Hearts of Iron IV: No Compromise, No Surrender Review

Grand strategy DLCs are always a bit of a gamble. Sometimes they shake up the game in exciting ways; other times they feel like small side-grades wrapped in big promises. Hearts of Iron IV expansions are no strangers to that notion. Some have been wildly successful, becoming must-haves for new players; others have been left by the wayside, marred by myriad problems.

Now, No Compromise, No Surrender sits firmly in the "ambitious" camp. Aimed at deepening the wartime politics and internal struggles of several nations, it brings new national paths, new political tug-of-war mechanics, and extra flavor to your favorite spreadsheet simulator.

Avid enjoyers of the genre should be no strangers to the gameplay loop of Hearts of Iron IV. You start off as one of the many nations of 1936 (or 1939), and forge your path through World War II, building armies, developing your economy, and planning your expansion. 

Compared to Paradox's other grand strategy titles, Hearts of Iron mainly stands as a sort of wargame, and so any DLC will naturally look to expand aspects of that. Like other Hearts of Iron IV DLCs, No Compromise, No Surrender focuses on the Pacific, specifically bringing new focus trees for China, Japan, the Philippines, and a reworked focus tree for the Chinese Warlords.

As always with the focus trees, the team has done a great job at bringing the historical events and ahistorical paths to the forefront. The Japanese focus tree is now huge, and the Chinese ones are no joke either. All the focus trees bring many, many debuffs to their host nations. A lot of the Chinese debuffs will take you upwards of 5-6 years to remove, and that's actually a good thing.

Previously, playing against AI, both nations were to a certain extent boring, as the main struggle wasn't winning the China War. Now, with the DLC, playing as both Nationalist and Communist China is much more of a struggle, making you deal with the new faction mechanics, debuffs, and more. However, the core gameplay remains relatively the same. You need guns, a lot of guns.

While you figure that out and wait for the inevitable invasion from Japan, you also need to deal with a series of events relating to the warlords.

For Japan, it now has to deal with its own set of debuffs brought on by its internal factions. History buffs should know of the struggle between the Japanese Army and Navy.

And this is well represented in the new system for Japan, where the factions have competing interests, and so, you will need to endorse them. However, you can't endorse all of them, so based on the situation, you will have to play favorites, netting the benefits from that, while dealing with the disgruntling debuffs from the rest.

The previously mentioned events also mesh well with the other big thing in this DLC. That is the new faction's mechanic. The faction system is now greatly expanded, with its own tab and fancy GUI. The faction ranking, territorial integrity, and leadership and influence are all still present, but much more relevant now.

You also now get a bunch of faction goals. These exist in three forms: short-term, medium-term, and long-term. For most historical factions, your medium and long-term goals are already set for you and seldom change. Short-term goals can be seen as missions; however, short-term ones that you assign and fulfill. 

This will award you with, among other things, faction initiative. You can use faction initiative to change goals and set new rules. You can also use short-term goals to boost your spy network, research, and help with construction.

The new faction mechanic makes the DLC worth it on its own, as it makes factions matter more than ever before. It also deals with AI issues like a random nation joining the Comintern in your Germany-run just because that nation is communist as well.

With new faction mechanics also comes a new doctrine mechanic. See, doctrines have been reworked and expanded, with each main doctrine then being split into subdoctrines focusing on each facet of your military. So the land doctrines are spread into infantry, armor, artillery, support, and operations.

As with anything Pacific, the navy got away with a slight touch-up as well, with new Naval HQs and a small rework, both of which also stand as highlights for the DLC. Naval invasions have been reworked, being much more realistic. Overall, the Naval rework has sought to both improve QoL and simplify things in a good way, while adding features that are useful.

There are a lot more minor additions, like many small events that got added, both historical and ahistorical ones at that. Many new decisions also exist for relevant countries. For example, Pearl Harbor is something you can now launch as Japan, and it'll actually do something. There's new IOs for Japan, the Chinese get to expand their guerrilla war, and Japan. There is a new resource, Coal, which is mainly required by factories to work.

The Philippines aren't really left out, so much so that there's not much to mention for them, other than their shiny new focus tree. However, they could've done with some more generals and such.

Finally, the map has been updated to be in accordance with historical East Asia, and it's really nice to see the commitment to that. 

Now that being said, this is still a Hearts of Iron IV DLC, so there's bound to be some misses, for No Compromise, No Surrender, this manifests in the usual bugs and pricing issues already known to the players, but also some others.

The new DLC's reworks brought on a lot of balance issues and AI issues regarding factions and debuffs for the Chinese and Japanese. The naval changes also brought on some unwanted consequences relating to naval dominance and a few other niche things. However, none of it is enough to write home about. 

Beyond mechanics and functions, the DLC adds a good amount of personality to the nations. Even the Philippines, which we've expected to be what Switzerland was in By Blood Alone, gets a fair chunk of content. The new events, especially the minor ones, add a ton of flavor. Like other Paradox games, they spared no effort in these departments.

The new focus trees, especially Japan's sprawling behemoth, come with the usual high-quality icons and event artwork. The updated map work in East Asia is also a nice touch.

As for audio, HOI4's DLCs always come along with new music, and that's the case here as well. There are some really good tracks and songs included in the DLCs, and them being oriented towards the cultures the DLC represents is always a plus point.

That said, the UI additions deserve mention. The new faction screen is clean and surprisingly stylish for HOI4. The doctrine rework also slots neatly into the existing doctrine menu, avoiding the clutter trap this game occasionally falls into.

Hearts of Iron IV: No Compromise, No Surrender is one of those HOI4 DLCs that feels dense, but mostly in a good way. It doesn't change Hearts of Iron IV dramatically like Hearts of Iron IV: Götterdämmerung or No Step Back, but it does deepen the game in ways that longtime fans will immediately appreciate.

China and Japan finally feel like the complex regional powers they should've been years ago, the faction system breathes life into political gameplay that used to be background noise, and the doctrine and naval tweaks inject some much-needed freshness into the military side of things.

It's not flawless; the usual balance quirks, AI oddities, and Paradox-launch roughness are all present. And if you aren't already invested in the Pacific theatre or the idea of juggling debuffs and political factions, this won't suddenly convert you. But for players who love HOI4's crunch, its chaos, then this DLC lands firmly on the "worth it" side of the equation.