The basic movement commands are given from the keyboard or with the mouse. The keypad commands are based upon the keypad layout.
The numbers 1 - 9 indicate directions, except 5 which commands the unit not to move this turn. For example a “6” would command the fighter above to move over the neutral city. Think of it as if the unit were sitting on top of the “5” key. (The keypad is not treated specially: you may use the number keys on the main keyboard interchangeably.)
Important: If a fighter cannot reach any city or carrier to refuel, then most movement commands will not work. The only way it can be moved is using the keypad commands to move it one square at a time. All other commands verify that the movement will leave the fighter (or bomber) within range of a place to refuel. The keypad commands make no such check.
Some modifiers provide shortcuts. The Shift key makes commands apply to every unit of the same type in the square. The shift modifier applies whenever it makes sense. The S (sleep), 1-9 (Keypad) and mouse click commands all support the shift modifier. This makes it very easy to move a whole stack of units.
The Option modifier does different things to different commands. For mouse movement commands the option modifier makes the unit sleep when it gets to its destination. For the 1-9 (Keypad) commands the option modifier makes the unit keep going in the specified direction until something happens. (You may always use the W (wake) command to a cancel previous order.) For example, a land unit will move unit it reaches the sea, or an enemy unit. A sea unit will move until it reaches the edge of the board, land or the enemy. The L (Load) command with the option modifier will order a transport to load armies as long as there are some immediately available. The Option Load command will never cause a transport to wait if no armies are present.
Clicking the mouse on any square adjacent to the current unit will also move it to that square. Clicking on the unit itself and dragging to another square will move the unit to that square, even if this requires more than one turn. Further commands can be given using the Commands menu or from the keyboard.
Some units can carry other units. Moving an army onto a transport or a fighter onto a carrier puts the army or fighter inside the ship where it will be refueled. The army must start from a land square next to a sea square with the transport. In this case the army is allowed to move onto the sea square, since it is really being loaded into the transport. The transport can then take the army to another island, where it can conquer more cities. This is the only way to capture cities that are not on your home island, so transports are very important. You must protect your transports because all armies on a transport will be lost if the enemy destroys the transport at sea.
The second way to load a transport is to move over the units you want to pick up. The only place that both armies and transports can be is in port cities. When a transport moves out of a city it will pick up as many armies as it can carry. When a fighter ends its turn over a sea square, nearby carriers can pick it up simply by moving over it.
You can make a transport stop automatically loading units by giving it the Just Move Transport command (‘J’). The transport will then always leave units behind if they are allowed to be in the current square. The Load or Load Available command will make the transport resume its normal behavior.
