Hearts of Iron IV - Communist Italy (Elite Difficulty) - Ep 1

Waaaaaaaaaay back in the day I did a PRE-RELEASE campaign with Italy -- but with three years of patches and several major expansions... it's a different game. THINGS ARE GOING TO GET A LOT REDDER.
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New to the channel? I do Let's Play videos -- these are like walkthrough guides of gameplay with continuous English commentary trying to explain my decisions and what strategy I use. If you're looking for hacks or cheats, you're in the wrong place!

[@quill18]

WTB Italian Communist puns! something something spaghetti with red sauce?

[@Bigbadburnz]

Logistics = %Supply consumption reduction

[@cyphrox8555]

Like unrinsed spaghetti noodles, comrades stick together!

[@josephdedrick9337]

JS, you can mouse over stats(or the gen) and it will tell you what they do briefly, which wouldve helped when you were talking about the inflexible strategist gen

[@harbl99]

"I change-a my mind again. Equal shares of spaghet for-a everyone." -- Benny Muesli

[@Accoulat]

HoI 4 is a blast in the past-a ! Ah !

[@rockinchild234]

I like how each true let's play, particularly HOI 4 Italy, is done with teaching people mechanics but in a way that doen't treat people like they are stupid for not knowing it. Going in depth on mechanics that aren't easy to understand and treating them as if they are not simple so it can help teach without getting preachy, Quill, never change

[@Visitant69]

I don't think anyone out there making a tutorial is trying to make you feel stupid. If you have any self esteem issues that might be causing you to see insult where none are intended you should do some self reflection and hopefully you can improve your outlook on the world.

[@AlexG-kp8sv]

Ah, the classic Quill full pause episode 1 :D

[@quill18]

I find it comforting to know that some things never change.

[@AngelicHunk]

@@quill18 This feels like a Frozen 2 reference

[@readmarx420]

I do it to.

[@davidknowles2491]

@@quill18 Like war. War never changes.

[@kinagrill]

@@AngelicHunk Sounds more like some US presidential quote or whatnot.

[@regu5987]

Great to see a "vanilla" HOI IV. And thanks for the refresher course as you are going along. Anticipating the follow up episodes.

[@daredaemon8878]

The big thing about the colonial divisions is that they have low reinforcement priority. That's important because it doesn't just mean they get replacement equipment slower if you don't have enough, as they also don't get your equipment upgrades until the other divisions have all gotten theirs. You can change that, of course, but having low priority cheap divisions to maintain order in occupied territories can be quite helpful.

[@cruffatinliveth]

How is it that everytime I take up a new hobby or activity you got like 50 videos on the topic. You're insane man I love you

[@MineMiguel40]

man, i love how enthusiastic quill seems about playing the game.

[@JacobReid]

I appreciate all of the explanation you gave in this video. I’ve never really gotten into your play throughs of this game until now, but I’m really considering buying this now

I really appreciate how you broke down the different systems. I know the game mechanics (from your tutorial series) but the navy stuff is a little iffy. Plus, I keep getting beat by France and Poland so seeing how you organize and structure your divisions and armies helps a ton.

[@philipjaques1653]

Thank you for this series Quill. I've never been able to get into Paradox games, but really enjoyed your unmodded Scotland EU4 run and Victoria 2 game. Now to watch this and a CK2 game to complete the set :)

[@Ogeidification]

As an italian every time you zoomed towards Addis Ababa I felt the guilt a little more crushing.

[@hamlap]

Feelings of impending doom? Check

[@QemeH]

Considering the "god king of naval battles" thing: Islands (and costal air force bases) are just unsinkable, immovable aircraft carriers. So if you don't plan to move your fleet, they are basically an upgrade to carriers...

[@illuindb]

Ooo, this looks good. I always suck at Italy so this will be interesting

[@hamlap]

Glad you are doing a naval game. I have only got like 20 hours in this game, but navies composition, missions and controlling them feels like black magic. Looking forward to learning.

[@cmdkaboom]

Thank you for all the videos regarding this game. You now made it, so it's playable for me

[@thehobobunny9686]

Been looking for a new quill series to dedicate my time to what better than my favorite paradox game so excited for this!!

[@seancravens5366]

Hey Quill! Happy to see more HoI. Old World Blues had another update recently if you wanted another thing to play through!

[@NexusNoxCS]

I loved the part where we didn't unpause. ;P

[@gladiatorgreyman1285]

I loved your original Italy campaign looking Ford to this let’s play

[@michaelw6277]

Yeah I thought Italy’s navy was decent too, at first. Then the war kicks off and the UK/France combined 18 battleship doomstack is spotted floating around in your small pond....

[@JanuzTrance68]

When you fight a relative weak enemy like Ethiopia early in the game, isn't it not better to do so with a just 1 star general to give him experience, and later on promotions to a higher level. That way you may have more skilled generals later on in the game when they are needed much more. Or am i thinking the wrong way ?

[@MrAlehkra]

I didn't consider myself a HoI noob. Not an expert by any means, but I figured out how to successfully play out a HoI III campaign and, I think like most people, found IV extremely easy to pick up by comparison. However...that little "shift click to open another window" thing is such a simple little thing I'd never known about, and immediately wished I had because it makes comparing equipment so much easier. Always new basics I'm learning about Paradox games :p

[@Outypoo]

I was literally just watching the Mexico playthrough waiting for a new HOI series smh

[@Peto111222]

smh??... facepalm

[@Stoic_Lizard]

Thanks for explaining things. Much appreciated for someone thinking about looking into this game.

[@loopyguy7611]

PET TANK. I lost it then! omg LMAO

[@talonschild]

Seeing this comment without context, I was expecting a petanque joke.

[@agarly]

The general with Inflexible Strategist giving +1 to defense and +1 to logistics, those stats are the four that each general has. If you hover over the attack, defense, planning and logistics, it will tell you what they do. Basically Inflexible Strategist gives a small boost to two of four stats a General has, and I believe if they are promoted to Field Marshal, they can get a unique defensive trait. I usually divert most of my troops down to Ethiopia, because I am lazy with battle plans and just like pressing play (like you). I have played Italy a lot in Hoi4, but mostly with RT56. Usually I like to go to Yugoslavia pretty early, and Heavy Tank research is usually my forth slot. One Heavy Tank in Infantry division really does wonders. In Vanilla Hoi4 however, I go exactly like you and get 1936 Fighters. in RT56, you can "convert/upgrade" a lot of things from generation to generation, one of those is Fighters. You cannot do that in Vanilla, as such the sooner you can get better equipment the better. I never understood why you couldnt strip down and re-purpose hardware at reduced time/resource cost, so I am happy that exists in RT56. Looking forward to more, thanks Quill!

[@jeroylenkins1745]

Yay it's back

[@michaelmuller6890]

The logistics Skill and corresponding trait reduces the need of supply of the commanded troops. Just like the corresponding support company. It is the most valuable trait of a field marshal and skill of a general in my eyes. It can save the lives of entire armies when they get in need of supplies.

[@vendetta1306]

Who's here after his 7 part tutorials?

[@brandonb1681]

Thanks man for breaking down the combat stats for we beginners.

[@nilsosinga495]

4:05 You were probably looking for the word ideology there

[@tylerjgreen4480]

"Gandar calls for aid!" Quill, we can be friends now.

[@danielefabbro822]

Funny fact: "Divisione Celere" means "Fast Armored". "Divisione di Fanteria" means "Infantry Division". You basically perfectly translated these names. And without knowing Italian I guess. Awesome. 😁👍👌

[@Maeyanie]

The light fighters vs. heavy fighters thing is reasonably historically-accurate, at least.

[@PaddyOFurniture]

This was quite good. I am confident that I'm going to lead the USSR in to complete ruin, but I this made me excited to do so. Thank you.

[@IquonYT]

WOW. I watched pravus before, and it autoplayed a new Video. After 10 Minutes i was like: pravus Sounds kinda wrong.. and why does he know so much about the game?... oh. Ohhhhh. I dont know you, but i already like you :D

[@MrJohanEk]

Hi Quill! I like this setup. Keep up the good work. 👍🏻

[@jskip8904]

You handsome bastard. Love this!

[@thejatangamer_1877]

Great video

[@kinagrill]

.... paaaaaasta! Also quill is playing on 'Elitaly' difficulty it seems.

[@Buckifan822]

Morty voice " You son of a bitch! Im in!"

[@robertdonovan6177]

I'm brand new to the game but trying to learn fast. I've got a question -- why bother assigning "Air Superiority" in a war with Ethiopia, who to my understanding, has no air units whatsoever? Am I not understanding something? Seems like a waste of resources with nothing to gain. Thanks for your videos, they help a ton!

[@grim_technician1626]

Great content as alwaya quill much enjoyed

[@sheamus83]

Quill I believe reliability doesn’t actually matter on airplanes because the attrition rate is so low. But Reliability is incredibly important with tanks.

[@oliverhoffmann1335]

Man so looking forward to what you do with that navy stuff^^ i avoided navalpowers since mtg because i just can´t wrap my head around the new system (despite over 3k hours pumped into the game). Which is really sad cause Japan was my absolute favourite before xD Anyway hope you have fun with the run looking forward to it :D

[@fives2155]

"We don't really need carriers" Thats exactly what Mussolini said to the Italian navy and he lost the war

[@ScarletEdge]

Heavy fighter high air attack is good vs enemy bombers, and to prioritize enemy bombers you should put them on interception mission ideally within area covered by radar. Normal fighters suck vs strats. Normal fighters should dogfight other normal fighters and heavy fighters. If you send your heavy fighters (AS mission) over contested area, your heavy fighters will be sitting ducks for normal fighters. You should only send your heavy fighters on air superiority when you want to contest far air zone over sea zone, for example in the pacific otherwise intercept with low aggression profile and always during day. In Europe just do CAS with range upgrade and normal fighters with same (+1 to +5 engine,+1 to +5 rel, +1 to +5 range to both CAS and FTR. TACS are worse than CAS in ground support and worse than STRATS in strat bombing. I can only recommend TACS for Asian countries where the airfields are scarce and you need that extra range for mission efficiency.

[@mikebaker2436]

Hearts of Iron: "Ethiopia" My Abyssinian Sympathizer Heart: "No."

[@ravenofra1114]

Great Video is it not possible to do this start with Italy in the vanilla game without expansions it seems like yugoslavia and czechoslovakia both seem to start under the protection of France which is a shame cus i really want to do this sort of land grab at the start before the war starts in earnest to help increase my resources and manpower

[@bellerrimo6915]

Thank you so much for this great content and your super clear explanations. The only negative thing I have to say is your pronounce of the Italian names, it doesn't really matter a lot but as an Italian it annoys me that you pronounced the LL like it is a Spanish word. In Italian we pronounce the L like in English and when it's double you just have to make the sound longer. Also in Italian the E is pronounced like E in "end" and not like the E in "be".

[@jskip8904]

No Football Manager this year Quil??

[@j.j.r.6075]

Zed. Zee if you're feeling nasty.

[@TraianusImperator]

Zed's dead baby, Zeds dead.

[@adamorick2872]

They should increase defense of heavy fighter as historical combat heavy fighters almost always came out on top because they could take the beating

[@Karagianis]

Got an idea, if you can't afford to design better tanks, how about converting the bad tanks into tank destroyers? Mix them with some motorised infantry to give them some ability to resist enemy tanks without slowing them down with towed guns. Not played enough HOI4 to know how practical it is, just seemed logical to me that it'd make some use out of an otherwise useless outdated tank.

[@StonedWidowOnDoom]

6:55 "All workers of the world unite! Except you, Spain... You are in the way." That was exactly the thinking of the communist party in the Soviet Union when the Spanish civil war started. They feared, when the Spanish Republic wins, democratic socialists and anarchists will become the dominant parties. Nothing is more fearful for a dictatorship when the people get the same flavor, but democratic. The people in Russia may get ideas.... Нет, НетНет... плохой! Spanish government feared the same, so the undermined, denounced and smeared the other factions. Also a reason why anarchy has a bad reputation to this day. It worked very well in the few month in Catalonia as long as government and others allowed it to flourish. This got so bad, that the Republic started to fight intern for power. I think that is one of the many reasons Franco's troops won.

[@StonedWidowOnDoom]

@@xdeser2949 I read some books about that topic. Primary sources, not hear and say. Among other was the report of George Orwell. He fought on the front of the P.O.U.M. and was in Barcelona when the government started to take the weapons from the P.O.U.M. I believe him, because other sources point to it. It's a very short comment in the internet, yes. The truth is more complicated, yes. Plus, it was a joke.

[@wetpenguin]

I need episode 2 NOW

[@fatsammy5270]

Great choice!

[@DLAlucard]

Well a taste of the vanilla to reacclimate yourself with naval warfare sounds reasonable. I do hope you are thinking of exploring greener pastures in the mod list. So as to entertain the channel with something new and very different then what had come before in your dabbling with HoI4

[@quill18]

greener pastures?

[@DLAlucard]

​@@quill18 Lol Ah sorry about any confusion there. I should have removed that 'the'. I was a little distracted when making the comment and didn't double check it. Anyway I was just using the common phrase of 'greener pastures' to suggest something different and felt it could also worked as a horse related bit of fun. Since of course horses or ponies graze in pastures. It was just my little way of suggest Equestra at War again.

[@LifeJLife]

Hey Quill will you be doing a playtrough with BlackIce at some point ? :)

[@illuindb]

Oo that would be interesting

[@Millawls]

Why not play with a mod that adds a communist focus tree to Italy?

[@karlhageman876]

The US still used battleships up until the early 2000s. They just weren’t as important as carriers any more.

[@DefaultProphet]

Karl Hageman the Missouri was decommissioned in 92. So nah

[@twistedpixel756]

Teach me how to play Quill, 500 hours and I still feel like I have no idea how to play this game

[@HEYabbot]

Lol that was me the first time i got into EU4 I had watched multiple playthrough of quills and still was like i have no idea what I am doing I ended up rewatching one while i played.

[@danielefabbro822]

By the way I really don't know why Italian research is so down. I mean at the time we was among the best researchers in any kind. Marconi invented the radio, we also had radars, we was proved experienced shipbuilders (we contributed to build or design much of the Soviet fleet), our scientists, Fermi first among them, was the keystone of any nuclear research of the time and Fermi itself was the man behind Americans atomic bombs. The only problem is that fascists wasted all of this. Literally, they spent nothing in research. It's desolating to see, but fascists was so dumb that they wasted everything good our country had to offer. 😑

[@simoneriksson8329]

How hard would it be to survive as Ethiopia in this game?

[@somerandomalbinodude]

Man the guns is by far my least liked of all the major expansion dlcs, mostly because of the unnecessarily large amou t of micro management it aded to the navy side of the game. Was much more enjoyable beforehand when i could organise the navy of a major like the US in a matter of a few minutes rather than spending 15 or 20 minutes sorting out all the fleets task forces and reserve fleets etc. Dont get me wrong theway the ai handled naval combat did need some changes but the palyer controled navy did not need all the extra micro management bs they aďded. Heres hoping for an option to use the pre mtg naval management in the future

[@Deilwynna]

i love the module system for the ships but it could be a bit more specific and more options. the new naval management system though, i totally i agree it sucks, i found it more fun and realistic to use a single, moderately sized fleet to fully patrol the north sea, another one for north-east atlantic, etc, irl they used intelligence and scout planes and some smaller, lighter ships to scour the vast open seas rather than actually having the full fleet out patrolling and later on also used radar on heavier ships

[@quill18]

I personally like Man the Guns (or rather, the 1.6 patch) naval changes because I feel like once you have things setup, the day-to-day automation is better. Or, at least, more immersive/realistic -- but that it suuuuuuper subjective, so I completely accept that some people would feel differently.

[@Kaarl_Mills]

Before there was absolutely no reason to build anything other than battleships, why would ever go back to that

[@Ylmorko]

YES!!!

[@TeleportingBread161]

"Divisione Celere" does not even mean armored division. It means fast division

[@DaDunge]

Yeah because the number of tanks in that is nominal mostly its a horse division.

[@Anonymous-zu7dh]

Jamme, jamme 'ncoppa, jamme jà,

[@Katsura_ja_nai_Zura_da]

Please disregard reliability comment by quill, if you have enough plane production, reliability is meaningless.

[@XochiCh]

Mussolini was a Hardcore Communist-Pacifist before coming with the idea of "Facismo" after WWI.

[@bennygohome4576]

Fiusha Ironfoot he was a socialist who got kicked out of the socialist party for being pro ww1

[@Imthefake]

quite appropriate, just yesterday the left party had a political win in italy

[@Imthefake]

@transylvanian stop gate keeping the left

[@Imthefake]

@transylvanian you can be pro capitalism and on the left

[@Imthefake]

@transylvanian yes, communism, the absolutely not genocidey alternative to capitalism

[@dylanb2990]

transylvanian I’m eating right now because of capitalism.

[@tobiasL1991]

Major naval power and Italy, haha that will always crack me up.

[@yoggz]

I tried to go communist japan and my game was just not having it, crashes every few mins lol

[@GraysGazette]

do total win and control the whole world and be the only country

[@mr.admr1016]

Where do you stream?

[@quill18]

twitch.tv/quill18 -- and we're streaming HoI4 today! 2pm Eastern Time (UTC-5)

[@AlexG-kp8sv]

@@quill18 this playthrough or a different one?

[@janne_kekalainen]

@@AlexG-kp8sv I'm assuming that he is going to continue the kaiserrich china.

[@quill18]

@@AlexG-kp8sv Kaiserreich China is the stream!

[@mr.admr1016]

quill18 thanks :)

[@ogscarl3t375]

*Italy a major naval power pffft...*

[@Kaarl_Mills]

*Pizza Time intensifies*

[@ThorbenTK]

This a tutorial ?

[@Supergforce777]

I always get sad when quill does a KZbin only series because I can’t just switch over to twitch vods when I want to watch more.

[@colinmullaly4328]

wooooo hooooooo

[@danielefabbro822]

A communist ww2 Italy? Well we was always friends of the Russians. Those cool sexy Russians. 😏😌❤️

[@sevearka]

Haha, "generally speaking"...

[@Karagianis]

Ah, itally, in ww2 of all the allied tanks they could pick to try and coppy, they chose the British Crusader, the crusader was AWFUL, sure it was fast but it had cheese for armour and had an engine that like to fall to bits.

[@Winnetou17]

Why on earth, of all places, Romania is called "Kingdom of Romania", with nobody else having this distinction (UK doesn't count) ??? As if nobody else had a kingdom ???

[@SirRyuk92]

WHAT!! what do you mean you're going to rename the divisions, that sucks and all because you cant pronounce them... what a lame excuse *hears quill try to pronounce a division* ok i agree, rename them

[@Schmorgus]

How come you mostly play as communists :P

[@Schmorgus]

@transylvanian Yeah, the worst of the worst :P Sure xD

[@Schmorgus]

@transylvanian Not sure how facts are brainwashing. Guess you're 'merican.

[@Schmorgus]

@transylvanian lol good luck with that xD

[@trihermawan9553]

@transylvanian yea, even I agree that communist is superior system, but horrible execution, the thing about communist is it's too good it's unreal and won't ever happened without force of violence

[@Anatoli_Punto]

@transylvanian Preach comrade I'm a socialist/commie too, and I hate people saying things like "Heyyy the f in USSR stands for fooood!!!!!! Wooo i'm s ofunny!!!", even though in the 60s there was loads of food in the USSR Also, communism/socialism is the superior ideology indeed, look for instance China, an industrial superpower, who could put USA down if they had a border with them. What are Americans scared of too? North Korea. They say they aren't scared, but that's not true, because they would've put them down by now. Also, do I have to remind that USA, the most democratic and "free" state lost to communist Vietnam? That shows who's the superior there.

[@Adyen11234]

I feel like this is just Quill trying to distract everyone from the fact that nobody can play any mods without jumping through loops. :P

[@quill18]

When the new launcher came out, I think all I did was turn off mods, launch the game, then exit the game and turned on the mods and it all worked? Does that not work for everyone?

[@Adyen11234]

@@quill18 If only. *sigh*

[@dylanb2990]

Mods are incredibly easy to use, just download from the workshop and enable them in the launcher. You don’t even have to download any third party mod support.

[@Adyen11234]

@@dylanb2990 I can tell you that I had to jump through a lot of loops with PD Support just to get my mods working, including manually downloading the launcher and reinstalling it in different locations on my HD.

[@vikingish11]

Dislike for renaming divisions. That's just awful.

[@fooladoo1076]

You need Jesus

[@exelenttee]

Quill18, please no more political and social commentary, you look silly.

[@Matt0604]

First?

[@pchelagmail]

Mare nostrum! Make the Romans proud!