GAME MANUAL - Steam

HEARTS OF IRON DARKEST HOURWhen you click the StartProduction button, a singleorder entry will be added tothe Production Queue andyour factories will begin tomanufacture the first unit.When production is complete,the unit will be added to yourForce Pool and your factorieswill then begin manufacturingthe second unit. This processwill continue, with the unitsbecoming available one byone, until your order has beenfilled. If you look at the order inthe Production Queue after ithas been placed, you will seethe total number of unitsordered as well as which ofthose units is currently beingmanufactured. The completiondate of the current unit /building in the queue for serialqueues is displayed below thecompletion date of the wholeserial queue and theProduction efficiency (which isthe quantity of the availableIC, as previously explained).It is possible to extended orreduce the number of units inqueue in a serial productionafter the production started.In the Production Queue twosmall + and – buttons willallow you to increase ordecrease the number of unitsordered. This is also true forsingle units: if you place anorder to produce only one unit,you can then change andmake this a serial run bypressing + and adding moreunits of the same kind to thequeue, making it a serial run.The usual shortcuts areapplied here too: Shift willextended the serial build by5 units, Control by 10 andShift + Control to themaximum allowed numberof units (usually 99).Increasing the “parallel runs”value will issue a series ofidentical orders and each ofthe units will be manufacturedat the same time. This is aquick way of placing multipleidentical orders without beingforced to go through the orderprocedure multiple times.When you click the StartProduction button, the numberof orders added to theProduction Queue will be thesame as the number ofparallel runs you havespecified in the Order Details.If you allocate sufficient IC toproduction, all of the units willbe manufactured simultaneouslyand become availableon the same date. If you useboth of these controls, you willissue multiple serialproduction run orders, eachcalling for the same number ofunits per run.There are obvious advantagesand disadvantages to bothapproaches of issuing anorder for multiple units, and ahidden one as well. Serialorders take much longer to fillbut spread out the drain onmanpower which, if required,will only be subtracted as eachnew unit is begun. They alsorequire a small allocation ofIC, since only one unit is beingmade at a time. Parallel orderswill rapidly deplete yourmanpower, if needed, anddemand much larger ICcommitments, but multipleunits will be available farsooner. Serial orders formilitary units can be updatedas new technologicaladvances are discovered bychecking the checkbox thatenables or disables the autoupgradeof units. Please notethe unit currently in productionis not upgraded, but thefollowing unit in the serial runwill use the latest unit model.There is one huge advantage,though, that applies only toserial orders: the gearingbonus.The Gearing BonusIn the “real world”, there aresignificant manufacturingbenefits to be gained fromdedicated production lines andother efficiencies of scale. Theheart of the idea is that if afactory or series of factoriessets up a dedicated productionline and can purchase its rawmaterials based on a highvolume of consumption, thenthe overall cost of productionand length of time it takes tomake each unit will decrease.In Darkest Hour, this isrepresented by somethingcalled the “gearing bonus.” Toavoid making the gearingbonus unduly complex orexcessively open to playerexploitation, DH takes a fewsmall liberties in the way it isimplemented and awarded.If you place a serial runProduction Order - one thatcalls for multiple units to bemanufactured in a singleproduction run - then you willbe eligible to receive a gearingbonus where each successiveunit that is produced willrequire slightly less time tomanufacture. The first unit willtake the usual length of timeand require the full allocationof IC. The next unit will require51