Hello, Community Manager Katten here. I want to begin by thanking you all for the feedback we have received on our two latest news posts regarding the DLC Integration and Trial of Allegiance Reception & Thoughts. We are reading all your comments and are working on responding to as many as possible.


Since our update last week, which added "Country Pack" to the beginning of the names for Battle for the Bosporus and Trial of Allegiance, we have received more feedback about the unclear naming of our DLCs. Of particular concern is the Subscription, referred to as the "Expansion Subscription," which may suggest to some that it only includes expansions when it actually encompasses all DLCs for the game. As a result, we have made the following changes to provide better transparency:

• Hearts of Iron IV: Eastern Front Planes Pack > Unit Pack - Hearts of Iron IV: Eastern Front Planes
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Eastern Front Music Pack > Music - Hearts of Iron IV: Songs of the Eastern Front
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Axis Armor Pack > Unit Pack - Hearts of Iron IV: Axis Armor
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Radio Pack > Music - Hearts of Iron IV: Radio Pack
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Allied Armor Pack > Unit Pack - Hearts of Iron IV: Allied Armor
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Allied Speeches Music Pack > Music - Hearts of Iron IV: Allied Speeches Pack
  
• Hearts of Iron IV - Expansion Subscription > Hearts of Iron IV - DLC Subscription

Additionally, at 18:00 CET today, Waking the Tiger, Together for Victory and Death or Dishonor will have their store pages removed, as they will then be included in the base game purchase of Hearts of Iron IV for $49.99. However, the DLCs will not be fully integrated at this time, so you will still be able to toggle them on and off in your game launcher. Full integration is scheduled for a later time; we'll provide updates on this shortly The Anniversary Pack will also have its Steam page removed as it is already included in the base game of Hearts of Iron IV. We do not see a reason to have its own store page, as it currently only serves to confuse some of our new players.


Now at 15:00 CET, our 1.14.3 Patch is live! With plenty of new balance changes and bug fixes.

Feel free to leave your feedback in this thread or in the bug report forum as usual, especially if you encounter new issues not present in 1.14.3, or if something marked as fixed in the below changelog still occurs for you.

################################################################
######## Patch 1.14.3 "Bolivar" #########
################################################################

##################################
# Balance
##################################
- South America Shared: Reduced Maximum Command Power Increase from Joint Operations Command (from 30% to 15%)
- South America Shared: Reduced the org and core defense gain of strength of the common solider to 4% (from 5%). Also reduced the infantry bonus gained
- South America Shared: Reduced attack modifier for Spearhead tanks specialization from 10% to 3.5%
- South America Shared: Reduced specializing in heavy guns attack for artillery from 10% to 3.5%
- South America Shared: Reduced specializing in heavy guns AA production reduction cost from 20% to 6%
- South America Shared: Reduced specializing in heavy guns AT production reduction cost from 25% to 15%
- South America Shared: Removed Recruitable pop factor from Increase Conscription focus
- Reduced division defense from increased army professionalism from 10% to 5%. attack and org from 5% to 4%. Reduced traning time from +25% penalty to +15% penalty
- Argentina: Reduced Women in the industry and state unions max efficiency factor bonus from 15% and 10% (25% total) to 7.5% (15% max)
- Argentina: Reduced regulated salaries efficiency cap from 15% to 7.5%
- Argentina: Reduced daily xp gain from US army training to 0.1xp/d (from 0.2xp/d)
- Argentina: Reduced maintain neutrality spirit stability (from 10% to 5%) and efficiency cap (from 10% to 5%)
- Argentina: Reduced our own path spirit recruitable pop factor from 30% to 15%
- Argentina: Reduced spirit of the conquistadors attack (from 20% to 6%)
- Argentina: Reduced Argentine Nationalism conscription factor (from 15% to 7%) and Civilian construction speed (from 10% to 6%)
- Argentina: increased war division temp manpower gain from 50 weekly to 250 weekly
- Chile: Replaced mapuche social classes weekly stability with a flat stability factor
- Chile: Elena Caffarena gives a flat stability factor instead of a weekly stability
- Chile: Reduced Embrace Indigenous Corporatism Factory output (from 10% to 5%)
- Chile: Expand the agricultural field gives 1 additional build slot (from 3 to 4)
- Old Guard for Army now gives 0.2 army XP daily (from 0.3) due to costing only 50pp
- Chile: Gabriela Mistral - Reduced PP gain (from 20% to 15%)
- Chile: Transport Minister no longer gives civ construction speed. Increase railway and hub construction speed (from 10% to 15%)
- Chile: Minister of Trade development - Reduced Trade law cost factor (from -30% to -15%) and consumer goods factor (from -10% to -5%)
- Chile: Father of Industrialization - Reduced Construction bonus (From 15% to 7%)
- Chile: Minister of Defense - Reduced MIL construction speed (from 15% to 10%). Reduced Defense on core territory (from 10% to 6%)
- TOA Shared Minister of Defense - Reduced mil construction speed (from 10% to 7.5%)
- Chile: Reduced merchant marine manufacturer discount on convoy production (from -50% to -20%) and reduced their reliability gained (from +30% to +10%)
- Chile: Unified in spirit - Reduced Org gain (from 10% to 5%)
- Chile: Reduced Army attack of Patagonian Giants to 5% (from 10%), defense to 8% (from 10%) and breakthrough to 8% (from 10%)
- Chile: Reduced the miners representative building speed (from 10% to 6%) and its max efficiency factor (from 10% to 5%)
- Chile: Reduced conservative businessman civilian speed (from 15% to 10%) and its max efficiency factor (from 10% to 5%)
- TOA Shared: Reduced the minister of lands and colonizaition non-core-manpower to 4% (from 10%) and 6% (from 15%) from version 2. Increased global building slots gained (from 5% to 15%, and 25% for version 2)
- Chile: Reduced Minister of Economy and commerce trade laws cost (from -50% to -25%)
- Chile: Reduced defender of araucanian soverighnty factory output (8% from 15%)
- Chile: Reduced president of the central bank consumer goods reduction (to -5% from -10%)
- TOA: Reduced social economist consumer goods factor reduction (from -15% to -7%)
- Chile: Apostlic prefect of Araucania reduced factory output bonus (from 10% to 6%)
- Chile: Reduced Emperor Of France and the Americas attack core factor (from 15% to 5%) and core defense (from 20% to 10%), war support (from 15% to 10%), and stability (from 15% to 10%)
- Chile: Reduced Carabineros de Chile army core attack (from 10% to 5%) and core defense (from 15% to 7%)
- Chile: Reduced Christian Democrat pp gain (from 15% to 10%)
- Chile: Reduced Laizzes faire civ construction speed (from 20% to 10%). Reduces law cost reduction (from -50% to -25%)
- Chile: Reduced High Quality Nitrate bonus (from 10% attack to 5% attack)
- Chile: Utilize Famae Mil reduced by 1
- Chile: Reduced Carabineros de Chile Core attack (from 10% to 5%) and core defense (from 15% to 10%)
- Chile: Reduced factory output from opressed working class (from 20% to 10%) and consumer goods (from -15% to -10%).
- Chile: Reduced Francoist Model Defense (from 10% to 5%) and factory output (from 10% to 5%)
- Chile: Reduced Max attack bonus gain from Pan historic rhetoric (from 10% to 6%) and defense (from 10% to 6%)
- Chile: Reduced Max attack bonus gain from Pan historic rhetoric (from 10% to 6%) and defense (from 10% to 6%)
- Reduced max attack bonus gain from the francoist model (from max 10% attack to max 5% attack) and defense (from max 10% to max 5%)
- Shared focus tree: Reduced arty attack gained from heavy Guns industries (from 10% to 5%) and defense (from 15% to 10%). Gives 1 research boost instead of 2
- Chile: Spirit of the conquistadors now gives 6% breakthrough instead of 10% attack
- Chile: Fascist Theologian gives 8% pp instead of 15%. Other stats unchanged
- Chile: Reduced the true enemy factory output gain (from 10% to 5%)
- Paraguay: Reduced Flourishing Economy (from 20% output to 15%)

##################################
# Gameplay
##################################
- Brazil now has updated infantry equipment names and icons.
- Added an extra flag for US of Brazil
- Added some extra flags for forming the United Kingdom/Empires of Brazil/Portugal and altered an event so that Brazil can now annex Portugal rather than puppet them to form the United Kingdoms.
- Changed some icons for Uruguay & Paraguay

##################################
# AI
##################################
- AI no longer overwrites other countries' supply node motorization settings

##################################
# Modding
##################################
- Fix bug where on_ruling_party_changed sometimes didn't get the correct old_ideology_token
- Adding on_ruling_party_change_immediate on-action as a deprecated and unsafe backwards-compatibility for mods that rely on that behavior

##################################
# Bugfix
##################################
- Added missing text for America Decolonized achivement
- Fixed a typo for the DEF name for Nordic Defence council
- Fixed a rare crash caused by government in exile eating resources without freeing them
- Fixed an issue where the Chilean communist focus "Propose Closer Cooperation" wouldn't properly be able to target your subjects, thus preventing you from annexing the way you were meant to be able to.
- Fixed an issue causing the Swedish AI to enable all strategy plans
- "Brazil/Argentina makes aggressive moves on Uruguay" event no longer triggers when TOA is disabled
- Fixed bugs where research agreements would kick out members for both Argentina and the Soviets
- Fixed a bug for the fascist demagogue causing "Fascism on the rise" decisions to appear
- Fixed a bug where Argentina would retain wargoal on UK after taking the Falkland and South Georgia islands
- Fixed a bunch of local_resources modifiers in state scope that should have been state_resources
- An attempt to maintain our neutrality bypasses if you are communist
- Added missing flags for America do Sul formable (Brazil focus tree)
- Brazil - 'Anuae!' national focus now gives a locked template to prevent an exploit.
- Brazil - 'The International Crisis' national focus now sets the game rule 'can send volunteers' for Brazil.
- Uruguay: Removed ghost focus in Uruguay
- Paraguay: Fixed being able to take Mass Drafts before adopt minority languages
- Fixed an issue where Paraguay could join cominterm despite not being allowed to
- Generic "join" faction events can no longer be used to bypass "can_join_faction = no" rules
- Brazil - AI Brazil will join Allies on historical instead of sometimes ending up in the Comintern.
- Removed a character for Argentina which was causing problems with the fascist path.
- Removed slot in Nigers impassable terrain. Niger proper now is rural

Happy Map Painting!

As the flowers bloom and the world awakens anew, the Hearts of Iron IV team is thrilled to announce a Spring Sale celebration. Everyone knows that long military expeditions should start in the spring, so with campaign season upon us, we are excited to share not one, not two, but THREE DLCs for absolutely free: Death or Dishonor, Together for Victory, and Waking the Tiger.


It is clear that the Hearts of Iron IV: Starter Edition has become the go-to choice for newcomers, and is recommended by the veterans of our community for its comprehensive introduction to the vast and intricate world of Hearts of Iron IV. In our quest to continuously improve the gameplay experience for new recruits and seasoned generals alike, we've decided to integrate the above-mentioned three DLCs into the base game, ensuring every player enjoys a richer, more complete Hearts of Iron IV journey.

Our view is that while the experiences they contain add a great deal to Hearts of Iron IV, parts of the content within Together for Victory, Death or Dishonor and Waking the Tiger no longer match the scope and direction that has developed in the game over the last several years. In addition, there are numerous core mechanics that we would like to rely on in future content that are difficult to work with due to ownership limitations. By rolling these expansions into the core game, we open up new opportunities for utilizing the features they contain, and create new avenues for developing content our players are repeatedly asking for.

As we incorporate these DLCs into the base game by the end of the Spring Sale (21st March), failure to update your game could lead to disruptions, such as save game incompatibilities. Redeem your free DLCs now to ensure your conquests and campaigns continue smoothly without a hitch.

To claim your free DLCs, simply log into your Steam account during the Spring Sale 14th - 21st of March and visit the Hearts of Iron IV store page. From there, navigate to the DLC section where you'll find Death or Dishonor, Together for Victory, and Waking the Tiger ready for redemption.



Question: Will I receive a refund for the DLCs that are now free?
Answer: No, if you have recently purchased any of them, here is the Steam refund policy: DLC bought from the Steam store can be refunded within fourteen days of purchase, provided that the underlying title has been played for less than two hours since purchasing the DLC.

Question: Does this mean that Hearts of Iron IV development has stopped?
Answer: On the contrary, this will help future development as we can assume that all players now own the first 3 DLC.

Question: What happens to my saved data when the DLCs integrate into the base game?
Answer: If you didn't possess the DLCs when creating your save file, it will become corrupted and unusable once they are integrated on March 21st.

Question: Why is Starter Edition still available when the DLCs included in it are free?
Answer: Once the Spring Sale has concluded on 21 March, we will be converting the Starter Edition to the current base game. For now, the Starter Edition remains a convenient way to access the base and three free DLCs. So that new players don’t have to redeem the DLCs one by one. The Starter Edition is also currently available with a price reduction to match the base game price.


Base Game

• Hearts of Iron IV 70% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Starter Edition 76% off

Expansions

• Hearts of Iron IV: By Blood Alone 30% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: No Step Back 30% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: La Résistance 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Man the Guns 50% off

Country Pack

• Hearts of Iron IV: Battle for the Bosporus 50% off

Music & Model Packs

• Hearts of Iron IV: Eastern Front Music Pack 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Eastern Front Planes Pack 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Allied Speeches Music Pack 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Radio Pack 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Sabaton Soundtrack 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Sabaton Soundtrack Vol. 2 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Allied Armor Pack 50% off
  
• Hearts of Iron IV: Axis Armor Pack 50% off

Hello, Community Manager Katten here, I have some updates regarding the Steam Store. We've taken your feedback to heart regarding the clarity of Trial of Allegiance as a Country Pack. As a result, we've decided to rename both Trial of Allegiance and Battle for the Bosporus to include "Country Pack" at the beginning of their names. Please see the changes below:

• Hearts of Iron IV: Trial of Allegiance > Country Pack - Hearts of Iron IV: Trial of Allegiance
  
• Expansion - Hearts of Iron IV: Battle for the Bosporus > Country Pack - Hearts of Iron IV: Battle for the Bosporus

Greetings all!

Today marks the first dev diary since the release of Trial of Allegiance, so we’ll be looking back over how things went, and community reactions in a little more detail than usual. While I would have loved to have some data on player choices and interactions for today’s diary, our analytics engine is busy chugging away. So, we’ll have to hold off on that until the machine spirit has assessed the incoming preponderance of data.

The Elephant in the Room

It would be hard to talk about Trial of Allegiance without first mentioning that we’re acutely aware of its critical reception from fans. I see no reason not to be transparent about this, and I’m going to use today as an opportunity to talk about what it means to us and how we analyze reactions, so let’s dive into some of the facts:

Everything’s on Fire!

Well, actually no. Trial of Allegiance has thus far been one of our most stable releases in terms of bugs and player-encountered issues. This doesn’t mean there aren’t bugs: stuff always creeps through, but as you may have noticed by now, we’ve had an Open Beta running with a patch scheduled sometime today. The patch notes will be attached to the end of this document. Furthermore, we have another patch scheduled in next week to give us a chance to tackle more complex problems.

Due to the low incidence of bugs in the ToA content, we’re spending a bit more time on general improvements and things folks thought were lacking.

Developer’s Perspective: bugs are defects in the game - errors or unforeseen complexities that render part of the experience to not work as intended. We don’t usually consider design choices or outdated content as bugs unless they cause the first statement to apply, since that evaluation is often subjective.

Circles Within Circles

Our steam review score has taken a fairly heavy beating on Trial of Allegiance. Reviews on DLCs are notoriously hard to draw accurate conclusions from, as very few people tend to leave reviews compared to the overall number of people who bought a DLC. Trial of Allegiance is particularly notable in that regard, as there are fewer reviews overall than we would normally expect. It’s absolutely possible to theorize behind why that is, but that’s all those are: theories.

That said, we read every review. Aaand it’s quite hard, tbh. Being a venerable ancient of the internet, I could wax lyrical on toxicity, vocabulary, and dissociation, but at the end of the day folks leave reviews for a reason. The language they use isn’t as important as the sentiment they’re trying to convey, even if they don’t always know the right way to do it.

What we try and do, therefore, is to try and don our armor of not-taking-things-too-personally, and group negative reviews by common themes or sentiments.

For Trial of Allegiance, we assessed clear ‘meta’ groupings in order of weight*:

- Unhappiness about recent regional currency price adjustments
- Unhappiness about the price of the country pack
> Compared to other HOI4 expansions
> Other
- Bought it but wanted something different
> New mechanics, or
> A european expansion
- Unhappy with the quality of the release
> In relation to specific issues;
> In relation to mods
> Unclear/Unintelligible
> Unclear/Horrendously offensive

*This requires looking at global reviews, not english-language only: something we take quite seriously.

The exact weighting here changes a lot over time, but suffice it to say that the top grouping is significantly larger than any of the others, and the last grouping vice-versa.

But hang on, does this just mean we’re being review bombed by angry interest groups? Well, that would be a nice easy assumption that allows us to feel good about ourselves and go home for supper, but there doesn’t seem to be any coordinated effort here as far as we can tell.

What we can tell here is that folks commonly leave reviews for reasons unrelated to the content we made.

So, these are the findings. So far these have been presented as factual; now we take a more subjective view when it comes to reacting to the findings.

Regional Pricing

This one was a little unexpected, though in hindsight it shouldn’t have been. Looking back over recent reviews on our other expansions, we see the same trend.

In January, Paradox made efforts to normalize pricing across various currency regions according to (as I understand it) a standard used by Valve. On HoI, we saw this as a mostly administrative change, and did not, I think, ask enough questions about the effect it might have on our game-specific player base.

I am not promising any sweeping changes here for decisions that have already been made. What I can say however, is that we will not be treating any such changes as administrative in the future. We will be doing our due diligence.

General Pricing

A little more expected, perhaps, but with some important notes. The vast majority of complaints about the pricing of this release came with comparisons or in relation to other content we’ve released in the past.

While it overlaps a little with the next topic, I feel like we could have been clearer with setting expectations about what a country pack is.

Another observation here is that our fanbase seems to attach more importance to the consistency of expansion prices than we tend to. A lot of the comparisons we’re seeing are equating content made many years ago or at a completely different scale to Trial of Allegiance.

Wanted Something Different

This one is a real games-industry conundrum. Traditionally, if you bring something to market that doesn’t interest everyone, the uninterested ones avoid it. Not so here.

We knew that South America would be a divisive topic amongst the fanbase: some regard it as important, some do not. We calculated that this would make these nations perfect for a country-pack release instead of a full expansion - including mechanics in something that may not interest everyone would put fans in the situation of having to purchase something they did not want.

And, uh, that backfired a bit. Overwhelmingly, reviews in this category are asking where the mechanics are, or why we’re spending time on X instead of Y.

Importantly though, we aren’t gonna change that. We will sometimes have country pack releases, and they will not contain mechanics, though perhaps there’s some middle ground for tech/unit/other additions.

This all comes with a big but: the Juno team who created Trial of Allegiance are not the only ones working on HOI4. Creating content packs is not being done at the expense of other things. We aren’t ready to talk about exactly what’s coming yet, but simply put: we have mechanical expansions in the pipeline that are being built at this very moment. Outside of expansions, we have even more big stuff happening for HoI in the very near future. Watch this space.

Developer’s Perspective: Even if we wanted to, making two mechanical expansions in parallel would be a significant technical challenge. Some games are built to make that easy! HOI is not one of them.

Quality of Release

This is predominantly the stuff that reviews traditionally focus on. Was the delivered content good/bad/neutral? The nature of this is subjective, and these reviews are really where we can act by making changes and fixes. Below you’ll find the patch notes for our first iteration on ToA’s content, with more to come soon.

Overall what we’re seeing from players that stated an active interest in South America is a trending positive reaction. There are some key problems raised to us from highly invested players, which we’ll do our best to address. There are learnings we want to take into future country packs or war effort patches, including but not limited to:

• Shared branches were one of those things that made sense at the time, but in hindsight we should have avoided.
  
• People love map changes more than I thought humanly possible.
  
• Power creep is real, and we should have a balance reckoning sooner rather than later
  
• We can do more with units, tech, and non-focus content without being explicitly ‘mechanical’ in nature. This was sort of on our radar already, but player feedback confirms that.

As I mentioned above, this has been a very bug-light release, but if an issue is plaguing you then please let us know through the usual channels, and we’ll spend any time left over on making other improvements to ToA’s content.

—-----------

Stuff That Doesn’t Really Help

Reviews that are empty/irrelevant/insulting/contain mysterious dwarven chanting are not going to be useful to us. When I say that we read all reviews, I’m not kidding - but if there’s no actionable text, we can’t do anything with it. Of course, it is your right to maintain a practice of critical ambiguity, I’m just saying it won’t produce results.

Reviews and comments that set up a strawman and try to assign a motive to the decisions we make serves only to create a rift between developers and community. We love this game as much as you do, and while it would be naive of me to assume that every discussion can be equally polite and constructive, I do believe that it is better if we let people represent themselves.

Of course, the vast majority of you understand this.

In Conclusion

From my perspective, team Juno had a cracking debut release, and I’m beyond proud of what they accomplished. The strategic side of things is where we’ve fallen short, and that is my cross to bear.

Finally, the reason I’m saying any of this stuff is to give you folks some context. This is hopefully an insight into the thought process that collectively happens behind the scenes at HoI HQ.

I’ll be around to try and answer any questions!

—

Below, you’ll find the patch notes for the update coming sometime today:


################################################################
######## Patch 1.14.2 "Bolivar" #########
################################################################

##################################
# Bugfix & Gameplay Additions
##################################
- Presets in the equipment designer should not be blocked because of so-called negative stats
- Blockade runner now requires fighting with at least one >37 knot ship
- Added a decision for fascist Chile after completing the focus "Forge a New Chilean Identity" to change the national flag to the Patria Vieja based one, due to popular demand.
- Added Felipe Molas López as advisor for Paraguay
- Valentino Riroko Tuki's trait has been buffed, and RAP now gains slightly more things when released and chosen to be played as a part of the Araucanian-Chilean civil war.
- Blockade runner is now actually obtainable
- Flourishing economy for Paraguay no longer expires
- Revenge for the Triple Alliance and Rekindle old gripes now gives wargoals against both actors in a civil war if BRA or ARG is in a civil war
- Fixed an issue where two designer companies for Chile wouldn't have icons with AAT disabled.
- Fixed a bug where Bartolome Blanche would go to the revolting side in the Araucanian civil war despite the non-aligned side still meeting all the requirements to keep him.
- Fixed an issue where taking any of the Promote Spanish Immigration decisions as Chile would permanently block the player from taking any further immigration decisions.
- Support the Spanish republicans no longer spams the error folder
- Historical AI behavior setting for Uruguay no longer disallows achievements
- Fixed an issue where Paraguay could take a focus before taking the prerequisite focus
- You no longer require French Somaliland for the Chilean empire achivement
- USA should no longer guarantee Monroe countries in addition to having the Monroe spirit if Trial of Allegiance is on, unless Tension is > 90%
- Replaced some Uruguayan spirit icons with nicer ones
- Italy now joins the war when France proper is being invaded by Axis troops, or on the historical date
- Reshuffled priorities for building slots for URG/PAR to make it less likely that the capital hits the 25 slot limit
- Paraguay river navy gets properly removed upon capitulation
- Fixed Oscar Escudero Otárola having his name backwards
- 'Reach out to Soviets' in the Argentina tree now checks if the Soviet Union is communist.
- Election event will now only fire if Brazil has completed 'Repeal the National Security Laws'
- Made the requirements to get Senor Hilter slightly easier.
- Added the correct Mechanized tech icons for Brazil
- Fixed an issue where Argentina and Chile could not use their modern small aircraft icon for carrier aircraft.
- Added a fix so you can now see that Prestes will become country leader with the 'Align with Moscow' trait.
- Added a check to Argentina's 'Support the Spanish Republicans' focus so it can only be taken if the Spanish Republic exists.
- some more portrait tweaks for minvervino, valentino and dartnell
- Added a check to the Juan Peron focus to make sure he is still recruited. Also added tooltip to event to make it more apparent he will not be available.
- Argentina can now peace out all UK allies when taking the Falklands
- Modified requirements for 'Revise Treaty of Roca-Runciman' in Argentina focus tree. Now accessible to communists after civil war.
- New Edelman portrait added and minor tweaks to previously existing portraits
- Fix for the Cisplatine war achievement not working.
- Fixed snake smoked achievement file names.
- Nerfed some of the recruitable population and supply in Communist Argentina
- Merged two instances of a duplicated Brazilian admiral/advisor
- Added fix to prevent elections from firing if Vargas is still country leader
- Eugenio Gomez portrait updated to show the right person
- Neglected state and Cangaco state modifiers will now be removed when another country owns the state.
- Fixed an issue that was preventing players from inviting countries to the Org of American states faction and made it easier to see how to integrate countries into US of South America.
- Updated some focuses that were not adding cores to new states.
- Added a fix to make sure that Support the Spanish Nationalists isn't available if they win the civil war
- Added chief of army for those without ToA for Argentina
- Removed "Fascism on the rise" decisions for Argentina
- Made Fascist demagogue advisors available from game start in Argentina
- Brazil and Argentina now have full access to their respective intel agency icons
- Improved tooltip for Align with Moscow focus
- Beneath the shadow of the Triple Alliance and Rekindle old gripes no longer instantly white peace PAR/URG, giving them the option of continuing the war without being teleported back
- Fixed confusing Tooltip for blockade runner
- Peru can no longer go to war with Ecuador if subject
- Chile can no longer create their own faction is subject
- Mexico can no longer invite Peru to their faction if they are at war with Ecuador
- Normandy is now part of Chile's decisions to core France
- Manuel A. Rodriguez no longer has a duplicated localization key and is recruited when ToA is disabled.
- Added fix that prevents players from taking "Demand Compensation From Spain" if Spain does not own Equatorial Guinea
- Fixed an issue with Argentina's starting plane having the wrong icon.
- Fixed a bug where "TAG makes aggressive moves on Uruguay" event fires twice
- URSAL focus now grants cores to Brazil
- Fixed a bug which required reloading the game to show hidden Senor Hilter focuses


##################################
# AI
##################################
- AI now motorizes supply hubs if needed, even if they are controlled by allies or puppets
- The ai should no longer be as willing to send volunteers to the Kingdom of Araucania and Patagonia for all of eternity.
- Limiting some italy ai strategies for only when in faction with germany


##################################
# Modding
##################################
- Removed the check on negative stats that disabled create_equipment_variant and AI equipment creation


##################################
# Stability & Performance
##################################
- Improve performance in resource computation.
- Various minor optimisations across the game (infrastructure etc)

Generals!

Trial of Allegiance is now Live, and with it comes the Fury of Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay!

Join the fight to turn the tides of war, or to give South America a new path through History!

With it comes bug fixes, balance changes and even more content in the free "BOLIVAR" update



https://store.steampowered.com/app/2695150/Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Trial_of_Allegiance/


For Version Rollback, see this post.

For known issues with the "BOLIVAR" patch, click here.

Hello there generals, it's your friendly neighbourhood Community Manager, Katten, here to talk about, Trial of Allegiance patch notes!

But before that, I want to remind you that the DLC releases tomorrow at 17:00 CET! So if you want to secure the exclusive track 'Carnaval Do Brasil', pre-purchase now!

And if you missed what this DLC is all about, watch our release trailer below;


https://store.steampowered.com/app/2695150/Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Trial_of_Allegiance/



################################################################
######## Update 1.14.1 "Bolivar" #########
################################################################

##################################
# Trial of Allegiance
##################################
- Added Brazilian focus tree
- Added Argentina focus tree
- Added Chile focus tree
- Added minor focus tree for Paraguay
- Added minor focus tree for Uruguay
- Added Voiceovers in Brazilian Portuguese, Argentinian Spanish and Chilean Spanish.
- Added numerous new (awesome!) 3D models for the new nations
- Added 6 new music tracks

##################################
# Gameplay
##################################
- Admiral Trait Tree has been reshuffled, ordered now by fleet role and with some rebalancing
- The Monroe Doctrine has been reworked from the old USA guarantees to something more flexible to go with the ToA launch
- More sensible AI weights for interventionists USA going Monroe Doctrine. Will now only DOW if enough tension is generated by that country
- Tweaked Ethiopia to be more aggressive initially in the war against Italy
- Added Embargo Decision against Venezuela
- Changed handsoff tag to Haiti
- Added Quebec as releasable at game start
- Added an event to Mexican focus "Bolivarian Alliance" to ensure that players can refuse the ticking communism national spirit if they wish.
- Fix that ensures a certain shadowy German gentleman can be 100 percent obtainable if Germany capitulates and a certain focus in the Argentina fascist branch is taken
- Reworked the Amazon to have Impassable Terrain areas to model the deep jungle

##################################
# Balance
##################################
- reduced the number of super heavy tank destroyers needed for support battalion to 20
- reduced IC cost of jet engines considerably
- German focus 'Treaty with the USSR' now grants 1x200% research speed bonus for tank hulls, from 2x100%
- Medium tank created by german focus now starts with an MIO if AAT is installed
- Railway Company now gives 15% armor to armored trains instead of reliability
- Several mission specific air advisor modifiers that were non functional have been replaced with mission efficiency bonuses
- Airborn advisors now give bonuses to paratrooper defence and org rather than plane states
- Escort Efficiency now reduce disruption from enemy attacks
- Fixed broken turret for Italian SH tank Hand of God
- CAS leaders/doctrine now also give ground attack bonuses on top of mission efficiency to boost impact
- Added the Union Pacific Railroad as a new Industrial Company for the USA
- Added a variety of new Spies for Germany, Japan and the United States.

##################################
# UI
##################################
- Equipment designer name is now shown in the production list
- You can no longer accidentally click on units while in construction mapmode
- naval battle reports are now properly hidden on reading when parts of stacks
- Fixed list positioning in Military Industrial Organisation Roster

##################################
# AI
##################################
- Fixed bugs in how AI selects research
- A bunch of bugfixes and improvements to how AI calculates research weights
- AI will now pick more appropriate military spirits. AI now cares more about getting early equipment design techs in order to unblock them from iterating on tank equipment
- German AI will prefer picking silent workhorse before other advisors
- German AI will no longer value Heinz Guderian more than every other advisor combined :'(
- German AI will prefer to take army chief advisor before air chief
- Unit controller will now properly handle impassable neighbour adjacencies during an attack
- Discourage AI from changing production lines too quickly and too often and waste efficiency
- Allies of Britain will now share invasion strategies around Norway and be more hesitant
- make sure UK AI doesn’t hold out on guaranteeing poland when it's time critical, just to save up for laws
- fixed a scope issue for italian AI strategies
- USA AI now more likely to lend-lease UK and Soviet
- UK AI should switch from interwar tanks quicker
- Various strategy tweaks for naval invasion behaviour around the mediterranean

##################################
# Modding
##################################
- Added AI strategy research_weight_factor
- Added variable values for deployed_army_manpower_k, deployed_navy_manpower_k, deployed_airforce_manpower_k, and deployed_army_manpower_k
- it is now possible to define colours on sub ideologies which will then be used over ideology group colour
- Added optional 'is_frame' argument to equipment definitions to let modders define fully designed equipment without the game thinking it's a frame.
- Added longest_war_length and war_length_with triggers to allow checking how long a nation has been at war
- Fix AI for assigning MIO to production line when Task Capacity is activated in mod
- From now on_leave_faction will fire every time someone leaves a faction.
- From now on_become_faction_member will fire every time someone joins a faction.
- From now on_send_volunteers will NOT fire when volunteers are sent back to their origin country
- AI strategy EQUIPMENT_PRODUCTION_UPGRADE_DESIRE_OFFSET now handles positive numbers as well

##################################
# Graphics
##################################
- Fixed some bugs in train gfx spawning which could cause almost all trains to pick high-traffic ports as target locations
- fixes and tweaks for mud look
- Several visual updates to make mud look nicer
- Mud never shown on impassable terrain areas as it makes them harder to see and you cant walk there anyways
- Fixed an issue with german army insignias

##################################
# Bugfix
##################################
- Fixed issue where submarine task forces attempting to pass through a strait would check the rule for navies instead of the one for submarines.
- Fix for a problem where white peace does not give back all owned territories, because neutral countries owned it.
- Fixed an issue where the price of equipment in a purchase contract could change.
- Newly created Spains (after SCW starts) now update their trade influence correctly, so volunteers sent to them will now reinforce correctly straight away
- Air deploy interface filters will properly work when land and CV planes are both in stockpile
- Slovenia, Palestine and Israel now start with the correct capitals
- Soviet Union: National Spirits for Anti-Soviet Military Thinking can now be removed via decision even when Beriya takes power before the Right Opposition Coup.
- Fixed bug where National Spirits from Scandinavian Joint Focus tree didn't always have an icon
- Fixed showing negative night penalty as a positive
- Sweden: Ebba no longer gets her construction speed bonus removed when upgrading her
- Sweden: Pull the Trigger decision for communist Sweden now makes Communist NOR/DEN very likely to want to form an alliance with Sweden, and reduces the want of wanting to join the comintern or other factions
- Fixed an issue that caused communist Sweden AI path to not work properly
- Fixed the names of Zimbabwe characters
- Fixed the names of Zambian characters
- Fix the diplomatic action Justify Wargoal disappearing when the target state is not controlled by the target country anymore
- Added namelists that were missing for LAO, VIN, CAM, TRA, KOS, PAL, ISR. Also fixed the capitals for Qatar and UAE being incorrect.
- Airwings attached to armies should no longer forget their missions when they lack coverage of target areas
- Italy no longer calls its allies to join the war against Ethiopia. Italy no longer joins war against Poland. Ethiopia in exile cannot join their overlord's wars until they have completed the "Formal Request" decision.
- Made Light Aircraft MIO now upgrade CAS as well as fighters.
- Blocked province buildings from being constructed in impassable provinces
- block construction fully in impassable areas
- Fixed a bug where no effect would come from the British focus "Gibraltar for Spanish Support" if having LaR enabled.
- updated the claims gained in the Portuguese focuses "Recover the East Indies", "Recover Brazil" and "Latin America".
- Norway's Modernise Armed Forces Decision available during wartime and can be selected after 3 months of war if the appropriate focuses have been completed
- CV NAV and CAS now have proper bonuses from Admiral traits (Dive Bomber and Torpedo Bomber)
- Fixed the bug where the airplane designer did not choose the proper 2d icon by default.
- Fixed an issue where navies could not be ordered to move out of blocked sea regions.
- Fix issue with Convoy raiding efficiency modifier from leaders not applying correctly
- Fixed issues in SCW hidden event handling the opposition side of the CW working on controlling garrisons against the player

##################################
# Stability & Performance
##################################
- Maximum number of players in a MP game can now be configured by the host in settings.txt. Bumped the default value to 64.
- Prevent CTD in International Market AI that could happen for sea routes
- Fixed a CTD in international market when sorting on linux and mac
- Fix CTD when a mod removes unit leader traits from DB

Extra! Extra! In today’s news, we bring you new footage of the ongoing struggle on the South American continent. We will give you exclusive shots of the political and military development in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile.

It is yet unclear how the political landscape will evolve during this tumultuous time, though we have seen some prominent persons appearing in both the political and military landscape. Here are some of the most influential people we’ve identified:


Significant Figures from Argentina



Significant Figures from Brazil



Significant Figures from Chile

On the broader spectrum, our office analysts have looked into all the data we have collected and recognized a multitude of potential developments within the countries. No one can predict exactly how a country will develop in the future, but they’ve drawn a general image of some focuses that the nations might orient towards:

A selection of focus icons from Argentina (Left Column), Brazil (Center column) and Chile (Right Column)

From our reporter on ground we have an exciting story on the military groups involved in the conflict in the South American region. Without further ado, we bring you this exciting interview.

marblemadness: So, Slurpen_Paradox, can you tell us more about what is happening behind the scenes?

Slurpen_Paradox: Yes! These are the most prominent armed forces that have been involved in the area.


marblemadness: Jolly gee! Is that an armed civilian? These people look very dangerous. Are there any other forces involved in the region as well?

Slurpen_Paradox: I’m glad you asked! Other than the “armed civilian” there have also been groups driven by various political ideologies. Here are the ones I managed to capture on camera:


Slurpen_Paradox: It’s not only ground troops that are fighting these battles. With the latest technological advancements we’ve seen in recent years all the primary countries involved in this conflict have acquired various planes, tanks, and armored vehicles to supplement their forces.

They seem to have a bunch of repainted ones as well as some that I haven't seen on the battlefield before!







marblemadness: All those vehicles looked dangerous. But hang on just a moment! This one does not look dangerous at all! Finally, some decent, upstanding…


marblemadness: …oh. I see. It belongs to the Liga Patriótica Argentina. Is there any other footage you would like to share?

Slurpen_Paradox: Yes. During my time in the deepest parts of the Amazons I’ve brought with me some dramatic photographs from the battlefields.




marblemadness: Oh, that looks absolutely brutal! Thank you for bringing this exclusive look on what is happening on the South American continent.

As a final section in our newspaper, especially in these worrying times, we try to keep our chins up by ending on a positive note. Now it is time for our final section; a series of comic strips developed by our inhouse art team.

AMERICA DECOLONIZED

As Mapuche Chile, Liberate all Native people in North and South America

AND THE SNAKE SMOKED

As Brazil, in the allies, capitulate Germany while controlling Berlin

CHILEAN EMPIRE

Control all of the mainland states that border the pacific in South America, North America and Asia

CISPLATINE WAR 2, ELECTRIC BOOGALOO

As Either Brazil or Argentina, be in a faction with Uruguay while at war with Brazil / Argentina

HISPANICS OF THE WORLD, UNITE!

As Chile, form the Hispanic Alliance and have at least 8 "Hispanic" nations in your faction

I'M HOME!

As Brazil occupy every core state of Portugal

ISLAS MALVINAS

As Argentina, hold the Falkland Islands and South Georgia for 73 days consecutively

KING OF WHAT?

Have Jaque Bernard as King of Chile and control Paris

LAMENTO BOLIVIANO

As Argentina, own all of Latin America except Bolivia

A LAND ON FIRE

As any country, drop a nuke on Tierra del Fuego

THE MERRY BAND

As communist Brazil, have Lampião as country leader and occupy Nottingham

PROACTIVE DEFENSE

As any communist South American country, occupy washington D.C.

RECONQUISTADORS

As Argentina or Chile, have a Conquistadors National Spirit active whil holding all Spanish cores

RED HOT CHILE PEPPERS

As Communist Chile, control California

REVENGE FOR THE TRIPLE ALLIANCE

As Paraguay, declare war on Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay within the same Month

RUMBLE IN THE JUNGLE

Own all Amazon core states as any South American nation

SOMEHOW HE HAS RETURNED

As Argentina, have Señor Hitler become country Leader

THE TRUE CONDOR LEGION

As CHL, BOL, PRU, ECU, VEN, COL - send volunteers to Germany

URSAL

Be communist and own all of South America

BAD ENDING - THE WHOLE WORLD IS NOW BRAZIL

Control every State in the World as Brazil


Thank you so much for reading today’s issue of “News from the Front Lines”. And just as always, remember. We bring news, you make the story!




Make sure to check out Trial of Allegiance here
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2695150/Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Trial_of_Allegiance/

Hello there! AveeBee here again to discuss alternate history Brazil this week. If you haven’t already, I highly recommend reading the historical dev diary where we also covered the industrial and military branches for Brazil as this week we will be just looking at the political branches. It’s worth keeping in mind that due to covering multiple branches this week, I’m going to try and keep the overview to the highlights as there will simply be too much to cram into a single dev diary and I imagine most of you are still digesting last week's big bag of goodies!

To get started, here’s some less obscured views of the full Brazilian tree and the political branches



First up, we’re going to look at the Integralist branch which constitutes the fascist path for Brazil. A little bit of context, the Integralist movement was established in the early 1930s by Plínio Salgado and in many ways mirrored the tendencies and aesthetics of Italian fascism with a distinctly Brazilian twist. In place of blackshirts, the Integralists formed greenshirted paramilitary groups which marched in opposition to liberalism and communism. Much of their doctrine consisted of an enforcement of typically traditional Christian values and a shared cultural/nationalist identity which glorified Brazil.

Last week we showed the historical/Vargas path and as you can see below, the Integralist branch is intertwined with that branch. The reason being, as Vargas attempted to increase his authority over the nation, he somewhat cozied up to the Integralists in order to sway them to back him. This can be seen in the manner Vargas adopted the rhetoric of contemporary fascists.


In this branch, the player has the option to Work with the Integralists which unlocks decisions to boost fascist support across the country.




Just as in the historical path, the goal at this point is to weaken support for democracy and to prepare for the forged Cohen Plan. With enough fascism support however, instead of taking the Estado Novo focus, the player can take Estado Moderno instead. This will realign Brazil to a fascist government with Vargas becoming leader of the Integralist party… for now.



With the Integralists in power, the need to to hold on to it becomes pressing. As such, the next logical step for the movement is to expand the greenshirted paramilitary groups across the nation and begin bringing Integralist advisors into government. In the states that we have already conducted an Integralist rally, militia divisions can be recruited.



(The Eagle Division Icon is a placeholder)


Following this, there are a number of focuses to choose from to reconfigure the nation along Integralist lines. But the most important of these decisions is the choice between who should lead the party.


If the player chooses In Vargas We Trust, Vargas will gain a new trait and secure himself as the face of the movement. Meanwhile, if For the Fatherland is taken instead, the previously mentioned Plínio Salgado will finally take his place as leader of Brazil.



Once the nation has been fully indoctrinated into the Integralist way of thinking, Brazil can begin to look at its neighbors and how to interact with them. This brings us to the Domination of South America sub-branch which will also be available to alt-history/fascist aligned Vargas and the Monarchist path.



This branch can be broken down into three components, alignment with Germany, alignment with Italy, and territorial expansion. By collaborating with Germany, Brazil will gain access to improved espionage abilities via operation Bolivar and the ability to purchase/develop Panzers and U-Boats. This will culminate in the final push by Germany and Brazil to dominate the South Atlantic Ocean, giving Brazil claims to a number of islands in the region.


Collaborating with Italy on the other hand, based on the historical connections between the two nations, will allow Brazil to procure/develop its air and motorized forces to better dominate the continent. This sub-branch culminates in a joint partitioning of Africa, which when taken in conjunction with some of the monarchist focuses for dominating Portugal, can lead to a sizable Brazilian overseas empire.



The territorial expansion section of this branch will of course give various wargoals and methods for conquest across the continent, up to and including the Panama canal. By this Brazil has more than likely gained the ire of the United States for a multitude of transgressions. As such, it better be prepared for an intercontinental war, and what better way to do that then to unify the continent under Brazilian leadership!


However, if Ethical Internationalism is a more appealing method of securing the continent, there’s also the option to Form Mercosul and work with Brazil’s neighbors to defend the continent.


Next up, let's take a look at the monarchist path for Brazil. The starting focus for this path is shared with the democratic path and consists of rallying the opposition to Vargas to end the state of emergency he instituted. Without this, Vargas has no justification for securing more power for himself and his support will begin to crumble.


Following on from this, a new movement can be created from those who are disgruntled with the instability wrought by years of democracy and revolutions. Initially the movement will coalesce around the romanticization of Brazil’s Imperial history.


Once the movement begins to gain momentum, calls for a restoration of the monarchy will grow. However, the difficult choice of which claim to the throne should be embraced will have to be made.




Once enough support has been gathered for the chosen leader of the royal house, an initial push towards restoration is the establishment of a constitutional monarchy. Don’t worry though, this is a stop-gap before the fun begins…


With increased influence in government, the newly crowned King can get to work undermining the democratic apparatus of the country before finally pulling a Vargas and using a national security law to suspend it completely. Once this is done, the Brazilian Empire can finally be restored.


However, Brazil will still have a number of political issues to contend with such as a population that has been forced to become subjects largely against their will. While this can be overcome, alternative military recruitment methods, such as penal battalions, may be used to swell the Empire’s forces.

Through expansion of the Brazilian Empire, either through conquest or diplomacy, the population's initial reluctance to accept the new monarch can be overcome. And of course their are methods for unifying with Portugal to create a global Empire.




From this point in the tree, Monarchist Brazil has the decision to make between either collaborating with the Allies or pursuing more conquest via the Domination of the Americas sub-branch.


Before moving on to the next political branch, here’s a close up of one of our prospective monarch's Portrait;


The democratic path, as mentioned earlier, shares the same starting point with the monarchist path which requires ending the state of emergency. However, instead of wallowing in nostalgia, the democratic path requires altering the constitution to prevent another such erosion of democracy.


This results in Vargas being ousted from power and Armando de Sales Oliveira being ushered in as President.


The primary concern for the new president will be preventing the military from attempting to overthrow the fragile government. As such, there are two methods for dealing with them. The first option is to promote federalism across the nation, embracing the distinct identities of the constituent states and allowing the creation of national guard. The government can also take a more social-democratic route, nationalizing the banks and meeting the promises of Article 138 of the constitution to support families.



The second option for dealing with the military is to promote centralization, strengthen the national government and find a compromise with the armed forces. Such a compromise will consist of allowing military personnel to take a more prominent role in the government as well as enforcing a policy of strict anti-communism by banning the movement completely. This will also force the government to take a less interventionist economic policy and promote traditional values.


Collaborating with the military will allow Brazil to be better prepared militarily, but increasing federalism will lead to a more stable country in the long run.

Once the initial concern over government stability in the face of military pressure, attention will have to shift towards preparing the country for potential conflict as the world descends into war.


Inviting foreign corporations to Brazil will allow those playing with Arms Against Tyranny to gain MIO’s from a number of democratic governments.


Meanwhile War Bonds will allow Brazil to cut the need for consumer goods and increase war support.


Finally, with enough war support, Brazil will be able to progress towards the Good Neighbor Policy via The International Crisis.


So, we touched on the Good Neighbor sub-branch in the historical dev diary but I didn’t expand on the alt-history aspects of it. You can of course do the historical thing of working with the United States and joining the war against the Axis powers. But There is also the potential to oust the fascists and communists from South America unilaterally as well as creating a faction based around the Organization of American States.



The culmination of this path results in the (somewhat) peaceful creation of a ‘United States of South America,’ which can be a pretty potent superpower in the late game.



The final path we’re going to look at today is the communist path. As you can see below, this path is completely isolated from the others and does not have access to the Good Neighbor or Domination of South America sub-branches.


As mentioned in the historical dev diary, in 1935 the communists had taken part in an attempted overthrow of the Vargas government. As such, at game start the clock is ticking for the communists as Vargas and the military will be attempting to clamp down on communism, so any chance for a successful revolution will have to be taken as soon as possible.

The most likely result of increasing communist support will be a civil war. Therefore the communists need to make sure that they are better prepared than the government when it kicks off. This can be done by taking a number of optional focuses such as swaying the lower ranking personnel in the armed forces to the cause, reaching out to the Soviet Union for support or even persuading the Cangaço to take the side of the proletariat.



Gaining Soviet support for the revolution will however depend on releasing Luís Carlos Prestes and Olga Prestes from prison first. The pair were arrested following the 1935 attempted revolution as ‘ringleaders’ of the movement. Olga was believed to be an operative of Soviet intelligence due to undergoing military training at an academy in the Soviet Union.


Once enough support has been gained, the second revolution can begin.


Once the civil war is won, the next choice will be over who should govern the Brazilian Socialist Republic. Depending on the choices made earlier, there will be three potential options. First up is Prestes, allowing Brazil to become aligned with the Soviet Union. Next is the ANL council, which will allow Brazil to maintain its own path to communism. Finally, we have the wild card option of having the Cangaco trigger a coup and taking Brazil down an anarcho-communist path.






After a leader is chosen, the difficult task of rebuilding and modernizing the nation will begin. There are of course a number of ways to carry out the task.


Now we come to the foreign policy aspect of the communist branch which begins with Expand the Revolution.


After this, Brazil can either form its own communist faction in South America or join the Comintern. Regardless of the path chosen, Brazil will have the opportunity to expand its influence through both espionage and military aggression. However, the USA and the other great powers may not sit by idly while Brazil paints the continent red. In order to placate them however, they can take inspiration from China and dabble in some Jaguar Diplomacy.



With South America falling under the sway of Brazilian communism, a new world power can be forged to challenge the old powers.


Before wrapping up this week's dev diary, I want to share some of the awesome portraits and tech icons we’ve got hooked-in since the last Brazil diary, enjoy!












That’s it for this week, I hope you enjoyed this dive into alt-history Brazil. Next week we’ll be taking a broader look at art and achievements.
See you then!



Make sure to check out Trial of Allegiance here
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2695150/Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Trial_of_Allegiance/

Generals!

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Hello there, Aveebee here to introduce this week's chunky Dev Diary covering a variety of topics. We’ll be covering everything free going into the upcoming patch that will release alongside Trial of Allegiance, an overview of some major map changes in South America, as well as some content pack specific updates. So without further ado, let’s get started!

First up, we have Jonathan!

Hello again everyone, now it’s time for me to show you guys some of the things for this bag of treats that I have been working on for the patch coming alongside the Country Pack Trial of Allegiance!

First up in terms of what I have contributed to this bag of treats is the Peruvian-Ecuadorian war of 1941. Now, Ecuador starts with ownership and a core on Pastaza, and Peru will have to take it through war, with the option of a scripted peace if they manage to take it. Ecuador can however also secure themselves a scripted peace from this ordeal, as long as they take Loreto, which means a skilled Ecuador player can even gain territory from the conflict.



But wait, there’s more! Now onto new formable nations (that aren’t for the main countries getting a focus tree in the DLC) that are included in the patch. And for this part I’m especially looking at you Hovelax ;).

The First on up is the Peru-Bolivian Confederation, formable in-game by either Peru or Bolivia.



The next one is the United Guianas, formable by either Suriname, Guyana or Cayenne.



And finally for new free formable nations coming in this patch, we have Hispaniola, formable by either Haiti or the Dominican Republic.



Now then, we’ve arrived to the non formable, but instead releasable nations added alongside this patch, or at least the ones that I’ve implemented.

First up on the list we have Quebec.


After that comes Yucatan.


Then comes another historical Mexican breakaway state, the Republic of the Rio Grande.


And finally we have a new island nation, which you might have seen briefly in last week's Chile Dev Diary. That nation is Rapa Nui, most often known as Easter Island.


And now, merged into this patch is a Canadian War Effort, updating and adding a small extra amount of content for our home and native land, Canada.

To start off with, Canada has a new industrial concern available to them, that being the Canadian Pacific Railway.


And after that comes the fact that the Canadian country leaders now start with their own unique traits.





And there are also three new focuses available to Canada, this time with more focus on the democratic branches.


The first two each give a National Spirit;



And then this focus allows you to gain Newfoundland and Labrador despite staying with the Allies, or even when going independent democracy.


A few of the old focuses have also been touched up, so I will show some. Not all of them are here, so you will have to find some differences on your own once the patch releases ;)

This focus now takes 35 days.


Taking this focus when having Mackenzie King as your country leader also gives him an extra trait.


And this focus now gives you two civilian factories.


Oh and what’s this?


The old formable nation of Central America now has two possible follow-up decisions that can give them a small bit of extra core states.

First up is Integrating Panama.


And then you also have Integrating Yucatan.


And now we arrive at my final contributions to this patch. First up we have the Union Pacific Railroad for the USA.


As for the owners of La Resistance, you will also gain new operatives such as the new American Operatives, George Musulin, Joe Savoldi, René Joyeuse, Willian G Sebold and Serge Obolensky. These operatives are unlocked for the USA through some of the various War Plans focuses.


As for new German Operatives, there are Erich Gimpel, Johannes Sigfried Becker, Herbert Hans Haupt, Norman Baillie Stewart and Fritz Joubert Duquesne.

Johannes Sigfried Becker;


Fritz Joubert Duquesne:


And finally, there have also been some new Japanese Operatives added. They are Patrick Vaughan Heenan, John Semer Farnsworth and Ignatius Timothy Trebitsch Lincoln.

Ignatius Timothy Trebitsch Lincoln:


John Semer Farnsworth:


And that’s all from me folks, next up Mordred Viking!

Hello! My name is Mordred Viking, and I have recently joined the Hearts of Iron IV team. As some of you may know, I have a bit of a thing for naval warfare in HOI, and have wanted to retouch the Admiral Trait tree for a while now.

Here’s the old version:


There were a number of things about this tree I was not a huge fan of, firstly how certain earnable traits (the ones you need to get through use) effectively blocked the latter assigned ones. Cruiser Captain being a particular pain to get due to Fly Swatter being very slow to gain.

Furthermore, there were a couple of traits which very rarely saw use, Mine Sweeper / Layer being most prominent. Having two traits for an area not often focused on anyway basically meant they just never got used.

Working together with C0rax, we rejigged the positions, trying to keep traits in some kind of role order; Raiding, Escorting, Cruising, Carrier-ing, and Big-Gunning. We also increased the number of pathways to the assignable traits, meaning you should find yourself soft locked far less frequently. Fly Swatter has been made an assignable trait now instead.

And here’s the updated version:


We also combined the mine traits into one, and it has quite possibly the best description in the game (I’ll leave you to find that for yourselves!).

AveeBee here again! Before jumping into the content pack specific part of this dev diary, I think it’s also worth pointing out that there will be a lot of bug fixes going into the Bolivar Patch that have not been mentioned here but are no less important. We’ll be looking more at those in a later Dev Diary.

The Amazon Rainforest is probably one of the most hostile places on the planet to get embroiled in a conflict due to the array of geographical features it includes. It is not the type of place you can sweep through with tanks or rapidly construct infrastructure to support massive infantry formations. As such, we’ve made some changes to its portrayal in Hearts of Iron to better represent the difficulty of fighting there.


As you can see in the screenshot above, we’ve added a number of impassible regions to represent the deepest parts of the Amazon where fighting would be almost impossible. However, we have created channels through the rainforest that follow the course of the major rivers along which troops can pass.


This creates some really fun gameplay due to the natural choke points that develop in the area. However, we wanted to make sure there were still enough provinces along the riverside to allow for encirclements and interesting maneuvers.


These changes have made the region challenging, but definitely more interesting. Anyone who can use the terrain to their advantage will likely enjoy fighting here. For example, using supply hubs along the river to support your troops without the need for railways can make a massive difference to your success in the region.

On the topic of map changes, we have also broken down the air regions above South America to make air combat more interesting.


Hey everyone, it’s Eilidh again. After taking your feedback into consideration, we have decided to implement a short alternate path in the historical branch where you, as the player, can decide to elect Juan Perón as the leader of Argentina. The position in this tree means that you can either choose to support the allies or go on your own conquest of South America, depending on the type of game you want to play.




And before I sign off, allow me to show you the leader portrait we have cooked up for the man himself.


We hope you enjoy this addition to the Argentinian tree! We appreciate you giving us feedback as we go, and whilst we cannot implement all changes in the time that we are allocated, we will do our best to accommodate!

Mba'éichapa!

Craniummuppet here to present two mini-trees, Paraguay and Uruguay. These trees started as a side-project for me after the release of AAT, mostly to give a small treat to you guys but kinda kept growing in size as time went on from a smaller shared tree into fully separated trees with a scope target like Aussa or Iceland. (Note that much of the icons are placeholders and will get updated)

At the start of the game Paraguay is reeling from two costly wars - The War of the Triple Alliance and the Chaco War against Bolivia.

This is felt in Paraguay



In Feb 1936 Rafael Franco will launch his coup against the government where you can pick to either let him seize control of the country or resist him. Allowing him to take power will lead you down the historical path, and resisting him will plunge you into a civil war.


Seizing power will allow you to do various socialist and military reforms, while not a communist per-se Franco (not that one) certainly had policies that were left leaning in nature, but also had typical military dictatorship tendencies.

He didn't last long though, and got ousted by the military after pulling back troops from the Chaco region. You can keep Franco though (not that one) by not pulling back from the Chaco, which is the second alt-history choice.

Pulling back from the Chaco will lead to a revolt within the army, putting Higinio Morínigo in power


If Franco was more left leaning, Morínigo is the polar opposite. To put it bluntly he had strong pro-Nazi sympathies,with parts of the police force and the military adopting the symbolism of the Third Reich. He also allied himself with militias, banned parties and consolidated his power.

This focus path will pivot the country from the Franco left leaning military dictatorship towards a more fascist and authoritarian military dictatorship under Morínigo.
(As an example the police chief at the time named his kid Adolfo Hioritho … )

While starting as unaligned in this path you can eventually commit fully to fascism, or you can stay as unaligned


One of the biggest reasons why Paraguay did not drift closer to the Axis powers was because of direct intervention from the USA. They started financing various endeavours in the country which kept Paraguay out of the war, such as favourable loans, road finance and technical assistance..

In game this is modelled by accepting American investment, whereby you won’t be able to join the Axis for the duration of the investment. Going down all the investment paths will keep you out of the Axis powers, but grant you massive boosts to the economy. How far you exploit this is up to you.

Going back to the world where Franco does not pull back from the Chaco, the alternative is war with Bolivia, this lets you keep Franco, and get some early conquest. With Bolivia conquered, you can finally get a coastline by getting wargoals against Peru and Chile, which leads to a very weird shape of a country. This is my current playthrough


And yeah… it has an interesting shape.


Going back to the top there is the other alternative history, the civil war route. Should you resist the Franco takeover you will enter a state of civil war where the army will rise up.


The army will have the upper hand at the start of the war, but the Paraguay river gives excellent defense.

To win the civil war, you can use the American scare of a “communist” state in its sphere of influence to increase your power. You can also use your wife's ties to France to get some aid from there.

Most powerful of all are the Marines, which will be used to break the river and win the war, or you can goad Bolivia to become involved in it which leads to a three way war that you can exploit.


When all is said and done you can use your civil war general, José Estigarribia to purge the military and cement your rule over the country. This leads to co-rule between Ayala and Estigarribia, or you can let Estigarribia take full control. It will take a while to rebuild the country as the civil war and various other wars have likely taken their toll, but eventually it will lead to a flourishing economy


Uruguay was comparatively more stable than Paraguay during the time frame, despite being under a quasi dictatorship under Gabriel Terra.

Despite this they enjoyed a rapid GDP growth and relative stability. The beginning of the period centers around industrialization and the policies under Terra.


Around 1938 he will step down and you can pick between either the Colorados or Blancos, which are the two main parties in Uruguay, but both are democratic aligned.


If Democracy isn’t to your liking you can instead go down to the Furhmann plan, ally with agitators like Adolfo Agorio become fascist and use it as a springboard for the Axis powers in South America. This path is now locked behind any election event and can be b-lined to at game start if so pleased.

Before asking, of course there's events for the Battle of the River Plate.


Which will be triggered whenever a British and German ship is in the Southern Georgia Sea or in the Argentine Coast at the same time.



There are also some shared branches between Paraguay and Uruguay which will appear in both trees.


First off, the conquest branch allows you to do a small-scale war at the start of the game for some quick conquests if you are cheeky enough. You can even conquer parts of Brazil while being in the Paraguayan civil war to bypass parts of the river line.

Uruguay has access to this as well but they target Rio Grande do Sul and Región Mesopotámica. Later you can decide whether you want to go on a crusade against imperialism, forgoing any factions but having the ability to core more land, or a more conservative approach where you can core some land but you can still join factions.


Paraguayan Version;


Uruguayan Version;


A bit silly fun where hopefully it can be a challenge as well as long term goals in a playthrough.

The industrial branch focuses on the exports of the country, which mostly comprises Beef, Wool, Hides and other agricultural products.


You can also choose to empower the landowners, upon which they will start improving your economy automatically. In this screenshot they seem really keen on adding a building slot.


The research branch is where you get your 3th,4th and 5th slot. You require to have some industry to unlock each, with each slot getting gradually more difficult to get.


This focus will also unlock more civs the more you have invested in the industrial focus. So if you want those slots early you might have to sacrifice some industry.

Similarly to all other focus trees in this pack, Uruguay and Paraguay will use the shared military branch. :)

Uruguay


Paraguay


AveeBee here again, that's it for this week, hope you enjoyed it and are looking forward to Trial of Allegiance!

Next week we will be taking a look at alt-history Brazil.

See you then!

Make sure to check out Trial of Allegiance here
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2695150/Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Trial_of_Allegiance/

Hola a todos! Jonathan here to bring you a brand new Hearts of Iron 4 Dev Diary for the upcoming DLC Trial of Allegiance! I will be introducing you all to Chile, a country mostly known as South America’s Prussia. And as such, it’s time for a country almost no one knows about (nor is probably all too invested in), it’s time for Chile!

And breaking from how we have done it ever since No Step Back, this Dev Diary will tell you about all of the Chilean content, as was done in the Argentinian Dev Diary.

As usual, please do keep in mind that everything you’re about to see is still WIP so things might change before release and you will see some placeholder art and WIP values. The team thanks for your understanding!

Now then, on to the actual stuff!



So seeing as most if not practically all people know little-to nothing about Chile, I will start with some historical context, to get everyone on track, and catch you up (hopefully also slightly increasing interest in the country). I didn't know anything about the country prior to being assigned to work on it either, so you can imagine my surprise when I got to know what to work on, but after reading about it, despite having had no interest in the continent whatsoever, I can actually say that I now find it a whole lot more fascinating than I ever did before! The few things that are more widely known are Salvador Allende's socialist rule during the Cold War, and General Augusto Pinochet’s CIA-sponsored coup d‘etat in 1973. But those are much later, so let’s turn back the clock a bit.

In the beginning there was nothing, but somewhere around 3000 BC the first people seem to have moved in. Jumping forward, by the 16th century, Spanish conquistadors began to colonize the region of present-day Chile, and the territory was a colony between 1540 and 1818, when it gained independence from Spain. In Chilean history, the earliest period of the nation is referred to as the Patria Vieja, and the Patria Nueva (the old and new fatherland respectively), where Bernardo O'Higgins led the country to victory against the Spanish Empire during the Latin American wars of independence. From 1826 to 1932, Chile underwent many government changes and the people got quite used to coup d’etats and political instability. The Great Depression that began in 1929 was felt strongly in Chile starting from 1930, and was felt all the way into our current game-time. Chile was the country struck the hardest by the USA closing down their borders, as a vast majority of the Chilean economy revolved around exports of Nitrate and Copper to the United States. This all led to the coup that established the Chilean Socialist Republic briefly in 1932, and which led to a former president, Arturo Alessandri, being recalled to counter-coup the coup makers. Once the Republic of Chile was back on track, he began working to restore the country, and that is where we find ourselves at the start of the game.

Chile also took part in a few wars during this period, even winning conflicts in which they were outmatched. Examples of wars they took part in are the War of the Pacific against Peru and Bolivia from 1879 to 1884, and the Occupation of Araucanía against the Mapuche and the Kingdom of Araucanía and Patagonia that took place from 1861 to 1883. It’s all very interesting, have a read up on it sometime!

TLDR for the last two paragraphs: Chile is and was very unstable, but also pretty tough…

That’s that for historical context however, sorry for geeking out… Now it’s time for the actual things you all came for, the in-game content, as I’m sure you didn’t all come here for a history lesson!



Arturo Alessandri is a very important figure in Chilean history, and now, as is tradition with almost all countries that get unique content, he starts with a trait. Be aware however, that despite staying democratic, he will not be around forever, as the elections roll around and new presidents need to be elected!

By 1936, Chile has grown quite a bit since independence, having conquered the south from the Mapuche, as well as Antofagasta, Arica and Tacna from Bolivia and Peru, though having sold Tacna back to Peru in the treaty of Lima (1929) to secure more funds to recover from the economic troubles.




And here you can observe the fact that Chile just doesn’t really function at game start…















And then the other two spirits are the “Legacy of the Naval Arms Race” and the “Monroe Doctrine”, both of which have been discussed in the previous two Dev Diaries.

As you can also see, the Chilean order of battle has been adjusted to better represent the army at the start of the game.



Chile also has quite a few new cool 3d models!







Chile also has quite a few new generals coming with the DLC, so here you can see some of the ones you start with (keep in mind that their art isn’t fully in yet):






Chile also starts with a vast plethora of political advisors now, and though it may be many, are invisible from the start, or will go invisible once you start going down paths where the respective characters will no longer be available! So here are the ones visible from the start.






And here are the various Industrial Concerns the nations starts with:



But now finally, on to the thing you have all been waiting for, the glorious Chilean focus tree!



As you can see, the focus tree is divided into the classic political, industrial and military branches respectively.

The industrial tree is mainly divided into three parts, the public works, the mineral extraction, and the “post-peso devaluation” part.



The rightmost part gives bonuses to construction and infrastructure.



While the leftmost part gives bonuses to resource extraction and trade.



Then, when you want to move down to the stronger focuses below, you need to devalue the peso, in order for the economy to be on track so that you can properly undertake these big projects. Note that these stronger focuses require the devaluation of the peso to have run its time before they can be taken.





As you all might have, or might not have, seen in the Historical Brazil Dev Diary, the countries of the pack share the general layout and effects of this military branch, but as stated previously, they all have their own unique quirks and bonuses, as can be seen here.









Now then, on to the political, historical, democratic branch of the Chilean focus tree.



To start of with, in the early stages of the game, Chile has to try and deal with the upcoming attempted coup d'etat by the fascist party “Movimiento Nacional-Socialista”, or as they were more colloquially known as, the Nacistas.



There are various ways to deal with them, such as suppressing them, for the most part ignoring them, perhaps to your own detriment, or attempting to use them, unfortunately however subsequently increasing their power when the fated coup d’etat occurs.



As some of you eagle-eyed readers might have noticed, the first democratic focuses have to do with Arturo Alessandri being the president, and after that comes the 1938 Presidential Election focus. That is because, while you are locked out of the late-game focuses of the democratic tree until the election has happened and you have chosen a direction to take your country, but until then, you have Arturo Alessandri’s own policies to enact.



And as the founder of the Banco Central de Chile, a democratic Chile led by Arturo Alessandri can focus on upgrading this industrial concern, gaining hefty advantages to economy management.



And when the presidential election at the end of 1938 rolls around, it is time to say goodbye to Alessandri, and welcome a new president, where you need to decide, a left-wing president, or a right-wing one?



And throughout the game, the 1942 and 1946 elections will also occur, prompting you to select a new (or sometimes keep an old) country leader. These ones however will not lock you out of parts of the focus tree, at least in a sense…



You see, there are focuses in the democratic tree that can only be taken while having a left and right-leaning president respectively. As seen previously, you can change your president at certain intervals, allowing you to, in theory, go for practically all focuses, seeing as Chile during this time went from being ruled by the Liberals, then Social-Democrats, then the same, and the Conservatives who placed bans on all form of communism, and then back and forth, on and on.



There are of course also those within the military who dislike the political changes going through the country. For example, general Ariosto Herrera could try something.





There are also multiple important choices to take throughout the mid-to-late game for a democratic Chile, such as how to deal with the democratic processes, and in what way to prioritize the industry. This part is important for one of the alternative history branches, so remember this.



And finally, as historically happened, you can go to war with the fascists by declaring war on Japan, or perhaps someone else if the world has taken a different turn.



There are also a few other big things that happened to Chile throughout this time, such as the great 1939 Chillán earthquake:



And the sinking of the SS Tolten.



And if you want to, you can do things that didn’t really happen until quite a bit after the war.







And here are some of the potential country leaders you can get:



























Chile also has their own operative, the actress Rosita Serrano, of course provided you own La Resistance!



Now then, remember the focus: Increase Presidential Powers? Well, if you have a communist president in charge when you take the focus, your country will become communist. This begins the Communist sub-branch, as can be seen on the left-hand side of the democratic tree.



Here you will be able to either align yourself with the Russians and take the aggressive approach, eventually attempting to achieve Hispanic Unity.



Or go it your own, and attempt to expand your influence through diplomacy and the support of communist revolutions in Latin American countries.



And now we continue away from the democratic branches, and ponder for ourselves, what if the Nacistsas had actually succeeded with their coup d’etat? Well, that’s what we will figure out in the fascist branch, starting off with you securing support for the coup, minimizing your loss of stability and war support once it commences, until you can finally take full control of the country.






Once securing your rule, you will have to shape the country to be better fit for your future ambitions.



After that comes an important choice for the party. Pick a side in the global conflict, siding with the Germans, or choosing to stay out of global affairs, though not counting out the possibilities for your own expansion and faction.



Both versions will have access to the small “Revision of our Borders” sub-branch, allowing for attempted territorial expansion gated by army size.



Both branches have their own focuses that they can do.



And in the end you will have two different choices of formable nations, choosing to either restore the old kingdoms borders, or going even further and uniting Hispanic America.



And finally, we move on to the alt-history branches that may indeed have the chance to bring every hoi fans’ beloved monarchy, and perhaps also something different.

These two branches start off by looking back to tradition to solve the issues the country is facing, and having the ex-president and general Carlos Ibáñez del Campo perform a coup d’etat to take matters into his own hands.



First, we will take a look at the leftmost branch, that being staying with general Ibáñez, and accidentally finding yourself in a civil war with a combined force of the fascists and communist on the opposing side.



During this civil war, the outnumbered president Ibáñez will be approached by a mysterious Frenchman who promises aid in exchange for the Chilean crown. His name is Jaques Antoine Bernard, and will be crowned the new king of the Kingdom of Araucania and Patagonia.






After having established your new french kingdom at the bottom of the americas, it is time to not only reclaim your namesake, that being Patagonia, but also going even further, becoming the Napoleon Bonaapate of South America.



And now for the final branch, we move onto a group that has lived in Chile long before the first conquistadors arrived. It’s time for the Mapuche and Anti-Imperialist Crusade branch.



The branch starts up with you molding the rising Mapuche-nationalist movement to fit your future goals, and finally rising up against the current Chilean government.



Once the war against Chile is over and you have secured the state, it is time to first reclaim the old Mapuche territory of Puelmapu, and then move on to liberate the Amerindian peoples from imperialist oppression.



And there is a lot of work to be done once the crusade has started.



In the end, America can be free from modern states, and the governments of the region can be reorganized to the desire of the leaders of the new Mapcuhe state.









Also for the end, here are some other advisors and leaders you might have interest in, such as the Mapuche advisors:



And Antoine III of the Kingdom of Araucanía and Patagonia.



And one of the possible fascist leaders, the starting leader for the ideology.



And that’s been all from me this time. Tune in next week for a look at a bag of treats that will hopefully satiate all the hungry mouths out there!

¡Adiós!


Make sure to check out Trial of Allegiance here
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2695150/Hearts_of_Iron_IV_Trial_of_Allegiance/