Hearts of Iron 3 : Questions

[Wegen7 die Große]

Thanks, but I checked that folder and my screenshots are not in there. After I press F12 it says it saved the map or pic but I can not find were it saved it to.

Would there be a different folder that it would save it to?

[TheBromgrev]

Believe me, that's where they go. I'm writing a pretty popular AAR on the official Paradox forum and I get screenshots for it by pressing the F11 key and going into the folder named Screenshots to edit the pictures. The only thing I can think of that would cause pictures to not show up is that you have Windows 7 or Vista and installed the game somewhere in the folder Program Files. There's a known issue with the newer Windows' "security features" (aka it sucks) that prevents you from changing the contents of anything inside that folder. If you do have one of those OS'es then you'll need to move the game out of the Program Files folder and put it somewhere else.

That's all I can think of though, as I've used the F11 key and that folder plenty of times in the past, and there's no possible alternate location for the pictures to go. Steam's new screenshot feature, if you're using Steam, has stupidly decided that the default screenshot key will be F12, but even then you'll still get a world map picture in the HOI3 Screenshots folder on top of the screenshot Steam saves.

[HissingNewt]

Bromgrev, how do I install that HPP mod? Do I just extract it to the mod folder or does it have to go in the HPP folder in the mod folder?

[TheBromgrev]

You install it similar to how you install Medieval 2: Kingdoms mods. Inside your HOI3 folder will be a folder named mod. The HPP goes inside of that, so you'd end up with this when you're done: ../HOI3/mod/HPP/

Here's a more detailed explanation I wrote up in the Paradox HPP forum:

Technical Questions

*I'm not entirely sure how to use the mod folder.

Most mods require you to make a copy of your vanilla folders and overwrite vanilla's files. The HPP doesn't do that, and instead uses the mod folder and the game launcher, so you don't overwrite any vanilla files. That way you don't need to have multiple copies of the game on your machine.

The install directions are pretty straightforward, but for people who've never used the mod folder, here're some clarifications. When you extract HPP.rar, the contents of that need to go inside of the mod folder. The contents should be a folder called HPP, 3 more rars (more on that later), 3 readme text files, and the file HPP.mod. All of that goes inside of your vanilla mod folder.

If you downloaded the graphical supplement, you'll see two folders after you extract it. The gfx folder needs to be copied into your *vanilla* directory. You shouldn't have to overwrite any actual files, but make a backup just in case you do need to overwrite something. The other folder needs to go inside of the mod folder and overwrite when prompted.

*What are those 3 rars after I extract the mod?

Those are different victory conditions. Read the file a_note_on_victory_conditions.txt for instructions.

*Why does my map look messed up?

If you're using version 1.9 or later, you'll need to rebuild your map cache. Follow the instructions in the file map_cache.txt.

Depending on where you got the mod from, the map part may not apply. The torrents and other forums where you can get the HPP from don't have the latest version with the improved map. You'll have to register your game in the Paradox forum and go to the HPP sub-forum to get the latest version, which is 1.9.2b. There are also instructions for Steam users in the HPP sub-forum.

[Veliky Kaiser Theos]

I've got a question. I'm playing as Romania and I want to join the Comintern. It's 1959 and everytime I get closer than 200 to that faction all of a sudden I move in the direction of Allies due to threat. Why is it that the Comintern is only threatening when I'm closer than them then the Allies? They Soviets have 30 threat against me, but all of the major allies have a greater threat against me, why is the Soviet threat the only one to affect me? I get this problem in both vanilla and mods.

If this problem cannot be solved can someone give me a console command to join the Comintern? For the past 15 years I have had a greater drift towards them and I am only being stopped by this problem.

[TheBromgrev]

You sure it's 1959 and not 1939? Did you edit defines.lua to move the game's end date back? If you really are at 1959 and didn't change the end date then your ships and planes will stop working they way they should, and won't perform continuous missions anymore.

Either way, the game's drift mechanics are odd unless you use the HPP mod (the HPP was started to fix this exact problem you're describing, but expanded to do other things). Romania should start off with a democratic ideology, which means you'll naturally drift to the Allies corner. When you get close to the Comintern you'll be pushed away because your ideology isn't communist and can't counteract the push due to threat.

You can edit your save to add yourself to the Comintern if you want, and in fact aside from a custom event that's the only way to do it. First make a backup copy in case you make a mistake. Then, open the save using a text editor (any will do), and search for "faction={". Scroll down a little bit until you see the Comintern entry, then copy and past one of the lines in the array and change the tag to "ROM".

[Veliky Kaiser Theos]

Oh yes I'm very sure it's 1959. I thought that my ships and planes would stop working, but they work just fine, I think it's because of the ICE mod I'm using.
Thanks for the save editing idea, I would +rep you again, but you're too helpful and I need to spread it around before doing so again.

[TheBromgrev]

No problem. It seems like I'm the only knowledgeable person about the game who frequents these parts of the forum. I've apparently usurped the original Questions thread and turned it into "Q&A with TheBromgrev" instead

[Omar Nelson B.]

Is there a better tutorial to this game. I have never played this games, though I have played Vic...a good amount, I just don't seem to understand what is going on.

[TheBromgrev]

Unfortunately the really bad tutorial is all that's there. I suggest you read some AARs first to get a basic grasp of what's going on, then pick a nation that won't be involved in the war anytime soon in order to get a grasp of the basics. There's a very good France tutorial you can read to get a good idea of how things work. Brazil, Argentina, Australia, Hungary, and Canada I personally feel are good nations to try in order to figure out how everything works. From there, Germany is my next suggestion to play as, since you're focused exclusively on the air and land aspects of the game.

[Augment]

So far HPP is very fun and i've been following its progress on the Paradox forums and im glad to see they are working on post-war events also.
I only had one crash when i created the Republic of China-Nanjing as Japan and afterwards i chose to annex the other Republic of China under Chang Ki-Check and the game crashed.

[TheBromgrev]

Glad you like it so far. The only known single player crash is Germany's surrender, because it uses an outdated file to determine who gets what. There's a hotfix available in the HPP's PI forum. I haven't had any issues with China crashing, although the AI and most people don't follow the order of events you did. Normally the AI creates ROC-Nanjing then puppets the rest (aka gives it to Jingwei). I typically don't make the ROC-Nanjing when the decision becomes available, but rather annex everything instead. I'll go take a look at your particular case, but any fixes I make will be posted in the Paradox forum.

[SLN445]

Been reorganising my forces.
How should i used Motorised Infantry? whats there purpose?

[RO Citizen]

Been reorganising my forces.
How should i used Motorised Infantry? whats there purpose?

Use them until you get Mechanized or if you're low on fuel/want to spend them in other areas

[oberst_ag]

Can I somehow se how many Italians I killed saving Ethiopia from them?

[Kamikaze470]

HoI3 doesn't have much of Military Statistics in terms of death tolls. It goes as far as telling you the outcome of battle losses and that's about it. You can keep track of how much you killed/lost manually by keeping track of the number of Italian soldiers you killed in every battle.

[TheBromgrev]

Can I somehow se how many Italians I killed saving Ethiopia from them?

This is a feature that's requested very often in the official forum, and always results in a thread being locked. I honestly don't know what the problem is, as kill stats were available in every earlier version of the game, but PI refuses to even discuss adding a death tally to the stats page. In the meantime you'll need to do what Kamikaze470 said and keep track of what your battle reports say.

[oberst_ag]

thanks and to bad but maby people can mod it?

[TheBromgrev]

thanks and to bad but maby people can mod it?

It's not possible, otherwise I'd have done so already. There's no way to keep a running total of losses in the game. All you can do is keep track of individual battles, then based on how many deaths there were on one side modders can write an event to do something, but you can't use that feature to keep a running total. Paradox would have to re-add the feature, and they've repeatedly said they won't.

[Veliky Kaiser Theos]

Is there any way to speed up a campaign? It's 1951 in my Turkish campaign and now at 19:00 every 2nd or 3rd day it pauses for about 3 seconds. This is getting a little annoying, so is there any way to fix the problem? Can I delete parts of the file such as previous wars? I think it's a problem with the size of the file.