Guide To Army Commanders In Civilization 7

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Every Unique Army Commander

Army Commanders are a brand-new unit in Civilization 7. They completely change how combat works in the game compared to previous entries in the series. They are the only unit that can receive promotions – regular units no longer receive promotions – and exist between ages, the only unit to do so.

Civ 7 Launch Pad, horses, unique buildings and districts.

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As a result, they are one of the most important and powerful units in the game. They allow for quick movement across the map, provide important combat buffs, and can even be utilized for buffing your city’s district output. This guide covers every facet of Army Commanders to help you optimize your empire.

Army Commanders Overview

Here’s a brief overview of what Army Commanders are, and how they work.

Army Commanders Exist Across Ages

Army Commanders are the only unit in the game that exists across multiple ages. For example, if you have two or three commanders during the Antiquity Age, they will reappear during the Exploration Age.

They retain promotions and experience gained across ages as well.

Commanders gain experience via units attacking, killing enemy units, and clearing independent powers or conquering settlements, within the commander’s Command Radius.

The Command Radius is indicated by the white tiles surrounding your commander. At the default level, commanders have a one tile radius.

Deploying And Assembling Armies

One of the key functions of Army Commanders is their ability to stack multiple units into one tile. At their base level, commanders can stack four additional units into a single tile – this cuts down on micromanagement and allows you to utilize the commander’s movement buffs if you’ve gone down the Maneuver promotion tree.

Focus Fire And Coordinated Attack

Army Commanders have special abilities that allow you to either Focus Fire with the ranged units within the command radius, or lead a Coordinated attack with your Infantry and Cavalry units.

Commanders can’t deal damage themselves, but they do have a combat stat and can resist some attacks from enemy units. They are precious, however, because they retain upgrades between eras – keep them safe if you can!

This provides a flat +2 combat strength for units when using this ability. This might not seem like a lot, but bonuses stack in Civilization 7, and this might provide the small advantage you need to be victorious.

Unit placement and movement is more important than ever in Civilization 7 because of the addition of Army Commanders. They allow for a lot more skill expression than in previous games, and it might take a while to get used to using these powerful new unique units.

Reinforcement And Recovery Time

One of the most powerful functions of Army Commanders is the Reinforce ability. This allows you to quickly transport units to an Army Commander even if they are many tiles away.

A unit just needs to be further than six tiles from the Commander and have full movement speed.

The speed at which units appear in your Army Commander’s stack depends on Recovery Time – this is determined by distance to the commander and whether you have any Recovery Time promotions.

Reinforce cuts down on unit micromanagement significantly. You no longer need to move your soldiers manually across vast distances. This becomes even easier with the addition of Railroads in the Modern Age.

There are five promotion trees for commanders: Bastion, Assault, Logistic, Maneuver, and Leadership.

Bastion Tree

The Bastion tree is all about fortification and defense.

The Bulwark promotion, for example, allows units to construct fortifications a turn faster. The Garrison promotion provides extra HP to fortified districts in a city when the commander is stationed there.

Getting hassled by aggressive AI, but you want to try and play a more peaceful game? The Bastion tree can help you defend cities against much more powerful opponents.

Assault Tree

The Assault tree is all about aggressive play, providing plenty of buffs for units that attack within the commander’s radius.

The first promotion, Initiative, allows units to move immediately after being Unpacked by the commander, allowing you to swiftly move your units and start attacking.
The other promotions provide flat combat strength when attacking.
Its final promotion, Advancement, provides Infantry and Cavalry with the First Strike ability, which provides extra combat health when at full health.

The Assault tree is great for aggressive military players, because it will allow you the element of surprise when moving units forwards. It works great when paired with the Maneuver tree, as you can swiftly move into position and deploy your units ready to attack.

Logistics Tree

The Logistics tree provides a nice balance between city utility and some interesting mechanics, like allowing units to attack through terrain.

Quartermaster, one of its first unlocks, provides +1 gold for every unit assembled on the commander. Combined with the Regiments promotion, which allows for an extra two units on the commander, you can turn your armies into gold generators.
The final promotion, Survival Training, grants units the Commando Ability, which means they can ignore terrain – like cliffs – when attacking and moving. All terrain combat bonuses, like attacking from height, are doubled.

The Logistics tree can be extremely powerful in certain situations, especially if you’re attacking an enemy army or settlement that has tricky terrain.

Maneuver Tree

The Maneuver tree is about providing your armies with movement bonuses, while also restricting the movement of your opponent’s troops.

The first promotion, Mobility, grants a flat +1 Movement to the army while it has soldiers packed. It also ignores terrain penalties. You can cross a lot of distance with this promotion, and it makes very slow units – like heavy siege equipment – much easier to use.
Redeploy and Harassment both come with flanking bonuses and flanking penalties for your opponents.
The final promotion, Area Denial, creates a zone of control around your army commander’s radius. This restricts enemy movement.

The Maneuver tree is excellent when paired with the Assault tree.

Leadership Tree

Leadership is another versatile choice. You can grab the first promotion, Zeal, to provide a quick five percent buffs to a nearby settlement if the commander is stationed on a district.

Field Commission allows you to upgrade units within the Army Commander’s radius of control, as if you were in friendly territory. Units are also healed by 10 HP.
Resilience provides a +50 percent reduction in Commander’s Recovery Time, allowing you to quickly move units around the map.

Commendations

Commendations are powerful unlocks that can be gained by reaching the bottom of any particular promotion tree. There are five possible Commendations: Valor, Duty, Service, Merit, and Order.

You don’t need to complete the entire tree to reach the Commendation Points. You could, if you wanted to, just go down one section of the tree to reach the final upgrade, unlocking the commendation buffs.

Valor

Grants the Army Commander the Second Wind ability, which allows your units to attack twice and restores movement points.

Duty

Grants the commander the Heroic Assault ability, which allows the commander to deal direct damage to a unit within the command radius.

Service

Provides one extra movement point for land units within the command radius.

Merit

Provides an extra one tile radius for the command radius.

Order

Provides five extra combat strength for land units within the combat radius.

You can earn multiple Commendations by completing multiple skill trees.

Every Unique Army Commander

Benjamin Franklin in his First Look trailer for Civilization 7.

Some civiliations provide a unique Army Commander unit, across the Antiquity, Exploration, and Modern Age.

Legatus

This is the Roman Antiquity Age’s unique Army Commander. For every three commander levels the unit acquires, you can settle a new settlement. It leans heavily into Rome’s expansionist and militaristic play style.

Noyan

The Noyan is the Mongolian Exploration Age unique commander. It provides a 50 percent flanking bonus to Cavalry units within its command radius. It works very well with the Keshig, the Mongolian’s unique ranged cavalry unit.