DEMO 6 · BUILD 20260928.3 · MOBILE CONTROLS
Choose your side and campaign settings.
Eastern FrontKeep your current armies, territory and reinforcement points. Later campaign reinforcement rates, schedules, reserves and objectives activate on their historical start dates. Current forces are retained; new formations from the later starting army arrive at eligible friendly cities without duplicating existing or eliminated formations. Romanian allegiance and Finnish withdrawal change at the Endgame scenario transition.
You can end this game now or keep playing from this position.
A quick guide to commanding your side. Tap or click to give orders; the same rules apply on phone and desktop.
Open Orders → Campaign status to see the objectives and turn limit for your campaign. The attacking side must hold its required cities, connected to rear supply, at the final check. The defending side wins by preventing this. When the attacking side achieves its required supplied objectives early, an End game / Keep playing choice appears. Continue keeps the current position and the original deadline; the same prompt will not repeat in that scenario. During an AI turn, the choice appears when its turn finishes. The defender still needs to deny the objectives until the deadline. Eliminating every enemy formation can end the game early.
One complete turn is one week. Both sides take their phases before the date advances. Campaigns have different numbers of weeks, but the time scale is always the same.
The current phase is shown at the top. Use End reinforcements, End movement, End combat and End armour to continue. You may finish a phase without using every unit. After Armour, the other side plays.
The large number above the map shows your reinforcement points available. Unspent points carry over.
Scheduled reinforcements arrive separately and cannot be undone this way. New and rebuilt units can move and attack this turn when otherwise eligible. Finish with End reinforcements.
Select a counter, then a highlighted destination. Click the selected counter again, or tap an empty unhighlighted area of the map, to deselect it. Each unit moves once in the Movement phase. Undo move reverses the last eligible move.
The three counter values are attack – defence – movement. Use the printed movement value: terrain, rivers, weather and isolation affect the distance you can travel. Two friendly units may share a hex. In a stack, click the upper or lower counter row to choose that unit; Orders shows its full name.
Enemy zone of control: the six hexes next to an enemy unit. Entering one ends movement. You cannot move directly from one enemy-controlled hex to another unless the destination contains a friendly unit. Clear gaps can be used to break through, but an unsupported advance may become isolated.
Soviet rail travel: eligible railway destinations appear automatically during Movement—there is no rail button. A supplied unit starting on Soviet-controlled track outside enemy control can travel up to 6 connected railway hexes. Enemy units and enemy zones of control block the route. Rail travel replaces its normal move and prevents combat and the later Armour move that turn. If both a normal route and a railway route reach your chosen hex, the game uses the normal route.
On iPhone, a floating Attack button appears near the bottom of the visible screen when a valid attack is selected. It shows the odds and stays with the screen while you zoom or pan.
Odds are attacker : defender. 3:1 favours you; 1:1 is even; 1:2 favours the defender. Higher odds improve your prospects, but a die roll decides the result. Each unit can attack once per Combat phase. All nationalities can attack when eligible; rail travel and national movement restrictions still apply.
The result box explains losses and retreats. If the defender's hex becomes empty, surviving eligible attackers are highlighted. Advance is optional: select an attacker, then the vacated hex. Click the selected attacker again to decline, or end Combat to skip the advance. A second defender still occupying the hex prevents an advance.
After Combat, German panzer units may move again. From 1943, Soviet tank and mechanised units can do so too. They must be supplied, must not have travelled by rail and must start outside enemy zones of control.
This phase allows up to 2 movement points, using terrain costs and any applicable movement reductions. Entering enemy control ends the move. There is no second attack. Select an eligible counter and destination, then press End armour to hand over.
Units have two strength steps: full → half → destroyed. Damaged counters become paler and show ½. Their printed attack and defence are halved and rounded down, except Finnish defence, which is 3 at half strength; printed movement stays the same. High-odds combat can destroy a full-strength defender in one attack.
Supply is checked automatically. A captured city only helps if it remains connected to a rear supply source. Isolated units fight and move less effectively, cannot be restored and lose a strength step at the start of their own turn. Protect the route behind your advance.
The combat-table bands are 1:2, 3:4, 1:1, 3:2, 2:1, 3:1, 4:1 and 5:1. Intermediate strengths use the lower band; more extreme odds use the end columns. The displayed odds already include combat modifiers.
Forest and marsh multiply defence by 1.5, cities by 1.75 and mountains by 2. An attacker crossing a river contributes 75% of its attack. Isolated formations fight at 75% strength before rounding.
Panzer/tank units within three hexes of an enemy, but with no other friendly infantry or mechanised unit within two hexes, attack at 75% strength. If they also start in enemy control, their movement allowance is capped at 2.
Most loss results remove one step from the defender, one attacking formation, or both. At 4:1, rolls of 5–6 destroy the defender outright; at 5:1, rolls of 4–6 do so. A blocked retreat can cause a step loss if that formation has not already lost a step in the battle.
In the 1941 campaign, German formations have +25% attack on turns 1–2. It applies only to their contribution in a combined attack. Selected Waffen-SS formations have +1 attack and +1 defence built into their ratings; this is a game bonus, not a universal historical claim.
Clear, steppe and city hexes cost 1 movement point; forest costs 2; marsh and mountain cost 3. Crossing a river costs 1 extra. Water, enemy-occupied hexes, full friendly stacks and prohibited national areas cannot be entered.
During normal Movement, a unit that cannot afford the terrain cost may still enter one otherwise legal adjacent hex and stop. This exception does not apply in Armour.
October–November and March–April bring mud, which halves normal movement, rounding up. December–February bring snow, normally subtracting 2 movement points while retaining at least 2. December 1941 uses severe winter: Axis movement is halved with a minimum of 2; Soviet movement loses 1 with a minimum of 3. Weather never raises an allowance already reduced by other penalties. Rail travel retains its 6-hex limit. Weather does not directly alter the combat table.
Supply traces up to 11 land hexes in 1941, or 20 in later scenarios, to a friendly city connected to a rear source. Enemy units and empty enemy-controlled hexes block it. Rear sources include Axis home cities or rear map edges, plus special port supply for the 1943 Kuban bridgehead and 1945 Courland; Soviet rear supply comes from the eastern edge.
In the 1941 scenario, Soviet infantry with a defence rating of 4 is increased to 5. This adjustment ends when continued play enters the 1942 scenario.
In 1941 the Soviets earn 3 points each week in weeks 1–19, then 52 points distributed across weeks 20–28: 109 earned points, plus 3 starting points. Scheduled formations are additional.
Axis income uses the pre-increase rates. In 1941 this is 2 points per week: 56 earned points plus 2 starting points. The pool is shared by Germany and its allies.
Points are shared by each side. Soviet mobilisation in 1941 is weighted towards the later weeks; additional Soviet formations arrive in November 1941 and November 1942. Scheduled arrivals and free operational reserves are separate from point-funded recruitment. If no eligible arrival city is available, arrival waits. Buying an available scheduled formation early prevents a duplicate free arrival later.
Axis recruitment uses German reserves in German recruitment areas and occupied Soviet cities, Romanian reserves in Romania and Finnish reserves in Finland. Rebuilding follows the formation's recruitment nationality. Restoring a unit never changes its nationality.
Scenario participation: Italian, Spanish and Finnish forces appear in 1941–44; Hungarians appear in all five campaigns. Romania is Axis through 1944 and Soviet-aligned in Endgame. In 1941 the Italians arrive in August and the Spanish Blue Division in October. Polish, Czechoslovak and Bulgarian formations join the Soviet side later in 1944.
All Finnish formations have a full-strength defence rating of 5, displayed as 3 at half strength. Their attack and movement are unchanged. In 1941 Finland starts with II, IV, VI and VII Corps; the 14th Division remains available to recruit for 3 points in an eligible Finnish city. Restore damaged Finnish units for 1 point, or rebuild eliminated formations for 3 points from the shared Axis pool. VII Corps is represented under Woldemar Hägglund; Finnish Heritage Agency commander reference.
Finnish operations are normally restricted to north of 60°N and west of 35.5°E. The setup option allows operations beyond that area. Neutral countries remain closed.
Historical simplifications: Italian and Spanish participation in later campaigns is a requested alternate-history option; their major historical withdrawals happened earlier. Romania's change of side and Finland's withdrawal occur at the Endgame transition in this game, rather than their actual 1944 dates. Formations, commanders and positions represent selected reference dates, not a complete order of battle.
The scenario result is recorded at its deadline. Choose Keep playing to retain your armies, casualties, captured territory and unspent points. Weekly play continues.
Later campaign rules activate on the first weekly turn reaching their start dates: 28 June 1942, 5 July 1943, 22 June 1944 and 12 January 1945. Reinforcement rates, schedules, reserve rosters and objectives change. Until then, the current campaign's final weekly reinforcement rate continues.
Additional formations from the next scenario's opening roster arrive at eligible friendly cities. Existing or eliminated formations are not duplicated, and no new starting pool of points is granted. Romanian allegiance and Finnish withdrawal follow the Endgame transition. This is a continuous alternate-history campaign; the armies are not reset to historical positions.
Easy is less consistent and sometimes passes up attacks. Normal uses standard campaign planning. Hard pays more attention to threats, support, favourable attacks and objectives. Difficulty does not change unit ratings, reinforcement points or movement rules.
Soviet AI is defensive in 1941–42, balanced in 1943 and offensive in 1944–45. German/Axis AI is offensive through 1943 and defensive in 1944–45. Defensive AI screens approaches, protects supply and may withdraw under pressure. Balanced behaviour does not use the early-war withdrawal doctrine, but units can still be forced to retreat by combat.
The three values are attack–defence–movement. Infantry uses a crossed rectangle; panzer/tank units use an oval; mechanised units combine infantry and armour markings. Select a counter and open Orders for its full name, commander and current condition. Stacked counters have separate clickable rows.
Values are game ratings for formations of different sizes. A tank division is not directly comparable with an infantry army. Some city garrisons are invented formations added for play balance.
Soviet-side music: Eastern Resolve, an original synthesised instrumental created for this game. No historical song or sampled recording is used.
Campaign march: Preußens Gloria, Piefke; Heeresmusikkorps Koblenz, recorded by Holger Weinandt, 28 August 2011. Source. CC BY-SA 3.0 Germany. Recording unchanged; audio played at reduced volume. The recording retains its original licence.
Menu music: Ride of the Valkyries by Richard Wagner, conducted by Philip Milman, funded by Ludwig and Schlatt, 2022. Recording source · CC BY 3.0. Audio unchanged; played at reduced volume and looped in the menu.
Campaign rosters and historical references
Commanders and portrait credits
1941/42 railway maps and routes