I posted this in another thread but it might be usefull to repost it here:
I started a game to test this and it seems that 1 soldier pop does not equal 1 division. In fact it adds one div to the total for every 10k in the converted pop. So if you convert a pop which is under 10k your div total might not go up, but if you convert a 100k pop you can build 10 divisions. So the good news is that pop merging won't affect your div totals and growth in your soldier pops can increase them. I tested this with south german, hungarian and romanian pops.
Converting non-national pops gives you less manpower, but you can still build 1 div for every 10k converted. Of course, you have to convert around 30k to get enough manpower.
Sapper_Astro said:
I started a game to test this and it seems that 1 soldier pop does not equal 1 division. In fact it adds one div to the total for every 10k in the converted pop. So if you convert a pop which is under 10k your div total might not go up, but if you convert a 100k pop you can build 10 divisions. So the good news is that pop merging won't affect your div totals and growth in your soldier pops can increase them. I tested this with south german, hungarian and romanian pops.
Converting non-national pops gives you less manpower, but you can still build 1 div for every 10k converted. Of course, you have to convert around 30k to get enough manpower.