challenge-questions

[solid gust]

but thank you for the breakdown, the next challenge will be up soon, I am going to continue the 'hard' then 'easy' challenges, with this one being a lil' funny

[charred timber]

@north garden the amount of rng in your strat is annoying

japanese exiles chance 50/50

getting a save where china puppets the right war lords

man wtf

[north garden]

0.3 * 0.5^4 * 0.8

[charred timber]

having soviet cw not before chinese war ends

man, how many attempts have you need to get the right setup?

[north garden]

151

[charred timber]

you really need that free dlc, dont you?

[north garden]

no

[charred timber]

F

[solid gust]

Chiro is a bit insane

but we like em'

[north garden]

Today marks the national day of mourning in our country. I wish to carry the essence of our nation's culture with me as we honor the memory of our esteemed leader, regarded by many as our finest.

[solid gust]

what do you have in mind

[north garden]

xD I can't express this in English

[solid gust]

yeah im a lil confused by the statement lmao

though you can ofc dedicate this on your own profiles and such, I would not be able to endorse any political person.

that and I'd quite honestly be breaking rule 2 at that point here in the server aha

[charred timber]

but how have you got 85%?

[north garden]

remnants of the Japanese army

here

[charred timber]

yeah but how?

have you encircled one of there ports or something?

[north garden]

Occupation warscore

[charred timber]

ok

how deep have you pls pushed before the soviets joined dafaq

i had a similar strat idea but only made it to tsingtao alone

[north garden]

You know, the Republic of China pushed most of its troops south to attack Yunnan, when I declared war I easily took over most of their land.

[charred timber]

sounds all plausible, thx for enlightening

[glacial stratus]

surprisingly my run was similar to Chiro's playthrough, but i will add my know-how regardless
(yapping session incoming)

after countless tries of trying to do this on Historical(i usually do hist since they are predictable with less AI tomfoolery), it was nearly impossible to defeat Chinese United Front and eventually Japan , given the nature of the challenge to do the requirements AS SOON AS POSSIBLE so i opted for turning off Historical AI

while doing test runs i noticed Japanese Civil War as Communist or Democratic AI will let go of the Manchukuo as their Imperial Protectorate (important given i have no desire to invade 🇯🇵 + remember: paratroopers are not allowed‼️ )

so my first priority was to roll Japan RNG to flip to anything that is not Support Kodoha Faction (Non-Aligned) or Purge them (Fascist, historical route)

But Communist Japan is way more preferable since

1. 🇲🇳 starts as Communist and having Japanese ally is always handy
   2)Democracies, as you know , have infamous tendency to guarantee nations needed for your challenges, especially if they have focuses acting as "Guardians of Pacific" so thats a no-no
   3)Communist Japan simply needs to occupy Tokyo to win Civil War, while Democracy already starts from the capital and needs to retake the rest of the country, so given how intelligent the HoI4 AI is, this is not desirable...

i also wanted the Soviet Union to basically carry Mongolia in its wars so there is only one option

1)Tsarists/Fascists have focus to Annex Mongolia + i am positive that they won't be so friendly to Marxism as state ideology therefore they are checked out

2)The Left or Right Opposition will drag the conflict to who-knows-how-late and given how badly i need to secure Soviet support - i also rolled for Soviet Union to go historical-Stalinist route since they will be only busy with Great Purge and not a civil war...

and rest of the world can do whatever it wants, so the process is coincidentally very similar to what @north garden wrote above, thanks to him, i don't have to copy the same thing again

my """army""" consisted of Cavalry units, usually the default template and very cheap 1 Cav divisions and i tried to spam them out as humanely as possible

also one thing i noticed at the end of 🇯🇵 focus tree is that they have mutually exclusive focuses to either Join Comintern or make their own faction with Communist China

while the former sounds ideal, i actually played this game for so long that i was sure that AI will do anything to ruin the playthroughs so they will go for the "Asian Solidarity" or whatever it is called in game to form alliance with the (L)Mao Zedong

so i had to get rid of them asap as well

[north garden]

Oh my 151 attempts, only 1 time I met Democratic Japan xD

[solid gust]

oof

also ignore me as I type up challenge rules here now

[glacial stratus]

combat strategy is what i have learned and realized from doing Spanish Civil War scenarios that it is ALWAYS a war of maneuvre

fighting 🇹🇼 Kuomintang China of all people as core-less nation as 🇲🇳 is madness therefore Cavalry was my only hope

so the Jap Civil War went smooth, they captured Tokyo and Militarists were exiled to Mengkukuo forming Imperial Kwantung Territories (its the reason why i have Taiwan, Iwo Jima and Okinawa as my territories in the screenshot submission)

for few world warlords i used Soviet aid, prayed for RNG to not let them take any territory in peace deal, i attacked China after they went against Guangxi and Yunnan

(also fun thing since they didnt fight Japan , they had the terrible Division Attack/Defense national spirit of -30%)

capped them all, and here we are 🙂

[solid gust]

Big Brother Challenge Rules

-Must start as Germany in the 1936 Scenario, and end the challenge as Germany, no Tag switching.
-Graphical mods are allowed but Ironman must be enabled. There is no time requirement for this challenge, however.
-The challenge requires you to puppet Belgium, not conquer. After you puppet Belgium, you must have it conquer/help them conquer France so that the entirety of mainland France becomes Belgium.
-As this is a relaxed challenge, there are no unit restrictions other than no Paratroopers, everything else is fine

-Land Requirements only include MAINLAND FRANCE everything else is optional to your runs, but you must actively take the land yourself, no random peacedeals as always.
-All wars must be resolved for an entry to count, regardless of if its against France or not.

[signal frost]

Does RK Belgium count as Belgium

[rough portal]

I never do these but gotta wonder ... yeah, that

[signal frost]

As they can share the same tag

[solid gust]

hmmmmm, seeing as its a relaxed challenge, both can count for this one

[signal frost]

Epic

[burnt bridge]

Mainland france doesn't include corsica does it?

[solid gust]

Corsica is not on the mainland no

[crisp grotto]

can we do reichskommisariat belgen?

[lucid cliff]

check #challenge-submissions pls

[charred timber]

im out

i refuse to support belgium in any way

except

[solid gust]

damn y'all already finishing the challenge, I know its easy but give it at least 15 minutes lmao

[charred timber]

@solid gust is it allowed to do with reichskommisariat belgien-nordfrankreich?

[solid gust]

do it

[charred timber]

then its belgium with a based german flag

[solid gust]

no need to ping me please, but yes I already answered that here #challenge-questions message

[charred timber]

ok im sorry

[lucid cliff]

😎

[tired ruin]

thought of an idea, attack belgium, justify on france when im at war with Belgium

this way i cna do it faster

this is not my submission, ill make a submission later

but thought it was funny because i gave belgium the world

[crisp grotto]

thats great and all, but L get embargod

[tired ruin]

ill just funnel it through my belgium

[crisp grotto]

idc if i win the challenge or not, just its a fun thing to do

so ima cheese it

[charred timber]

is that easy challenge then also going two weeks?

[glacial stratus]

yes, each one is two weeks

this one has no timed requirement, so the winner will be chosen randomly between your submissions, folks

have fun!

[charred timber]

man i dont want to wait two weeks for an insane hard challenge that hatless, palo and me plan so hard but never submit because it breaks us and as result we submit nothing

that was fun the last too weeks

[glacial stratus]

its the pattern with the contests lately , my man

tough timed one followed by easy enough one or two

then repeat

[solid gust]

I'd gotten a lot of requests for the easier challenges when I did a lot of the harder ones, so now I alternate them

gives a chance to everyone to participate in these challenges

[charred timber]

sure why not

[solid gust]

also @glacial stratus though you cannot win this one, I have a more difficult variation of this one if you want it

[charred timber]

but is it necessary two have it two weeks for such a simple one?

[fickle river]

if I end up on 2nd or 3rd place, can I reject the place so I can participate in the next one with chance of winning?

[charred timber]

one week is enough, isnt it?

[solid gust]

I can only do 2 challenges a month, and there needs to be leeway for people to participate around their schedules

[charred timber]

but ok, cant await whats coming in two weeks

[charred timber]

ah i see

[glacial stratus]

i know man, i know, although i don't have access to pc now (since im on holiday)

sure man, gimme your tough one, i'll maybe do it when possible

[solid gust]

technically no, but in some instances I allow it

[charred timber]

alr

[solid gust]

like if you've won a few challenges already and want to give the prize away etc

[solid gust]

It's the same challenge, except As Belgium, puppet Germany and give it the UK

[fickle river]

like I want only the 1st place and dont care about the two others

thats why i am asking

this challenge is based on luck, so I cant influence it, therefore willing to give that place to someone else is only natural if I ended up 2nd or 3rd (the actual dlc is something i still lack and want)

[glacial stratus]

out of spite to 🇳🇱 Dutch or 🇫🇷 French? and 🇬🇧 UK of all people?

seems diabolical enough 😈

[glacial stratus]

i am sure this guy would be pleased

[charred timber]

impossible

[solid gust]

for the easy challenges, I can accommodate that for you, on the difficult ones I cannot, I will make a note of it for you

[fickle river]

most certainly

[charred timber]

gun metal grey dont play belgium

it is possible to do but i wouldnt play belgium volunteerly

[solid gust]

be careful now, or you will be doomed to 10 dutch east indies runs without going independent

[charred timber]

well, its non-aligned at the start of the game and has infinite manpower

i see no downsides

[solid gust]

each run has to go to 1970, no breaks, no sleep

[charred timber]

can someone borrow me the best pc on the market?

[charred timber]

As Dutch East Indies, conquer the entire East Indies and Indochina while you stay a puppet the whole time

that would be an insane nice challenge

[glacial stratus]

i am interested in trying out a mod i installed a while back that adds real portraits to leaders with generic portraits - ironman compatible

would be fun enough to try, i think

at least a week from now on that is

[glacial stratus]

that's masochism my bro

(Mongolia was already torture enough, let people have their fun bro 😄)

[charred timber]

tbh i dont think so

you just need a fascist netherlands run, thats it

[umbral latch]

What makes the runs different?

[charred timber]

Yes

[crude pasture]

#1 is march 8 I got it march 9

huge

[empty lintel]

is it necessary to cap the uk or nah

i did it for funny

but i capped france like in march

[crude pasture]

I feel like you have to but not sure, doing it in my runs

[empty lintel]

do they select winners randomly or who did it faster?

[glacial stratus]

first time seeing contest with so many submissions day 1

[charred timber]

With that difficulty it would be suprising if its less

[topaz crest]

It is allowed to World conquest and gave it to belgium?

[charred timber]

Nah

You need germany at least somewhere

So its no real wc

[wraith jolt]

First time doing challenges, how are the winners decided? Fastest subsmission? Earliest completion date? Random?

[north garden]

Random

[wraith jolt]

and i assume i just send the screenshot in #challenge-submissions right?

[north garden]

yep

[wraith jolt]

aight thx

am i tripping or is the challenge like... hella easy?

[north garden]

Remember to hover over the gold trophy to show you are playing ironman mode.

[wraith jolt]

yea yea

[north garden]

good luck

[crude pasture]

no way nov 36 is possible

[bitter thistle]

Technically may 36 is possible

But you'd have to get stupidly lucky

[crude pasture]

using ahist ?

[bitter thistle]

Shhhhhhhhh

[crude pasture]

cause there's no way you would declare war that early

[bitter thistle]

You'd have to save scum like 100 times minimum

[crude pasture]

yeah

not doing that, mongolia had my soul already

[solid gust]

I try to alternate difficult and easy challenges so everyone can participate, I enjoy giving more difficult challenges for the tryhard players to show off their skills, and easier ones like this that get people into the challenges themselves.

its a way everyone can participate and earn a chance to get a lil' something in the process

oops ping, my bad

[wraith jolt]

Aight, makes sense, thanks!

[wraith sand]

Even if I don’t typically participate in the easier ones, my boy Chak including everyone and doing a great job at it.
Cheer this man!

[empty lintel]

how do they give you dlc?

if you are the winner

by gifting?

[solid gust]

HOI players have skill ranges on both sides from pro's to newer players, including everyone is just something that is right to do imo

though I don't think cheering is needed for me haha, though its very kind of you to say

[solid gust]

We give out Steam keys to the winners

[empty lintel]

ok

[mighty echo]

if i were to say, own all of the downloadable content for hoi, could i still participate?

(just saying it seems easy...)

[empty lintel]

yeah

[mighty echo]

okay, sweet

[solid gust]

if you win and dont need a dlc to finish your collection, you are allowed tro grab one for a friend or a family member

[mighty echo]

okay

[empty shell]

Please dont discuss non-authorised resellers on here, whilst its lamentable that you were scammed we cannot help. @shell talon

[shell talon]

it was made as a joke

/ sarcasm

[empty shell]

regardless this isnt the place for it

[shell talon]

whatever u say

[chilly walrus]

Dang dude, in my attempts to complete this challenge, I've finally gotten my first Steam achievements

(Don't ask why I sealioned if the challenge only involves France and Belgium, I'm cooking something)

[chilly walrus]

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1097516572584706150/1266760457184612404/image.png?ex=66a6521c&is=66a5009c&hm=330de7b89d5684d8914d0ba9389451a2d89f696dbd967c174c43a3104dba339a&=&format=webp&quality=lossless&width=994&height=559

I didn't wait long enough before flipping Communist for Austria to willingly anschluss themselves

I considered restarting to get those ideal borders

But then I realized - no, wait, it's funnier this way

[north garden]

hey check out this pic, you should do something like this to prove that you are playing Ironman Mode

[chilly walrus]

Oh, is the gold trophy being there not enough?

[north garden]

yep

[chilly walrus]

I don't usually do these sorts of things, so I wouldn't know

[empty lintel]

so you don't cheat

[chilly walrus]

Yes, I'm aware of the rule about Ironman being on - it was listed in the challenge rules

I'm talking about needing to hover over the icon to see the tooltip in the screenshot

[empty lintel]

also you can't send 2 submissions lol

[north garden]

he did nothing wrong :b

[empty lintel]

what

[north garden]

You can add missing images

[lapis rivet]

do you need to be historical germany or can you be any germany in the challenge?

[glacial stratus]

Historical is not required, you can be whatever ideology as long as you start as Germany

[sterile saffron]

What difficulty do I need for these chalenges?

[empty lintel]

normal?

[sterile saffron]

I meant if I can play on lower than regular

[empty lintel]

idk

why tho

[solid gust]

you cannot

has to be achievement compatible

[wraith jolt]

did it end or is it still ongoing?

[empty lintel]

still

it doesn't end till 2 weeks

[wraith jolt]

oh damn thought it was like a weekend thing

neat

[icy kite]

Can you use mods for the challenge, like no division limit?

[north garden]

you cannot

except graphics mod

[glacial stratus]

personally apart from colored buttons and few flag/portrait mods i don't use anything else

i just dislike majority of generic portraits, especially for Europe&Asia

i wish Paradox made an update on new generics/adding leaders irl portraits

like there was an update with new flags in No Step Back

[river cosmos]

umm i am trying to use the modern mod but it aint opening

[solid gust]

no, only graphical mods as Chiro has mentioned

No mods that change the gameplay restrictions within the game

I allow graphical mods because a lot of people want to use things like FPS maps, or different aesthetic mods to their preference

but anything that changes gameplay is a no

[solid gust]

You can post more than one image, correct, however it must be in the same message/no submission from another person should be inbetween it, or I will take it as a second submission and disregard both

@fervent slate Unfortunately your submission cannot be considered in this fashion, please take a screenshot, not a picture with your phone. I am also simply pinging you so that you can change it before the submission time is up so that you can delete it and resubmit for a chance at winning.

The screenshot must have you hovering over the Trophy Icon as well to show that you have Ironman enabled and it is achievement compatible.

[glacial stratus]

i know its very, VERY early to say, but do you plan to make contest when the next dlc is announced on Steam?

[lapis goblet]

Am I allowed to give Belgium all of the allied territories?

Or just france

[solid gust]

If you mean a giveaway, not that I know of. But it would not be my decision regardless

Whenever a new DLC releases, I do center challenges around content from it however, so things will be featured around whatever the content would be

[solid gust]

France is the only required lands, you can go wild and give Blegium the world if you wanted to

[lapis goblet]

Fair enough

[empty lintel]

which day of august is it gonna be released the results?

[glacial stratus]

8th

[umbral latch]

What makes people different?

[solid gust]

Everyone has an equal chance in this challenge, so long as you meet the challenge requirements

that's why this is one of the 'easy' challenges

when picking winners, though, I will make sure an entry is valid, then give it a number, then use a random number generator to choose the winner, so that its fair

[bitter thistle]

so its not a time challenge?
so i spent so long save scumming praying france will deny rhineland for nothing?

[empty lintel]

the biggest trolling you've seen

[solid gust]

I mean, I do post the additional rules of the challenges in this channel everytime i do a new one, and I pin it

I think thats just an unfortunate increase in effort on your end

[bitter thistle]

But that's reading...

[solid gust]

reading is the bane of all our existence, true, but in this case it seems like you dug your own hole around the rules lmao

[empty lintel]

what does it do

[glacial stratus]

steam screenshot, like you did

[tiny swift]

Ups

[signal frost]

I technically conquered Belgium in 1937, but I released RK Belgium mid war so it should count, right?

There was no other way to get RK Belgium without taking Calais first

Also if you need evidence I didn't use paratroopers, I can provide that

[glacial stratus]

nah man, you always need to puppet them first and then give it French territories

the rules say so

[signal frost]

I was also told earlier that RK Belgium was allowed

[signal frost]

As seen here

[glacial stratus]

that's a very interesting observation, given that it also contradicts the rule of the challenge

i am curious about what Chak has to say, he usually lets these things slide

[frank umbra]

What if one challenge was you play hoi4 but in a foreign language you don’t understand

Mixed in with like Macau my day

[solid gust]

I allowed it because its a 'relaxed'/easy challenge

else I would have the exact path you have to take with it

[glacial stratus]

no difference, since button design is the same

[empty lintel]

i expect no win tbh, it's my first challenge but always everything can happen

[glacial stratus]

lots of submissions with wars still ongoing, despite rules saying otherwise

so there is less competition for you than one might think, who knows if you get lucky in the end 😄

[dawn apex]

wdym otherwise? it says help belgium conquer mainland france not own meaning a war can still go on

oh nvm

dang

[glacial stratus]

yep, no wars

[dawn apex]

i might actually win then

[solid gust]

A reminder for all those that participate; although you can have graphical mods, you cannot have the Nazi flag with a Swastika on it. It is still against the rules here to have that within your screenshots regardless of 'Historical Accuracy'

[empty lintel]

are entries closed now?

[solid gust]

they are now closed yes

[dawn apex]

...

actually?

so i cant submit one?

[empty lintel]

that's why i do things early lmao

[dawn apex]

aw man

i was literally completing it now 😭

[empty lintel]

dw they, do more challenges

luck next time ig

[dawn apex]

thanks

how long does it take for the other one to start?

[empty lintel]

if i'm not wrong they start when the another one ends

[dawn apex]

and how long until they find out the winners usually?

for this challenge

[empty lintel]

idk maybe soon

[solid gust]

Every challenge runs for 2 weeks

As for the next challenge it will be sometime today within the next few hours, I have to go through all of the entries and validate them

[dawn apex]

you can go through all of them in just a few hours?

that sounds extremely difficult

also thank you for your response

[solid gust]

its not necessarily difficult, it just takes some time

[dawn apex]

ah

[glacial stratus]

i hope the next challenge will be really challenging, preferably by doing formable nation

[solid gust]

not technically a formable requirement for the next one

but you wont be stopped from doing one

(main issue with formables is they require a certain DLC half the time so I try to find ways around it if possible but that can't always be the case)

[charred timber]

Next one pls without belgium

[solid gust]

all future challenges are now belgium centric ones

just 4 u

[charred timber]

Rip

[raven nest]

Pls no south america

[charred timber]

I give you 100 euros paysafe if you make sure devs never add belgium tree

Ever

[raven nest]

They will get more euros for selling belgium dlc t

[glacial stratus]

after doing Mongolia, nothing bothers me anymore

[raven nest]

South america is worse than china

[charred timber]

Its hispaniola challenge

[raven nest]

I hope this challenge will be with european country

[charred timber]

Gg ez

[raven nest]

As spain?

[glacial stratus]

wdym Very Hot Jungles aren't better than Gobi Desert

[solid gust]

the next challenge is not in europe

[charred timber]

Rip

[raven nest]

Bruhh

[glacial stratus]

very good

[solid gust]

but that is all I will say until I announce it

[raven nest]

No

[charred timber]

Palo we lose

[solid gust]

but it is not South america

[raven nest]

I wanted to have fun this challenge

[charred timber]

Its hispaniola

[glacial stratus]

no relaxing, only pain

besides it's the rule, one fun challenge, one extreme pain

[raven nest]

I want pain but in europe

[charred timber]

Its so safe hispaniola

We dead

[glacial stratus]

tbf, last bunch of challenges were all Europe

[charred timber]

As Dominican Republic, conquer entire carribean

Or something

[glacial stratus]

even if you were recreating Andalus, you still had to go to Europe

[empty lintel]

including uk netherlands france colonies

lmao

[charred timber]

Yes

[glacial stratus]

guys be thankful its not Jan Mayen

[charred timber]

Eww

Jan Mayen has no cores on itself

[glacial stratus]

imagine the possibilites (or lack of)

[charred timber]

Can we have challenge of the best nation in game?

Latvia

[glacial stratus]

its not even the best nation in the Baltics

[charred timber]

You are not a sigma

[glacial stratus]

https://tenor.com/view/kicking-him-alan-smiling-friends-knocked-out-kicking-his-teeth-out-gif-14787404105374321547

[solid gust]

The South Will Rise Again Challenge rules:

As South Africa, Liberate and conquer the African continent from the Colonisers

• Graphical mods are allowed, however no Nazi insignia (like a swastika) is allowed. If you have a Swastika within your screenshot, block it out/scribble over it or your submission will be invalidated and removed. The server rules prohibiting Nazi symbols are still upheld here. No other mods are allowed as they change game play.
• You must begin the game as South Africa. You cannot switch to a releasable at any point.
• It must be on the 1936 start scenario. No Hist/Non Hist AI restrictions this challenge.
• You must become an independent country before conquering the continent.
• Any and all wars must be resolved for this challenge. If there is still a war going on within your submission that you are participating in, then it will become Invalid.
• I will not restrict the Ideology you use for this challenge.
• No Puppets this time around, it must all be yours.
• All land must be conquered/taken by you, you cannot use a peacedeal in other wars to claim land

UNIT RESTRICTIONS

• This challenge will have specific unit restrictions: No Paratroopers and no Tanks are allowed. You will have to come up with a way to defeat your enemies without them. There are no Naval/ Air restrictions this challenge.

• The challenge winner will be determined by The shortest time it takes to achieve this challenge and will be subject to a detailed breakdown of how they achieved it if I deem it necessary.

• Submitting an entry will require you to hover over the trophy icon on the right of your screen for your screenshot. If it is not done, then the entry will be Invalid

• Your save has to be Achievement Compatible, so that means regular difficulty or above.

• Having fun is Mandatory (not really but at least try? lmao)

[solid gust]

difficult challenge is difficult

[glacial stratus]

honestly, after South Africa, i wish instead it was South America

ok its timed one again

let's rock and roll

[solid gust]

I try to cover all parts of the map as best I can, every corner will be played if I have something to say about it lmao

but this one will be painful for everyone who tries it, considering the restrictions

[unreal bolt]

Retake continent from colonizers? As south africa?

[keen shell]

comintern is probably best? idk

[pallid magnet]

Communist path i guess

[tiny folio]

i mean, youre probably gonna need that pop

[keen shell]

yeah i dont think you get any other cores

[lethal prawn]

isnt there that mutapan empire with cores

[tiny folio]

i forget the exact nation, but there are some formables in africa

[empty shell]

No tanks is foul

[charred timber]

ethiopia too?

[empty shell]

ethiopia gets a formable in bba i think

[solid gust]

https://tenor.com/view/mike-myers-mikemyers-austin-powers-movie-austin-powers-gif-austin-powers-movies-gif-12468430630872606186

[charred timber]

no i mean, is ethiopia reuqired to take?

its not a coloniser

[glacial stratus]

i guess by pain, Chak also wanted us to pick nation as boring as South Africa

https://tenor.com/view/steven-he-that-right-there-emotional-damage-gif-24563909

[charred timber]

wdym?

south africa is great

[empty shell]

SAF is useless

[glacial stratus]

https://tenor.com/view/sus-scout-lachen-tf2-gif-17981608274864336621

[solid gust]

you have to take the entire continent

[charred timber]

do i get bonus points if I do it as rhodesia?

[empty shell]

just annex saf into Canada

(defo not tryna curry favour with chak)

But tbh Canada makes tanks better than SAF only problem for them is resources

[glacial stratus]

Madagascar as well?

[solid gust]

nah just the continent

though you can take it if you want

[wraith sand]

Hey Chak, you forgot to make this an official announcement on hearts of iron news, unless you didn’t want to this time

[charred timber]

🤓

[solid gust]

huhhh

[charred timber]

im joking

[solid gust]

you mean this part?

[glacial stratus]

rules are always in the submissions+questions tabs 😄

[charred timber]

ah yes, beloved rhodesia

[fickle river]

Chak failed, its should have been:
as Liberia conquer american south

would be much more painful and funny

[wraith sand]

Typically your announcements show up here and is then pushed out into any discords that have a hoi4 news integration

[solid gust]

its using the ping and I clicked publish

[glacial stratus]

• Edwin Barcley has great portrait, i would rly do this as Democracy

[charred timber]

maybe our bot dead

or on vacation

[solid gust]

might be a discord issue

[charred timber]

hatless fix bot

[solid gust]

its published so

[wraith sand]

Hmmm

[charred timber]

eww why you reminding me to that

bad challenge

[wraith sand]

I checked some other discords that also have the integration and it has not published to theirs either

[solid gust]

it hasnt published to my personal one either

so its a discord issue

[wraith sand]

Pydgin’s and Bitt3rsteel’s discords specifically

I don’t see the @hearts of iron news within the post, but maybe that only shows up once it feeds through to the news

[wraith sand]

It’s not our bot though, it’s just an integration.
Could be discord is ded

[solid gust]

yeah idk, I have not changed how I did it, so discord borked itself or smth

if anything I can do a reminder ping test on monday

[charred timber]

hatless fix integration

[solid gust]

just become a programmer, Hat

and fix that

also my bank account is emptier than it should be

fix that too

[burnt bridge]

Chak purposefully disallowing puppets so you can't get the achievement thats similar to the challenge smh

Jk lol

[solid gust]

https://tenor.com/view/big-brain-gif-27108854

[wraith sand]

Same tbh

[charred timber]

also belgium still exists

pls fix that too

[burnt bridge]

Excuse me?

[solid gust]

deleting it rn

patch going out in 2 minutes

[charred timber]

holy shit

[wraith sand]

I’ll just do a patch fix on the global economy, give me a few minutes

[charred timber]

PDX fixing the biggest bug in the game

[glacial stratus]

wait, rly patch is cooking up?

[charred timber]

are you making us all millionaires over night, like Mugabe did in Zimbabwe?

[solid gust]

no lmao

[wraith sand]

Yes, just put more zeros on everyone’s bank accounts, what could go wrong?

[solid gust]

If I could do patches I would, but when I hear about an actual patch I will let you all know

[solid gust]

economical inflation was never a thing

what could one apple cost, ten dollars?

[charred timber]

23 billion german marks

like a loaf of bread did 1923

[wraith sand]

At least the toilet paper is cheap in that instance

[glacial stratus]

make it like 1986-1991 Japanese bubble economy 🪩

[wraith sand]

Lifetime supply of German mark toilet paper

[glacial stratus]

https://tenor.com/view/dnc-gif-20056437

[charred timber]

can we do Rhodesia next after South Africa?

or even better, Hispaniola conquering carribbean

[wraith sand]

Pirate kingdoms

[hallow token]

better idea

ethiopia for carribean

[wraith sand]

🤝

[charred timber]

that I will do soon

probably somewhere next week or in 2, maybe 3

[empty lintel]

ah lol i didn't win

[charred timber]

nah, thats cringe

[solid gust]

the random number generator was not in your favour this time

[glacial stratus]

one question though

[solid gust]

that was the question

1 question complete

[glacial stratus]

rules say no paratroops or tanks, like in previous challenges

how the contestant is gonna prove that they havent used the damn things in their playthrough? 🤔

[glad vector]

Ooh a south africa challenge, nice. Might be able to try it after my holiday

[solid gust]

1st place will have to go over their strats and I will ask for screenshots regarding divs etc

[glacial stratus]

oh ok great

[empty lintel]

do you need to take all uk africa?

[glacial stratus]

yes

the entire continent

[solid gust]

You need to be independent and own the entire continent of Africa yes

you do not need Madagascar

[barren anchor]

do you need the small islands on the west coast of africa

[solid gust]

nah

just mainland

[empty lintel]

so it doesn't matter if i take long?

[solid gust]

this challenge is timed

so the fastest one to do it will win

provided they can provide me the proof I request at the end

[glacial stratus]

so basically this

[solid gust]

yes, though I will say you need the entirety of Egypt too

or starting egypt, that is

[glacial stratus]

no islands surrounding Africa, no Middle East

[solid gust]

only the mainland continent, correct

[glacial stratus]

French+Italian+UK territories in North Africa , then all the way to 🇿🇦

oh and Spanish Africa too, right?

they have bits of 🇲🇦 Morrocan territory as well

[naive wyvern]

also Portugal

[glacial stratus]

well its not possible till 1937 at very least

1938 is too probably, but i am not sure

[naive wyvern]

so France, Italy, UK, Liberia, Ethiopia, Belgium, and Aussa (if they survive Italy somehow)

[glacial stratus]

in historical, yes

Unhistorical is much more spicier

Especially if certain 🇬🇧 goes full Arstotzka and starts their Decol....

https://tenor.com/view/papers-please-gif-14921863512507916418

[naive wyvern]

-All required land must be taken yourself, not through peacedeals in other wars.
does this rule applies here?

[solid gust]

yes, I forgot to put it in, thank you for the reminder

[naive wyvern]

and also, we can't puppet at all or we need to annex puppets for the end submission?

[solid gust]

no puppets at all

[signal frost]

Must there be a peace deal?

My quick glance at the thing didn't say anything about it

[solid gust]

I forgot to include the usual 'no peacedeals' thing in the initial posting of the rules, thats on me

but essentially its just for not dragging nations into a war that doesnt really concern them then taking land from it at the end

it only applies to lands required by the challenge, external ones do not count

[signal frost]

So no puppets, conquer France, Britain, Portugal, Spain, Ethiopia, Italy and Liberia

Oof

I don't think I can accomplish the have fun part of the rules

[solid gust]

No AI restrictions on hist/non hist portion so you can probably make something out of the chaos

[glacial stratus]

Crusader Kings II achievement but with extra pain deluxe

[signal frost]

Is it based on who can win the fastest?

[glacial stratus]

yes

[signal frost]

Ooof

[empty lintel]

so make uk go descolonization and invade their colonies?

[signal frost]

That will take awhile due to all the war goal justifications

[empty lintel]

yes but tho how your gonna cap the uk

[signal frost]

This may be the first time I use marines with the jungle pioneers due to all the jungles lol

[signal frost]

How are you going to cap France

Going to do a naval invasion eventually

[glacial stratus]

have fun snatching 🇫🇷 from German Reich after 1940 though

[cloud wharf]

the secret is to go fascist

join spain

and use spain to invade netherlands

than annex netherlands

and wait for ww2

than u sealion

and peacedeal

[glacial stratus]

the secret is that Italy will be on the same faction as you

and you need Libya

[cloud wharf]

declare on italy lol

so they dont join axis

[glacial stratus]

until 1941, assuming that one can reach there

hmm to be honest, you are right

its not that impossible

[solid gust]

the challenge is not impossible, just a tad difficult

[signal frost]

Submit your own run then >:)

[glacial stratus]

it really isnt, but the time restrictions are the real juice

[signal frost]

Then award a dlc to yourself lol

[glacial stratus]

The House Always Wins

you can't be richer than the House, even if you are House

[cloud wharf]

its not that hard lol

[solid gust]

I barely have time for the job at times haha, else I would

[cloud wharf]

only hard part is getting the fastest time

[solid gust]

harder for the average players, is the intention

[signal frost]

Just tell your boss John Paradox you are doing this for your job

Doing the community stuff by playing with the community

[glacial stratus]

i am sure Arheo will be pleased that you called him John Paradox

[signal frost]

Clearly that is his alter ego

Evidence? Who needs that

@ Arheo you truly John Paradox?

[solid gust]

https://tenor.com/view/skeptical-futurama-fry-hmmm-i-got-my-eyes-on-you-gif-17101711

so close to being Smote

so close

[signal frost]

If only I knew what smote was

[solid gust]

the past tense of smite

[signal frost]

That word can't stop me because I can't read

Ah

[glacial stratus]

"hey Generals i need 2000 convoys to naval invade Easter Island 🗿

war doesnt change"

or whatever the catchphrase of the HoI franchise is

[solid gust]

what am I, Fallout?

[signal frost]

"Germany can easily win if they made 40 width tank divisions!"

That was the classic line

[glacial stratus]

hope your contests doesn't lead to any Fallout ™️ ©️ between us

[signal frost]

Or giraffes are heartless creatures

That is a classic line

[glacial stratus]

"I didn't like that vase anyway"

[wraith sand]

@solid gust I see the post on bitt3rsteel’s discord now.
What is this Belgian favoritism?

[solid gust]

LMAO

Idk man, discord being weird today

[arctic rock]

graphics mods allowed??

[glacial stratus]

always has been

[hazy parrot]

are you allowed to join a faction?

[solid gust]

it triggered in my own discord now, make sure to check yours

using a graphic mod that has no gameplay impact is usually allowed, since some are for FPS reason and some are for people who cant see the original map well enough

and there are the people who cant let their anime waifu's leave them when they game but I aint got anything to say about that

[slim sentinel]

Oh that's what you meant by the South will rise again 💀

[naive wyvern]

what about if we didn't create puppet, but we got it different way, like italy when they go civil war and you get them as puppet

[charred timber]

Told you, its a conspiracy

[solid gust]

no puppets of the required area, if you get a puppet from outside of the required land you cannot keep them

[fossil minnow]

how do challanges work? do you have to be the first to do it?

[naive wyvern]

but how do i not get a puppet, its an event
and i need to invade italy to get their land in africa

[solid gust]

Challenges are something I run for 2 weeks at a time. each time it is a different objective, in this case you can see this message here #challenge-submissions message for a basic description of it

and the additional rules are always pinned here when it goes live like it currently is.

Each challenge has different winning criteria, this one is a speed run of it with a restriction on the player, in this case no paratroopers or tanks can be used.

It is not the first person to post them completing it that wins, but simply the fastgest time. you can always resubmit a run so long as you delete a previous entry for it, and this challenge are for the more hardcore players who want to show off their skills and optimization of their gameplay

[charred timber]

the trick is to throw your sanity away and your freetime, your friends and your family for hoi4, likely everyone of us does

[empty lintel]

no submissions yet this is going to be hard

but uh

i'm gonna try

[charred timber]

You for real expect an submission after a few hours?

[empty lintel]

has actually someone ever tried lmao

[charred timber]

Bro, give the people time to find a strategy

[empty shell]

There's been quite a few early submissions for prior challenges albeit none as hardcore as this challenge

[barren slate]

Can someone explain me about challenges like how it works and how can we proof that we complete

[empty lintel]

you need iron man on

and hover it over the trophy

and for the winner they do random number generator, but this time is it the one who does it faster

[glacial stratus]

i went to sleep by that time, will try today

[glacial stratus]

it seems Mongolia was much harder than this

this is basically Crusader Kings II achievement with extra steps and time limit

[tiny swift]

Where do i See all the Rules? I have No pinged Massage.

[raven nest]

@tiny swift

[tiny swift]

Thx

[thick tusk]

Tbh by the name, I would’ve thought it had something to do with the confederacy or South America lol

[glacial stratus]

yeah, i agree that name could be a lot better

should have been something like "The Boers Strike Again" or "Cape Liberation Front"/"Anti-Colonialist Crusade"

[solid gust]

I am bad at naming things in general, I can see where you're coming from though with the naming bein better for like the confederacy

[glacial stratus]

better luck next time

(and/or let me pick out the names, free of charge) 🙂

[spiral berry]

What templates should I use that are capable of fighting German divisions?

[gilded ore]

omg south africa starts with 1 mil

[empty lintel]

why would you even fight germany

[glacial stratus]

let him cook

[glacial stratus]

i wasted half of my day for this, hopefully it's worth something

[empty lintel]

how did you even start expanding lol

i was stuck and idk what to do

[glacial stratus]

well, as a democracy you will definitely get stuck in Cape Town

[empty lintel]

did you attack on africa

[glacial stratus]

only my own civil war and 🇱🇷

[empty lintel]

on civil war it makes you enter against allies?

or no

[glacial stratus]

too tired to answer questions right now , bro 😄

you'll figure it out , imma go to bed

[empty lintel]

yeah gn

[charred timber]

''All land must be conquered/taken by you, you cannot use a peacedeal in other wars to claim land''

but tbh, I dont want to fight on central african soil either

[glacial stratus]

what do you mean, i took entirety of Africa on my own

[charred timber]

but conquer means, you have to conquer it by moving your troops in every single province, doesnt it?

can we remove that rule for this challenge?

thats annoying af

[glacial stratus]

nope, thats not the case

it also wasn't the thing in prev challenges

[charred timber]

why? if I defeat france in france, i conquer france. But I dont conquer their colonies technically, I only get them through the peaceconference

thats at least how I understand the rule

[charred timber]

for mongolia, it was yes

thats why im asking here, chak, do i have to conquer literally everything?

[fickle river]

decent run, i have to admit, just one question, how is Italy not your puppet, but you still have colonies?

[glacial stratus]

i attacked Italy with German help since we are both in the Axis

i extremely dislike how AI contests with you for states, so i tried to have as much % participation as possible to take African states

and just left the peace conference

[charred timber]

and here is it again. so you have not conquered libya with your forces?

[fickle river]

so Italy is german puppet?

[charred timber]

that rule is annoying

[glacial stratus]

they annexed it

[charred timber]

BBA off?

[fickle river]

oh I didnt see

[glacial stratus]

the mainland, i took only the African states

[fickle river]

how does Italy die without getting the puppet though?

[charred timber]

BBA DLC off, maybe

[fickle river]

no, I dont have the dlc and yet it always happens

[glacial stratus]

to my knowledge , i don't have to set foot in actual colonial territories

i just rampaged on the main colony states like 🇧🇪 , 🇵🇹 , POUM 🇪🇸 , Historical 🇫🇷 and Mosley 🇬🇧

i have no idea, Chak has to give final verdict on this one

[fickle river]

I think you are right, how would anyone do it and prove it?

[glacial stratus]

oh and while fighting UK and Portugal i went on to neighbouring states to form Great Zimbabwe formable

[fickle river]

walking into every tile would be just pain and wars would never end

[glacial stratus]

like Mozambique and Rhodesia and stuff

[glacial stratus]

ikr, it stretches the game unnecessarily, given the limited time nature of the challenge

[fickle river]

the fastest run would be like 1960 xd

[glacial stratus]

maybe i could get it done sooner in-game months

but i basically played my whole wars in 2 speed, i kid you not

[charred timber]

at least you could easily redo it, in case it doesnt get accepted. You could just cap allies, but dont take their colonies in the peacedeal and declare a second war, where you rush through undefended territory then

[fickle river]

I had a try yesterday, could be faster than you, but Italy

[glacial stratus]

Historical is reliable but pain

i restart unhistorical till i get the results i want

[fickle river]

as if unhistorical was any safe

the most unreliable idea

[charred timber]

depends on what you want to do

[glacial stratus]

but then again i am mad so, not for the faint of heart

[charred timber]

for some challenges a historical is always better

[fickle river]

historical has many advantages, for example, ai does not spam divisions

[charred timber]

a historical better, cause AI does formables

[fickle river]

but sometimes you need some ai to go non-hist

[fickle river]

ai always forms when they can

dont know what you are talking about

[charred timber]

that is absolutely not the case

[glacial stratus]

it is, bro

[charred timber]

no its not

[fickle river]

it is

man, just play the game

[glacial stratus]

on my test runs, they always form after 1 day passing or so

news event pops up

[charred timber]

demark never forms baltic dominion on historical, austria never forms a-h for example

[fickle river]

the ai is scripted to always form whenever they can

[glacial stratus]

regardless of Hist or Unhist

[charred timber]

maybe play the game then#

[glacial stratus]

if they somehow get the territories , they will

i don't remember if there is decision to form AH for 🇦🇹

[fickle river]

have you ever seen ai with all the territorries for austria-hungary?

[charred timber]

ok, give me 5 minutes i will prove it

[glacial stratus]

i know Czech do so i bet Austria does as well

[fickle river]

there is, but you need czechoslovakia, hungary, austria and half the balkans

[glacial stratus]

the focus is only for Hungary, i know

[charred timber]

i will prove it, alr

[cloud wharf]

they do click the decisions

if they fulfill the requirements

you never see ai click because they never fulfill the requirements 😭

[fickle river]

you can use the fact they form nations for more fun, I sometimes as Mexico ally north SA nation or Peru and then give them all their neighbours so they form gran colombia, does not matter if hist or non-hist ai

[fickle river]

very true

i think greater german reich is one of the most often seen

also PLC everytime non-historical is turned on

[cloud wharf]

like maybe on some countries they are scripted to never click their decision

[glacial stratus]

when i play co-op with friends, i always do some formables to make game start more challenging (AI is still stupid regardless)

like doing Arabia and/or forming whatever Malaya had

[fickle river]

i dont think i ever formed majapahit actually

one of the most boring regions, I understand why no dlc is there

xd

[glacial stratus]

well, i barely touched some nations because of no flair/generics

only when challenges tell so xd

[fickle river]

I mean, I play hoi4 basically only for these challenges, sometimes rp games, but yeah, similar

[glacial stratus]

Transcaucasia was fun to do, although kinda simple

[glacial stratus]

yeah, likewise, i did 100% of the achievements + some mods, so i come back whenever new DLC drops

speaking of which, i am surprised on why there is no another teaser/dev diary yet

it usually drop every July-August

and stretches till October-November

that's how it was in previous couple years

[charred timber]

@glacial stratus @fickle river @cloud wharf

[fickle river]

I think it will be some serious dlc

but hope in focus tree only, they are better

[glacial stratus]

they need to fix late game content

like nukes are so dissapointing to use

[fickle river]

mainly rest of europe and rest of SA

[charred timber]

and austria also used to not click the decision on historical, seems like they changed it in AAT

[glacial stratus]

only nations that i had fun playing late game and had actual content for it were the 🇹🇷 and Soviet Union

otherwise i usually drop what i am doing in 1942-1944

unless its the nuke achievements (never will miss them)

[fickle river]

I do not have the dlc, but what I thinks is either it is a bugged formable for ai, or the ai somehow slept and was off

[fickle river]

because their focus tree lasts until 50s

[charred timber]

bro, you can see they draw a frontline. its not off

[fickle river]

like ussr has warsaw pact stuff

who know why

[glacial stratus]

and 🇹🇷 can form Turan

[charred timber]

why cant you just say, that you are wrong when you are obivously wrong? it not the end of the world. you cant know everything, thats normal

[fickle river]

I want to see more

i am seriously interested in how it works

show me denmark on historical forming it

[charred timber]

this is historical

[fickle river]

or non-hist if they form kalmar union or other stuff

i am now confused in what you were trying to say, but still

seems suspicious

i would dig deeper and write the devs so they can fix it

but i do not want to

[charred timber]

but idk in which file it is located if ai clicks it or not. But in general on a historical they always click nearly all available decisions

unlike on historical

anyways, lets talk about southafrica here

[fickle river]

do they form other countries or nothing on historical?

[charred timber]

like a-h they did, but some updates ago, austria for sure didnt. sejozwak made video about it back then

[glacial stratus]

i find it weird that fash South Africa had access to focus to remove Segregation

isn't brown ideology South Africa all about being an Apartheid state?

[fickle river]

it is the first time i see ai not form, so either bug in denmark ai or the formable/denmark (since it is denmark related)

[fickle river]

dont ask

hoi4 at its finest

they remove segregation by painting all people white

[charred timber]

yeah, thats is weird

maybe they make everyone white with this focus, idk

[glacial stratus]

they actually had focuses to add Cheap Labour and segregate population even more

but it was mutually exclusive to Expanding Cape Corps which will remove Racial Segregation spirit (-65% pop)

weird

i still find even more weird that they added Empire of Fire name and Fire Horse Clique party to my country when it goes fascist lol

(both never existed lol)

[fickle river]

maybe they simply remove the people

but would not you lose population then?

[glacial stratus]

well black folk are not conscripted for starters

doing some Confederate America type shi

maybe thats what Chak meant with "South Will Rise Again" title for the challenge /s

[charred timber]

found two more

finland doesnt form nordic union, lithuania doesnt form baltic federation

so no, its not just a denmark bug. its entire historical

[glacial stratus]

can it be the reason because you do it with console commands and AI is not capturing it with normal peace deals? 🤔

[fickle river]

it is the last dlc, makes sense nordics are buggy, it would not be paradox

[charred timber]

no, because then A-H wouldnt form but it did

[fickle river]

actually there might be something into it

[glacial stratus]

fair enough

[fickle river]

sounds like interesting idea

[cloud wharf]

its prob just an aat thing

[charred timber]

baltic was nsb tho

[cloud wharf]

do it on an ai that wont be scripted

like forming majapahit

or arabia

[fickle river]

maybe denmark simply does not want these lands (if they conquered the country they would not fully annex them in peace deal) so they do not seek to form nation, whereas austrians see it as theirs

only theory

[charred timber]

but like gun metal grey, thats why hatless does its core challenges on a-historical with ai going historical scripts, just so they do the formable decisions

[fickle river]

well most do it anyways

[charred timber]

besides A-H and the south american ones, which one tho?

[fickle river]

I mentioned germans at least, but I dont know

[charred timber]

yeah thats true

[fickle river]

mainly I want to return to south africa

still wondering how to avoid Italian split

[charred timber]

i think at least fascist nations always do formables

cause back then croatia was the only country which does a-h

[fickle river]

have you though about that theory above, because it might be ideology related

[charred timber]

and fascists are the only country who declare indpendence if their autonomy is high enough. democratic, communist and non-alinged will never declare independence

[charred timber]

its possible. but still would make more sense if they always do even on historical

[fickle river]

is it only me, or when you go communist south africa, you can declare civil war whenever you want and when fascist you only can when you are free

it is extremely weird

[naive wyvern]

regarding formables and ai, the folder is Hearts of Iron IV\common\decisions and file is formable_nation_decisions.txt
from a quick look the ai would only do austria hungary, united central america, horn of africa and greater italy on historical

[charred timber]

thank you

first person who proves what I say besides of simply saying I would be wrong without checking. You save my trust in humanity

[wraith sand]

Specifically only Czechoslovakia will do Austria Hungary by decision (to my knowledge) on historical

[charred timber]

no, they fixed it. but probably only because you asked

now austria finally forms it too

[wraith sand]

Oh really?
Sweet! I am all for more formables working on historical.
Does Croatia form it too?

[charred timber]

croatia always did because they are fascist. thats the only reason

[naive wyvern]

from the code i don't see any limitations so they should do it

[charred timber]

but again thx for looking it up

will I do a bug report? probably not because noone reads it anyways

[naive wyvern]

i remember when i tried to give lithuania baltics and they did not make a formable so i looked it up

[charred timber]

yeah no, 3 people told me here earlier that nations always click formable and that I should start playing the game

[naive wyvern]

xd

[naive wyvern]

bug report about what exactly? i think they are supposed to not click a decision

[charred timber]

I even proved it man. I hate it so much, why cant people just admit they are wrong or they just didnt know anything about a topic. That is normal, you cant know everything, thats makes you not stupid, it just shows you are a human. Its here for a videogame the same like irl. Its normal you dont know everything or you make mistake sometimes.

[charred timber]

are they?

its a bit random the nations which form and which ones not, dont you think?

[naive wyvern]

i think it's kinda stupid but it's intended

[charred timber]

and A-H origianlly also never did, until hatless asked for a change

idk, in my view at least, they should always form. there is no reason why they shouldn't

[naive wyvern]

yeah, and argument "cause its more historical" is dumb because if the nation controls the required territory means that something non-historical already happened

[charred timber]

i mean, this is now more an opinion topic, but personally for me it makes more sense if they always form it

[naive wyvern]

and it would be cool to have a puppet with a lot of cores

like baltic duchy

[charred timber]

thats the main reason why I want it, like for example Poland. It can inherit all cores of Czechia. ALL

back then hatless needed to do it on a historical because czechia never formed A-H

same for bulgaria or yugoslavia

[naive wyvern]

yeah i remember
and also you couldn't do turkish achievement to be in faction with ah

on historical

[charred timber]

exactly

now at least it is possible

so idk, in my view this needs to be changed

[charred timber]

@solid gust I have important question about this rule in particular: ''All land must be conquered/taken by you, you cannot use a peacedeal in other wars to claim land''

what does that mean pratically?

[solid gust]

I left my computer on overnight somehow

but of course I can clarify

The rule in this case refers to not dragging one of the countries you have to conquer into a pointless war somewhere else and then having a country capitulate and taking land you had no hand in conquering.

'all land must be conquered by yourself' refers to you doing the conquering to take the states that you require. I am not expecting you to take every single tile of Africa by yourself. But you will still need to take the majority of the tiles within the African continent when conquering one of the colonising countries.

aka, not dragging france into a war against spain or something, and having your units sit on the front line/taking random tiles for war score

[charred timber]

so if I want to fight france, the only way I ''conquer'' it to be valid, is, I take over some states in west africa to, before I capitualate them, even if the war is just a 1v1?

or is it valid to directly naval invade them for example, without having combat with them in africa?

[solid gust]

You have to combat them, at some level, in Africa

by only naval invading france you you are not completing the challenge by avoiding the fighting within africa itself

regardless of a 1v1

[charred timber]

ok I see

@glacial stratus big F for you

[solid gust]

dont get me wrong, you can still capitulate them outside of it but you need to fight at least in some of the tiles in africa because the challenge takes place there

[glacial stratus]

i had troops fighting in every African colonizer states except Belgian Congo and African Libya, does it still count?

[cloud wharf]

but its hard if germany forms vichy tho

[glacial stratus]

my mainland army were basically in Europe, but i had garrison troops pushing bits of French, British and Portugal territories

[cloud wharf]

since every french african colony goes to the vichy government

[glacial stratus]

and guaranteed by Germany

[charred timber]

why tho? the have only 13 unites if you justify immideatly on them

[cloud wharf]

u should be in the axis

u cant declare on ur own allies

[charred timber]

vichy isnt an axis member till 43

[cloud wharf]

guaranteed by germany

[charred timber]

however yeah you are right

you can only fight them if you are not at war with allies

[glacial stratus]

in all fairness , you can justify on Vichy since they arent in the Axis till like 1943 or so

if you are in the Axis first of course

or wait, does faction leader guaranteeing them won't let you declare war on them?

i know for a fact that non-aggression pacts between your target and faction leader prohibit you from declaring them

[cloud wharf]

yea it shouldnt allow u to declare

[solid gust]

you actually pushed within the tiles for the majority, I do not see the issue with yours

[solid gust]

yup, this is why this challenge is 'Difficult™ '

I made this one extra hard because I've gotten a lot of dm's about the 'difficult' challenges being too easy, so I put this one up a proverbial notch

[cloud wharf]

well but this challenge is ridiculously easy to lie about tho

u can just say u naval invaded every african coastal port

giving u control of the states

[glad vector]

yeah well, there's an honor system here, somewhat 😉

[solid gust]

there is that yes, but I do encourage you to take multiple screenshots just in case you may need to prove things

[glad vector]

No Puppets this time around, it must all be yours. - I do kind of dislike this one. Liberate might have referred to the anti-colonialist crusade mechanics in which case you liberate africa into actual free countries 🙂

but it is what it is. Might video this one

[solid gust]

There's no puppets in this one because I am looking to do a puppet-centric challenge soon

but I will have more info on that at a later date :p

[glad vector]

oh nice, will look forward to it

[glacial stratus]

last two "difficult" ones were pretty solid imo, challenge wise Carlist 🇪🇸 and 🇲🇳 were just enough

not 2 easy, not 2 ridiculous

although fun wise, i enjoyed making super 🇱🇾 -> Andalusia, despite the generic tree

[solid gust]

the issue I have with formables are that some are locked behind a given DLC, so I cannot make the challenge be that if someone does not have the required one

I dont want to put someone on the generic tree (all the time, sometimes is fine) just to complete a challenge

i want everyone to be able to participate as much as possible

[glacial stratus]

yeah, i agree and totally understand

although i want to point out not every formable is locked behind DLC-though, given that Waking Tiger, Death or Dishonor and Together for Victory expansions are part of base game now

[charred timber]

the best formables are Ostland, Zapadoslavia with A-H cores, Belarus but with Baltic cores and the best of them all: Super-Prussia

[glacial stratus]

what's the Super Prussia?

[charred timber]

some insane cores I discovered for Prussia

prussia can core all of HRE and EU

[glacial stratus]

pulled it from https://hoi4.paradoxwikis.com/Formable_nations

notice the few formables like Persian Empire or Arabia don't need DLCs to form

[charred timber]

franco british union speedrun, easy

or what about play as slovakia and core the entire world as next difficult challenge

[glacial stratus]

coring world as generic focus tree is really boring and not fun

it is not particularly challenging, but rather time consuming, like nuke achievements

[charred timber]

same like al andalus and arabia as libya🤷

[charred timber]

everything is time consumption

we could go to a gym instead of playing hoi4

but we dont

[glacial stratus]

Caliphate of Cordoba challenge few months ago was a "fun" category challenge, and not "timed" one

so far Chak only does two types of challenges whether "fun" - has the random winner

and "timed" - is difficult one, selected by who got there first

[solid gust]

there is also the one civs/mils type ones with whoever gets the most as XYZ nation

its difficult to make other kinds of challenges haha

[glacial stratus]

after completing 100% achievements on HoI4, i only login after every 2 weeks to do challenge to test myself 😄

i go to gym alot , so the stereotype doesn't apply to me 🙂

[charred timber]

what about core challenges in ironman? downside, its DLC required so not everyone could do it

that option would be there

[glacial stratus]

they aren't really fun or challenging to do, Chak does it infinitely better

[charred timber]

then lets make it as one requirement to stay democratic

THAT IS PAIN AND SUFFERING GUARENTEED

[glacial stratus]

i wonder on whether will you make challenge that doesn't require specific country to play with 🤔

like as any Democracy or Non-Aligned minor nation sorta thing

[solid gust]

Coring challenges never really pan out great, I trialed them a while ago but it was not fun at all for the participants so it's never made it into a challenge

[charred timber]

depends, what was the challenge tho?

[solid gust]

there's been a few, but country specific challenges as of late are to ensure all parts of the globe are played (I want everyone to be able to play their part of the world and to make sure each place gets it's own time in the lime light)

[charred timber]

Austria-Hungary offers a lot of fun challenges in my view

Poland can core it. Bulgaria can core it. Yugoslavia

the good nations

As Tsar Boris the iii, core austria-hungary

best challenge

[glacial stratus]

as a potential future contest, playing as 🇦🇿 Azerbaijan would be fun to do sometime

[charred timber]

as empire of fire , conquer fireland

why is that not an achievement yet?

[solid gust]

iirc it was in Europe but I can't fully remember it, only the emotion tied to it which was negative

[glacial stratus]

well for starters, neither Empire of Fire title nor the Fascist party for 🇦🇿 at the WW2 were a thing to begin with

[charred timber]

its a videogame

[glacial stratus]

yeah its a classic Paradox meme since 2016 lol

like Empire of Thunder Dragon

[charred timber]

Nah I love Empire of fire

only realm of the great god of light is more based

[charred timber]

only challenge I found with europe was, as any monarchy conquer all of europe

damnit that i missed that, I would have submitted Kingdom of Saxony

either that or Kingdom of God

[solid gust]

you misunderstand, I trialed it not in active challenges but with a few people whom I asked if it'd be fun to do XYZ

a lot of challenges themselves are in europe for obvious reasons already, but I am also trying to do similar things to the devs in which every place gets it's time played

[glacial stratus]

so this one was Africa, the previous one had Asia, the one before was 🇪🇸 making a trip to 🇨🇺 and 🇺🇸

so the potential new location is South America?

[solid gust]

next challenge is not south america i dont think, but I havent decided yet

[glacial stratus]

food for thought, you don't have to give direct answer 😄

[charred timber]

im for as a carribean nation, conquer all carribean islands

[glacial stratus]

Middle East also seems plausible enough

[solid gust]

I did a middle east centric one not too long ago iirc

[charred timber]

as Israel, unite Arabia

[solid gust]

the one where you had to own all the land around the red sea or smth

or was that long ago and I have no concept of time

[glacial stratus]

it was years ago 😄

[solid gust]

ohgod

im old

[glacial stratus]

the latest thing resembling it was Caliphate of Cordoba , but it was North Africa instead

i have been following challenges for a while, but the first one i really participated in was Cordoba

2 months ago i think

[charred timber]

as syria, conquer entire arabian peninsula, camel divisions only

easy

[solid gust]

Ah, the red sea type challenge was late last year

dear lord how the time flies

[charred timber]

or my personal favourite. As the netherlands, unite european unity by using bicycles only

[glacial stratus]

are you open to any ideas for possible challenges, Chak, like people can write down whatever here

or should thy estabilish a Chak-ocracy, as if ideas will only appear from your master-mind?

[solid gust]

#challenge-submissions message

[solid gust]

Suggestions in this channel are fine but I dont tend to take people's suggestions 100% on as I dont wanna take someone's idea and not reward them for it, or someone might try to expect something out of it (it has happened in the past)

so I take bits and pieces/add a bunch to it

to make sure its somewhat unique

[glacial stratus]

yeah true, fair enough

i don't try out the random thoughts i gave here though, there is no sportsmanship by doing so 🤷

doing challenges at the given time frame is half the fun of it

although again, i would love to do some timed challenge while playing as 🇦🇿 Azerbaijan though 😄

it starts out very small but you have endless oil banks at your disposal, with 2 extra Southern cores annexed by 🇮🇷 Iran at 1936 game start

although after No Step Back, Soviet Union can't release it unless it does one specific "Give Autonomy to Republics' focus which is done only on Trotskyist SU.
However, alternatively starting as 🇮🇷 Iran you can start with the same 2 Southern Cores instead

you could potentially liberate the mainland in the North, which is held by Soviet Union/Russia, could be a hardcore challenge though i think

although personally never tried it

just food for thought

[charred timber]

empire of fire conquers land of fire

[glacial stratus]

it works as a challenge though, given the 1)historical context to merge the two sides of one country from their imperialist neighbors like Russia and Iran (given that the challenges were all about uniting or conquering something)
2)while it starts with generic focus tree, i think it can be objectively tough, but not impossible challenge to do

specifics are Chak's expertise, i am just tossing around a potential idea

as per required ideology, i think there shouldn't be any restrictions

i can and would do this as Democracy, personally

[charred timber]

nah, best Democratic challenge is, as democratic Romania, never switch ideology and conquer the entire Balkan

and yes, that is possible

[glacial stratus]

Azerbaijan Democratic Republic would actually work in this case, since Soviet Union/Tsarist/Fascist Russia always does something that spikes World Tension

so that it wouldn't feel restricted + having Allies actually be your friends for once instead of conquering them in each challenge is a nice touch as well

[dreamy swift]

Is a Mongolian-Chad Facist Empire possible?

[vapid cliff]

Fascists can't be chad

[naive wyvern]

@solid gust is expeditionary forces allowed for the challenge?

[glacial stratus]

yeah go for it, only tanks and paratroopers are not allowed

[solid gust]

Expeditionaries are usually fine, I don't see the problem with them

[naive wyvern]

what if italy split and became my puppet? i conquered everyone except italy and spain, and italy just went into civil war
the funny thing is i didn't control a single core state of italy, only their north africa, and every core state i took i gave to germany who was my ally and still puppet became mine and not germany

so the question is, is it alright if i had italy puppet (i annexed it though)

[glacial stratus]

no puppets man, no matter how fast you annex them after

[naive wyvern]

i mean i didn't want this puppet

and i did everything to avoid it

[glacial stratus]

how can you gain puppet if you havent pressed anything in puppet tab?

maybe you want access to their resources

(those decisions will always make puppets)

[naive wyvern]

what?

im talking about italian civil war

[glacial stratus]

yeah its bugged, hate when they pull that off

[naive wyvern]

its not bugged, its supposed to happen. but who gets the puppet is always a mistery

maybe it was because i was the first one to take italy's province, but there were numerous games where it wasn't the case and i still got the puppet

so it's not my fault that i got it, don't think that could be avoided

moreover, it didn't gave me any advantage, just slowed me down for like 6 months

[fickle river]

from my understanding, you can have puppets, just not at the submission time/end of campaign

+there is not a way to avoid Italian puppet

[naive wyvern]

yep

i think i'll wait for @solid gust responce and then submit my run

[fickle river]

i think he wrote something like that

[fickle river]

you already aked man @naive wyvern (sorry for ping chak)

[naive wyvern]

what does it mean? that i need to annex it or that i cannot have it at all?

[fickle river]

they either get independent or you annex them

i mean

what else "you cannot keep them" would mean?

[naive wyvern]

alright, thank you

[north garden]

you just tagged Chak oh no

[fickle river]

https://tenor.com/view/star-wars-obi-wan-kenobi-we-all-did-obi-wan-kenobi-series-ewan-mcgregor-gif-25857927

[solid gust]

When replying to a message you can uncheck the @ on the right hand side above the text box to not ping the person you're replying to, but its alright

I will allow the pings.... this time

but no, puppets are not allowed, if you receive one you have to release it or annex it immediately

(this only applies to one received by accident, you cannot make one then do so)

[glacial stratus]

R.I.P @naive wyvern

[naive wyvern]

sorry for ping then

so i didn't create puppets myself means im alright

[solid gust]

@glacial stratus I saw the question you had here before you removed it, but you are correct you cannot select that as a prize

[broken path]

im not going to do the challenge but how are people doing it in 1939?

isnt south africa so weak at the start

how do you kill france brtiain and italy

[glacial stratus]

never heard of the country Brtiain but it depends on your experience with the game

[fickle river]

Brtiain, home of our grandfathers, dont ya remember

[broken path]

these savages dont know of our great nation

brtiain is the greatest of all

[brittle rapids]

paradrop france probably

[wanton karma]

RULE BRITANIA, BRITANIA RULES THE WAVES

[glacial stratus]

not allowed for this challenge, i am afraid

[glacial stratus]

are you trying to pull off one of these, ol' sunshine? 💂

[empty lintel]

i'm gonna wait for an easier challenge ig

i'm not that good to do that

[fickle river]

just like all the harder ones, it is more about exploiting the game, thus your game knowledge than actual skill

[empty lintel]

the far i can do in this challenge is to puppet east indies to get divisions lol

after that idk what to do

[solid gust]

@naive wyvern alright bud, I'm gonna need that detailed breakdown of your run, please and thank you

If I don't get an answer within 2 hours, I will have to ask Grey regarding his

[solid gust]

I will ping you @glacial stratus just in case they do not answer so that you are aware

[glacial stratus]

https://tenor.com/view/das-boot-salute-arrival-gif-18731703

[naive wyvern]

ok im here

build 2 dockyards and then mills
rush focus "South Africa first"
before scw, improve relations with spain, ask for docking rights and license the cheapest sub
after cw improve relations and create faction with italy and justify on the netherlands
join italy's war in ethiopia, ask italy for convoys
ask italy for as many expeditionary forces as they are willing to give (return the tanks if they give them)
set up a naval invasion from sardinia to holland, use 1 sub that should be done by now
annex netherlands and DEI
after "reclaim boer colonies" finishes declare on the uk, but before make sure that we've prepared a naval invasion, and the rest of the expeditionaries have crossed gibraltar
declare on the uk, justify on portugal, then on france)
capitulate the uk before october 1937 when france joins allies
after taking out uk kick italy, disband faction and join axis
create new infantry template and deploy 2 armies of them in egypt
declare on portugal and france and make a naval invasion in cherbourg from britain
while on war with france, justify on belgium, liberia and then italy
try to take out portugese colonies with african army to do a formable
train as many divisions as possible, deploy them near liberia and italian colonies
declare on italy, justify on spain
after capitulating liberia use this army to take out portugal
when anshluss happens, push into italy and if possible in colonies
in my run i got very lucky and italy didn't split and just capitulated, so i took their colonies and divided mainland with germany
last thing is spain, when i declared and called germany in, republicans joined axis
and after a couple of naval invasion and force attacks, spain capitulated and i took their land in africa

if you want i can provide screenshots from the world tension tab, to see the dates of capitulation, etc

[glacial stratus]

question, why attack 🇳🇱 ?

for their ships or Indonesian manpower?

[naive wyvern]

to acces to uk

we can't attack them directly because gibraltar

i tried portugal but they always had their ships ready, and it was really rng if im able to naval invade

but netherlands almost consistently didn't use ships in first days of war so thats it

[solid gust]

if you can provide a few sure, though I am not doubting the run at the moment more screenshots do not hurt right now to help prove things

I like the route you took though, very multitask oriented when doing a war and justifying at the same time, a lot of players still do not do that

[naive wyvern]

it based on the fact that if you're fascist and on a war with major, all justifications take 50% less

with backroom backstabber it is even less

oh its backwards

but its proving that i capitulated everyone by myself, not in a peace deal

[solid gust]

do you by chance have a screenshot of your divs?

[naive wyvern]

template?

[solid gust]

ye

[solid gust]

I like using the honour system but to be fair I'll ask

[naive wyvern]

default template with added support companies

[solid gust]

alright looks good, thank you for the additional screenshots

very well done by you, good sir

[naive wyvern]

thanks

i counted and it took my like 15 tries