Army management

How commanders, squads, formations and battle orders turn a pile of recruited units into an army that fights in the way you planned.

verified 6.37updated 2026-10-02 · Jake13 min read

You never steer units by hand in a Dominions 6 battle. Everything you decide happens beforehand, on the Army Setup screen: who leads whom, how troops are grouped, where each group stands when the fight opens, and what each group has been told to do. This page covers those choices and the rules that limit them, and ends with the supply and upkeep rules that decide whether an army can stay in a province at all.

For what happens once the orders are in play, see Combat. For the morale numbers that leadership and formation feed into, see Morale and rout. For the unit statistics themselves, see Unit attributes.

Garrison units and commanders

Fresh recruits land in one row along the top of the Army Setup screen. Those not yet assigned form the garrison, and they remain in it until you give them to a commander.

What an unassigned unit does when the province is attacked depends on whether the province has a fortress. Inside a fortress the garrison is considered to be behind the walls and does not join the units that are patrolling outside. In a province without one, the garrison does fight, and all of it forms one large squad that begins in the middle of its side’s army.

Every commander in the province is listed down the left of the screen, with a placement box beside the icon, then the name and the squads below. Organised troops need a commander, which is why the number of commanders you have caps how large an army can be.

Squads and the leadership limit

A squad is the basic unit of organisation in battle. It can hold anywhere from a single unit up to the whole of its commander’s leadership value. To start a squad, select a unit and click the commander’s icon. To add to an existing squad, select the unit and click that squad’s box.

Two limits apply at once:

• A commander cannot lead more units than his or her leadership value, however those units are divided into squads.
• A commander can lead at most five squads, so the number of squads in the whole army can never be more than five times the number of commanders. Leading many squads can carry a morale penalty, covered below.

The leadership rating sits among a unit’s abilities, and clicking it shows the finer print. Troops are counted in three groups: ordinary troops, magical beings and the undead. Some units will not take orders from just any commander. Undead and demons need a commander with undead leadership, and magical beings need one with magical leadership. A unit that is both magical and undead needs undead leadership.

Leadership and morale

How many squads a commander leads changes the morale of all of them. The manual states the pattern at five reference ratings:

• At leadership 10, the poorest kind, a single squad is already at -1 morale, and every squad beyond the first costs all squads another point. Five squads therefore means -1 for the base penalty and -4 for the extra squads: -5 in all.
• At 50, there is no penalty for one or two squads, then -1 for each additional one.
• At 100, all squads gain +1 when there are three or fewer, and lose a point for every squad above three.
• At 150, up to four squads gain +2. Adding a fifth squad takes a point from all of them.
• At 200, all five squads gain +3.

These effects follow the commander’s base leadership. Experience raises leadership, which allows more troops, but it does not change the morale tier. The manual’s example is a veteran with base 50 who might lead 175 units or more while keeping the morale effects of a 50 leader. The experience bonus to leadership is +25 at the first level and +50 from the second on, and a fifth of those figures for a poor leader (+5 and +10).

Mixed squads

Putting different kinds of troops together has a price in morale:

• one undisciplined unit makes its whole squad undisciplined, at -1 morale;
• mixing undead into a squad of living troops takes a point;
• mixing demons into a squad of ordinary troops takes a point.

Selection shortcuts on the screen help you sort troops: double-click selects every unit of one type, shift-click selects several, and pointing at a squad and pressing a key picks out the units with afflictions, or the ones with two or more experience stars. The manual’s suggested uses are pulling limping units out of a squad so that gaps do not open as it advances, and gathering veterans into elite squads that get higher morale than the others of their type.

Where troops stand

Beside every commander and every squad sits a small green box that stands for the battlefield. Drag your pieces around inside it to choose their opening spots. Its left edge is the rear of your army and its right edge is the front. Commanders show up as circles and squads as rectangles, scaled to how large they are, and a squad’s rectangle shows the icon of its most common unit. Left-click or drag a rectangle to select; right-click to move what is selected.

The colour of each shape shows its order:

• grey for a squad on default orders, white for the one selected;
• turquoise for Attack Rear, dark blue for Guard Commander, light blue for Hold and Attack, yellow for Retreat;
• red for a squad that contains undisciplined units;
• for commanders, grey is the default, purple means a Cast order and yellow means Retreat.

In the battle itself, the attacking army starts on the left side and the defending army on the right.

Room in a square

Each unit stands in a grid square, and a square holds ten size points of units. Human-sized units are size 3, so three fit. A very large unit can force its way into a crowded square by displacing the smaller ones, if it is at least three size points bigger than any it displaces; that costs it one extra point of combat speed. Units that trample will not do this unless they are routing, since it would hurt their own side. The Formation Fighter ability lets a unit fit more to a square.

Formations

A formation is the pattern in which a squad’s units are laid out on the map. There are five.

• Box fills out as close to a square as it can. For the manual’s example, 36 size-3 Infantry of Ulm in a box occupy four squares across and three deep, with three units to a square.
• Line is a single straight rank facing the enemy.
• Double line is a line with half the units in a second rank right behind.
• Sparse line is a line with an empty square between each occupied one, doubling its length, at -1 morale for the squad.
• Skirmish is a checkerboard in which every occupied square is separated from its neighbours by an empty one in all four directions, also at -1 morale.

Line, double line and sparse line are open only to good leaders. An undisciplined squad is locked into skirmish formation. The Tight Rein ability cancels the undisciplined trait of the commander’s units, which opens the other formations and lets you give those units specific orders. The Skirmisher ability cancels the morale penalty for a unit deployed in skirmish or sparse line.

Battle orders

A squad cannot be controlled once the fight is joined, so each squad is given orders that it tries to carry out. Every squad under the same commander can have a different one. An order is either a general order alone, or a general order plus a target. Attack, Hold and Attack, Hold and Fire, Fire and Keep Distance, and Fire all need a target. See also battle orders.

Squad orders

• None leaves the squad to the computer, which decides what is best.
• Attack engages the enemy in melee.
• Fire makes archers and other missile troops keep shooting at the chosen target until their ammunition runs out.
• Guard commander gathers the squad around its commander to protect him or her. Ranged troops on this order fire only when an enemy gets close.
• Hold and attack keeps the squad in place for two turns, firing if it has missile weapons, and then sends it into melee.
• Hold and fire keeps the squad in place for two turns, then has it fire or move up to get within range.
• Fire and keep distance has missile troops fire until the target closes in, then back away to a safe range and carry on firing.
• Retreat takes the squad off the field. This is treated as a rout, and the units can scatter into neighbouring provinces.

The manual answers the obvious question: there is no order to sit and defend indefinitely. Hold and Attack waits two rounds, then attacks.

Target choices

A target order says whom the squad goes for. With no preference, it picks a random enemy and that enemy’s squad. The other choices are archers, cavalry or other fast units, fliers, large monsters, the closest enemy squad, and the rearmost enemy. Large monsters means size 7 or more; if none exists, a size 6 unit counts. Whatever the order, a squad can fail to reach its target if an enemy’s zone of control holds it up on the way.

Commander orders

A commander can be scripted too. Specific orders last for one turn, and you can script up to five of them in a row. General orders then govern the commander for the rest of the fight. A commander with no orders is handed to the computer.

Specific orders:

• Hold for one turn.
• Hold, but shoot if the commander carries a missile weapon.
• Hold, but cast if able, with the computer choosing the spell. Spellcasters only.
• Cast a specific spell. The commander casts your chosen spell if there are enough gems and a valid target in range. If either condition fails, the computer picks a spell.
• Attack for one turn: move toward a random enemy and engage in melee if possible.
• Fly attack for one turn: the same, in the air. The commander must be able to fly.

General orders:

• Stay behind troops: cast spells and fire missiles from the rearmost part of the army.
• Attack: move to engage in melee.
• Cast spells: cast spells chosen by the computer.
• Advance and cast spells: move close to the front and cast, casting some spells on the way if possible.
• Retreat: try to rout off the map.

Ticking “conservative gem use” makes a mage spend gems as sparingly as possible and only on scripted spells, which is useful for saving gems for later battles. A scripted order can be repeated by clicking the x. A script can be copied between commanders: hold the mouse over a script and press Ctrl with a digit to store it under that number, then point at another commander’s order text and press the same digit. The digits 0 to 9 give ten stored scripts.

Bodyguards and assassins

A squad given the Guard commander order is how you assign bodyguard troops. Besides protecting the commander in an ordinary battle, these troops matter when someone tries to assassinate the commander. The Assassinate order fights the assassin against the target commander, any guards and any townsfolk who happen to be nearby. Bodyguards assigned to the victim each have a 50 percent chance of being present. The Bodyguard ability raises that chance, and the assassin’s patience lowers it. The victim is caught unprepared and follows none of his scripted orders. In a siege, assassination cannot cross the walls in either direction. Some items also carry a Bodyguard Limit bonus; the Crown of Command, for one, lists +5.

Commander equipment

A commander has inventory slots for equipment. In a province with a laboratory, clicking an empty slot takes you to the nation’s magic item inventory. Not every unit has every slot: a non-human commander may lack a head slot or feet. A mounted commander’s foot slot is disabled while mounted but works again if he is dismounted, and a mount has a barding slot. Items can grant a long list of benefits. A better item improves a unit, but the unit’s standard gear cannot be removed, and returns when the new item is taken off. Commanders can also carry magic gems for their spells.

Supply and upkeep

An army costs something to keep even when it is not fighting.

Supply

Each province has a supply rating, which is how many units it can feed. Each unit uses an amount based on its physical size. A province’s supply comes from two places:

• Population. The first 15,000 people give 1 point per 30 inhabitants, and every person after that gives 1 per 60. The Growth and Death scales adjust this first, then the Heat and Cold scales.
• Forts. Within four provinces of a fortress, add (the fortress’s Administration x 6) divided by (distance + 1). Only the best fortress counts.

The manual works through a province of 21,000 people with Growth 1 and Heat 3 dominions, three provinces from a castle of Administration 30. It makes 600 supply from population, +20 percent for Growth to 720, -30 percent for Heat leaves 540, and the castle adds 30, for 570.

Starvation

When the units in a province need more than its supply, some of them starve, enough to use about as much as the shortage. A starving unit takes -4 morale in the first month and has a 5 percent chance of falling diseased. If already starving, the chance of disease is 50 percent. Diseased units take damage each month until they die. A suitable survival skill gives a 50 percent chance of being unaffected and a further 50 percent of not catching the disease. Starvation stops once supply covers the units again, but the disease stays. Because battles come earlier in the turn than the supply check, an army that first goes without supply this turn still fights its battles unaffected.

Upkeep

Nearly every unit costs upkeep every turn, equal to its gold cost divided by 15; the exceptions are most summoned units. Sacred units and slaves pay half that, a gold cost divided by 30. Upkeep is paid after the turn’s income has been collected, in the same step where desertion is applied. The Income button on the treasury lists income and upkeep in full. Provincial defence costs no upkeep.

What the manual leaves open

• It does not say how a unit’s square is chosen beyond “the center of the army” for the garrison squad.
• It does not explain how a squad’s frontage is worked out for line formations, or which squads are placed first when squares run out.
• The manual calls the top four commander orders specific and the bottom four general, yet it lists six specific orders. We take that to be an interface detail, and say nothing more about it.
• Whether a commander on default orders always joins a battle is not covered here.