Selecting units and issuing orders

THE MAP CURSOR

When the mouse pointer is over the map you will see a ‘map cursor’ which highlights a particular position on the map. This map cursor is always in one of three states:

Green: There are no units at the cursor position

Yellow: There is a unit you control at the cursor position.

Red: There is an enemy unit at the cursor position.

The map cursor always sits at discreet map positions that are 1 metre apart in the game scale, so you can use the map cursor for counting distances.

SELECTION METHODS

In order to issue orders to a unit you must first select it. Move the cursor over a friendly unit, making sure the map cursor is yellow and press the left mouse button. You cannot select more than one unit at a time.

An arrow above the unit’s head highlights the selected unit. Its name and unit graphic will appear on the unit panel on the bottom left of the screen.

You can use the ‘next unit’ and ‘previous unit’ buttons to the side of the unit’s name to select another unit you control. These buttons cycle selection backwards or forwards between your units. You can also use the ‘TAB’ key to do this.

UNIT ORDERS

Each turn lasts 10 seconds, and each movement and combat order will take some time depending on the unit’s speed and firing rate. If a unit still has orders remaining at the end of 10 seconds, the remaining orders will be ignored. These orders do not carry over to the next turn.

THE UNIT TIME DISPLAY

The estimated time for all orders given to a unit is shown next to the unit graphic on the bottom left panel. You can issue more orders than a unit will have time to do in a turn, so keep an eye on the unit time indicator to avoid issuing unnecessary orders. However, this time is an estimate, and may not accurately reflect what happens in the turn. This is because some orders may fail, such as an order to shoot a unit that has moved into cover before the shooting order started. Therefore it does sometimes make good sense to issue orders which go beyond ten seconds if you think some of these orders may not actually be carried out.

CORRECTING ORDERS

You can delete orders from a selected unit by clicking on the ‘Undo’ button or by pressing the ‘U’ key. Each press will delete the last order given to the unit. You can then issue different orders to the unit if you wish.

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