Military: train, shield, fight and rally in Vanguard

The Military page in Vanguard keeps your troops trained and healed, protects your city when it is attacked, fights barbarians and forts, jumps alliance rallies across multiple cities, and teleports your city to a spot you pick. Every card has a switch, Run now, Settings ▾, an Advanced fold and Test run — sends nothing, the same as on Chores.

Speed-ups only ever come from your bag. The daily limits on Settings (Most speed-up items used per day and Most speed-up time used per day) cap training, healing, building and research together. See Settings.

Train troops

Collects finished troops and trains the troop type and amount you pick for each building. In Settings ▾ each training building has its own line:

A troop picker. Leave it on the default to keep training what that building trained last.
troops each time: how many troops to train per batch.
A switch that turns that building on or off.

If no buildings are listed, attach to the game (or train something once by hand) so Vanguard can see them.

Setting	What it means
Use speed-ups	Uses training speed-ups from your bag.
Also use universal speed-ups	Uses universal speed-ups too.
Check every	How often Vanguard looks.

Heal troops

Collects the hospital and heals wounded troops each pass. The card shows how many troops are wounded right now and how many speed-ups you own.

Setting	What it means
Troops to heal each time	0 = every wounded troop. Highest tier first.
Use speed-ups / Also use universal speed-ups	Uses healing or universal speed-ups from your bag.
Ask the alliance for help	Asks your alliance for help once on every heal, with or without speed-ups. On by default.
Wait for max alliance helps first	Only uses speed-ups once every alliance help is in, however long that takes.
Check every	How often Vanguard looks.

Auto shield

Puts a shield up from your bag only when your city is attacked. It never buys a shield and never brings your own marches home. The card shows whether a shield is on and which shields you own.

Setting	What it means
When your city is under attack, put the shield up	As soon as the attack is detected, or When hospital space left drops to the % below.
Hospital space left	Only used with the hospital choice. The hospital fills only while your city is fighting, and the game won’t allow a shield mid-fight, so this works between attack waves.
Shield to use	8 hours, 12 hours, 24 hours, 3 days or 30 days.
Send allied reinforcements home if they stop the shield	If allies reinforcing your city block the shield, Vanguard sends them home and tries again.

Hunt barbarians

Hunts barbarians with the marches you pick. How the marches hunt offers two ways:

Group: all marches hit one barbarian together (the default). Every march gathers next to the target, all attack together, and nobody moves on until every fight is over.
Chain: each march drags its own pack together. Each march attacks a barbarian, then walks on to the next one so the barbarians it fights follow it. Once the pack is big enough, the march stands and fights them all at once, so one area skill hits the whole pack. Best with commanders whose skill hits in a circle. Marches never share a barbarian.

Marches in the group: tick the marches to use, then tap a march number to set it up with a commander, a supporter (or Auto-select), troop types (none picked = any except siege, best tier first) and troops (0 = 50,000).

Setting	What it means
Hunt	Barbarians, or Marauders (event). With marauders the level range is ignored.
How the marches hunt	Group or Chain, as described above.
Barbarians each march drags together (chain)	Chain only. 3 by default. A bigger pack kills faster, but every barbarian in it hits the march too, so weak marches go home sooner.
How far a barbarian follows from its spawn (chain)	Chain only. In tiles, 6 by default. The next barbarian must stand within this distance of where each barbarian in the pack spawned.
Lowest barbarian level / Highest barbarian level	The level range to attack.
Search radius from your city	0 = any distance.
Send a march home when its troops fall below	A % of the troops it left with. A fresh march takes its place. 0 = never.
Barbarians to kill	Each march that hits the chosen barbarian counts 1. Starts at 0 every hunt. 0 = no limit.
Use action point items	Uses action point items from your bag.
Most action points from items per day	Counted by size: 50, 100, 500 or 1,000 per item, smallest first. Starts again at the daily reset. 0 = no limit.
Go out (and go out again after running out) when action points reach	0 = enough for one attack. To wait for a full bar, type your most action points.

Never spend action points on Settings blocks barbarian hunting.

Fort rallies

Joins your alliance’s barbarian-fort rallies, led by your strongest Peacekeeping commander. It never rallies against players and only sends the troop types the rally leader asks for.

Setting	What it means
Join rallies on	Barbarian forts, Marauder encampments (event) or Both.
Most rallies to be in at once	How many rallies you join at the same time.
Troops sent into each rally	Troops per march.
Furthest rally leader from your city	In tiles. 1 tile = one step of the X/Y numbers the game shows on the map.
Skip a rally that already has	Players already in it, the leader included. 0 = never skip.
Check every	How often Vanguard looks.

Start fort rallies

Starts a 5-minute rally on the nearest barbarian fort in your level range, one at a time.

Setting	What it means
Rally	Barbarian forts, or Marauder encampments (event). With encampments the level range is ignored.
Lowest fort level / Highest fort level	The level range.
Furthest fort from your city	In tiles. 1 tile = one step of the X/Y numbers the game shows on the map.
Troops leading the rally	Troops in your leading march.
Most players in your rally	If more join, the last ones to join are sent home. 0 = no limit.
Use action point items when short	Smallest item first, one at a time, only until the rally can start.
Most action point items per rally	The cap on items per rally.
Troop types	None picked = any except siege, best tier first.
Commander pairs	Press + add pair. The first idle pair leads. None = the strongest idle pair that is not a gathering pair.

Rally rush

When a captain you name opens an alliance rally, Rally rush switches through the cities you tick, teleports next to the captain if needed (optional, never gems), and joins with as many troops as the rally has room for. It works in classic Vanguard (PC client or emulator) and in Vanguard Hub. Each march sends T5 troops first, then T4. It never sends T1 to T3, so a march can go in under its maximum when the city is short of T4 and T5.

In classic Vanguard every city switch reloads the game, which can take 30 seconds or more per city. A rally only prepares for a few minutes, so tick only a few cities. With too many ticked, the later cities miss the rally. Vanguard Hub switches cities without reloading a game.

Pick a captain and cities

Under Captains to follow, type a governor ID and press Add. The card also shows Rallies this city sees as quick-add buttons for captains whose rallies are currently visible.
Under Cities to send, tick the cities you want to send. The city currently logged in goes first. If none are ticked, only the logged-in city joins. Use the arrows to change the order.

Link your governors on the Governors page so Vanguard knows which cities exist.

Options

Toggle	What it does
Teleport next to the captain when the march would arrive too late	Uses a Territorial or Targeted Teleport from your bag. Never gems.
Free a city that has troops out	Parks marches out on the map in the nearest finished alliance building or the captain’s city, or brings them home when that is nearer, so the city can teleport. A march helping to build always comes home. If no march slot is free, it brings the closest march home.
Also send 1-troop marches	After joining, every free march goes to the rally’s target with 1 troop of your lowest tier and a spare commander, and stays there.

Run it now

Press Rush now to start on the captain’s newest rally immediately, without waiting for the next scheduled check. A chore that is already running stops at its next step and picks up again on its next turn. In Vanguard Hub the overview card for a running account also shows a Rush now button.

Rush prep

When you know a rally rush is coming, press Rush prep on the Rally rush card. One press starts it. Each city ticked under Cities to send calls every march home: gathering marches, garrisons and the build-credits march. A march already in a rally stays there. The account then goes on hold, so nothing marches out again until the rush runs or you press Resume. In Vanguard Hub, a running account’s card also has a Rush prep button. To prep every running account at once, see Rush prep and Post rush.

On hold after a rush

Once a rush starts, the account goes on hold. Rush prep puts it on hold too, with the banner On hold after rush prep. No other chore runs and Vanguard never switches governor. Only the rally watch and Teleport now keep working. A banner at the top of the account page says On hold after rally rush. In Vanguard Hub the account’s card is outlined. Press ▶ Resume on the banner (or on the hub card) when the fight is over. Every chore and governor switching carries on. A rush that joins nothing lifts its own hold. The hold survives a restart.

Settings

Setting	What it means
Check the alliance’s rallies every	How often Vanguard looks.
Most troops each city sends	0 = as many as the rally has room for, up to the biggest march.
Biggest march the game allows	Used only when Vanguard cannot work out the march’s own maximum. 500,000 by default. A march that is still too big is cut down 5% at a time. 0 = no ceiling.

Advanced

Setting	What it means
Wait after switching city	Pause after Vanguard switches to a new city.
A walking march must arrive this early	How many seconds before the rally starts a walking march must be able to arrive.
Spots checked around the captain	How many spots Vanguard checks around the captain’s city for teleports.
Wait for a city’s troops to load	How long to wait after switching before Vanguard expects troops to be visible.
Time to come back for a city whose marches moved	How long before Vanguard revisits a city after it parked or freed marches.

Teleport

Moves the city that is logged in to the X:Y you type, for example after a fight. It uses a Territorial or Targeted Teleport from your bag, never gems. It tries that exact tile first, then the nearest free one.

Type the X and Y coordinates (0 to 1200).
Press Teleport now.

If troops are still walking home, Vanguard waits up to 10 minutes for them. Teleport now also works while the account is on hold after a rally rush. With the loop running, it cuts in at once. To reuse a spot, type a name such as home base and press Save X:Y as a spot. Tap a saved spot to fill in X and Y. Press ✕ next to a spot to forget it.

Military: train, shield, fight and rally in Vanguard

Train troops

Heal troops

Auto shield

Hunt barbarians

Fort rallies

Start fort rallies

Rally rush

Pick a captain and cities

Options

Run it now

Rush prep

On hold after a rush

Settings

Advanced

Teleport

Next steps

Dailies

Staying safe

​Train troops

​Heal troops

​Auto shield

​Hunt barbarians

​Fort rallies

​Start fort rallies

​Rally rush

​Pick a captain and cities

​Options

​Run it now

​Rush prep

​On hold after a rush

​Settings

​Advanced

​Teleport

​Next steps

Dailies

Staying safe

Train troops

Heal troops

Auto shield

Hunt barbarians

Fort rallies

Start fort rallies

Rally rush

Pick a captain and cities

Options

Run it now

Rush prep

On hold after a rush

Settings

Advanced

Teleport

Next steps