For example, does one point of manpower in the game equate to 1000 men in 'real' terms?
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Really the whole thing is abstracted. As Maggix stated for the most part yes. When making a division Pdox breaks down the manpower per brigade with "actual" numbers. But you cant look at a nations manpower pool and feel any sense of historical accuracy, its simply an abstracted "game" unit of measure. Industry and Manufacturing require no manpower. Each nation had differing amounts of manpower in their various units, along with support personnel (divisional slice) that in some cases (US being one) were often as much as 5-7x the actual fighting men per division, and this isnt even represented in the game. The various nations manpower pools dont accurately reflect the relation between nations, if they did the Soviet Union would never run out of manpower. Myself i just think of things in terms of "units" so to avoid any expectation of historical relevance.
Take the Anschluss of Austria. If i recall correctly (bear with me!), Austria had a population of about 7 million people, and about 50k troops went over to Germany. Now by firing the event, Germany gets 450 MP (in TFH) and if you delete the units they gain from Austria you gain another 44 MP for a total of 494 MP. In a test game at the point of the Anschluss, i deleted all the Austrian units and their total available MP was only 147. At the same point in the game Brazil, a nation of 40 million at the time, with all their units deleted only had 359 MP available. So trying to truly relate MP to actual figures is futile. It is simply a game tool they use to "balance" the game.
Take the Anschluss of Austria. If i recall correctly (bear with me!), Austria had a population of about 7 million people, and about 50k troops went over to Germany. Now by firing the event, Germany gets 450 MP (in TFH) and if you delete the units they gain from Austria you gain another 44 MP for a total of 494 MP. In a test game at the point of the Anschluss, i deleted all the Austrian units and their total available MP was only 147. At the same point in the game Brazil, a nation of 40 million at the time, with all their units deleted only had 359 MP available. So trying to truly relate MP to actual figures is futile. It is simply a game tool they use to "balance" the game.
The idea is that 1 MP is 1K dudes, so 3 MP is 3K, which is a division. But to actually produce an infantry division in game it takes 3.33 MP. Not sure what those extra 333 men rerpresent (one hell of a support staff? Cooks, maids, comedy acts and rock bands? The entire USO!), but suffice it to say the figures aren't EXACT.
Also, not every country divided its divisions and brigades the same way. So, its hard to extract the MP from the game and put it in real life terms.
Another thing too is that the MP in the game is given to each country not based on its actual MP typicaly, but its war contribution in real life. Realisticaly, the soviets didn't have unlimited population, they just conscipted and charged like they did. Think about it. The population of Russia is less than that of the US today, half in fact, back then the ratio was probably 1:1 or closer. But in game terms, Russia has unlimited manpower. China doesn't have as much manpower as it had in real life at that time, in fact it has less MP and MP gain than the soviet union, yet China had far more population.
Also, not every country divided its divisions and brigades the same way. So, its hard to extract the MP from the game and put it in real life terms.
Another thing too is that the MP in the game is given to each country not based on its actual MP typicaly, but its war contribution in real life. Realisticaly, the soviets didn't have unlimited population, they just conscipted and charged like they did. Think about it. The population of Russia is less than that of the US today, half in fact, back then the ratio was probably 1:1 or closer. But in game terms, Russia has unlimited manpower. China doesn't have as much manpower as it had in real life at that time, in fact it has less MP and MP gain than the soviet union, yet China had far more population.
Only units which actually do fighting, save HQ, are modelled in this game. As already mentioned the amount of manpower tied up in support staff could be very much greater than the actual fighting forces. Also, every nation had a slightly different idea of what a division was. Its an impossible task to create an accurate generic brigade, because no such thing exists. Ultimately, the solution made compromises for simplicitly and I don't think anyone could have done much better. Nor are there any major failings which could be easily corrected.
SM did a recent test and built the German historic OOB from 1936 start, so that was nice. But there was a huge discussion as to what the historic German OOB would look like in HOI3 terms!
SM did a recent test and built the German historic OOB from 1936 start, so that was nice. But there was a huge discussion as to what the historic German OOB would look like in HOI3 terms!
But the only reason Germany can even come close to accurate OOBs is because the Decisions/Events give them enormous MP buffs. Buffs that in RL they didnt get from those events. Just as an example from what i posted above, Germany fires the Anschluss and gains 494 MP, but if you were playing Austria you would only have 147 at the time...
The Soviet Union had a population of approx 162.5 mil in 1936. In 2013 Russia had 142.5 mil, so well use these two for comparison. There is a 1.14 differential between the two, ill use it to adjust the data. In 2013 Russia had 22.6 mil available "men" in their manpower pool (16-49), that would give approx. 25.8 mil back in 1936. That means the Soviets (AS OF 1936...) would have had an available manpower pool of 25,800 brigades or roughly 8,600 Divisions. Regardless of what manpower you choose to allocate to industry or support services, its clear the Soviet Union in game doesn't even come close to scratching the service of their true manpower potential. I find even considering that the MP has any relation to actual data is futile and frustrating. Also consider the support personnel. In one of Dunnigans books i had, he broke down the USA, essentially for every 12,500 "fighting" men in a USA division there would be a divisional "slice" which included support personnel (including those all the way back in the states), I dont recall the actual data but it was something like 65k for a European Division and 85k for a Pacific Division. That means for every US Fighting man in europe there would be at least 5 support personnel and more in the Pacific. This is not represented for a variety of reasons.
Easiest thing to do imo is to just approach manpower as an in game unit of measure. Confusing this game with actual history can lead to frustrating results.
The Soviet Union had a population of approx 162.5 mil in 1936. In 2013 Russia had 142.5 mil, so well use these two for comparison. There is a 1.14 differential between the two, ill use it to adjust the data. In 2013 Russia had 22.6 mil available "men" in their manpower pool (16-49), that would give approx. 25.8 mil back in 1936. That means the Soviets (AS OF 1936...) would have had an available manpower pool of 25,800 brigades or roughly 8,600 Divisions. Regardless of what manpower you choose to allocate to industry or support services, its clear the Soviet Union in game doesn't even come close to scratching the service of their true manpower potential. I find even considering that the MP has any relation to actual data is futile and frustrating. Also consider the support personnel. In one of Dunnigans books i had, he broke down the USA, essentially for every 12,500 "fighting" men in a USA division there would be a divisional "slice" which included support personnel (including those all the way back in the states), I dont recall the actual data but it was something like 65k for a European Division and 85k for a Pacific Division. That means for every US Fighting man in europe there would be at least 5 support personnel and more in the Pacific. This is not represented for a variety of reasons.
Easiest thing to do imo is to just approach manpower as an in game unit of measure. Confusing this game with actual history can lead to frustrating results.
Your point is fine.
But from what source did you derive the available manpower (Russia)? It is clearly not the total pool of men in that agebracket so how did you find the number?
Manpower is very far from realistic.
First of all, how do you stockpile manpower ? People got cryogenized at 18 years old ? And when a country surrender, they blow up the storage in order to deny it to conquerors ? Where is this storage facility ?
Then, how the hell does your mobilisation law affect your manpower ? Does it mean that changing this law affect the sexual behaviour of people 18years earlier ?
To be realistic, manpower should in fact be "population" in provinces. This population grow (or not) based on fertility. When you loose it, the manpower isn't gone, as population is the same, but it is not yours to use. And your mobilisation law can just determine which portion of the available manpower you use. When you recruit units, you pick into provinces manpower, reducing the population growth as men are elsewere, but it have little impact as it will only matter 18 years later.
Currently that's just silly that your manpower stockpile at the same rate regardless of what you did. If you butchered each alive man in your contry while the WWII, you will have serious manpower issues later.
The population growth appart, it would not be very hard to implement.
First of all, how do you stockpile manpower ? People got cryogenized at 18 years old ? And when a country surrender, they blow up the storage in order to deny it to conquerors ? Where is this storage facility ?
Then, how the hell does your mobilisation law affect your manpower ? Does it mean that changing this law affect the sexual behaviour of people 18years earlier ?
To be realistic, manpower should in fact be "population" in provinces. This population grow (or not) based on fertility. When you loose it, the manpower isn't gone, as population is the same, but it is not yours to use. And your mobilisation law can just determine which portion of the available manpower you use. When you recruit units, you pick into provinces manpower, reducing the population growth as men are elsewere, but it have little impact as it will only matter 18 years later.
Currently that's just silly that your manpower stockpile at the same rate regardless of what you did. If you butchered each alive man in your contry while the WWII, you will have serious manpower issues later.
The population growth appart, it would not be very hard to implement.
I used the CIA world factbook to get Russia's data from 2013, i then applied the difference between populations (1936 & 2013) to get a modifier which i applied to the population from 1936.
2013 Russia had a population of 142,500,000 and a manpower pool of 22,600,000
1936 Soviet Union had a population of 162,500,000 so they would have likely had around 25,800,000 available in their manpower pool. This is only a simple approximation. Some nations, France for one suffered in birthrate between the wars, others like Germany had an increase in birthrate. So without any knowledge of special circumstances this is a likely estimate. You can adjust it in any direction you choose, with any modifiers you choose, my only point was the game uses manpower in an abstracted way and doesn't come close to historical accuracy.
2013 Russia had a population of 142,500,000 and a manpower pool of 22,600,000
1936 Soviet Union had a population of 162,500,000 so they would have likely had around 25,800,000 available in their manpower pool. This is only a simple approximation. Some nations, France for one suffered in birthrate between the wars, others like Germany had an increase in birthrate. So without any knowledge of special circumstances this is a likely estimate. You can adjust it in any direction you choose, with any modifiers you choose, my only point was the game uses manpower in an abstracted way and doesn't come close to historical accuracy.
Thank you. Statistics on populations are readily available through the UN so I was just curious where you got the manpower pool figure from. But I can see that the CIA factbook does infact provide an estimate. That said the current russian population composition is not "normal" so it is highly likely that calculating based on current numbers isnt a particularly good predictor; but that is not really important in this context.
Nah because we are simply looking for a "ballpark" number. Hey cut the number in half if you want, the game still will never approach those figures. The game is totally abstracted, if you read one of the other threads i posted in for example, Germany gets nearly 500 MP from the Anschluss (incl the units), at that same point Austria only has a total of about 150 MP (incl their units). So voila where did the other 350 MP come from? lol
No, manpower does not equal any number of specific soldiers. Anyone who tells you otherwise is not looking at the brigade and division builder screen.
Go look at the division builder screen right now. You know for a fact that all combat brigades have a maximum strength of 3,000 men, and all support brigades have a maximum strength of 1,000 men. Now, if you look at the manpower cost of various brigades, you will notice they vary widely. MIL brigades are actually pretty damn cheap in terms of manpower compared to INF. There are also some really manpower-efficient armored brigades, too.
It is impossible to create any kind of manpower=soldiers in division ratio because of this. It also means that two entirely different 800 brigade armies might cost widely different amounts of manpower to create or maintain. You might see 25 MIL brigades defending Kiev, but don't get excited about wiping them out; the manpower cost was not nearly as high as it would have been if they had been INF.
The take away from this is that you can get lured into a trap of strategic thinking by erroneously thinking that all 3,000 man brigades have the same impact on your manpower. You start making unwise decisions or incorrect assessments of enemy strength. I wouldn't even get super excited about the casualty estimates from combat resolution. If 25 MIL brigades lose 1,300 men in a combat, it's simply not the same thing as 25 INF brigades sustaining the exact same casualties.
Go look at the division builder screen right now. You know for a fact that all combat brigades have a maximum strength of 3,000 men, and all support brigades have a maximum strength of 1,000 men. Now, if you look at the manpower cost of various brigades, you will notice they vary widely. MIL brigades are actually pretty damn cheap in terms of manpower compared to INF. There are also some really manpower-efficient armored brigades, too.
It is impossible to create any kind of manpower=soldiers in division ratio because of this. It also means that two entirely different 800 brigade armies might cost widely different amounts of manpower to create or maintain. You might see 25 MIL brigades defending Kiev, but don't get excited about wiping them out; the manpower cost was not nearly as high as it would have been if they had been INF.
The take away from this is that you can get lured into a trap of strategic thinking by erroneously thinking that all 3,000 man brigades have the same impact on your manpower. You start making unwise decisions or incorrect assessments of enemy strength. I wouldn't even get super excited about the casualty estimates from combat resolution. If 25 MIL brigades lose 1,300 men in a combat, it's simply not the same thing as 25 INF brigades sustaining the exact same casualties.
SU had an estimated population of 190-196 million on June 22, 1941. By 1945, 34.7 million people were drafted into the Red Army, and SU had 11.5 million under arms when Germany surrendered, out of which 6.6 were in the active army, composing ~500 divisions.
Start up a game with Austria edited to Two or Three-year Draft, and check the figures again.
The figures i used where from a hands off game, so the data is accurate. I dont know what laws Austria had at the time...do they get to that point with the AI Two or Three year Draft?
Anyway what i did was simple. I saved the game prior to the Anschluss, then the Anschluss fired. Germany was given 450 Manpower by the event, I deleted all the units (incl the INT) and gained another 44 MP so "My" Germany gained 494 MP from the Anschluss. I then reverted to the saved game (same day) and after deleting all the Austrian units, they had a MP pool of 147. So how does Austria provide Germany with 450 MP when they only had 147 to give?
Anyway what i did was simple. I saved the game prior to the Anschluss, then the Anschluss fired. Germany was given 450 Manpower by the event, I deleted all the units (incl the INT) and gained another 44 MP so "My" Germany gained 494 MP from the Anschluss. I then reverted to the saved game (same day) and after deleting all the Austrian units, they had a MP pool of 147. So how does Austria provide Germany with 450 MP when they only had 147 to give?
Ill check that out Opanashc, i guess what threw me off was that it happens immediately. Ill run a test for the hell of it later and get some numbers.
Edit. I never even came close to Two year draft. I got my NU to 66% it needed to be 70%. The Anschluss fired in June of 1938, i deleted all my units and had a total MP of about 155.
Edit. I never even came close to Two year draft. I got my NU to 66% it needed to be 70%. The Anschluss fired in June of 1938, i deleted all my units and had a total MP of about 155.
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Like I said, it's very common that if a state go o 3 years draft, it makes the people reproduce more. 20 years in the past.
Rofl.
So true.
Well, I think it represents people joining the military faster, and that others are staying longer since its three year draft.
Manpower is people available, not joining. The only thing a conscription law can change is the range of age where you recruit