How to make invasions work

[pcasey]

So, dumb question, but I can't seem to get my nation to invade an enemy nation's territory. I can take stuff just fine in peace deals, but invasions don't seem to happen for me.

The situation:

I am playing Germany.
Its about 1946.

I control the entire baltic.
Russia control Norway.

I have a crippling naval superiority in northern europe (Russia is blockaded).

I bring up the map view.

I select Norway.

I select set invasion target.

I note that its going to cost me like $4m.

I have like 120M in the bank.

I wait like a year ... no invasion happens.

What am I failing to do?

[enioch]

You are failing to be lucky.

Invasions do not fire when you give the order, they fire when the Random Number Generator decides to fire the invasion you asked your navy to pursue

[garrisonchisholm]

This is true, though also know we have been having discussions about the invasion mechanic. I recently spent 96.5 mil over 24 months with complete supremacy and never had my invasion fire. At the very least, I think we want the players to get better feed-back from the game regarding this.

[aeson]

How much of a fleet advantage do you actually have? Because, within the game, blockading Russia is relatively easy - you only need a 10% advantage in fleet strength score in Northern Europe, and on top of that Russia has a penalty to its fleet strength for the purposes of blockade to represent the weakness of its geographical position (note: this does not care about what colonies may or may not have been picked up during the game; a Russia that controls all of Scandinavia is just as easily blockaded by Germany as one that doesn't have any possessions other than those marked as 'home' territories) - whereas for invasion it's recommended that you have a much higher margin of superiority, presumably because it's a lot easier to stop a merchantman than it is to protect a group of transports during an amphibious assault.

If you're unsure of your and Russia's fleet strengths in the area, go to the map tab and hover your mouse cursor over the sea zone; a tool-tip should pop up listing the number and type of ships in the sea zone by nation, and at the end is a number in parenthesis - that's the local fleet strength score.

Note that this may not be entirely accurate - the numbers are for the ships you know to be in the area, but you don't necessarily know all of the ships that are in the area, especially hostile ships in wartime - and only AF (and probably FS) ships count.

As to how much time it takes, there's at least some degree of randomness; I've had invasions pop the turn after I set the target and I've had invasions prepping for years without ever going anywhere. Your local margin of superiority appears to have something to do with it, and there's a post recommending at least a 4:1 margin if you want things to happen quickly.

[generalvikus]

A question for garrisonchisholm or any other members of the dev team - considering that Operation Weserübung was carried out by the Kreigsmarine from a position of great numerical inferiority under the nose of the British Home Fleet, what is the justification for the requirement that the invader be greatly numerically superior? 

[rodentnavy]

May 31, 2019 2:00:56 GMT -6 generalvikus said:

A question for garrisonchisholm or any other members of the dev team - considering that Operation Weserübung was carried out by the Kreigsmarine from a position of great numerical inferiority under the nose of the British Home Fleet, what is the justification for the requirement that the invader be greatly numerically superior? 

Not a member of the team but surely Weserübung is modelled by being able to Blitzkrieg Norway?  It was a neutral country not expecting attack with its largely reservist defence forces demobilised.  Once the British Royal Navy turned up the KM got reamed.  Now imagine trying a landing where the local land troops are ready and waiting for an attack. 

[tortugapower]

I like the way you think generalvikus . It would be great if invasion events triggered battles where even an inferior force could attempt to invade. Clicking the invasion button against a superior force could be allowed with drastic loss of VP if things don't go well.

Mind you, I think the biggest annoyance about the invasion mechanic is its chance to fire is static per turn, and a flat distribution can lead to a very unpredictable result.

Why not make the chance to invade a Poisson distribution (discrete normal/Gaussian)? There is a mean time to fire of X months, and you can control the tails of the distribution, insert skew, etc.

[dorn]

I think that there should be preparation time which is function of:
- distance of friendly territory - game has already this info
- large of own base (there can be even limit of minimal base needed related to how large possession is invaded) - info is in game
- how large is the possession invaded - info is in game, either possession value or resources

After preparation is done, players can start invasion anytime pushing buttom but will pay monthly even if players does not start invasion.

Another sugestion is that battle related to invasion fleet is seperated from battle system so does not count as monthly battle.

Another sugestion is that in time of preparation there can be inteligence report about invasion fleet is prepared in certain port.

[dizzy]

May 30, 2019 19:15:40 GMT -6 garrisonchisholm said:

This is true, though also know we have been having discussions about the invasion mechanic. I recently spent 96.5 mil over 24 months with complete supremacy and never had my invasion fire. At the very least, I think we want the players to get better feed-back from the game regarding this.

May 31, 2019 11:16:59 GMT -5 tortugapower said:



Mind you, I think the biggest annoyance about the invasion mechanic is its chance to fire is static per turn, and a flat distribution can lead to a very unpredictable result.

This, tortugapower. So perhaps as more time goes by, there is a higher percentage it will happen.



garrisonchisholm, more in-game feedback would be appreciated for invasions. Perhaps each month that goes by adds a percentage modifier to increasing the chance the invasion will trigger? Also, this percentage could have events fire that explain prestige changes, added costs, tension changes all related to the invasion, perhaps with choices to help trigger it. All of it would be more involving and enjoyable.



Hey, we want to invade neutral countries during peacetime or war with different strategies for democratic or authoritarian governments. Add that too please!

[dizzy]

May 31, 2019 10:29:17 GMT -6 dorn said:

I think that there should be preparation time which is fuction of:
- distance of friendly territory
- large of own base (there can be even limit of minimal base needed related to how large possession is invaded)
- how large is the possession invaded

After preparation is done, players can start invasion anytime pushing buttom but will pay monthly even if players does not start invasion.

Another sugestion is that battle related to invasion fleet is seperated from battle system so does not count as monthly battle.

Another sugestion is that in time of preparation there can be inteligence report about invasion fleet is prepared in certain port.

Really good points!

The time for invasion should matter to these points perhaps:
- Distance to your base should play a role, the further away the more risk and prep needed
- If your base is larger or smaller than the enemy base should factor in, invading a larger base with a smaller base takes more time
- how many coastal cities there are, more takes more time
- How many gun emplacements and bases require more careful planning....
- the time of year and geographical location. Maybe weather should play a role
- Number of times you lost 4:1 naval supremacy to the number of times you maintained it
-

[namuras]

May 30, 2019 19:15:40 GMT -6 garrisonchisholm said:

This is true, though also know we have been having discussions about the invasion mechanic. I recently spent 96.5 mil over 24 months with complete supremacy and never had my invasion fire. At the very least, I think we want the players to get better feed-back from the game regarding this.

To be honest: it seems the AI will invade on turn 2 of a war if it can... but players have to seemingly wait ages for anything to happen. Even in backwater territories...

[garrisonchisholm]

I agree, it really feels like more feedback is necessary. If it *is* valid for a long delay to occur then the player should have messages like "difficult to collect supplies for invasion" or "invasion drill reveals glaring weakness and generals go back to the drawing board" or some such thing.

& I know what you mean about the AI. I had an Italy game where in the first 6 months of a war I lost Algeria and was defending Tunisia, and normally I could only dream of that kind of responsiveness. However we have also tested some very fun scenarios where a Beta tester was able to launch and succeed in 3 invasions in 1 year, though the player is still left wondering "am I going to pick up the news paper and read about an invasion today..." Hence, my impression that at least a greater degree of feedback would be desirable. We are engaged upon the issue! That's all I can say at the moment.

[namuras]

May 31, 2019 15:35:47 GMT -6 garrisonchisholm said:

I agree, it really feels like more feedback is necessary. If it *is* valid for a long delay to occur then the player should have messages like "difficult to collect supplies for invasion" or "invasion drill reveals glaring weakness and generals go back to the drawing board" or some such thing.

& I know what you mean about the AI. I had an Italy game where in the first 6 months of a war I lost Algeria and was defending Tunisia, and normally I could only dream of that kind of responsiveness. However we have also tested some very fun scenarios where a Beta tester was able to launch and succeed in 3 invasions in 1 year, though the player is still left wondering "am I going to pick up the news paper and read about an invasion today..." Hence, my impression that at least a greater degree of feedback would be desirable. We are engaged upon the issue! That's all I can say at the moment.

Some sort of feedback would be appreciated... i don't need them to fire all the time, but atleast lets have some hint as to "why" it doesn't happen. Usually the Navy should get some hint about when to deploy...

[rodentnavy]

So I had a little war with a communist (not necessarily soviet) Russia over Iceland. The Russians decline the invasion battle and then the game tells me the invasion went ahead without interference. That sounds about how it is supposed to work but I get the notion is it not for a lot of people.

[demol]

I can never achieve invasion in my two walkthrough campaigns.

Even when enemy had literally no ships (lager than DD) at all.


But enemy CAN do invasions even at 1-2 month of war.