Map movement

How armies spend map move points, what terrain and borders cost, how fliers, sailors and stealthy units differ, and how meetings and retreats resolve.

verified 6.37updated 2026-10-02 · Jake10 min read

On the strategic map an army goes from province to province, and how far it gets in one turn depends on three things: the speed of the units, the ground it crosses, and whose province it is entering. This page sets out the rules the manual gives for each of them, then the special cases (rivers, passes, water, stealth) and what happens when armies end a turn in the same place.

Every figure here is one the game’s manual states. We have not re-measured them, so this page reports what Illwinter says the rules are. The last section lists what the manual leaves out.

For what happens once armies meet, see Combat. For the fate of units that lose, see Morale and rout.

Who can move

Only commanders can be given a move order. Troops that have no commander over them stay where they are, and troops that do have one go along with him or her. An army moves at the pace of its slowest member, so mixing fast cavalry with heavy infantry slows all of it. To find the slow units in a squad, the manual says to hover over the squad and press the m key, which selects them for removal.

A unit’s turn allowance is its map move figure, which appears on its card after the label “Map Move” when you right-click it. The figure is a plain budget of points: Map Move 12 means twelve points of terrain cost can be paid in one turn. The manual gives typical values by kind of unit, while noting that each unit has its own exact figure:

• on foot: heavy infantry 8, light infantry 14;
• mounted: light cavalry 20, unicorns 26;
• in the air: slow fliers 14, ordinary fliers 20, fast fliers 26;
• a commander adds 2 to whatever his or her type would have.

Half-steps and costs

Movement is counted in half-steps. Leaving a province is one half-step, priced by the terrain you are leaving. Entering the next is a second half-step, priced by the terrain you are entering. A single move between neighbours therefore pays twice.

For a unit that walks, the manual lists the cost of one half-step by terrain:

• the cheapest ground is plains, at 3;
• forest, waste and sea each cost 5;
• highlands cost 6 and swamp costs 7;
• an ordinary cave costs 4, while the three special caves cost more: 6 for a cave forest or a crystal cave, 7 for a drip cave.

Three things then modify that base figure:

• Entering an enemy province, for a unit without stealth: +4. For a stealthy unit it is +3.
• Snow adds 1.
• A road takes 2 off, but a half-step never drops below 2.

The manual adds that random maps contain no roads. Roads appear only where the author of a custom map put them.

Fliers use a different, much simpler list: most terrain costs 3, caves cost 5, and an enemy province adds 1.

Survival abilities

A unit with a survival ability moves through the matching terrain at 2 less per half-step. The manual names forest, swamp, waste and mountain survival. Forest survival also eases the fungus caves, mountain survival the crystal caves, and swamp survival the drip caves.

Survival matters in a second way. Movement into or out of forest, mountain or swamp is described as affected by these abilities, and mountain survival also lets a unit use a mountain pass, covered below.

An ability only helps if the whole army has it. The manual’s own example is a commander who flies: that does not make his or her troops fly. The exceptions it gives are commanders that grant their troops water breathing, and commanders with sailing, who can carry units that cannot sail.

A worked example

The manual walks through a raid by a commander with Map Move 22 whose knights have Map Move 20. Leaving a plains province costs 3 and entering another costs 3, but with a road each of these is cut to the minimum of 2. Two roaded plains half-steps cost 4 in all. The next border, from a friendly plains province into an enemy plains province, costs 3 to leave and 3 plus 4 to enter, which brings the running total to 14. The following enemy province would take a further 3 plus 4 to leave and enter, 28 in all, so the army stops short and fights where it is.

Rivers and mountain passes

Rivers and mountain passes belong to the border between two provinces, not to either province.

• A river cannot be crossed unless the Cold scales are +1 or higher in the provinces on both sides, which the manual describes as the river being frozen. Flying, floating and swimming units cross without penalty whatever the scales, as do units able to enter water.
• A mountain pass can be crossed when the Heat scales are +1 or higher in the provinces on both sides, meaning the pass is open. Flying and floating units ignore this, as do units with mountain survival.

Water, caves and sailing

Going under the surface is limited to amphibious and aquatic units; a plain walker has no way into a province that lies beneath the waves. Poor amphibians qualify as well, although they are not the same as full amphibians once a fight begins. Either sort crosses rivers freely. Aquatic units have the opposite restriction: dry land is closed to them.

A unit with the sailing ability can pass through water provinces while moving but cannot end the turn in one. Sailing does not by itself let a unit cross a river.

Caves have their own prices in both lists above: 4 to 7 for walkers according to the kind of cave, and 5 for fliers.

Enemy provinces and stealth

Stopping in an enemy province brings combat, unless every unit that enters is stealthy. A stealthy force can even pass through an enemy that has not found it without a fight. The manual says that if one or both forces are undiscovered, no battle takes place.

Sneaking is what a stealthy unit does unless told otherwise. The price of movement is unchanged, but arriving in an enemy province does not draw the unit into combat that turn. To make the move an ordinary one, and so an attack, hold Ctrl as you click the destination. A unit that is already lying hidden in an enemy province may be ordered to attack that same turn.

A stealthy commander only sneaks if every unit under him or her is also stealthy. Otherwise the commander moves normally. Taking the non-stealthy units away later does not turn the order back to sneak on its own.

Whether hidden units are found depends on the hiders’ stealth, how many of them there are, how many are looking, and the strength of the searchers’ patrol. Provinces with at least 15 province defence search automatically each turn. A commander must be on the Patrol order to search. Fast and flying units search better, and so do units with a patrol bonus.

Move, Patrol and Defend into a fortress

A commander ordered to move into a province that holds a fort goes inside it and acts as though ordered to defend the castle. This has a consequence the manual spells out: if one army is patrolling in the province and a second army moves in to help, the second army enters the fort. If an enemy then attacks, only the first army fights, and a defeat there leaves the second army to be besieged. To reinforce an army in the open, or to fight in the province instead of the fort, use the Move and Patrol order.

By contrast, patrollers fight outside the fort, and defenders concede the province and become besieged. Defend, which is the default order, does not reduce unrest and does not search for hidden units.

Who arrives first

Moves are carried out in two waves. Armies bound for a province of their own side go first. Armies bound for enemy territory follow. The practical result is that a reinforcement you send to your own province lands ahead of an invader aimed at the same place, and stands with the garrison against it. Your enemy may have other ways of keeping your army from moving at all.

When two nations both attack a province belonging to a third, one arrives first, and the manual says the choice is random. When three or more sides end the turn in a province, the game works out the order of arrival and fights a series of battles, in which the survivors of each become the defenders of the next. A battle never has more than two sides. Allied armies may share a province, but if allied armies are attacked, the attacker fights each defender in turn, in random order.

If you order a move into an adjacent enemy province while an enemy army ordered a move into yours, the manual says one of three things happens: a battle in their province, a battle in yours, or the two armies pass each other and swap places. It says the result depends on army sizes and terrain.

A move order is checked again when the turn is processed. If it was legal when you gave it but is no longer, for instance because a commander lost his flying boots, the arrow stays but the commander does not move. The arrow itself runs from one province to the other and does not mean the army enters every province it crosses.

Retreats on the map

A retreating force ends up either in a neighbouring province or, when the province has a friendly castle, inside that castle. Every commander is tested for a smart retreat, with a 75 percent chance of passing. If the fight was on the commander’s native terrain, a failed test is followed by a second test at 50 percent. The smart choice is the castle in the same province when there is one; failing that, a random neighbouring province held by the commander’s own side. The not-so-smart choice is any random neighbouring province, hostile ones included. Anything that retreats into an enemy province dies there.

Troops follow their commander if they pass a morale check, with the squad’s morale bonus counted double. Undisciplined units suffer -3, and the skirmish formation penalty also applies. Troops without a leader, or that fail the check, make their own smartness check at only 50 percent, again with the native second chance.

A defender who breaks and runs during a siege battle does not leave the province but withdraws into the depths of the castle. If the defenders won and the unit was smart, it comes back out in the castle afterwards. If they lost, every one of them is killed, and a unit that was not smart is killed either way. Commanders always count as smart, and a unit fighting alone gets an extra 50 percent chance of being smart in this situation.

What the manual does not say

The manual does not state how a road reduction and the enemy-province surcharge combine when both apply, and its example only uses roads in friendly provinces. It does not say how far an army that cannot finish its route gets, only that an order which is illegal when given is refused. It lists no half-step cost for mountains, and does not say what a global enchantment does to movement. It does not say how armour weight or other unit traits change a unit’s map move. Those are left out until a source states them.