The commander’s guide
Your army and anti-air defence
Meet the three factions’ armies, issue combat orders, and protect your forces with mobile shields, anti-air tanks and drone catchers.
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Your army
Each faction has six vehicles of its own, from a light tier-one tank to a tier-three battery:
| Faction | Tier 1 | Tier 2 | Tier 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sunhearth | Dawnling | Emberguard, Kilnbreaker, Hearth Howitzer | Sunlance, Solstice Battery |
| Mossglade | Sprig | Reedrunner, Bramble, Spore Carrier | Thornback, Bloom Battery |
| Moonveil | Glimmer | Veilguard, Comet Carriage | Eclipse, Moonray, Lunarium Battery |
Beside them, every ground factory builds a common line in its faction’s colours, and each faction has a specialist or two:
| Vehicle | Tier | Cost | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Copperfin | 1 | 85 / 160 / 9 s | fast skirmish tank |
| Pebble | 1 | 55 / 90 / 6 s | unarmed scout rover that sees 420 metres |
| Briarback | 2 | 260 / 540 / 22 s | armoured siege tank |
| Lumen | 2 | 210 / 430 / 17 s | ion shield breaker |
| Hearth, Acorn or Crescent Mortar | 2 | 220 / 460 / 19 s | mobile siege mortar |
| Hearthkeeper, Grovekeeper or Moonkeeper | 2 | 190 / 400 / 18 s | repairs the vehicles around it |
| Bastion | 3 | 800 / 1,600 / 40 s | twin-cannon heavy tank under its own shield |
| Sunfall, Seedstorm or Starfall Battery | 3 | 780 / 1,700 / 42 s | rocket artillery, 520 metres |
| Daybreak, Heartwood or Apogee Carrier | 3 | 980 / 2,400 / 55 s | one heavy siege missile, 680 metres |
| Cinder Sunhearth | 2 | 250 / 480 / 20 s | armour-piercing tank destroyer |
| Skywarden Sunhearth | 2 | 200 / 420 / 14 s | mobile anti-air, 360 metres |
| Burr Mossglade | 2 | 240 / 520 / 22 s | rocket salvo tank |
| Wisp Moonveil | 3 | 550 / 1,250 / 30 s | disruptor hover tank |
| Dawnwatch, Canopywatch or Starwatch T1 | 1 | 90 / 180 / 10 s | mobile anti-air: aircraft and drones only, 260 metres |
| Anti-air tank T2 | 2 | 240 / 480 / 20 s | mobile anti-air, 340 metres |
| Anti-air tank T3 | 3 | 640 / 1,280 / 36 s | mobile anti-air, 440 metres |
| Hearth, Grove or Veil Aegis T1 | 1 | 190 / 420 / 20 s | mobile shield: an unarmed hull with a 700-point dome over the units within 30 metres |
| Aegis T2 | 2 | 450 / 1,000 / 30 s | a 1,500-point dome over 50 metres |
| Aegis T3 | 3 | 1,400 / 3,200 / 60 s | a 1,600-point dome over 60 metres |
- Sunhearth builds the heaviest armour. Its Sunlance rail lance ignores armour.
- Mossglade is fast: Reedrunners circle their target, and Bramble seed blasts slow everything nearby.
- Moonveil hovers on lighter armour with a regenerating shield. Veilguards escort under shields that recover after combat, Moonrays burn through with rapid beams when they can see their target, and the Eclipse does fivefold damage to shields.
- The tier-three siege batteries (Solstice, Bloom and Lunarium) outrange every rocket truck, 760 to 900 metres, with heavy shells on a slow reload; they cost 700 / 1,400 / 45 s and drive slowly.
- Artillery vehicles drive into position and deploy before they fire: about a second for the tier-two guns, 1.8 seconds for a rocket battery, three for a missile carrier and five for a siege battery.
- Turning. A ground vehicle well off its heading stops, turns on the spot and then drives along its hull, so nothing slides sideways or backwards. Aircraft and ships steer as they go.
- Mobile shields need no power. One covers your units of its own tier and below, but not other shield vehicles and not its own hull. A hit is taken by the nearest dome that is up, mobile or built, so overlapping domes are drained one after another, and a dome drained to nothing is down until it has recharged in full: for a mobile shield, eight seconds after the last hit and then 25 to 30 seconds. Each mobile shield keeps with the nearest armed unit that no other carrier covers, so several of them spread over an army instead of stacking over the same few tanks.
- Unarmed units on an attack-move (shields, repair vehicles and scouts) stop short of armed enemies and close up behind your nearest guns, then carry on once the way is clear.
- Veterancy. A vehicle, aircraft or ship earns a star at 3, 6, 10, 15 and 21 kills, and each star adds 10% to its health.
- Guarding. A unit you send somewhere guards that spot. It engages what comes within its range, fires back at whatever hits it, and leaves the spot by up to a fifth of its range (15 to 60 metres, 38 for a light tank) to get a shot before it goes back. H stops a unit and holds it strictly where it stands.
- Splitting fire. Left to pick their own targets, half of a group keeps the shields under fire while the other half takes the nearest target no shield covers. An attack order is obeyed by all.
- Attack-move presses on. On an attack-move (Q), units do not stop on a bridge or at the river for a target across the water: they fire on the move and take up the fight on the far bank.
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