so does UK's invitation. So not a fool-proof method.
Pro Tip for anyone attempting this, hold the line. The AI likes slamming themselves into lines they view as easily defeatable, but it often fails to account for divisional quality. This means the Russians just grind their divisions on your line until eventually running out of supply or Manpower. It takes a bit longer, but its a very effective strategy if you don't feel comfortable on a blitz.
Thank you for the hints, it was very helpful. But still, a few comments based on experience with my playthru: - Fighters production - I was producing Fighters in 35 mils, and attacked in same time as the author did. If I am correct, in the video he has placed 1800 fighters over western Poland. I have placed there 3600 (max doctrine and 500xp on the fighter model), and I was smashed by 4800 Axis fighters, 1800 CAS a 1000 Tac. Waiting longer and accumulating fighters wouldn't probably help me, because he was producing probably more in all the countries combined, and I needed Allies not to invade Denmark (quite funny looking backwards, they didnt get out of Africa) - there was not a single allied plane over Europe all thru the war, all axis planes against me, and I was simply not able to outproduce all 5 axis countries - looking backwards, because I was not able to gain air superiority anyway with spending 1/3 of my production on fighters, I maybe might have done better giving up fighters production, and spending it on AA guns and tanks instead - the Mots divs did not work that good for me. Whenever I have made a breakthru, there was enough fresh divisions around and behind to counterattack for long enough that the other division had time enough to reorganize - When I was holding a line on Elbe and Kiel kanal, Axis have managed to nonstop unhinged attacks on all front nonstop for 18 months, and still have enough of manpower, resources and material. - I have cut off Axis in Denmark and Scandinavia, where he was having some 40 division, and got all the ports down to Groningen, and the Allies didn't even bother to intercept the convoys in the channel. - Otherwise, Allies were stuck at Tobruk, , and did nothing against Axis on Land, Air or Sea, and sent no Lend Lease. As I have said - with Allied AI so much weaker and impotent compared to the Axis powerhouse, the game is not much worth (unless you are a wehraboo as much as PDX programmers are)-
@@Bigzthegreat The thing is AI is not bad overall, they only have Axis AI as their favourite child. "AI not able to do good invasions" - have you seen Japanese AI? All Allied nations, and China and Soviets start with a ton of negative spirits and mechanics. Japan doesnt, Germany doesnt, Italy doesnt. And do you know whom a term Hearts of Iron comes from? Heydrich.
Just finished my run, really appreciated the video as was a great help. Only one thing I noticed is that it would be useful to see the infantry template used before starting the war with Germany as that required a different setup to prevent being curbstomped.
I personally did it playing fascist lithuania, 1v1ing Poland in 1938 after they declined to give Vilnius. Because of this I wasn't at war with the allies. I joined the axis, took out the Soviets, and after the war I built up a massive amount of planes and took out Germany relatively easily by 1944. Taking out the other northern states was a very simple thing to do after this. It was an increadably fun game xd.
Which Commonwealth do you think is stronger these days in HoI IV, the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth or the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth? I mean in terms of focus trees, available cores, etc, mostly, as the strategy is pretty much the same between the 2.
Just wanted to say I hope your channel picks up even more, your videos are the most chill to watch/listen to and always have the most efficient and inventive ways of getting stuff done.
Also how not to lose memel is to let iron wolf go full on crazy it will end up in civil war where they will take memel, and you just wait for germans to bypass and then retake memel as you are in civil war as Germans wont demand from rebels memel. Hence you keep memel without going to war with germany, played as lithuania a lot so picked up lots of things hope this helps to anybody reading :)
I probably can’t execute this myself, but here’s a tank template that might be good. For support, you have to have support anti-tank, support artillery, maintenance, and logistics. The 5th one can be filled with something else. The division has to be something around 20 width or higher. Maybe include SPG mediums and close support mediums? Also motorized for the speed bonus. Reliable heavies can be used to resist armored attacks and maybe anti air lights can fight infantry and cas. I’m gonna test it myself and I hope it works! Update: it worked after making it 30w
If you keep Poland as a personal union state for as long as possible, it will focus on finishing the industrial focuses in its focus tree to beef up your economy when you annex them.
The weakness of the aggressive AI is that you can just wait in a good defensive position til they are low on strength then counter attack. The force attacks are scary but they burn through unit strength and war score even faster when they do that. Big encirclements look nice, but I find that most of the enemy casualties come from them trying to battleplan me when they don't have a chance of breaking through. You can get encirclements after that but they are like 25% strength units so doesnt feel as good XD
Hungary has a lot of Aluminium if you want it in the axis war. You can trade for rubber through your northern ports like Archangelsk just ban some of the oceans so that your convoys take a sensible route XD
Don't go straight for "Root out the Wolf", go with "Lithuanian Activist Front", and then "A New Wolf", then go "Root out the Wolf", you will get a small recruitable population bonus.
This reminds me alot of north Africa irl a back and forth slog where commanders often didn't understand the weakness of supply and limitations of motorized warfare in hostile terrain
I discovered dis randomly, if u shift and click in the supply Crete things, it changes to motorized, and if u click 2nd time, u get the dual motorized supply
I’ve tried it, but adding the AA tanks for a space marine feel…BUT time runs out before you can get enough troops. Usually have three 24 division armies for the main line and 12 or so divisions to watch my shores…i think 🤔 can win it if the can squeeze another month before the Soviets attack…and Romania did the Bessarabia thing as well…
They've actually confirmed that the current Soviet AI is broken. It's not weighing the value of more civs properly and tends to ignore them...which makes them a super weak "major"
@@Bitt3rSteel the latest patch hopefully mitigates some of those issues. It mentions "Soviet Union will now aim to build a decent civilian factory base before switching to other priorities" in addition to loads of bug fixes.
I did this a week ago with Poland, and I took a few Soviet states in the second russian civil war. I had baltic states go facist, I took Latvia after my conquest of those soviet states, and then declared war on Estonia, but is was facist. I then joined the allies after my declaration of war, and I held onto Warsaw and started planning offensives in Estonia and the German Reich. edit: It was also non-historical AI
Its better to not take that first advisor.u can get both free trade and partial mob at the same time and u have like 100 more pp at the end of the polish focus. With higer support for non-aligned.
I think you would be more successful with the encirclement at 23:00 if you micro managed your motorized units. By the way, it's not stupid if it works.
I used motorized artillery all the time because I’m always producing motorized and artillery and it doesn’t require it’s own production line like motorized rocket rocket artillery.
i have personally tried the truck+mot arty division pre no step back. definitely did a lot of damage and had decent breakthrough, with enough speed to make encirclements. BUT, the damage i received was MASSIVE. if the enemy has even some half decent armour, this division just melted away.
fyi...I build supply hubs, railroads, trains, convoys, transport planes and all things logistics...first...logistics...logistics...logistics and go all mils first cuz theyre cheaper so quicker to make unless buffs are dif but youll make more than civs and when you need civs you can just convert and by that time you convert you should have some convert buffs...so all in all you just get more going mils as smaller nations As bulgaria, I literally built railways everywhere...and kept building them everywhere and when you go far out you build sup hubs and airports..so build a sup hub in greece near athens port and build a few in eastern turkey near border with soviets and a few in bulgaria just to boost those and the airports you build in strategic areas that up the efficiency so you get more supply from your planes...connect all this in a way where the trains bring the supplies to the airports who then deliver those to airports further out...and yes make sure to make sup hubs and port sub hubs double truck priority...you'll need thousands of trucks just for the supply system...I am using 10k right now lol The airports you want to build close to where the planes arrow goes when you click on territories for them to cover...the closer the aiport is to that arrow's point the more efficiency and more supply you give to that whole territory...and if that airport is built by or well stocked by a port or by a sup hub nearby or with a lot of trains coming it will drop more supplies...and if you up the efficiency with more crews buff it is even more and less accidents!! Felt like sim city lol but with all this and when it all comes together, nothing can stop your supply and you'll always win becuz the supply debuffs are awful for attack and defense...this is how I we won against the uk landing all over the place around turkey and italy and soviets way out in the urals...we had slightly better supply and could move our troops around fast and with very little organization loss...soviets were getting -60% attack and defense and we were getting -20%...uk was having to fight over supplied coastal defense units who could quickly move around...we just out moved the uk's navy with our railway and supply system... Once japan joined the axis, since I had them go at russia, they were able to come to europe in droves with planes and marines and helped us completely clean up north africa and the med...and with italy and japan's navy they were able to take naval supremacy from the uk there...it is just too much for the uk even though they have 10k planes and 400 ships...they can't contain south america, africa, south east asia and med against everyone...and on land they just can't compete with our overwhelming land might...even with us all fighting deep in the urals still... And all of this was only doable because of the supply system I started in little bulgaria... Uk took over most of the med, took over north africa...took over rome and the middle of italy...and we still pushed them back all the way to the middle of africa... We are fighting in south america in columbia, venezuela, peru...fighting in indonesia and india...its too much for even the uk No matter how far you are you'll always win this way...sup hubs, planes, trains, ships and railways...logistics are everything in this game imo
I don't know if you're aware of this already but you should totally have a look at joining the TommyKay tournament, though I do understand you mostly play single player but still I think you'd be able to hold your own and it would be cool to see you in the game.
The Baltic Coast one feels a bit easier if you manage to get Esti is Scandi before barb starts. You can just join Germany, only join the russian war (so you stay neutral with Allies), then once you have the USSR territory you need, turn around and declare on Germany to get theirs. You don't even need to cap Germany, the achievement says "control", so you can just join Allies straight up.
Didnt anyone notice 1939 at 41:46 ?, all things aside i know this is a year (or more) out of date as a comment. Enjoy your comment no matter how back it is, keep it up i enjoy your daily upload and your gameplay teaches me more about hoi4.
Lithuania's national policy: invite representatives of the Republic of China (Taiwan) Impact: resignation of the foreign minister Forced economy from Germany - 20% China's intervention, living materials - 20%
Hello Mr.Steel, I was considering making an updated guide for Lithuania with the new update. I have tried several times and succeeded, but I'm not sure how to go about actually presenting the video. Any tips?
got a 100% collar government, took Moscow, Leningrad and Crimea, made it to the gates of Stalingrad, the soviets made a massive counter offensive just as I ran out of guns, took Moscow, now its a complete deadlock on the eastern front. gonna try joining the axis for the last push into the union, but mr moustache man doesn't seem to want me in his faction anymore, absolutely crushed
I didnt actually intend to do the achivement, but i got it on my 2nd lithuania run (the 1st run i quit in 37 when i saw estonia become a USSR puppet, not that i actually needed it though) like 2 days into NSB. Take the baltics and (diplomatically) poland in 37, go after the USSR with various inf-arty divisions in like 41 (was a long way to vladivostok...) pump out fighter 3s like a madman to contest german air supeority and brute force my way to berlin with 2 million men on the front
I got lucky doing this because the Soviets got into a civil war in the early game and lost many divisions and after taking Poland I had more divisions that were also better so I just steamrolled them
I almost had this. My dumbass brain thought the focus "Axis-Baltic Industry" debuffed germany against me and not the other way around. Couldn't even take Koninsberg.
ya soviet espionage defence is broken i was Germany with 4 spies. 1 being a soviet turn coat 2 being seducers and 1 infiltrator, got all 4 caught before i could build enough network to free the first one that was captured.
Tried it and joined the Axis for some reason, now i am sitting on the german border ready to take Berlin and the rest of the baltic coastline but can't because the USA are still fighting the Axis and i can't leave the faction. Guess ill start again, proably quicker than finishing a 1947 late game campaign that moves at a snails pace even at speed 5
I had to do it 2 times lol. The first time the soviets were extremely strong for some reason and i lost all the baltic countries and was pushed back to warzaw and had to wait for germany to do barb. After which i was in no position to attack them and had to build up. Which fucked me even harder when they somehow succesfully sealioned and took all of africa. I had never seen such a powerfull axis AI prior to my first run. The second run was easier and i was able to kill the soviets on my own by mid 1942 and the allies were still in the game.
I've used your way. My war with Soviets was so much harder, cause he didn't want to attack. i got 12 divs of motorised, 3,5 armies of infantry. With air. After the end of war in the end of 43, i've realised same puppet states. BUT!!! I've declared war on finland, while at war with soviets, so i got her in a peace deal. In the middle of 44 i've started a war with Germany. In the end of war i've got war goal at Sweden and then did focus to join allies. U cannot justify while nt leading Allice, but u can declare war)))) i 've did it, and without WW3 i've compited the second achivment. P.S. I've got control of Allies faction))) So if i wanted to, i could paint the world
Its weird, when you’re making a video…the Auto-subtitles go Nuts with thinking of stuff… When you’re sick, the automatic subtitles can seemingly near flawlessly translate into the right things… I don’t understand mr. “Bit of Steel” 🤔🤔
I know this is an old video but the naval invasions for the AI are ridiculous. I can build up an army to hold the front lines well but then they just naval invade non stop.
Tried it 3 times, failed it every time. You have my highest respect Bittersteel. I love your channel!
tried*
I was almost at Moscow and forgot to defend the coast and got naval invaded
@@bruhbruh1245 By the soviets?
@@AlaZenH by the Izraeli. Fucking hell didnt expect that at all!(british accent)
after my 5th try I FINALLY DID IT!!!!
The AI force attacking is a good thing. It destroys their equipment and as seen the Soviets already couldn't resupply their troops. Them doing that basically destroyed those divisions.
My question is: Does the AI merge units together to put them back to full strength?
Well i tried just holding out, and in 43 their ground forces were really mangled, but their air was absolutely crazy and eventually halted my push.
So just attack ASAP.
They delete division to allow other division to get equipment sometimes, but I never understood what is triggering this behaviour. Sometimes they just don't do anything, sometimes you see their division number drop by 50 or 70 with no offensive on any direction.
Well, I tend to think that the forced attacks were a programmed AI weakness, because if AI was deffensive and not killing itself off, it would be more difficult, and boring. Sometimes I have built forts out of neccessity, AI stopped attacking, and I got stuck.
What makes them force attacking in your game? They don‘t attack at all in my game, maybe my forts (level 3) are too strong?
@@falkherbst5019 They force attack to relive an encirclement. Romania gave up beserabia and the AI thought they got encircled so they tried to free the land. (Even tho there wasn't any divisions there)
You dont need to get an aircraft designer early anymore. Simply upgrading your plane once whenever you do decide to pick it up post research is enough to transfer the bonus to your planes. That means you can start building them ASAP, upgrade them to max engine to get the bonus and then refit your planes when your efficiency is high.
It is worth it for the 15% research speed. Pair that up with Industry Liaisons spirit which gives another 15% and you can significantly reduce plane research speed.
got the baltic coast achievement with estonia, was pretty difficult but still doable
Someone give this man an award I mean LOOK
anschluss?
That’s the point of the achievements lol😂
❤
First time I tried got both achievements. I think that the motorized tactic that you used actually made the game like 60% easier since its so much easier to encircle enemy divisions and you can rush the victory points.
I don't know... in my game allies were nonexistent (in Europe), and Axis were having 6k fighters I was not able to counter (+2k CAS + 1k Tac), and somehow after 18 months of unhinged nonstop attacks on all the front from Netherlands to Mukačevo they still had no lack of manpower, oil, resources or material, and whenever I have made a breakthru, there were 4 fresh divisions behind to counterattack... In such scenario I think less but armoured divisions would do a better job.
Man i just started playing HoI4 couple of months ago with my friends, and i have to say that you are by far the best channel on YT. Most of the other guys just abuse the game too much and don't properly explain some stuff that are not so clear to noobs like me, but you cover it all. Thanks for all of your hard work man!
I prefer bittersteel but taureor(however you spell it) is also great and has a similar style and video length.
I love how he doesnt shove his fucking face in the videos like them
@@jimmerkd_3398 Taureor is good, but in small doses. His whispering voice gets on my nerves lol
Bitter and tommy are the best
If you do Lithuanian activist front before rooting out the iron wolves you will get 1% more recruitable pop the rest of the game.
Also, VERY important, do not do rejoin railways until you have both poland and the other baltic states. If you wait it adds 1 infrastructure to all states cored...
That being said, get royal reform while waiting on poland support and get the air designer first for faster research and better planes.
Use the polish troops to take the other baltic states and then go to work on your economy and military buildup. It is ok to delay taking the baltic states a little, you want them to do the extra focuses to get more civs.
If you move your capital be sure to check your railways and supply.
If you go with the allies you can get negative % civs. Just lol
You can justify and take Finland while pushing back the Soviets. They will join comintern on historical due to communism >30%.
When you go after Germany green air is the key. I found having atleast 10 factories on both fighters and CAS while fighting the soviets and then increasing that to 20 each for Germany is enough. Without green air Germany will be difficult.
After beating Germany, you should be able to puppet most of the Balkens, Germany, and Italy. Take the states you need. Then start justifing on Sweden. Guard Denmark against the Allies and do not call your allies into the war.
During Peace deals makr sure you are puppeting states on your land borders. This makes it so you do not have to defend them later.
Any way to avoid fighting the allies over Sweden? I’m not very good at blitz and are worried I can’t take Norway and Sweden at the same time. Thoughts now is any chance you could join ally while at war with axis? That way maybe could, after puppet Germany and Italy, take over faction lead?
@@hzcyd101 You probably are not going to take faction lead. Should just take them after russia and germany. You only have to control the states.
Fun fact: the weird-looking Austria at 42:14 is mildly how the Republic of German-Austria looked in the immediate aftermath of WW1
Epic
Cisleithanian Austria within Austria-Hungary
I tried that exact motorised template (the early version you showed, with no AT in the fifth support slot) with Germany, and it's really surprisingly good when combined with the Mobile Infantry branch of Mobile Warfare. It took some sacrifices and efficient management to keep everything supplied with fuel (in my case, I opted to do a No-Tank Germany), but two full armies of that template plus three armies of 9-1 infantry and CAS completely crushed the soviet union without a Panzer it sight. It couldn't directly face Soviet tanks, but that didn't matter much when I could just go around and quickly encircle all the tank resistance the motorised divisions ran into.
Did it twice so want to share some tips too
1) You can get *Lithuanian Activist front* before rooting out Iron wolf to get bonuses to manpower form that, each danger stage takes 100 days and this 70 days focus will drop the stage
2) You need only Latvian capital, but not Estonian
3) Don't bother with raising monarchist above 80, don't send any guns, they'll win almost instantly
4) Don't sleep on the *Forest Brothers* focus! It's +10% to everything in your core territory, but after uniting with Poland your cores will reach even into Ukraine, making the most important moments (initial holding and first pushes) easier
5) If you have some spare PP, advisor that gives non-core mp also makes Soviet wargoal longer to make, thus giving you time to build stuff, train more troops and take short focus (it changed from something like 230 days to 280, varies on world tension)
6) If you're struggling with holding back all soviet troops, when annexing Latvia leave the part on your border with SOV as your puppet
7) If Axis intervene, try to steal as much occupied territory from them as possible (temporarily join Axis to request territory transfer, don't join their wars), will make the next core focus (where you need to hold a bits of Germany easier). I also created different puppet states around my cores to make Axis stuck in the east or block them from me (like Moldova puppet blocks a big part of your lands from Romanians)
The Soviet war goal isn't too much of a concern since they'll probably do they "Send an ultimatum" focus, but it's indeed useful in the case they don't do it. Another big help would be making Supply Planes, people underestimate how OP they are if you have air superiority
@@satanhell_lord 1) You only get ultimatum when wargoal is about 95% ready, every time. AI is acting weird.
2) Planes were already nerfed in beta and probably will be nerfed again, plus it's not that easy to get air superiority against major, and later won't be much as needed
Cool tips, thank you!
On point number 6 - do not do this - I think I staved off the war with the soviets for a bit by having a greater mass of troops on their border than bitter, but while I was waiting for Soviets to attack I realised around Feb 1940 that my puppet was gone and the soviets had a nice little dent into Latvia before the fighting had even begun. All the other points seemed to work well though.
@@peterlewis-morgan6934 I had the same problem in first try, it's fixed in beta now
27:25
I have never seen Romania *not* surrender Bessarabia, it could really use a tweak.
Probably just hard coded to happen with historical ai
Historical focuses does that.
When you're expanding early on like that, it's better to wait to do the first industry focus, because it'll give you 1 infrastructure in every single state you own (all of the baltics and poland)
A good voice, achivment hunting, HOI4, just got into the game again. Totally a new sub
Welcome aboard
Did it according to your guide, works perfectly with some of the comments on holding the industry focus. In the middle I was torn between going down German Investment focus for the +1 infra on all cores, or continue the politic focus for the consumer goods, but seems no biggies.
One thing I did notice is there is a chance of not fighting the Allies to get the Baltic coast. Take Finland in the war with USSR (the Germans will do the heavy lifting from Norway). The Ally will invite you every 4-6 months since you start the war with Axis (oddly they don't accept applications), decline till you take Denmark and Norway. Hold Denmark and don't finish the war, and naval invade Oslo or build supply hub in the middle of Norway so you could push down the tile and get the whole thing. Once you joined Allies, not only any Democratic country you took will be liberated to them, you also somehow lose trade influence with British Malaya so you can't get any rubber! After you took both and there's only Sweden left, join the Allies and declare on Sweden. No one could kick you out and Sweden will join the Axis. Timing is essential though, since justify does expire and so does UK's invitation. So not a fool-proof method.
Pro Tip for anyone attempting this, hold the line. The AI likes slamming themselves into lines they view as easily defeatable, but it often fails to account for divisional quality. This means the Russians just grind their divisions on your line until eventually running out of supply or Manpower. It takes a bit longer, but its a very effective strategy if you don't feel comfortable on a blitz.
Thank you for the hints, it was very helpful. But still, a few comments based on experience with my playthru:
- Fighters production - I was producing Fighters in 35 mils, and attacked in same time as the author did. If I am correct, in the video he has placed 1800 fighters over western Poland. I have placed there 3600 (max doctrine and 500xp on the fighter model), and I was smashed by 4800 Axis fighters, 1800 CAS a 1000 Tac. Waiting longer and accumulating fighters wouldn't probably help me, because he was producing probably more in all the countries combined, and I needed Allies not to invade Denmark (quite funny looking backwards, they didnt get out of Africa)
- there was not a single allied plane over Europe all thru the war, all axis planes against me, and I was simply not able to outproduce all 5 axis countries
- looking backwards, because I was not able to gain air superiority anyway with spending 1/3 of my production on fighters, I maybe might have done better giving up fighters production, and spending it on AA guns and tanks instead
- the Mots divs did not work that good for me. Whenever I have made a breakthru, there was enough fresh divisions around and behind to counterattack for long enough that the other division had time enough to reorganize
- When I was holding a line on Elbe and Kiel kanal, Axis have managed to nonstop unhinged attacks on all front nonstop for 18 months, and still have enough of manpower, resources and material.
- I have cut off Axis in Denmark and Scandinavia, where he was having some 40 division, and got all the ports down to Groningen, and the Allies didn't even bother to intercept the convoys in the channel.
- Otherwise, Allies were stuck at Tobruk, , and did nothing against Axis on Land, Air or Sea, and sent no Lend Lease. As I have said - with Allied AI so much weaker and impotent compared to the Axis powerhouse, the game is not much worth (unless you are a wehraboo as much as PDX programmers are)-
sometimes you have games where the AI was busy smoking some really good stuff
@@Bigzthegreat The thing is AI is not bad overall, they only have Axis AI as their favourite child. "AI not able to do good invasions" - have you seen Japanese AI? All Allied nations, and China and Soviets start with a ton of negative spirits and mechanics. Japan doesnt, Germany doesnt, Italy doesnt. And do you know whom a term Hearts of Iron comes from? Heydrich.
Just finished my run, really appreciated the video as was a great help. Only one thing I noticed is that it would be useful to see the infantry template used before starting the war with Germany as that required a different setup to prevent being curbstomped.
I personally did it playing fascist lithuania, 1v1ing Poland in 1938 after they declined to give Vilnius. Because of this I wasn't at war with the allies. I joined the axis, took out the Soviets, and after the war I built up a massive amount of planes and took out Germany relatively easily by 1944. Taking out the other northern states was a very simple thing to do after this. It was an increadably fun game xd.
Which Commonwealth do you think is stronger these days in HoI IV, the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth or the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth? I mean in terms of focus trees, available cores, etc, mostly, as the strategy is pretty much the same between the 2.
Poland can get a massive industry with focuses while Lithuania gets cores on estonia
Wouldn't it be better to get the manpower and bonuses from the "A new kind of iron wolf" focus before exiling Voldmaras? Or would it take too long
I'm thinking about that too! It's 70 days, so not that long. I'd take it
@@sfjuhispst8144 yeah i took the one before that gives manpower before getting rid of him, was super helpful
I try thousand times and I can say it worth especially if you are going to use motorize with the tank division
Just wanted to say I hope your channel picks up even more, your videos are the most chill to watch/listen to and always have the most efficient and inventive ways of getting stuff done.
Keep these coming! Thank you!!
I slugged my way to this achievement just yesterday and NOW you upload this?! Damn it!
Also how not to lose memel is to let iron wolf go full on crazy it will end up in civil war where they will take memel, and you just wait for germans to bypass and then retake memel as you are in civil war as Germans wont demand from rebels memel. Hence you keep memel without going to war with germany, played as lithuania a lot so picked up lots of things hope this helps to anybody reading :)
Whats cool is that France still proceeds to surrender
Holy shit steel just half way through you practically yell “I fucked up of course I fucked up” for no damn reason I like it
I probably can’t execute this myself, but here’s a tank template that might be good.
For support, you have to have support anti-tank, support artillery, maintenance, and logistics. The 5th one can be filled with something else.
The division has to be something around 20 width or higher. Maybe include SPG mediums and close support mediums? Also motorized for the speed bonus. Reliable heavies can be used to resist armored attacks and maybe anti air lights can fight infantry and cas. I’m gonna test it myself and I hope it works!
Update: it worked after making it 30w
antitank is for MP. there is absolutly no need for it in SP
If you keep Poland as a personal union state for as long as possible, it will focus on finishing the industrial focuses in its focus tree to beef up your economy when you annex them.
The weakness of the aggressive AI is that you can just wait in a good defensive position til they are low on strength then counter attack. The force attacks are scary but they burn through unit strength and war score even faster when they do that. Big encirclements look nice, but I find that most of the enemy casualties come from them trying to battleplan me when they don't have a chance of breaking through. You can get encirclements after that but they are like 25% strength units so doesnt feel as good XD
Hungary has a lot of Aluminium if you want it in the axis war. You can trade for rubber through your northern ports like Archangelsk just ban some of the oceans so that your convoys take a sensible route XD
Fun change to your motorized template is to use motorized rocket artillery. Cheap and if you research rocket tech later it gets outrageous soft attack
Don't go straight for "Root out the Wolf", go with "Lithuanian Activist Front", and then "A New Wolf", then go "Root out the Wolf", you will get a small recruitable population bonus.
I love your willingness to try new strategies that may or may not work just to show us the result
This channel is underrated ngl
Imagine what the entire world was thinking when Romania decided to give up Bessarabia
M.I.L.F.S = Militaryfactories
I want to go to the modern Lithuanian-Estonian border!
Must be a pretty big improvement in the AI to make bittersteel rage at them stopping his offensives.
10:19 Samsung notification
This reminds me alot of north Africa irl a back and forth slog where commanders often didn't understand the weakness of supply and limitations of motorized warfare in hostile terrain
I discovered dis randomly, if u shift and click in the supply Crete things, it changes to motorized, and if u click 2nd time, u get the dual motorized supply
I do wish that if you united the baltics and control Poland the name changes to Polish-Livonia Commonwealth instead of Polish-Lithuania
"Timetraveller moves a chair"
the timeline:
Damn! You're really cracking them out!
If you're feeling really petty, you could delete all factories from Memel and also blow up the railroads but it's quite pointless, just kinda funny
I’ve tried it, but adding the AA tanks for a space marine feel…BUT time runs out before you can get enough troops. Usually have three 24 division armies for the main line and 12 or so divisions to watch my shores…i think 🤔 can win it if the can squeeze another month before the Soviets attack…and Romania did the Bessarabia thing as well…
Still learning this game, helpful video. Great job man
It's funny how despite the Soviets no longer having the officers purged national spirit at all they still falter fairly easily.
Their industry is broken as hell right now...AI can't build Civs somend sup being super underpowered
@@Bitt3rSteel Feels like the AI is still working with the old focus tree in mind I swear.
Atleast we as players can steal the US' civs, the AI won't.
They've actually confirmed that the current Soviet AI is broken. It's not weighing the value of more civs properly and tends to ignore them...which makes them a super weak "major"
@@Bitt3rSteel the latest patch hopefully mitigates some of those issues. It mentions "Soviet Union will now aim to build a decent civilian factory base before switching to other priorities" in addition to loads of bug fixes.
LIETUVA! seeing this makes me happy automatically because i am lithuanian.
I did this a week ago with Poland, and I took a few Soviet states in the second russian civil war. I had baltic states go facist, I took Latvia after my conquest of those soviet states, and then declared war on Estonia, but is was facist. I then joined the allies after my declaration of war, and I held onto Warsaw and started planning offensives in Estonia and the German Reich. edit: It was also non-historical AI
Its better to not take that first advisor.u can get both free trade and partial mob at the same time and u have like 100 more pp at the end of the polish focus. With higer support for non-aligned.
I think you would be more successful with the encirclement at 23:00 if you micro managed your motorized units. By the way, it's not stupid if it works.
Your Polish and Lithuanian subscribers are so happy now
I used motorized artillery all the time because I’m always producing motorized and artillery and it doesn’t require it’s own production line like motorized rocket rocket artillery.
i have personally tried the truck+mot arty division pre no step back. definitely did a lot of damage and had decent breakthrough, with enough speed to make encirclements. BUT, the damage i received was MASSIVE. if the enemy has even some half decent armour, this division just melted away.
fyi...I build supply hubs, railroads, trains, convoys, transport planes and all things logistics...first...logistics...logistics...logistics and go all mils first cuz theyre cheaper so quicker to make unless buffs are dif but youll make more than civs and when you need civs you can just convert and by that time you convert you should have some convert buffs...so all in all you just get more going mils as smaller nations
As bulgaria, I literally built railways everywhere...and kept building them everywhere and when you go far out you build sup hubs and airports..so build a sup hub in greece near athens port and build a few in eastern turkey near border with soviets and a few in bulgaria just to boost those and the airports you build in strategic areas that up the efficiency so you get more supply from your planes...connect all this in a way where the trains bring the supplies to the airports who then deliver those to airports further out...and yes make sure to make sup hubs and port sub hubs double truck priority...you'll need thousands of trucks just for the supply system...I am using 10k right now lol
The airports you want to build close to where the planes arrow goes when you click on territories for them to cover...the closer the aiport is to that arrow's point the more efficiency and more supply you give to that whole territory...and if that airport is built by or well stocked by a port or by a sup hub nearby or with a lot of trains coming it will drop more supplies...and if you up the efficiency with more crews buff it is even more and less accidents!!
Felt like sim city lol but with all this and when it all comes together, nothing can stop your supply and you'll always win becuz the supply debuffs are awful for attack and defense...this is how I we won against the uk landing all over the place around turkey and italy and soviets way out in the urals...we had slightly better supply and could move our troops around fast and with very little organization loss...soviets were getting -60% attack and defense and we were getting -20%...uk was having to fight over supplied coastal defense units who could quickly move around...we just out moved the uk's navy with our railway and supply system...
Once japan joined the axis, since I had them go at russia, they were able to come to europe in droves with planes and marines and helped us completely clean up north africa and the med...and with italy and japan's navy they were able to take naval supremacy from the uk there...it is just too much for the uk even though they have 10k planes and 400 ships...they can't contain south america, africa, south east asia and med against everyone...and on land they just can't compete with our overwhelming land might...even with us all fighting deep in the urals still...
And all of this was only doable because of the supply system I started in little bulgaria...
Uk took over most of the med, took over north africa...took over rome and the middle of italy...and we still pushed them back all the way to the middle of africa...
We are fighting in south america in columbia, venezuela, peru...fighting in indonesia and india...its too much for even the uk
No matter how far you are you'll always win this way...sup hubs, planes, trains, ships and railways...logistics are everything in this game imo
>Wake up
>See bittersteel uploaded
>Day Made
I don't know if you're aware of this already but you should totally have a look at joining the TommyKay tournament, though I do understand you mostly play single player but still I think you'd be able to hold your own and it would be cool to see you in the game.
The Baltic Coast one feels a bit easier if you manage to get Esti is Scandi before barb starts. You can just join Germany, only join the russian war (so you stay neutral with Allies), then once you have the USSR territory you need, turn around and declare on Germany to get theirs. You don't even need to cap Germany, the achievement says "control", so you can just join Allies straight up.
Didnt anyone notice 1939 at 41:46 ?, all things aside i know this is a year (or more) out of date as a comment. Enjoy your comment no matter how back it is, keep it up i enjoy your daily upload and your gameplay teaches me more about hoi4.
Worked like a charm! The Prince of Terror was very useful for racking up more manpower after defeating the USSR
22:48 because you're not pushing with the rest of your army they are not occupied elsewhere so can afford to divert the troops
You inspired me to complete almost all the archivements thank you 😊😊😊
Lithuania's national policy: invite representatives of the Republic of China (Taiwan)
Impact: resignation of the foreign minister
Forced economy from Germany - 20%
China's intervention, living materials - 20%
If you look at weird looking Austria at 42:22 on the border of Czech it looks like a leg with a shoe
if you want to be even more meme-ey with your trucks, you could make armored cars or light tanks to give them armor.
Congrats, i only managed it with historical off where Britain went fascist and Russia had a quick civil war. (3rd try)
Try using transport planes when you have low supply, supper OP right now in the current patch.
Hello Mr.Steel, I was considering making an updated guide for Lithuania with the new update. I have tried several times and succeeded, but I'm not sure how to go about actually presenting the video. Any tips?
38:43 I can’t believe he said that
for Benelux resident , i am impresed that you know the diference between Latvia and Lithuania :)
GJ mate.
Thanks again for another great guide. Now if I could just recreate it. Cheers.
What prefferred tactics, if any, did you use for this run?
They changed the agricultural nationalist. Not sure it's still a good choice since it does -.05 for fascism and unaligned.
got a 100% collar government, took Moscow, Leningrad and Crimea, made it to the gates of Stalingrad, the soviets made a massive counter offensive just as I ran out of guns, took Moscow, now its a complete deadlock on the eastern front. gonna try joining the axis for the last push into the union, but mr moustache man doesn't seem to want me in his faction anymore, absolutely crushed
I didnt actually intend to do the achivement, but i got it on my 2nd lithuania run (the 1st run i quit in 37 when i saw estonia become a USSR puppet, not that i actually needed it though) like 2 days into NSB.
Take the baltics and (diplomatically) poland in 37, go after the USSR with various inf-arty divisions in like 41 (was a long way to vladivostok...) pump out fighter 3s like a madman to contest german air supeority and brute force my way to berlin with 2 million men on the front
Nice guide. I did that achievment on historical ai off its much more fun an the soviets are much weaker in this dlc as they explode every time.
Well, the last thing this game needed was to make SU weaker.
If you disrupt railway leading to the hub you cut them off supplies.
Having cores in all directions really makes Lit OP... Manpower just keeps climbing.
No air or sea tech in BBA tho.
It seems like it would is actually way easier to encircle divisions now.
the only youtuber that I can watch for more than minutes.
I got lucky doing this because the Soviets got into a civil war in the early game and lost many divisions and after taking Poland I had more divisions that were also better so I just steamrolled them
"all we need to do is conquer out neighbors, it's not a problem for mighty Lithuania"
I almost had this. My dumbass brain thought the focus "Axis-Baltic Industry" debuffed germany against me and not the other way around. Couldn't even take Koninsberg.
As a Lithuanian I wish that the world turned out like this
thank you bro ive tried 3 times and finally got it !
ya soviet espionage defence is broken i was Germany with 4 spies. 1 being a soviet turn coat 2 being seducers and 1 infiltrator, got all 4 caught before i could build enough network to free the first one that was captured.
Tried it and joined the Axis for some reason, now i am sitting on the german border ready to take Berlin and the rest of the baltic coastline but can't because the USA are still fighting the Axis and i can't leave the faction. Guess ill start again, proably quicker than finishing a 1947 late game campaign that moves at a snails pace even at speed 5
I had to do it 2 times lol. The first time the soviets were extremely strong for some reason and i lost all the baltic countries and was pushed back to warzaw and had to wait for germany to do barb. After which i was in no position to attack them and had to build up. Which fucked me even harder when they somehow succesfully sealioned and took all of africa. I had never seen such a powerfull axis AI prior to my first run. The second run was easier and i was able to kill the soviets on my own by mid 1942 and the allies were still in the game.
This was great! Thanks for sharing Bitt3r; as a really new player it helps me learn.
Another thing, protect your ports in the baltic sea or else the soviet will naval invade those and will be really hard to push them out of there
Can you reform the Grand Duchy of Lithuania 1430
Great video as always! Btw, are you sick or something?
Very, this was recorder before I lost my voice entirely
@@Bitt3rSteel, sad to hear that. Hope you get better soon!
I like how you turned "pedal to the metal" into "balls to the walls" lmao
I've used your way. My war with Soviets was so much harder, cause he didn't want to attack. i got 12 divs of motorised, 3,5 armies of infantry. With air. After the end of war in the end of 43, i've realised same puppet states. BUT!!! I've declared war on finland, while at war with soviets, so i got her in a peace deal. In the middle of 44 i've started a war with Germany. In the end of war i've got war goal at Sweden and then did focus to join allies. U cannot justify while nt leading Allice, but u can declare war)))) i 've did it, and without WW3 i've compited the second achivment.
P.S. I've got control of Allies faction))) So if i wanted to, i could paint the world
Its weird, when you’re making a video…the Auto-subtitles go Nuts with thinking of stuff…
When you’re sick, the automatic subtitles can seemingly near flawlessly translate into the right
things…
I don’t understand mr. “Bit of Steel” 🤔🤔
thank you for doing my country much love
I know this is an old video but the naval invasions for the AI are ridiculous. I can build up an army to hold the front lines well but then they just naval invade non stop.
Germany was that old fish that gets beaten up repeatedly in Spongebob.
I think this is one of the achievements you could do without the dlc if you wanted it'd just be painful af