Hello everyone and welcome to another entry in the Hearts of Iron development diary series. Today we’ll take a look at Italy.
Italy starts with modern-day Italy, Libya, Eritrea and Somalia, but with the Fascist leadership under Mussolini, they are out to restore the old Roman Empire as an Italian Empire.
Italy starts with two national spirits.
- Vittoria Mutilata, which increases their fascist political leanings, and make them less likely to fall for democracy or communism.
- King Victor Emanuel III, the King provides a small national unity increase each month.
Italy has 39 divisions in 1936, but while that looks strong, it is due to them moving to binary divisions earlier, so each of their divisions has less punching power. They also have about 300 fighters and 400 bombers in 1936, but it is not modern. The navy is rather strong with 2 battleships, 8 heavy cruisers & 80 smaller ships, but is not modern either.
Italy has an interesting National Focus tree with five different entry points.
Ethiopian War Logistics – A smaller tree which focuses on industrial build up.
Army Primacy – Strengthens your army research.
Mare Nostrum – The big naval strengthening tree.
Light ship focus – Destroyer & Submarine benefits.
Triumph in Africa – The big political and diplomatic tree, where you have lots of different choices on who to befriend and conquer.
Italy starts at war with Ethiopia, which is something they will be focusing on for the first months of the game. The italian technological superiority pretty much guarantees that they will win the war. The new transportation mechanics makes it less of a hassle to strengthen this theatre, and less of a hassle to move back troops afterward.
Next week, we’ll take a look at weather and terrain.
