Hearts of Iron 3: Their Finest Hour

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Wow thanks for the write up!
Very cool! Let us know how you fare next.
Would you say HoI 3 is worth learning now? Rhetorical perhaps? ;)
The UI and countless of screens are pretty daunting to me, but I have the game for ages now and really want to get into it.
What did you do to learn the interface? Just play and restart?

Yes, I'd say it's worth it.  (Of course I might change my tune now that there are six divisions of Tiger tanks massing outside of Dunkirk and Cambrai and I don't think my 76mm AT guns can stop them.)

To learn the interface, I looked at various AARs on the HOI forums and when I found one with a lot of detail, I just tried to replicate what they did in my own game.  I think the parts that are most problematic for me at first were how to set up proper chains of command and how to build divisions that would give a good combined arms bonus without losing too much robustness.   Much of my confusion came from the fact that the way the game determines the combined arms bonus changed with the release of Their Finest Hour and I was following older AARs.

Nefaro, I don't know that I've got enough experience to really comment on the AI yet as I've only played as France and I've been pretty defensive.  For the most part, the AI for the various nations in my game have been pretty passive.  I don't know if that's always the case or if everyone's just holding their breath to see which way the Battle of France is going to go before they jump in.  The only issue I have with supply is that you can't select your own supply hubs and the AI doesn't seem to do a good job of picking places when you're on the offensive.  I think it picks the biggest port in the general area rather than the most central so you sometimes end up with pretty tenuous lines of supply.

[Martok]

That was a fun read, SDR.  Thanks for posting it! 

[Nefaro]

Thanks SDR.

[Rizik6]

Great AAR.  Enjoyed reading it.

[jomni]

I wanna know what the Soviets will do next.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Well, that moustachioed nutbag in Moscow has been supplying the Krauts with uranium and my spies tell me that their research into isotope seperation is going disturbingly well.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

The summer of 1942 looked a lot like the spring of 1918.  As I feared, the Germans had been busy building new Tiger tanks and supporting them with mechanized infantry divisions.  These divisions charged across the Franco-Belgian border on the last week of May.  I had 3 divisions of French heavy tanks but an up-armoured Char-B1 ter with a 6 lber QF cannon is no match for a Tiger.  Thankfully the clever boys in the lab had come up with an improvement on the Bazooka, namely the RL-83 Blindicide.  It was touch and go as to whether or not I'd be able to produce and distribute them quickly enough to blunt the German advance, but extra effort by the logistics boys (basically me going through each and every god-damned brigade and turning the prioritize button on or off) paid off and the infantry manning the forts along the Belgian border had the weapon that would prove to be a Tiger killer.  The German offensive lasted 6 weeks with the heaviest fighting at Dunkirk, Cambrai, and Charleville-Mezieres.  (Playing through this bit took me hours and hours.  I found it a bit overwhelming at times even running at the slowest time progression rate.  Couple of complaints about the game engine.  Air power needs to have a few more control options such as allowing you to select at which loss rate they should RTB.  Also, they need to do something about the up-down arrow slider in the battle interface as when one side has more than 4 divisions committed to a fight, this slider blocks out the unit organization level indicator.  Makes it hard to determine how the fight is progressing.)  As usual, the Luftwaffe dominated the French air-force and by the third day, the only planes in the skies over the Pas de Calais and Lorainne were sporting crosses on their wings.   

I was able to hold the Germans at Dunkirk without too much trouble.  Cambrai was closer, but we held them there as well.  It was at Charleville-Mezieres where I ran into trouble.  Unlike the other two areas, this one didn't have a river as a natural defensive barrier.  The combination of Tiger tanks with massive amounts of close air support proved more than the four divisions I had stationed there could handle.  After a week of intense fighting, French morale cracked and two divisions routed.  I started pulling mobile divisions out of other parts of the line and rushed them towards Charleville-Mezieres.  They didn't arrive in time and the remaining French divisions also routed and ceded the province to the Germans.  I ordered my divisions on either side of the newly developed salient to attack into Charleville-Mezieres but the Germans countered by attacking into the provinces where my attackers were based, forcing them to abandon their push into Charleville-Mezieres and instead concentrate on defending against the threats facing them.  In a last ditch attempt to prevent a German breakout, I sent my antiquated bombers to conduct nighttime bombing raids against the German supply depots around Charleville-Mezieres and Hirson.  I also called upon my intelligence assets.  Prior to the outbreak of war in '39, I'd built up a network of covert operators in Germany in the hopes of possibly assassinating Hitler and deposing the Nazis.  Instead, I called upon my saboteurs to attack the German lines of supply.

I had earlier anticipated the need for the development of night bombers as my bomber force was hopelessly outmatched by the German fighters so I conducted some rudimentary research in 1940-41.  This research paid off as my bombers used Gee and Oboe radio navigation systems to find and hit the German supply depots night after night with relatively minor losses. Between the bombers and the saboteurs, we were able to wipe out the German fuel reserves.  With their fuel supplies in flames, the Germans weren't able to exploit their breakthrough and I was able to close off the salient.  (Had I been playing against a human, that would've been the end of the game for France.  I had to weaken my defences all along the border in order to retake Charleville-Mezieres yet the AI didn't capitalize on this and I was able to retake the province and reinforce the line with almost no interference at all.)

The fighting died down by the middle of July and by August, land forces were back up to full strength.  The French air-force wouldn't recover it's numbers until mid-September.  The Germans would launch the occasional attack with land forces but mostly contented themselves with daily bombing raids.

While the battles in NE France were by far the most intensive, they weren't the only ones occurring.   The pesky Italians took the opportunity to wreak some havoc while I was preoccupied.  In June, they launched a series of attacks towards Nice and Marseilles with some German and Slovakian units in support.  The mountainous terrain worked in my favour and my alpine units easily held the line. 

The Brits succeeded in clearing the last of the Italians out of Africa by taking Ethiopia  but they left Malta wide open and Mussolini pounced.  I missed this happening and didn't find out until Italian dive bombers started pounding the ports of Sicily where my battleship fleet was undergoing repairs.  Bloody Mussolini!  The Italian AI was proving very adept at being a thorn in my side.  I gathered 3 divisions of marines in Calabria and sent them with bomber cover and a battlegroup to re-take Malta.  That proved a very tough nut to crack!  It took almost 6 weeks of fighting and some very heavy casualties on my side before we were able to hand the island back to the Brits.  In the meantime, the Italians took advantage of my battleship fleet being tied down providing shore bombardment and launched nuisance raids against Corsica, Tripoli, and Sardinia.  It was very frustrating as the AI had me constantly reacting to situations and putting out fires rather than pressing my own attacks.  I'd send a squadron of destroyers or subs to drive away the invasion force and then the Italian air-force would show up and blast my ships.  I'd send them back to port for repairs but the bombers would follow them and then bomb the hell out of port.  Having to constantly repair ships and port facilities and trickle replacement men in ate up a lot of valuable resources. 

I decided I'd had enough of the Italians so it was time to hit back.  In the fall of 1942, I transported two divisions of heavy tanks to Sicily.  I send 3 divisions of marines to launch an amphibious assault on the heel of the Italian boot in the hopes that they'd draw German and Italian divisions away from the Straits of Messina. It worked like a charm and once the Straits were denuded of defenders, I sent my heavy tanks along with 4 infantry divisions across the water.   We were able to push up as far as Taranto and take the heel and toe of the boot but then massive numbers of Italian and German reinforcements arrived and we were forced to go on the defensive. 

This was a depressing time for France as we really did seem to be going it alone.  The Americans were still staying well out of the fight.  Stalin was still acting like Hitler was his buddy and supplying him with uranium.  The Brits were making a great show of sailing back and forth without accomplishing much of anything at all.  The ANZACs made a landing in Italian controlled Albania and seized the main port but seemed content with that token effort.  The Canadians landed several divisions in England and proceeded to get drunk.  Apart from some plucky Danish and Polish resistance fighters, it felt like France was the only doing any fighting at all. 

Thankfully, the Axis members weren't much more active either.  Finland took the opportunity to grab up some worthless arctic provinces from the Norwegians but they were the only ones active at all.  The Japanese were still busy slaughtering Chinese peasants and the remaining Axis satellite powers didn't seem to be up to much at all.

Again, it felt like the world was waiting to see what was going to happen between Germany and France before they were willing to pull their thumbs out and get stuck in.

After the failure of their summer offensive, the Germans started on a new tack.  My spies reported that German research focus was shifting away from tanks and towards naval assets.  I was thankful as, as I'd mentioned before, German industry was out-producing French industry by a 2-1 margin.  It was only my tight focus on defensive tech that stopped the Blitzkrieg.  Now that I was facing off against both German and Italian forces on 3 fronts, the Germans really should have no problem taking me out through simple attrition if they'd only stick to building more heavy tanks and infantry. 

At least that's what I was thinking in mid to late autumn 1942. 

Winter 1942-43 was relatively quiet.  The Italians and I would take turns attacking one another in and around Taranto in southern Italy and the French air-force continued to cower under the bombs of the Luftwaffe in the north.  I built up my armies in Sicily more and started putting more research into amphibious warfare with an eye to hopping up Italy's coasts in late '43.

In March, things started to go pear-shaped.  The French navy, which had dominated the North sea and the western Med in 1939 and '40 now began to show its age.  Apart from the carrier air groups, the fleet hadn't modernized at all and the French merchant marine began to pay the price.  Reports of French convoy and escort losses started coming in with alarming frequency and the French navy was completely unable to cope with the new U-boat threat.  We just simply couldn't find them at all.  To make matters worse, new German naval bombers began to appear whenever my ships sailed close to home ports and these bombers were deadly accurate.  Cherbourg and Marseilles were no longer safe harbours and my fleets were forced to take shelter in Le Harve or Algiers in order to affect repairs.

French shipping losses got to the point where I was no longer able to reliably re-supply French forces in southern Italy and fuel and supply shortages became the norm.  We were unable to effectively fight and were forced to abandon the heel of the Italian boot. 

I switched production from landing craft to convoy ships and cursed the Royal Navy.  With both the French and British navies forced out of the North Sea, the Germans were finally free to make a play for Norway and they landed troops at Tronheim in early April.  By mid-May, the were knocking on the door at Oslo and this success seemed to galvanize the Germans and the world was finally plunged into total war.

The Germans again launched mass attacks against my forces at Dunkirk but also decided it was finally time to put Barbarossa into play.  They declared war on the USSR on June 1, 1943.  The same day that Japan launched surprise attacks against Hong Kong, the Dutch East Indies, Guam, and the Philippines.   

That's where we stand.  I'm again fighting a holding action against heavy German tanks along the Belgian border.  I'm being pushed back towards Sicily from southern Italy due to lack of supply.  The Americans are getting their asses handed to them in the Philippines and the eastern Pacific Islands.  The Brits have just lost Singapore.  Norway's about to fall but things are not all bad.  The Red hordes are on an absolute tear in the east.  Looks like Adolf left it too long and the Red Army had recovered from the purges.

Uncle Joe has taken the offence and forced Finland to capitulate in 3 weeks, he has already taken Warsaw, and is poised to take Bucharest.  The only place where Stalin's forces are facing defeat is at the hands of the Japanese in Manchuria.

It's now September, 1943 and France is about to re-invigorate its merchant marine and once again push for Rome.   
   




   



 

[Martok]

Damn, sounds like things have tense as hell for France.  Hopefully this widening of the war ultimately works in their favor! 

[Tuna]

Great AAR SDR!.. Insert some pics to enhance the story!... Hopefully the start of Barbarossa willl be all you need to turn the tide.. especially where they waited so long. hopefully Russia will have built up enough (and it does sound like she is strong).

[MetalDog]

That's some really good writing, SDR.  I playe HoI 2 to death and wished I liked 3 better.  This AAR might put me over the top. A quick comment on the A.I. based on observations of many hours spent on 2.  The game is not hard wired to following history, but, it seems that some events will not fire if other events do not fire either.  The fall of France would have started Barbarossa.  Because you held off the Germans for Norway and France, it had to re-think its strategy.  And for a computer, it's usually slow on the up take.  Not a lot of aggessive behavior. 

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Do you find that if you load a saved game, the AI gets really aggressive and attacks as soon as you start the time running?

[Barthheart]

Do you find that if you load a saved game, the AI gets really aggressive and attacks as soon as you start the time running?

I remember that happening in HOI II. If you played for hours the AI would go dormant. You had to stop and start the game to get the AI to wake up.

[MetalDog]

Do you find that if you load a saved game, the AI gets really aggressive and attacks as soon as you start the time running?

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

????


September has been ugly.  The Germans hit the Belgian border and the Maginot line with everything they had.  They punched through my lines and took Cambrai and Charleville.  They whittled my unit's organization stats to zero and just kept hammering at my lines so that I was never able to successfully reinforce.  I'm now racing back to Paris in an attempt to hold them outside the capitol. 

My assessment of the situation in the east may have been premature.  Never count on the German's ability to rally in the face of adversity.  Despite the initial Soviet gains, the Germans successfully counter-attacked and took back Warsaw and about 80% of the other provinces as well.

I've produced a couple of Marine divisions that I'd originally intended to sent to Italy but I've since thrown them at Cambrai in the hopes that they can stem the tide.  Being freshly produced units, their organization stat is zero though so they need a few weeks of peace and quiet to get sorted out before I throw them in the path of the Kraut panzers.  I don't have the luxury of time though.  It'll be interesting to see if they can hold their own.

[Boggit]

Excellent AAR SDR. I really want to fire HOI3 up now, but things to do today.

I last played Nationalist China on HOI3, but was utterly stomped by Japan.