As you’ll no doubt be aware, the launch of the No Step Back expansion last year was the climax of a busy year of development for the HoI team, and it continues to be one of our best received releases to date.

Of course, the last year also saw the departure of @podcat as Game Director who was reassigned to Siberia greater things at Paradox. Many of you will also have read the roadmap document that was produced towards the beginning of HoI4 development, and are asking questions as to the veracity of that plan under a new director, and whether I have any different ideas or plans to announce.


I mentioned at the beginning of my tenure that both @podcat and I see HoI4 in broadly similar terms. This hasn’t changed, and you can expect to see many of the parts of the previous roadmap make an appearance at some point in the future.

My approach to a ‘Grand Plan’, however, may be somewhat different. I have a preference for leaving plenty of space for reactive development (something that served us well on Imperator), and while there are many things that I feel are ripe for future development, I am also keen to leave a lot of space for changing course and acting on community sentiment.

There are two main points I want to raise before we get to details, however. Firstly, we intend to up the tempo of our releases a little. This is, of course, an ambition, and not a promise, however it informs some further decisions related to the development of HoI. Namely, that we are considering ways to change how and when we release information on development to you folks. Since faster development is the goal, this also means getting ideas into public view slightly faster, for feedback and conversation. We’re not exactly sure how this will look yet, but it is likely that there’ll be a reorganization of the traditional dev-diary schedule into something that feels less like a milestone delivery. This comes in tandem with a need to shift the community’s expectations on what ‘in development’ means: getting fans accustomed to seeing placeholders, WIP balance, and half-built systems in early phases, and seeing things develop as time goes on.

The last major point here is that we recognize a need to maintain the game as well as to develop it, especially if development pace is picking up. We’re still considering how best to achieve this, and I’m watching initiatives such as the Custodian team on Stellaris with curiosity. For the time being, what this is likely to manifest as, is the inclusion of older system maintenance into our patch planning - you may start to see patch bulletin features including things such as minor focus tree revamps, as well as attention paid to older systems and expansion content.


As mentioned above, the 2020 roadmap for HoI4 included many things which have now either been completed or rendered unnecessary. This leaves several from podcat’s list which I believe are still important for the future of the game:

• Improvements to frontline stability (progress in NSB, more to come)
  
• Long term goals and strategies to guide ai (progress in NSB)
  
• Improving peace conferences
  
• Update core national focus trees with alt-history paths and more options (Italy)
  
• Wunderwaffen projects
  
• More differences between sub-ideologies and government forms
  
• More National Focus trees
  
• Make defensive warfare more fun
  
• Adding mechanics to limit the size of your standing army, particularly post-war etc
  
• Have doctrines more strongly affect division designing
  
• Strategic and tactical AI improvements

In addition to these items, I will of course add some of my own personal intentions:

This is one area that I feel doesn’t need much explanation. More diplomatic tools are a clear area for expansion, and a careful look at how this module can be developed without interfering with the overarching global war, is likely to happen.
The economic system is very abstracted in HoI, and I do not foresee ever making it a major part of the game loop. This said, there are elements of an industrial economy that I feel could do with being part of decision making in HoI.

Optional tools for making your mark on a game, and/or development of further building blocks to enhance attachment to a HoI campaign. Bring the simulation to life.

And of course, many more that I feel do not need as much of an explanation:

• Battleplanner improvements
  
• Advisors/internal politics improvements
  
• Ideological distinctions
  
• Multiplayer & social layer improvements & support

I like to remain as open as possible to the needs of the community, and the inclusion or omission of any particular item above should not be considered ‘set in stone’.

As we look at how we plan on structuring future communications, there may be some space for a few more dev diaries on what you’ve all been getting up to in NSB in the near(ish) future!

/Arheo

Patch 1.11.5 "Barbarossa"

###
# AI
###
- Majors will now send volunteers to the Spanish Civil War even without La Resistance
- AI will no longer consider enemy lakes to be dangerous
- AI has learned the definition of insanity and will now try to avoid attacking in same place if previous invasion failed
- AI will be more careful with their attacks if they start running out of manpower
- AI now assigns free aces to valid existing wings instead of only when creating new wings
- AI is now significantly less likely to release collaboration governments unless they have narrative reasons to do so

###
# UI
###
- Supply map mode allows normal interactions with naval unit counters and doesn't hide fleet windows
- Fixed ship stats details pages not showing correct supply usage
- Fixed UI elements highlighting spurriously when tech template would unlock equipment which isn't included in current DLC profile
- Fixed Army and Navy view windows opening on top of each other
- Fixed shift+k shortcut for training air/navy
- Decision map icons with CP costs no longer overlap unreadably
- Fixed rail upgrade buttons sometimes not being generated. Buttons now line up with rails connecting to naval bases.
- Fixed Railway Gun supply icon never showing up and being in the wrong place when it did
- Fixed naval unit counters not showing low supply icon
- Naval battle screen now correctly shows admiral portraits
- Fixed operative map icons not getting frame mask applied
- Updated equipment conversion and ship refitting tooltips to use accurate language and include the relevant values and modifiers.
- Hold units command now applies to all selected units when mixed armies are selected
- Supply bottleneck tooltip should now include undersized ports

###
# Database
###
- The Race for Germany achievement will no longer fail if the player does not control Luxembourg at the time of German surrender (it's complicated)
- Non-NSB tanks will now have their correct fuel usage again. It was fun while it lasted!
- Brazil should no longer have access to non-NSB tanks with NSB active

###
# Modding
###
- Added on_capitualtion_immediate on_action. This will be executed at the very start of the capitulation process, where on_capitulation is played in the middle of the process, which can bias the triggers result.
- Added multiplicative modifier equipment_conversion_ic_cost which reduces conversion IC cost for non-naval equipment edited with the equipment designer (i.e. tanks when NSB is active).
- Game will now try to reconcile provinces declared as coastal without bordering a seazone (and vice versa). Check your error log!
- Invalid buildings (like naval bases in landlocked provinces) in history setup will now be ignored and reported in error log.
- Modifiers declared in advisor character entries should now properly apply and persist between saves
- Made set_character_name also work for unit leaders
- Fixed a CTD when going over the building state cap with off-map buildings

###
# Balance
###
- Blitzkrieg Theorist advisors now have increased base cost
- Smooth talking charmer now reduces maintenance cost for improving relations.
- Backroom Backstabber no longer grants political power factor, and instead grants subverseive activities cost; drift defence factor buffed to 0.25
- Compassionate Gentlemen now reduce resistance damage to garrisons in addition to monthly opinion gain
- Ideological Crusader now grants party popularity stability modifier in addition to old effects
- Armaments Organizer now increases supply hub construction -speed- by 10%
- Balance changes for armor and varient units
- Moved High velocity 2 to antitank_4 tech
- Increase mot equipments to 36 for mot AT
- Halved motorised breakthrough and armor
- Reduced AT gun piercing
- Added missing tungsten cost to mot rocket arty
- Total rebalance of tanks
- Tank weapons now based on turret weight class

###
# Stability & Performance
###
- Fixed player/ai list not being properly reset when going back to menu, triggering OOS on new games
- Significantly improved game startup time

###
# Graphics
###
- Fixed naval fort model luminance problem

###
# Bugfix
###
- Fixed issue where Danzig could get stuck with negative modifier when Polish Danzig focuses were getting bypassed.
- When loading a save from a lost ironman game, observer mode is loaded and ironman flag should be turned off.
- Fixed script parser silently ignoring last line of a file if it didn't contain a newline
- Fix positioning of the Expand Polish Intelligence branch when Man the Guns is not active. Without MtG the focus Expand Polish Intelligence will no longer require the player to complete the (MtG DLC-locked) parent focus Prepare for the Inevitable.
- Added newline at the end of equipment bonus tooltip
- Fixed George VI national spirit showing an advisor portrait instead of the regular national spirit portrait.
- Hooked-in several NSB Baltic portraits for generals that were using generic ones.
- Fix AI Queueing more railway upgrades than it intended
- Fix allied task force local supply draw
- fixed a reference to a missing German armor 3d model (this should not alter any 3d assets being displayed, just cleaned up the error log)
- Fixed issue where Generals, Field Marshals and Admirals were not being transfered when annexing through Polish and Lithuanian monarchist events.
- Made it less likely that The Soviet Union partitions Poland with Lithuania if Lithuania is AI, and even less likely if Poland is controlled by the player.
- Spanish generals should again be able to properly pick a side when the Civil War starts
- Fixed exploit which allowed circumvention of the building removal cooldown effective while at war.
- Adapt assignable trait skilled_staffer so field marshals can also gain xp in that trait.
- Air Supply now redistributes supply consumption to the hosting airbase.
- Fixed bugs with multiple air supply missions having zero effect."
- Soviet focuses will no longer grant tank designs if NSB is not active.
- Soviet focuses requiring certain armor tech will now check for the appropriate tech based on NSB being active or not.
- German focus Danubian Membership will no longer be bypassed if only one of the countries is gone, a subject, or allied to Germany. It requires all three countries to fulfill one of those conditions in order to get bypassed.
- Fixed supply network sometimes reporting no connection when shortest path traveled through an enemy province
- Added loc to an unlocalized Estonian country flag
- Fixed continous focus exploit which allowed stacking modifiers
- In civil war process, when copying unit leaders, use the clone function rather than recreating the unit leader from template (some unit leaders do not have template). Also use the character merge mecanism for those copies too if the revolter country receiving those copies already have the character.
- Fixed crash caused by invalid naval invasion order
- Railway guns should no longer be able to end up in a naval invasion
- Fixed crash caused by invalid province templates in mods during trade route computation
- Fixed CTD when playing tutorial videos or opening the ingame browser on DirectX 11
- Fixed Empire of Brazil being so much into Fascism
- Fixed inconsistencies with Dutch Wilhelmina national spirit portrait.
- Fixed logistics strike mission not taking plane number into account correctly
- Soviet focus 'Committee in Exile' focus can now be bypassed if the Civil War is completed
- Modifiers from propaganda campaigns are now properly cleared when Soviet Union capitulates.
- Emilio Mola will no longer be retired after completing the focus The National-Syndicalist State, he will just drop his country leader roles but will keep his advisor and unit leader roles.
- Swapped Soviet armored cars I and II in the tech tree.
- Communist support threshold to complete Estonian focus Break the Silence has been increased to be less than 5% (instead of less than 1%)
- Fixed several character issues with Spanish Falangists in the focus tree. Emilio Mola and Primo de Rivera should be properly handled now and will no longer be literally killed in order to allow the other to take over as country leader.
- Capital supply connection graph will now prioritize shorter sea routes
- Supply network now considers convoy availability and tries to prioritize throughput over unconditionally avoiding naval connections
- Naval Supply routes now respect blocked region flags.
- Fixed Patagonian lake being considered some sort of flooded plain aberration and prevented players from building nuclear reactors on it.
- Fixed an issue that made it impossible for players to progress down the Vichy focus tree because a Petain imposter was in charge
- German Air Innovations 2 now correctly reduces cost of air doctrines, rather than increasing research speed
- Fixed some design company ideas not having bonuses shown on equipment stats page
- Steal blueprints operation no longer gives access to locked out mutual exclude branches
- Taskforces operating in a blocked naval region can draw supply from naval bases in that region
- Characters no longer get traits for other classes of characters from national spirits
- Supply Network (and tooltips) now correctly factor in building damage when considering throughput
- Issuing a move command to a province the unit is already fighting in no longer resets combat
- Non-NSB tanks once again have their correct reliability (80%) across the board
- Fix rail construction partial progress not getting saved correctly
- The Turkish investment decisions should now actually work
- Fix British designers focus for baltics not giving correct air bonuses
- Fix crash in any_navy_leader, all_navy_leader, any_army_leader, all_army_leader when there is no general/field marshal or no admiral in a country
- Stalinist mission Behead the Snake should now properly kill Trotsky when the player is going opposition.
- Changed the Polish Focus 'Request Autonomous Status' so it can be bypassed if Poland is more than autonomous than a reichsprotectorate or integrated puppet.
- Fix so that Franco can use Nationalist Infantry Division names in 39
- Fix upgrade costs not being calculated consistently
- Fixed issue where event for Poland dismissing Lithuania's claim to its throne is sent to the wrong country.
- Fixed issue where Poland's Ignacy Moscicki would have the legacy portrait instead of using the new one from NSB.
- Rocket interceptors pilots don't consider themselves too cool for school anymore
- Toggling naval region access settings should no longer make captains panic when they reach a blocked zone and get stuck in place
- Rumors of TODOs in Soviet Stalinist missions flavor texts turned out to be counter-revolutionary propaganda. There never was any TODOs.
- Fix carrier based fighters sometimes not contributing to combat
- Fixed CTD when renaming a railway gun variant.

Patch 1.11.4 "Barbarossa"


###
# Balance
###
- Reduced compliance gain bonuses in advisor and country leader traits from 0.1 to 0.05. Kamenev will now provide 0.02 compliance bonus as advisor, and 0.05 as country leader.
- Reduced weekly stability bonus and replaced weekly war support bonus by a flat one in Stalin's traits.
- Slightly reduced weekly War Support and PP gain on Stalinist campaign. Reduced XP gain and Breakthrough bonus on For the Motherland campaign.
- Army and Navy Spirit cost adjusted down to 20/35/50 from 25/50/75. Air spirits now all cost 50 air experience.
- Naval bases now cost 5000 IC (from 3000), and incur an extra cost of 1000 per additional level.
- Air Supply mission fuel costs increased by 50%
- Increases hub Max Motorization cost to 80 trucks, from 50
- Democratic government type now confers a bonus of -25% political advisor cost. Several national spirits have been slightly tweaked down to accomodate the possibility of stacking this bonus.
- Several historically Allied countries now start with a small amount of Command Power in 1936 (ENG, USA, FRA, HOL)
- Relief of Command Army Spirit (democratic only) now reduces Military Advisor PP cost by 50% from 75%, but increases army experience gain factor by 25%
- Reduced Dozer Blade entrenchment bonus to 1, from 2
- Several Italian military advisors have had their traits upgraded, pp cost increased, and cp allocation decreased. This change will only be applied to new saves.
- Revert " Democratic government type now confers a bonus of -25% political advisor cost. Several national spirits have been slightly tweaked down to accomodate the possibility of stacking this bonus."
- Reduced Unternehmen Barbarossa modifier to 10% attack bonus from 15%
- Air supply now grants 0.2 supply per plane at 100% mission efficiency, from 1.2
- RK Ostland now releases on controlled territory, not just owned territory.
- AA gun 3 now medium weapon, Tanks are now a bit slower, heavys/sh are now more expensive
- Removed base equpment conversion modifier, removed conversion modifier from dispersed industry, increased conversion tech time
- Modernize Industry national focus (shared baltics) now grants 4 civilian factories, from 5
- Arms Industry National Focus (baltic shared) now grants 4 military factories, from 6
- Arm The Nation national focus (baltic shared) now grants 3 military factories, from 5
- Attract Workers to Capital national focus (baltic shared) now grants 2 civilian factories, from 3
- Defense of our Nation national focus (baltic shared) now grants an additional 10% civilian factory construction speed
- reduced CAS ground attack by 2 (approx 20% at tier 1, down to 10% at top tier)
- Tank gun techs have moved dates, added SA bonus for SPG
- Balance changes to consumer goods bonuses/penalties in the Soviet industrial branch: CG penalty from starting Second Five Year Plan spirit reduced from +10% to +5%. CG bonuses provided by Reorganize the PC of Heavy Industry and Fourth Five Year Plan reduced from -3% to -2%. CG bonus provided by Transformation of Nature reduced from -5% to -3%.
- Support tank variants now get -0.95 breakthrough
- Increase HA/SA of mutliple tank guns, reduced costs for medium modules, slight increase in medium base speeds
- Tank Destroyer brigades are now 2 width (down from 3)
- Updated templates for new TD combat width
- Removed AA gun component breakthrough modifiers since it is now handled by the battalion
- Heavy Tank Destroyer brigades now correctly reduce Breakthrough instead of increasing it
- Lowered ground attack values for CAS by 2 points

###
# Stability & Performance
###
- Fixed a modder CTD related to scripted mapmodes when accessing intel interfaces
- Fixed a corner case where AI defensive line generation would slow the game down to a crawl
- Fixed OOS caused by bombing buildings with railway guns present
- Assigning railway guns to armies will no longer induce a sudden drop in gamespeed performance
- Fixed clients sometimes crashing to desktop when host shutdowns in MP games
- Fixed 2 different OOS caused by joining/hosting an MP game after doing another playthrough
- Fixed CTD when loading mods with messed up adjacency errors

###
# UI
###
- Manually marking equipment variants as non-obsolete updates the alerts
- Fix hourly UI update Breaking transitions between officer corps windows
- Capital star icon updates when province changes controller
- Fix orders group UI not reflecting the motorization state of units after loading a save
- Some minor changes to low supply icons and alerts
- When selecting the role for a tank design, the stat modifiers of the associated battalion type are now displayed in the role tooltip. A breakdown of battalion, doctrine and tech modifiers for each stat are also displayed in the stats table tooltips.
###
# AI
###
- Fix AI rail upgrade issuing redundant upgrade commands
- RWG slightly afraid of provinces under attack
- Soviet Union will now aim to build a decent civilian factory base before switching to other priorities
- Railway guns should now have better positioning
- Removed obsolete Soviet AI strategies. Old AI strategy to antagonize Finland is now enabled by the appropriate focus.
- stop ENG from build too many civs
- fixed templates for ENG to prevent issues with tank design templates
- bump ai build prio on disconnected supply nodes
- Field strength training threshold also factors in divisions in training. This prevents AI fro stacking up a huge list of divisions that are all out of equipment.
- Fix various bugs with how AI checked manpower for exiled divisions in training
- Updated German templates to correctly use motorized
- Soviet should now not get stuck in a spiral of decision spending when they desperately needs manpower laws
- USA should no longer fail to produce a usable infantry template
- usa should now prioritize getting a m. tank design working faster
- soviet should now avoid justifying on targets where it can push its ultimatum
- AI is more conservative about implementing no_garrison law if resistance target will raise too much
- Impassable provinces will no longer be seen as land connections by the AI military strategists
- Japan slightly less keen to squash China while at war with USA
- Fixed template target widths for sov and ger AT divs, reduce ger at div to 1 line AT gun
###
# Modding
###
- Can now use decision as target for pp_spend_priority strategy to block spending completely on decisions
- Documentation has been updated to reflect Barbarossa changes
- Fix remove_ideas_with_trait so that it works with advisors too
###
# Database
###
- The Superior Warmachines focus in the Soviet tree is now available for players without NSB
###
# Bugfix
###
- Remove German claim on Katowice if Poland cedes Danzig as indicated in the Polish tooltip.
- Make sure there is no duplicate of user name in player_countries in save file. This avoids any confusion when determining if the country is human or AI controlled.
- The Japanese Torpedo Cruiser focus now displays the correct art when finished
- Added missing trigger to the Sabotage Behind Enemy Line focus
- Give Inter-War medium and heavy tank designs proper default names.
- When a character is added to a country and they are already in the retired character list, remove them from this list. also when setting character in scope, keep the country as well.
- Kurdish liberation unit spawned in Atlanta, should be Batman
- Fix to make Japan less likely to turn the Russian Provisional Government Fascist after making it a puppet through the Request Imperial Protection focus
- Allow field marshals to be assigned the advisor roles of generals
- when copying characters, copy also the flags attached to them
- Adjusted the changes in Party Popularity in the Portugese focus 'The Return of Duarte' so it matches the tooltip.
- Fix is_dynamic_country trigger that was not calling the right function
- Fixed incorrect image link in between the seas event
- When portraits are invalid, pick a random portrait for live version (keep using placeholder for debug)
- Replaced old tech speed bonus effect for doctrines in the generic focus Flexible Navy by the new doctrine cost reduction bonus effect.
- Fixed CTD that would sometimes occur in multiplayer when viewing air combat in a region as another player hot joins the game.
- AI less hesitant at reassigning divisions (fixes a bunch of bugs)
- Estonia and Latvia no longer get negative national spirits from NSB when not using the DLC
- Latvia now get the correct country leader when not using the No Step Back DLC
- Subject states can now create some of the formables in the Soviet Union
- Fixed wrong positioning of dynamic modifiers in the National Spirits tab when using the small version.
- Added loc for two non-MTG naval techs that may be granted to Soviets in their focus tree.
- Baltic focus Technology Sharing will no longer be bypassed to prevent Baltic countries to get stuck with 4 research slots. Baltic research sharing group will no longer be formed if it already exists.
- Trotsky will now enjoy an up-to-date trait for his Army Chief role in Mexico.
- Balance changes to Soviet national spirit Desperate Measures to prevent Soviets from insta-deploying divs while active (in combination with Mass Assault Doctrine)
- Implemented alternative tooltip in Soviet focus National Academies of Sciences for non-Soviet Soviets.
- Soviet generals with new portraits will now use the small version of their new portraits for their advisor roles.
- Baltic shared designers no longer appear in their lists without No Step Back
- When using auto design in the tank designer the resulting design will now always be valid.
- The Polish national focus "Expand the University of Warsaw" will now properly count owned factories.
- More stable AI behavior when a naval invasion fails
- AI will no longer try invading provinces outside target area
- Naval invasion arrow will point to the first targeted province instead of the last
- Single-character purges will now use the character list tooltip implemented for larger purges, so that their roles, traits and level are shown in the purge event tooltip.
- Remove preferred tactic if it becomes invalid
- When designing tanks the AI will not install more modules of the same category than is allowed, which will help the US among others to field tanks.
- Soviet focuses Improve the Stalin Line, Far East Fortification and Impregnable Forts will now require full control of at least one of the states in which forts will be built. Protect the White Sea-Baltic Canal focus requires full control of all the relevant states.
- Removed obsolete Soviet Alternate plan. Fixed Left Opposition plans never being selected on random.
- Manchukuo no longer becomes a Japanese Communist Puppet when the Japanese Civil War starts
- Focuses should no longer cancel a few hours before the Soviet Civil War starts
- Fixed tooltip in German focus Treaty with the USSR. Germany will now get armor tech bonus regardless of having researched basic medium tanks or not.
- Korea now controls provinces when released after Japanese surrender to China.
- AI no longer using trade to determine naval access
- For characters and parties, do not store the translated name, store the loc keys instead. This avoids OOS when 2 players use different langages.
- Zhang Xueling now has the correct portrait when promoted to advisor role
- Fixed issue where Estonia couldn't start decisions for marching on Finland if Estonia started their fascist civil war while they were marching on an Estonian state.
- For most tank designs the AI will no longer install multiple smoke launchers, secondary turret, or additional machine gun.
- No more free Baltic trees after winning civil wars without NSB DLC
- Fixed insta-win/lose the Soviet Civil War if DLC No Step Back is not active and both sides in the civil war are communist.
- Fixed certain Soviet decisions with did not really cost the intended CP and PP
- If a trait for unit leader is already assigned, then do not consider it assignable. This fixes the alert being displayed when the player cannot actually assign new traits.
- British Malaya and Dutch East Indies now get the correct leaders from start
- Lithuania can no longer get Poland into a Personal Union without Lithuania being fully independent.
- Fixed the wrong Bulgarian deomcratic leader appearing with BftB
- Fixed missing portrait for mexican advisors Othón P. Blanco Núñez de Cáceres and Antonio Cárdenas Rodríguez
- Danzig Decisions are now available without No Step Back
- Mexico Characters Dionisio Encina, Valentín Campa and Jesús Degollado Guízar now become party leaders when their respective events trigger.
- Fixed missing Spanish political advisors and one chief of army when LaR was not active.
- Fixed some decisions in Lithuania, Poland and Estonia where it was possible to start them without the required available civilian factories.
- Fixed several mismatches in the Tutorial texts in Portuguese and Polish.
- Beriya is not Stalin, therefore he can no longer access Stalin's Cult of Personality.
- Fixed tooltip in Soviet focus Increase Aircraft Production. The player doesn't need to know about the weird stuff that is going on behind the scenes.
- Fixed an issue where units could get stuck in exile
- Italy now starts with the appropriate focuses completed in the 1939 bookmark.
- Adding missing Loc for POL Danzig resistance modifier.
- Changing the name of a State Modifier in SOV so it doesn't get the description from the decision with the same name and show an untranslated loc.
- added missing detailed description for supply mapmode.
- Trotsky can now be properly assassinated even when the player deactivates the News Events popup
- Communist China will now respect their decision to accept the tribute increasement for at least 90 days.
- Fixed monarchist decisions in Poland and Lithuania so they cannot make other countries into Personal Unions if they're puppets of another country.
- Fixed wrong event being sent back to the Soviet Union resulting in Stalin refusing his own demands.
- Spain will no longer conspire against their Soviet overlord after losing their War of Independence.
- Adjusted the effect for the Sanation Right irritation so when it's meant to increase over 4 and it's AI Non-historical it just keeps the spirit but when it's the player, a civil war starts.
- Changed the Dutch focus Wilhelminism so it bypasses when The Netherlands and Germany are in a faction and both have Non-Aligned Governments.
- Changing Neutrality and Fascism drift of Lithuanian advisor from positive to negative to make it match the historical character.
- Adjusting Soviet decision 'The Enemy is Treacherous' so it's not visible when the player doesn't have La Resistance.
- Added missing focus to the Polish historical AI plan. Danzig or War will now remove POL-LIT guarantee
- Adjusting the True Enemy event for the baltic countries so it places forts in the correct provinces.
- Fixed Kazim Orbay's multiple problems.
- Fixed issue where Lithuania can continue boosting monarchist support in Poland even after they have a king. Other adjustments to these decisions.
- Changes to Romanian ideas so they transfer correctly when Poland triggers a civil war in Romania
- Made Vapsid Marches in Estonia and Finland not visible after they're completed regardless of ideology. Also adjusted the balance of one of the Estonian marches
- Fix of dlc and non-dlc portraits from WTT for MAN and CHI
- The Montreux Convention event chain now allows and blocks the appropriate countries depending on the results of the events.
- Fix civil war effect posing messages without updating country names
- Fix various supply map/volunteer UI issues
- Poland now starts with embargoed economy in 1939 as they haven't completed the focus to remove it yet
- Fix replacing template companies costing double
- Fix Government in Exile supply hubs not connecting to allied supply before they controled enough territory to be assigned a capital
- Fix building conversion double counting slot consumption while being built
- Made the Polish Decision Categories for dealing with the Peasant Strike, Sanation and Inviting Foreign Motors be available without No Step Back
- Leadership of the Axis now remains with the German Reich when civil war starts
- Fix AI not assigned requested units to naval invasion armies, which could leave them idle wherever they happened to be standing
- Fixed the Wilhelmina idea so it has the correct portrait.
- fixed an issue where French and Japanese Heavy tank chassis icons were in the wrong spot in the tech tree
- Adjusted the Iron Wolf appeasement decisions in Lithuania so it's not as easy to get locked out of the rest of the branch.
- Puppeted Russia can now take Pacify the Rim focus even if they have sold Vladivostok, making it possible to progress to the independence war focus.
- Fix river supply connections sometimes getting absurd boosts to supply flow
- a number of triggers were broken due to translated character names not registering correctly. These have been fixed. This should only affect non-English players (Russian in particular).
- Removed condition from the Bring Old Trotskyists Back focus to stop players from sometimes getting locked out of the Permanent Revolution section of the Left Opposition focus tree.
- Improved AI weights for Prospecting decisions.
- Baltic AI will no longer reject Soviet ultimatum on historical due to a major country guaranteeing them.
- Added missing Soviet focuses to 1939 Bookmark
- Focuses and decisions will now work correctly when checking for a character that has a different name spelling in non-english
- Volunteers will no longer be lost when returning
- Russia can now properly form the Pan-slavic union
- The AI will no longer cheat and try to use Military Spirits if No Step Back is not enabled
- Fixed issue where exiled characters didn't return after a successful coup
- Translate localization key for all character name, not just unit leaders
- In the tank designer, the top/default entry in the model selection list is now the expected one for super heavy, modern and amphibious chassis.
- The tank model displayed in the tech details view is now of the expected tech level.
- Comintern is now dissolved when starting the Soviet civil war
- Fix rare crash where logistics strike targetted consumer whose cached status was invalid
- Fix PREV (etc) keyword when it references a character.
- Super heavy and modern tank designs will now get a proper default icon when playing with NSB active.
- Missing glyphs for Turkish and Latvian names are now back. Also fixed non-breaking spaces showing up as '?' in French and Russian translations.
- Units in naval transfer will no longer trigger 'low supply' theater alert
- Poland is no longer able to complete the April Constitution while being a puppet
- Fallback lines now work correctly for volunteers
- Yoshiko Kawashima uses correct picture when being a general when having the WTT dlc
- Fixed several issues with Soviet and Russian national spirits in the Russian civil war, such as spirits being added to the wrong side, not providing the intended modifiers or being duplicated.
- Fixed error spam about missing 3d assets for axis tanks
- Fixed issues in Poland and the Baltics where they could annex or puppet a player's country without warning.
- Fixed exploit by adding another exploit
- Fixed create_country_leader where the created character would have a random name rather than the input one.
- With NSB active, equipment conversion is now possible between any tank designs based on the same chassis. It's however not possible to convert tanks to self-propelled variants of a higher tech level as is possible with NSB inactive.
- Vehicles like tanks will now be able to draw and refuel during the invasion step while landing
- Fix calculation of num_units and num_battle_plans for unit leaders
- Fix for focuses being locked for Romanov branch.
- Added extra building slots to certain focuses providing factories or dockyards in the Polish, French and Soviet focus trees.
- Fixed Georgios Kosmidis not becoming the fascist leader in the appropriate Greek event.
- Controlling slovakia will now allow poland to bypass either of the Demand Slovakia focuses
- Cag night fighting acronym now correctly capitalized
- fix some allied supply issues
- Empire of Brazil will no longer embrace fascism.
- Democratic Germany focuses no longer invite foreign subjects to faction, causing subjects to lose subject status
- Corgis are not people with a mustache and a tie.
- Both Australian and New Zealand volunteers National Spirits will now reduce required world tension and required divisions to send volunteers.
- Improved triggers for Iberian Summit decisions.
- Fixed issue where Polish regent would be retired after capitulation.
- Dynamic Modifiers and Weather modifiers now apply to CAS ground attack stats
- Fixed news of an Anarchist uprising spreading, despite said uprising not having materialized. Anarchists should now no longer be all talk, no action.
- Fixed research exploit
- Corrected pre-SCW division counter values in the preparation phase, to properly reflect the reality of unit counts for each side once the SCW begins.
- Fixed an OOS when starting a MP game after returning to menu from another game
- Added back in the option to rename equipment variants of types lacking upgrades like Artillery and Convoys.
- Seek a Defensive Pact with Allies News event no longer has Stalin in it if he is no longer the leader of the Soviet union
- Naval spotting speed is no longer scaled by ... naval base repair speed(?), and spotting speed bonuses no longer increase the speed at which you lose a fleet
- Fixed missing portraits in Baltics and Poland when playing without No Step Back enabled
- The first tank design for each specialized role can now be modified instead of automatically being saved as a new design.
- Improved AI weights in Lithuanian fascist characters (Voldemaras and Alantas) and added AI weights to Hungarian communist revolutionary (Laszlo Rajk) so that the AI prioritizes these characters when taking the relevant paths.
- Fixed capitulation progress requirement for Poland's 'Prepare for the Inevitable' branch.
- Soviet ultimatum decisions will no longer be available if the target country is someone else's subject.
- Fixed issue where some focuses would not lead to war with the right country if there was more than one Soviet Union or Stalinist Soviet Union didn't exist.
- Fixed issue where Polish Focus 'Demand Lithuania' wouldn't get bypassed when it should've
- Fixed one cause of CTD on starting nudger with bad map setup (primarily the case in certain map mods)
- Fixed scope where we use character scope only when needed, and country scope otherwise
- Fixed long party name (short party name was displayed)
- In civil war, when copying retired characters from target country to the revolter, skip characters that are actually active in the revolter country. Avoid having the character in a double state of active and retired at the same time, confusing most effects and triggers.
- Austria, Belgium and Switzerland now have correct scripted start stability again
- Fixed typo in focus Policy of Individual Security
- Lev Trotsky now returns to Soviet Union when completing Return Democracy to the Party.
- Fixed Placeholder loc in the tutorial in Polish and Portuguese.
- Fixed Command Power tooltip losing the names of advisors affecting it when reloading a savegame
- Fixed missing assets for german tanks DLC

Fixed - Armor 3D units from previous addons showing in the Tank Designer
The expected models can now be selected for tank designs
Game executable should be properly signed again
READ IN FULL

And if you would like to enjoy is in Russian version (This is the one I like more)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUBQBshRB0c
Bellow you will find a brief breakdown of what is included in the free patch, and what is in the DLC, the full patch notes can be found here.



If you are finding yourself a little in the woods with all the new content, we produced a short series of tutorials to prime you on all the new mechanics you'll have to deal with in No Step Back, you can watch them, here.



And last but not least the Grandest World War Two game has teamed up with the Greatest World War Two YouTube channel, for a glorious Operation Saturn re-enactment!

Buy it here!

An early look at our Patch Notes are available on our forums. Unfortunately, the notes are too large to fit onto steam in this format, an official patch notes post will accompany the release next week.

I will also take this opportunity to point out that as is normal for large updates, saved games from earlier versions will not be compatible with No Step Back. An opt-in rollback to the current live version will be provided when No Step Back and the Barbarossa update launch

Hello, and welcome back to another Dev Diary for Hearts of Iron 4. As we close in on wrapping up this major operation, code-named Barbarossa, before winter falls (the first snow fell in Stockholm this weekend, I am sure it’ll be fine), today we will talk about the new achievements that will be added with the release of No Step Back.

As far as the process is concerned, we usually have an open list of achievement suggestions during the whole DLC development cycle. Near the end of the cycle, we take a vote on what achievements we want to see in the game (after eliminating any that would be technically impossible) and start the process of implementing them and ordering art.

For No Step Back, we started with a list of 49 suggestions, and whittled it down to 20 Achievements:


At least they run on time!: As fascist Italy, have max level railways in all your core states


Not much fun in Stalingrad: As Germany, capitulate the Soviet Union without taking Stalingrad


No more Partitions: As Poland, be independent and ensure that both Germany and the USSR are either in your faction or don’t exist


Habsburgs. Habsburgs everywhere: As Poland, install a Habsburg monarch and be in a faction with another Habsburg monarch.


The Pope? How many Divisions does he have?: As the USSR, take Rome.


This is going to be LIT: As Lithuania, hold the capitals of all of your neighbours


It has my name on it: As any Baltic State, conquer the entire shoreline of the Baltic Sea


This Achievement is Cheesy: As Latvia, form Ostland and occupy Vasterbotten. (n.b.: Vasterbotten is located in Lappland State)


Esti is Scandi: As Estonia, secure Scandinavia (n.b.: Every state in Scandinavia needs to be controlled by Estonia or a Subject of Estonia)



Not a step back!: As the Soviet Union never lose 1 core territory to anyone before 1945



one_step_forward.png
One Step Forward: As the Soviet Union, declare war on Poland and Germany before Germany attacks Poland.


The Soviet Onion: As the Soviet Union, have only puppets as neighbors


Crusader Kings III: As Poland, crown a Monarch and capture Jerusalem



The Romanovs laugh last: Restore the Romanovs to the throne and conquer Germany, Hungary, Austria, Czechoslovakia,Turkey, and Bulgaria.


We don’t really like statistics: As the Soviet Union under Stalin, conquer Germany while suffering less than 1 million casualties total


Race for Germany: As the Soviet Union, capitulate Germany after the Fall of France but before the Allies control one German core state


Siberian Tiger: As Tannu Tuva, form Siberia


Just proper gander: As the Soviet Union, activate 30 propaganda campaigns before 1945.


Around Eurasia in 80 days: Have a railroad from Gibraltar to Singapore


Poland Peasant Revolution: As Poland, have the Peasant’s Strike overthrow the government.

That's all from us today! Next week, you will get the Patchnotes for 1.11 Barbarossa (unless we are thrown out of position by a sudden enemy counter-attack).

Hello everyone, it's your favourite (and only) tech lead, The French Paradox!

In this diary I'll tell you more about our tech, give some insights into the programmer's job, what we've been up to for the past year (and some change) and offer you a chance to ask any question you may have about tech.

Saying old platforms goodbye

First, with the upcoming 1.11 patch we will be retiring some old Linux and Mac platforms that aren't maintained by their own developers anymore.
This means that starting next update the minimum OS version to run HoI will be Ubuntu 18.04 (on Linux) and macOS 10.11 (El Capitan) on Mac.
There shouldn't be much to worry about though, as the previous versions are older than HoI itself at this point and our telemetry shows almost all of you have upgraded long ago.
For those on Windows who look anxiously at their aging Windows 7, keep calm and carry on, we have no plans to drop support for it (although as a friendly tech person I'd still suggest you consider upgrading ;)).

Why do we make those decisions you may wonder? Two reasons: one maintaining old tech comes with a cost that we would rather spend on improving the game for 99% of the users, and two sometimes it blocks the adoption of new tech that would make our programmers job easier and more efficient.
Without going too much into details, the general idea is that we can only use tech that is supported on all platforms, so basically we're only as modern as the oldest thing we support. If you take the case of Linux for example, the previous Ubuntu release was from 2016, meaning HoI could not use anything released since then (and probably a bit before, as Ubuntu LTS releases usually don't ship with the latest shiny goodies). Some time we can work our way around it, but not always.
Speaking of new tech...




That's right, the next HoI4 release will join Stellaris and the other more recent PDS games by adding DirectX 11 support.
DirectX 9 will still be the default for now, but you will be able to select another renderer in the launcher settings.

There shouldn't be any visual difference between DX9 and DX11 (and OpenGL for that matter), we have been working on making sure the experience will be the same.
The game should load a bit faster however, especially if you use a lot of mods that bring extra textures and models.
Working remotely for more than a year, we also noticed less issues playing with remote desktop and the like, which might not be a big deal for most of you but was quite appreciable for our devs during development.
Finally it did help us tweaking & fixing the new railways & trains graphics (as most graphics debugging tools have dropped support for DX9).
We know that performance is always at the heart of every discussion about our games and as a Tech Lead I have been keeping a close eye on it.
So far it looks like our release candidate is roughly on par with the current 1.10 patch, performance wise.

Why not better, I can already hear you typing? The main reason is that the game on 1.11 is a different beast 1.10 (which itself is quite different from the original 1.0 release).
Namely, the supply simulation is now much more deep and complex, and needs to account for all those railways across the world and the fact that now allies can supply each other.
While I am writing those words, our compatibility is working hard at running the game on various hardware configurations to give us a more complete picture and perhaps a few suggestion for an updated recommended configuration, as the one you can see on Steam right now dates back from the original release.



Toying with a 11th generation i9 and a RTX 3090. Will it take off?

On the topic of measuring performance, the Barbarossa update will include an ingame profiler that could use to measure how your machine performs.
You should be able to spawn it from the console using the magic line imgui show profiler.

For example here is the current release candidate on my home i7-10700 with a RTX 2080 SUPER:


1936 fresh start, speed 5, Direct 11, vsync off

1943 test save, speed 5, Direct 11, vsync off

As you can see this offers a few metrics that can be collecting by toggling the Enable/Disable Collection button at the top.
A few things you can get from it:

• Render time: the average time to render one frame over the last second
  
• Render time excluding present: same as previous but excludes the time spent waiting on the GPU to actually present the frame on screen. The difference is usually due to vsync.
  
• Frames per second: the FPS count, you know this one
  
• Ticks per second: how many in-game hours were simulated over the course of the last second
  
• Last tick: the time it took to simulate the last hour or new day/week/month
  
• Last 24 ticks average: same as previous but averaged from the last 24 (or less depending on how much time was spent collecting data)

Next you have a nice graph representation of where (in which system) that time was spent. We use it to quickly eyeball a performance report, especially when external programmer tools are not available (for example when it happens on a non-dev machine).

Final tip: if the profiler doesn't show up with the magic console command, try turning it off and on again using imgui off then imgui on.



Programmers at PDS are rarely just that. Most of us get involved in the game development by offering insights on design, balance or content, and I am no exception.
So now is the time to talk about French Communism.

If you remember the French focus tree from La Résistance, if you go communist you get this guy:


Maurice Thorez was historically the leader of the Parti Communiste Français (PCF).
If you walk through some cities in France you can even find streets bearing his name still today.
But he had one characteristic trait: he was a die-hard Stalinist who followed the Moscow line until his death in 1964. He had a city and an institute named after him in the USSR.
On the day the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed, he is in vacation in the Alps and the PCF changes its stance on Germany and Poland overnight following Moscow's instructions without asking him. When he comes back, he just shrugs and goes along with it.

With that in mind, I felt that it was weird you would keep him as a leader if you do not go for the "Loyalty To Moscow" sub-tree.
I did some research in French sources and found a better candidate to replace him. Behold:


René Nicod was a member of the PCF in 1939, but when the party decided to realign itself following the Pact, he and a couple other MPs quit the party and founded the Union Populaire Française (UPF) or French Popular Union in English. They denounced the Pact and supported the government's decision to stand with Poland.
In Barbarossa if you own La Résistance and go either Anti-Fascist Coalition or Loyalty to the cause you will get a new party and leader:




Each branch will give a different flavour of Nicod inspired by his published opinions pieces during the Great War (he both supported in the French Army and lost his hand in the trenches but also denounced the war on ideological grounds and hoped the French and German workers would unite in a common cause).

Finally, it turned out to be a bit difficult to find a good portrait for our artists. My initial research in the French National Assembly online database only yielded a low-res blurry picture.
But luckily a small French shop decided to sell its stock of old photos on eBay and his mayor portrait was one of the articles.

We could have stopped there and used the ad's preview picture as a source, but of course we had to buy and ship to Sweden.

So here he is, looking over the HOI corner in our Stockholm office!

Greetings, HoI fans.

I'm not much of a forum goer, so most of you probably never heard of me, but I am the Art Lead on Hearts of Iron 4.

Today I bring you a rather special Dev Diary. This was prepared for you all by our 2D artist on HoI4 and should give you a glimpse into the work that goes into each new loading screen. We hope that you will all find this to be an interesting and enjoyable read.

Without further ado, I now hand over to the artist.



So where does an artist start?

First and foremost, to have a tool to gather the most crucial thing to build an epic looking loading screen is a reference board. The tool that our artist uses is called PureRef. It keeps track of your images and is easy to organize and customize.

And of course, photoshop to draw in. Can’t forget the most important of them all now, can we?

So! The tools are in place, the artist is ready and the prompt lands on their desk, saying “Polish cavalry attacking resting German soldiers early in the morning”.
Google time!

You may be familiar with the illustration by Jersy Kossak who specialized in painting military scenes. This was one of the first images that our artist found and immediately banked it in their PureRef for later use.

The myth, the legend, the Krojanty Battle:


It's epic and cool but oh so inaccurate. But it is a start!

Doing some more research led our artist to a reenacting movie about the battle. Of course still not accurate but a great score for poses, mood and composition. They also only had the trailer/making of available to them but that never stops an artist.
Screen grab galore took place, no regrets.


Epic light in this one ^


Great references for poses in these^

Of course our artist can’t stick to one source. Time to hit google again and this time they found some more reenacting scenes to add to their growing collection.

More poses and epic looking horses ^

With a PureRef filled to the brim with interesting angles, poses and an interesting mood and light our artist now starts to work on something that’s called “Thumbnailing”.

It essentially means that our artist is making quick, easily viewable suggestions for the loading screen depicting a cool looking battle, sketched up with the help and guidance of the reference material they gathered.

Fun fact; the word “thumbnailing” is actually a direct reference to the human thumbnail in size and the word has been used as early as back in the 17th century for small imagery.
Kind of gross... kind of accurate, but still.

These are the thumbnails that they did for Podcat and Archangel85 to pick from!


Yes. They are that ugly. Yes they take no time to make, that’s the point. There's a bunch of ways to go about thumbnails and our artist usually use grey scale when doing these. Mostly to be able to tell hierarchy in the scene quickly. For example, the darkest parts are the most visually interesting ones where we want you to look first and the lighter ones are secondary and not as important.
Here we also see our artist giving us the A-B-C-D options for easier communication with the team. Pro tip here is always be clear on communication with the team to deliver the most accurate representation you can as well as often showing the progress to steer the illustration in the right direction.

So the Work In Progress phase begins.
The first WIP that’ll be shared is the very first “clean” thumbnail that Podcat and Archangel85 together with our artist went for. They choose to change the direction of motion from left to right because that is the way we read as well as adding another rider in the foreground to give visual depth of the image.


Next phase in the WIP series is colours! We wanted the illustration to be time accurate, so what do we know? We know that the cavalry attacked early as heck in the morning. We know the German soldiers were camping near a forest. We know that the cavalry came through it. But what kind of feeling was most interesting/epic?
Our artist made two colour variants to choose from:

^ More time accurate with a cooler tone of morning


^ And this one is more romantic/golden hour esque which in the end we went with. This felt more on-style with what we wanted to portray even if the time of day is wrong this feels more HOI.

After working some more with what tone and mood of the illustration should lean towards, our artist start to define some more characters. Right now they are just blurs and blobs as well as straight up photos.


At this stage our artist went in the direction of adding more drama to the background. A new skyline was added with a helping paintover to show direction from HOI’s art lead as well as defining the landscape some more.

In this stage our artist also started to add some more definition of the soldiers who suddenly got multiplied (in the distance you could hear sad artist noises who realized they had bitten off more than they could perhaps chew). But as we say in Swedish “Skam den som ger sig!”


And yes… You saw right. Was that gear time period accurate? Were those crates truly used? What's up with those crazy large tents? Why are they even white? How strange…
So yes. Sad artist noises were once more heard as they realized the finds they had collected in their PureRef were indeed inaccurate for the time period. It dawned on them that they had to re-do some stuff.
There's a reason why artists live by “kill your darlings”. Sad, but oh so true. But also a very good thing to do! Sometimes you just have to realize that the best way to fix something is to start over. Now this was of course not the case. But still a hefty re-paint was in order.

Thanks to Jamor who so kindly rallied to our artist’s aid, gave them proper reference material and managed to steer clear of an embarrassing illustration.
So now we are heading somewhere! The noisy background elements were taken out because it was too distracting which wasn’t entirely the case up until now.
Remember the thumbnailing? Yeah those explosions had suddenly stolen the show which was a big no-no. Let the horses be the stars!
And in this stage the character got more defined as well as the background getting more painterly.



Well, we finally arrived where it really started to come together! It looks epic, the mood is heroic and you can feel the battle about to happen. This was therefore a time to go back to the beginning, to look at how the other loading screens had been made to maintain an equal feeling and style of rendering to this new piece!
Grabbing a bunch of older loading screens our artist studied the brush strokes, textures and colours that had been used.


Aaaan back to the illustration! More textures are now added to mirror the old style as well as adding to the foreground and middle ground as well as details in and around the camp. Some soldiers got new jobs, instead of lying dead someone is now defending the camp and some more soldiers crawl out of the tents. Our artist wanted the feeling of “panic” to be visible in the camp.



Here the decision to actually raise the ground a good chunk to balance the whole image better was taken. And at this stage our artist, together with lead artist and art director, checked the values of the image.
Arguably this could have been done much earlier in the process but sometimes you simply forget until it bites you in the ass. Luckily tho it was at least caught!
For example, the darkest part of the field kitchen was too dark to match where it stood in the field and our artist had to make it lighter in value to push it back where it belonged in the image.

Not to get in and be TOO technical about what was happening in this stage, in short, our artist checked the contrasts to make them feel believable. The things at the foreground should be the darkest and as further back you go in the image the lighter in value it is.
The example with the field kitchen was that it didn’t look believable. The darkest part of it matched the darkest parts of the horse and rider in the foreground and therefore looked off in its position.
Flipping a adjustment layer of Black and White on and off helped with a quick overlook of the scene since sometimes colours can deceive. Being able to toggle a grey-scale filter on and off can do wonders and give a new perspective and light to the image.



The final stretch of “last minute fixes”, here we go!!
Here our artist started to do those last 10% of the image to take it over the finish line! Fun fact, usually the last 10% are referred to as the longest and most tedious part of an illustration.
Here they are adding details and more life to all the characters as well as adjusting and fine-tuning the background and the light in the illustration.


The whole illustration from gathering references to thumbnailing to finally done took approximately 3 weeks, 2 of which were dedicated to be set after each other, while the rest of the remaining days were spread out in between other work our artist had to prioritize.

Our artist sure did an amazing job here and can you believe that this was the first time they ever created such a huge piece of art?!
Their usual work on HOI is to create the icons and buttons you like to push and glance at as well as a few portraits here and there so this was indeed a challenge for them. But least to say is that they sure had fun (despite some suffering, but let's be honest… what is an artist if they're not suffering) and enjoyed the challenge and above all the experience the loading screen delivered, and hopefully you’ll agree with them that it looks pretty cool.

And perhaps we’ll see them take on another loading screen again in the future.

But before I let you go, I have a little meme from our artist to you.
(artists are artists, not programmers )


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now for something completely different.
Here are a few of the new portraits you can expect to see in No Step Back.










There are plenty more where these came from. ;)

Additionally, here is a peek at some upcoming focus and achievement icons:





Well... That's all from us for now, folks.
We hope you are all as excited about playing No Step Back as we are to have you play it.

The No Step Back feature streams are starting this week, with a first look at the new focus trees in action. The first stream is today (Wed 27th) at 16:00 CEST, during the normal HOI weekly stream slot!

From the womb of Mother Russia, Machines are born - But it is in the blood of the People the Union survives!

Hearts of Iron IV: No Step Back will release November 23rd, 2021

Do your duty Comrades, And preorder now!
https://pdxint.at/3be5rXn