Manpower in Hearts of Iron 4 is the total number of men and women available for military service. The number shown in the row of numbers at the top of the screen is not total manpower, it is the amount of manpower you have available for military service. No DLCs were enabled for this game.
Changing conscription laws is the best way to increase recruitable manpower. Changing laws costs political power with ever stricter requirements to meet as you go from one level to the next higher level. Manpower provides recruitable manpower, which are the men and women available to serve in your armed forces.
HOI 4 Conscription Laws
Changing conscription laws is the single most effective way to increase manpower for recruitment and all countries have the same laws and requirements. Changing a level either up or down costs 150 Political Power and is additive. In other words, if all conditions are met, changing from a disarmed nation to Limited Conscription law would cost 300 Political Power.
- Disarmed nation = 1.0% of core population available for conscription
- No requirements
- Volunteer Only = 1.5% of core population available for conscription
- Cannot have economy law of Undisturbed Isolation or Isolation
- Limited Conscription = 2.5% of core population available for conscription
- More than 10% war support
- Does not have economy law Undisturbed Isolation or Isolation
- Extensive Conscription = 5.00% of core population available for conscription
- Ruling party must be Fascist or Communist or all the following must be true:
- Must be at war
- Estimated enemies’ strength ratio of 50% or more compared to your army
- Must have more than 20% war support
- Ruling party must be Fascist or Communist or all the following must be true:
- Service by Requirement = 10% of core population available for conscription
- Ruling party must be Fascist or Communist or all of the following must be true:
- Must be at war
- Estimated enemies’ strength ratio of 60% or more compared to your army
- More than 60% war support or more than 0% surrender progress
- Ruling party must be Fascist or Communist or all of the following must be true:
- All Adults Serve = 20% of core population available for conscription
- Must be at war and one of the following must be true:
- More than 70% war support
- More than 0% surrender progress
- Estimated enemies’ strength ratio of 75% or more compared to your army
- Must be at war and one of the following must be true:
- Scraping the Barrel = 25% of core population available for conscription
- Must be at war and one of the following must be true:
- More than 85% war support
- More than 25% surrender progress
- Estimated enemies’ strength ratio of 100% or more compared to your army
- Must be at war and one of the following must be true:
There is a complete breakdown of HIO4 conscription laws at the Hearts of Iron 4 Wiki.
Read More: If you’re a beginner my what to do first article will help.
Political Power
It takes Political Power to change conscription laws so the starting amount and daily increase in Political Power are important. Each country starts out with different starting amounts and daily gains.
| Country | Starting Political Power | Daily Gain |
| France | 2 | +2.19 |
| US | 2 | +2.15 |
| UK | 3 | +3.25 |
| Germany | 3 | +3.43 |
| Italy | 2 | +2.97 |
| Japan | 2 | +2.93 |
| Soviets | 2 | +2.62 |
| Poland | 2 | +2.70 |
Land Doctrines
There is a Land Doctrine that gives manpower increases. Taking the Mobile War Doctrine and then following the Desperate Defense path leads to Volkssturm, which increases the Recruitable Population by 2%. Sounds like a German name but all the countries have the same Land Doctrines.
How To Find The Amount of War Support In HOI4
One of the criteria for changing conscription laws is war support. The War Support percentage is located on the Diplomacy menu in the upper right corner. Hovering the mouse cursor over the percentage will activate a tooltip listing all the modifiers affecting the support. For example, an offensive war can decrease war support by 20%.
How To Increase War Support in Hearts of Iron 4
Propaganda Efforts is part of the Events and Decisions menu, and a War Propaganda Effort is one way to increase war support. You can conduct war propaganda, unless you’re conducting another propaganda effort, at a cost of 150 Political Power. There must also be more than 50% World Tension, you must have less than 50% War Support and must not be embroiled in an offensive war. A War Propaganda Effort will increase War Support by 1% per week for 90 days.
At the start of the game the only visible option is War Propaganda. Depending on the country you’re playing and at what point of the game you’re in, you can start a propaganda effort against another country. As the game progresses Germany starting propaganda efforts against countries like France become available provided as you meet the prerequisites, such as France justifying a war goal against Germany. Starting a country specific propaganda effort costs 75 political power and increases war support by 1% per week for 90 days.
Increasing World Tension is another way to drum up war support. It is done mainly through National Focuses by your country and others. As World Tension increases more National Focuses become unlocked, plus your War Support will increase as your population sees the need to be ready to defend itself.
Surrender Progress
This probably won’t be an issue unless the war is going badly for you and your allies, but it is one of the criteria that can be used to change conscription laws. If you’re at war, there will be an alert at the top of the screen. This is one alert that cannot be dismissed with a right click, possibly because this is the only way to see how the war is going and what your capitulation (surrender) progress is, at least it’s the only way I could find.
Clicking the icon will bring up the war screen with the name of the war, like the German-British war. At the top there is a bar representing the progress of the war with a tooltip telling you who is wining and by what percentage. At each end of the bar are numbers telling you much fielded manpower each side has and what the losses are for each side.
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You and your allies will be listed on one side of the screen and the enemy countries on the other side. Underneath your country’s name and under all your allies name is a bar representing Capitulation (surrender) progress, the more red in the bar the higher the surrender progress. Placing the mouse cursor over the progress bar will activate a tooltip giving you the exact percentage of your capitulation progress, the higher the worse. The obvious way to improve it is to start winning, easier said than done in most cases!