Ranking ALL 5 Soviet Focus Trees in Hearts of Iron 4
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- čas přidán 17. 03. 2023
- Today in the Soviet Union we will be ranking all five focus trees they have, from Stalin to Trotsky, Bukharin to the Monarchists they will all be put to the test to determine which ones give the player good national spirits, leader traits and which ones leave them wanting more.
Along the way we will find what does and doesn't work with the USSR, what it needs to stand up to it's opponents and what trees enable that.
Music used from:
A Hat in Time:
Hearts of Iron IV:
18-03-2023. - Hry
I really should've called this ranking every Russian path but Soviet sounded better. Funny story I only did the Spanish ranking video since it was the anniversary and I was not expecting to be doing another so soon. But thats okay I can always do with another a series which this could be if there's interest in more.
I haven’t watched the entire video yet, but how would the rank change if you were to include the paths from Road to 56(I.E-The Fifth Column)?
@@RansomMoney58 Well that's not all paths in Hoi4 is it? If I included one mod that opens the floodgates to all of them.
@@BubblesZest Road to 56 is the biggest mod and simply makes the game better though
@Jacket08 that's not hoi4 though so why would he
@@BubblesZest Well, how about just saying "How would you rank the road to 56 soviet focus tree paths"? It's not like he was telling you to rank red flood, kaiserreich, TNO, etc.
The most insultingly stupid part about monarchist is I was still in the civil war and germany barbarossa’d ME, inviting stalin into the axis
my brother, how did you carry the civil war all the way into 1941?
Non-historical focuses?
@@adamapplewhiteFrom what I’ve seen, if you go monarchist Russia, Germany invades in like 1940 instead
To add to how stupidly overpowered Germany’s civil war tree is, if you go tobal mob during the civil war, and then get ‘prepare for the next blockade’, you can have 0% consumer goods the entire game
I didn’t even know that omg I’m gonna do that next time
brb doing this
The manpower issues tho
@@lynarisevershadeshadowfall1684 if you are going mobile warfare, go for desperate defense for a free 5% manpower
@@mylandaigle7160 but, but....Superior Firepower goes boom D:
I love the Stalinist tree. If you manage the purges correctly, you come out of them with no damage at all. Grinding Rokossovsky in Spain and then promoting him to FM makes him better than Tukhachevsky. You can become an economic superpower before WWII kicks off. To me it feels like the perfect 'narrative' playthrough in the game, in that you're constructing a story and then playing it out.
Rokossovsky may end up better, but Tukhachevsky my beloved...
@@fernsong8558 hes replaceable
A fellow Rossokovsky fan?
@@tomirk4404 Yep. He eclipses Zhukov by far.
how do you become an economic superpower pre ww2?
At least the Monarchist can claim China
Because claims are so useful
Intervention in China gives you wargoals. Why would you need claims?
Claims also decrease base resistance target for claimed states, that's the only use of them as well as making them cheaper to select in peace conferences
@Communism it increases compliance gain silly
@NoCommunism I was surprised by it but I found it out when you hover over compliance
@@Wickedonezz yeah, but its not by very much
They really did the democratic side dirty did they.
The least they could do is unlock Kerensky as an advisor, it'd be like Communist Germany which has no path either but you can do it.
@@BubblesZest there is the trick of course,
@@robland3253 how?
@@KelgorothTheFinalShape Bubbles has a video on it
Paradox say they ran short on time so they couldn't do it.
I like stalins wild ride all because of being able to shoot every single person in your cabinet
O.O
O.O
O.O
Absolute government, if you want something done do it yourself and only yourself
#6 is probably the best, I think Paradox did a great job at expanding that with BBA.
It doesn't hold a candle to the communist tree for Germany that they added back in Waking the Tiger, though
@@ertrick3693 way too op paths paradox should just remove them
@@ertrick3693 for the Germany the fascist path can be a communist path, too. Theres no ideology requirements, and u can even ally with the soviets!
@@tobbele1010sarcasm.....
One thing I noticed playing the soviet union is how unfinished certain areas seem to be. Like you kind of address this but the beaten but not defeated path has a very watered-down version of the comitern path. Why not make it like Italy where the "foreign affairs" tree allows you to be almost any ideaology and still do the focuses for wargoals. It would be like if only Nazi Germany could do the industrial tree because it mentions names like Herman Goering. Instead they change the name of the focuses (ie after the kaiser). I think beaten but not defeated would make way for sense if instead of random wargoals in the political trees it just changed the comitern focus to "foreign affairs" or something like that. Also beaten but not defeated gets you like one general and five field marshals, because they scrapped the "sway general" decision as most of the soviet generals would clearly not side with a monarchist civil war, but they could have at least just added more generals. Also they scrapped the democratic tree for time, which I get, but I feel like a really simple quality of life change would just be making Kerensky availible as an advisor when the white civil war is over. Also I am 90% sure there is a focus in the right opposition branch (maybe the supreme soviet sub-branch) that says +2.00% recruitable population but the modifier is green instead of the usual yellow and it provides no manpower bonus. Also if you like daily compliance, it may interest you to know that you can have Lev Kamenev as both a leader and an advisor and I think both provide a compliance gain.
Most complete paradox project moment.
Personnaly I think the right Soviet path is the best in hoi 4 but the take the left path with the right path advisor can also be really powerful.
Why is the best?
@@ElRealista. because the focuses and advisors give you production/efficiency/consumer goods bonuses.
Stalin isn't at the top? NKVD, this man right here!
Jokes aside, you planning on doing Italy next? Theirs is the newest and one of the largest trees now, would love to see it covered.
I haven't played Italy enough to give all of their paths a fair opinion.
@@BubblesZest Alright, well I hope it isn't out of the question. I am especially curious to hear your opinion on the alternate Fascist paths (Grandi or Balbo), since no one really talks about them.
Great video!
I love this series it’s easily my favorite one that you have done, maybe Italy eventually?!? It should be simple but there is quite a bit to take in considering every leaders balance of power buffs and everything!
Tbh, I would argue that the stalins path is the best, as it lets you have bigger eco in the short and long run. 0 consumer goods are great but the speed reduction will not allow you to have more eco compared to center path
I actually hate Trotsky's tree but i think like monarchist russia could be better like giving you more generals or doing it more realistic like in the white russia expanded mod
One thing i mostly like about the monarchist tree is that it allows you to ally the germans so that you can focus on defeating another nations like every soviet game is actually the same build up and defeat germany but of you ally them you can try new things like russia against allies or usa or china were you can get claims which is fun
Punctuation
I delayed playing ussr all together for too long because I didn’t like the great purge part. The idea of going through focuses that actually cripple your country instead of strengthening it just made no sense to me.
However, last weekend I finally decided to give it a chance and boy was I wrong.. Managing Stalin’s paranoia while trying to get rid of those horrible de-buffs and reach ussr’s full potential was soooo fun. And by doing a few tricks I learned online (knocking off Turkey and Romania early) I was actually able to finish the axis off by late 1943. and get most of Europe in the peace deal. And that still left me plenty of time to turn my eye to the west and the US afterwards.
After seeing your video, I’ll definitely try the alternative paths too, I just need to decide which one I’m gonna go for first - the right opposition or Romanov’s restoration.
The soviet union is definitely the most fun to play. That big focus three is just very fun, so many options, hoping now for a germany rework like for the soviets. Would be nice to have a big three for the germans
Nice Video
Please do a Germany path ranking, there’s just so many choices and I don’t know which to choose!
So many choices? Like dude Kaiser is the most overpowered, historical is easy wc and democracy is basicly discount allies. So its up to personal preference between historical or kaiser.
@@Natpad_027 its probably ironic
@@bltsevdallarfanclub641 i hope so
@@Natpad_027 Democracy is the Most OP.
I feel like Stalin is easy mode for beginners. You lose a lot of good generals and advisors, but there's a lot less rng involved and it's a lot easier to keep that paranoia under control. It's a lot easier to plan ahead as Stalin but as the opposition, you might plan to use someone as your linchpin only to find they've been purged.
The monarchist path is probably my favourite but boy does it suck.
Their needs to be a path or focus to restore the general staff and give new officers. I'd rather have the option to have new inexperienced generals for Barb instead of Denikin holding the line.
No general staff and cavalary commanders is big problem of White Russia path
I must say, despite all of its horrid disadvantages, I really enjoy the monarchist tree, primarily the roleplay of it. The idea that you need to create monarchist cells in Siberia, fight slowly and brutally to Moscow and beyond, rebuild the nation and reverse many of Stalin's policies, the reconquering of the former imperial territories, the strike eastward into Japan and China.
On the note of roleplay, I also really enjoy the Bukharin tree, specifically the Coup of Stalin, Returning Democracy to the Party, the New Economic Policy, and later the Supreme Soviet. I know, it probably sounds dumb, but I really enjoy it.
If we’re talking role play, Lenin did not intend for the NEP to be a permanent policy. The right opposition is a weak concessionist government that invites capitalist exploitation and continues Stalin’s policy of socialism in one country, making life objectively worse for the people living there.
@@tetra. I did not know about that first point, thank you for telling me! And on the subject of the Right Opposition, ya their government is weak, concessionist, etc. and you bring up some good points on how they still essentially just continue Stalin's policy of Socialism in One Country. Of course, I also use mods and a few cheats to simply make the game more enjoyable for myself. For instance, in the past I've used cheats to easily justify on countries, or I've configured the game files so I can do the Five Year Plan Focuses in conjunction with the Right Opposition. (And frankly, as dumb as this sounds, I play their tree simply because I like the Coup D'Etat, Returning Democracy to the Party, and the Supreme Soviet. In my mind, it's this grand coalition of both Right and Left Parties that strive to further expand communism and democratic freedoms. Once again, it sounds stupid, but I still find it fun.) (:
@@skyblivious3755 Yeah I get it, it’s just democratic centralism larp. That’s what Lenin envisioned originally for the USSR but it was corrupted by Stalin. Though, even in that deformed state, socialism still did way better than capitalism.
On the subject of the NEP, basically Lenin said that it wasn’t really possible to transition directly from feudalism to socialism, and you had to do it from capitalism to socialism. Russia was feudal before the soviets, and so Lenin instituted the NEP so that he could simulate capitalism in a more controlled fashion to eventually transition into socialism. I don’t know the exact theory behind it.
I also did restore democracy to the party for the larp (though it’s obviously weaker than the other choices) and go for the supreme Soviet. I wouldn’t recommend using cheats because it starts an endless cycle of cheating and losing skill.
That sound like bad russian monarchist fanfic
Fighting against well equiped Red Army with less then 1% people support.
There is a reason why white movement lost, you know..
Monarchist tree is hardly enjoyable cuz it's just poorly made. It's ok they start weaker and on siberia, but then they start with no generals and it's content is just poorly made. I would like way more if the monarchist tree would be recreation of the old empire which would kinda justify your wasted time in any way, and then add 2 democratic paths which one would be constitutional monarchy supporting allies and getting industrial help from them, etc maybe even buy alaska, and then a russian republic which would dismantle ussr and make their own super mega alliance, supporting all of their faction members like france do, but even more and to compensate lost territories you could get stuff to get resources from siberia.
I really want soviet union to get more coring options. The only additional cores you get are tannu tuva and the pan-slavic countries cores. No baltics, no eastern poland (exept if poland gives it to you) and no finland. On the other side, poland can get half of europe and the soviets. Pretty underwhelming if you ask me.
And if you said that, for example, the baltics had a reason to resist, so did the other soviet member states, but they are cores???
Yeah its so stupid fr, especially that they dont get cores on eastern poland and the baltics. I mean eastern Poland is literally cored by belarus and ukraine.
Soviet Union is made up of Soviet Unions lmao. Why would the Soviets resist upon themselves
They should make it that if you get compliance or something low enough you get an option to integrate those lands.
That has something to do with politics, actually
@@cmr_0333 how so?
For the right opposition path there are a few downsides. First, it closes five-year plan focuses. Second, the COMECON focus is getting closed, which can give you a HUGE amount of industry from your puppets. Which is why I consider that Stalin's path is the best
So something outside of Stalin's tree makes it the best? Lmao. Also this assumes you can even get to Comecon, which could be years if you aren't messing around with majors.
You can just avoid taking curtailment of the collective farms until you've completed the five-year plan focuses though
@@BubblesZest Stalin will always be better for min maxing pre barbarossa on historical. NEP is very bad, 100% weaker than total mobilization with women at the workforce and damn bro, while NEP gives you -15% construction debuff then war and total eco gives you like +20% mil construction speed, so yeah stalin is really better for historical.
Italy ranking next?
I think the monarchist park its really fun. Hard when ww2 start but its really fun overall
The Right Opposition at first place? A surprise to be sure, but a welcomed one.
I love the Right Opposition Path, is so versatile when you combine it with Return Democracy to the Party, and is my must go path when I play with the Soviets, which is usually most of the time :s
However, I would like to know how you do the path, because, honestly, I feel that the way I do it is not the best.
- I usually Rush the Return Democracy to the party, no bases and only waiting until the Zinovievite purge is going to happen to frame the military and save the 4 main guys: Bukharin, Zinoviev, Kemenev and Rykov. Then I start creating bases on Arkhangelsk and rush to begin the civil war, and once is going to start I cheese the game with the Artillery Exploit.
The reason why I feel I'm not doing it that efficiently is: First, this way I fully depend on cheesing the game, and if someday Paradox do something to avoid that, which I doubt they will yet is still a possibility, it would become almost impossible, and Two, I leave the army on the dust, but to be fair, I usually don't mind that that much because I focus Heavily on the Air Force and with that I usually stall the Axis very early on, with a big and strong Air Force.
What do you usually do and what would you recommend?
I am playing HOI4 in Russian, and here's a bug in localization, when you are starting civil war as right opposition. event says, that civil war in Spain started. it is here since No Step Back release.
Could you do a video ranking all the Polish paths?
My man has beef with the entire monarchist focustree
Left Opposition is the best IMO. It has just a lot of really nice bonuses. Ive got 200 production efficency with it.
The one problem with the coup for me is that when you do anti-soviet thinking then the coup the spirit NEVER goes away unlike the civil war.
At least have a focus for it
As an eastern European, hoi4 is the only youtube media sphere where the English side seems a few years behind the Russian sphere instead of the other way around. This channel is the only one doing these kinds of videos and it's really great
damn, now I wish I spoke Russian
Right opposition coup is so industrially op, but it's only a chance of getting it without civil war
I literally only go right opposition whenever I play the Soviet Union. My boy Bukharin always carries me the W
I recently made a post on reddit on how much I hate the soviet (alt hist) focus trees. (Search for: unpopular opinion soviet focus tree is bad)
It's so nice to hear you rant about the monarchist paths, they are such wasted potentials. It's music to my ears
Ranking all polish paths pls :)
Idk why but my favorite is the left opposition.
Make next Italy, France or Poland pls
When I do non-commie Russia I play with gurantees off and instantly begin to justify on Poland after the civil war is over, giving me some time to rebuild (yeah I cheese the civil war like a loser), and then instantly go in on Germany. I usually cap Germany before mid-37 or early 38 iirc, it's been a while since I've done it...
Can you do one with Poland?
Regional development is quite fun
There should be memes of Haile Selassie, Benito Mussolini, and Joseph Stalin pasted over anime fight scenes throwing all their ridiculous HOI4 modifiers and traits at each other. The paths that beef up your leader to ludicrous degrees are always fun in this game.
I think the permanent revolution had the ability to start uprisings as well.
I normally finish soviet civil war by june 1937 from snaking
Should you ever do the five year plan, or is it not worth the consumer goods hit?
Idk, the advisor it gives seems okay.
Always
I think it will be fun to create menshevic democratic path. Seems pretty interesting
How to have as monarchist starter capital in europe?
Right opposizione locks you out of your industrial tree tho
the tomee bear
Idk about you but as the left opposition i achieved my first world domination game
Puppeted USA japan france and germany
Became world global superpower with Spain's help
Backstabbed Spain because there can be only one number one
And then my game crashed
I can’t find the monarchist path as the best one because you can’t even play as the historical Russian empire permanently because there is the focus tree of pan-Slavic and you can’t honestly prevent the Russian empire from turning into a different nation. It’s the annoying part to me so I don’t really prefer doing it. unless paradox gives the Russian empire extra focus tree that can just let it be what it is. which is pretty unlikely. but this is my opinion. about the monarchist path
The permanent revolution tree is neither useful nor accurate. A permanent revolution tree should have simply aided coups and revolutions in neighboring countries. Unfortunately, the game devs decided early on to make the official history of the USSR the Canon. Some players pointed out that the left opposition tree isn't accurate or faithful to Trotsky's beliefs and the devs basically said they just didn't want to do that, so we're left with a stalinist version of events.
COMECON enjoyer
I mean you do it because restoring the Tzar is fun and there was a purge of monarchist and republican sentiment in the USSR so it would have been extremely difficult for the whites to rise up, while a Menshevik opposition was far more likely which are the less radical elements in Lenin's revolution (which was actually the majority in spite of the name meaning minority) but they were ultimately silenced and we got Lenin and Stalin after him and the Soviet Union became the Russian Empire 2.0 now with significantly more propaganda and an unclear line of succession.
The right opposition is the best!
bubble zest is the zestiest hoi4 ytber
Stalin path is the best. İf you do things correctly the paranoia do not hurt you at all. Only thing is that in one purge you cant avoid the "cursed generals by stalin" things and thats random. Sometimes he cursed 5 irrelevant generals for me even it is konev or zukov but sometimes he cursed the 2 generals (rokkosovsky and vlasov) that you have grinded in spain for field marshall with another 3 irrelevant officers, yeah that is a bit annoying but thats the only rng thing other than that Stalin path is the most powerfull path.
I'm like nr. 999
I feel powerfull
Yeah I don't know. I've tried every branch WAY too many times and I don't agree with you, except for the fact that the beaten but not defeated path is ridiculously weak.
Going for Stalin is mathematically proven to be the #1 option. You just build way too much stuff before the fascist invasion in comparison to right opposition, and it's not even close. The right opposition focuses take way too much time and PP away from you, and before you're done with everything you want to accomplish with them, the Japanese and Germans come knocking at your doorstep. It's not worth it at all, restricts you from building up the army, air force and industry plus the NEP is horseshit since it's practically a -40-50% construction speed debuff to your military industry (in comparison with war economy and total mob). The consumer goods don't make up for it.
You also underestimate Trotsky's potential since with his tree you can snipe total mob in the civil war and if you manage everything correctly it will stay with you for the rest of the game. Way better than the shitty NEP and if you add the insane army buffs, the trotskyist tree is probably only slightly weaker than the stalinist path because of the civil war. It also is super effective in MP since you can give bs debuffs to other nations (and them raging over it 90% of the time is just too funny to not be mentioned)
To add legitimacy to what I'm saying, i played probably over two dozens of MP campaigns as the communist soviets and I never lost to Germany. I also did a lot of test runs to see which path with the best possible optimization is superior, and stalinism is just so ridiculously overpowered that I don't even play it anymore because 200+ civs and 200 mils at 1941 is too easy (you can easily get twice as much only in the SU cores after completing the 1943 industry techs).
Fu tsar go brrrr
You should rank the Polish focuses, so many choices
--spoiler shield--
I figured Buharin's path would be #1. The economic strength, the lack of civil war (unless you want to go that way), the supreme soviet, it's just so good.
You should rant every path instead 😈
Crushing communism is a reward all on its own
Unbased and cringepilled
@@tetra. indeed, comrade, indeed.
@@kevin_changedhisname The 94 million figure comes from the ‘black book of communism’, which is infamous for artificially inflating the death count by counting Nazi soldiers and infant mortality as “deaths by communism”. Many of the authors of the book have since denounced it as inaccurate, and there are several interviews with them in which they detail how the numbers were faked.
For a more in-depth look at how the ruling class lies about their political opponents, read The Triumph of Evil by Austin Murphy, an economist and historian.
Haven't watched the video yet, but I play too much SOV HOI4. And if you aren't playing Stalin, you are roleplaying or being a masocist.