Frontier Accord

Goal

Defeat every rival player on the selected map. When only one player remains alive, any neutral countries are automatically overrun by the winner before the victory reward screen and fanfare.

Lobby Setup

• The Main Lobby is the front desk. It shows active games, the shared leaderboard, and the Game Instructions button.
• Create Game creates a separate game lobby from the main lobby. The main lobby keeps the shared leaderboard and lists all created games.
• Game Name names the created lobby so other players can find it.
• Private Game requires a password before players or spectators can enter the lobby or view the running game.
• Enter opens an existing game from the main lobby. Private games ask for the password before you can enter.
• Open game lobbies are announced in Discord's looking-for-game channel. The bot keeps the announcement updated with the players currently waiting in that lobby.
• Public waiting lobbies can also appear on the Frontier Accord TV Twitch feed with a direct join link and a compact summary of the game settings. Private lobbies are not promoted on the stream.
• The game creator is the manager. In the game lobby, the manager ticks which connected people are players; unticked people are viewers.
• The manager can change game options, load saves, choose who plays, drag the turn order cards to choose who starts when, and start the campaign. Other connected people wait as players or viewers.
• The game lobby has a 60 minute gathering timer so players have time to join before the manager starts.
• Waiting games such as Accord Bore and Recon Sweep are browser-only distractions inside created lobbies. They give players something to do while the manager gathers everyone and chooses campaign settings.
• Name sets the first local player's name inside a game lobby.
• Add Player adds another human player controlled from the same browser. Added players can be renamed or deleted before the game starts.
• Computer Players sets AI opponents. At least two total players are required, so one human player forces at least one AI.
• Map chooses the battlefield before the campaign starts. World is the original full map; Europe, Asia, Africa, USA States, United Kingdom Counties, and Luna Sphere focus the same rules on a selected theatre.
• Planet Locations appears for sphere maps and controls how many generated named locations will be available on that planet.
• Computer Skill sets AI difficulty: Easy uses simple attacks, Medium tries to finish continents, Hard moves armies around its empire, Hardest blocks opponents from completing continents, Master adds threat defence, elimination hunting, continent breaking, and expected battle planning without hidden army or dice bonuses, and Grand Master is the highest standard AI tier.
• Demo Mode starts a zero-human campaign where every player is controlled by the computer and connected browsers watch as spectators.
• Neutral Armies controls the random army count placed on unowned countries at game start.
• Start Armies controls how many armies each player receives in their first country.
• Country Cap is the maximum armies allowed in any single country.
• Start Gap spreads starting countries apart by route distance when the map allows it.
• Capture Move controls how many armies automatically move into a country after a successful capture.
• Load Saved Game in the main lobby opens a protected downloaded .FA save as a new game lobby, using the current Game Name and Private Game settings.
• Save files are compressed, encrypted, and authenticated by the server. Edited or plain JSON save files are rejected.
• Saves also carry replay history from the start of the campaign, so a later leaderboard replay can begin at round 1 after a restored game is won.
• Loaded games show every saved player seat in the game lobby, including saved computer players. Human players with matching names can join their seats; when the manager presses Resume Loaded Game, any missing human seats continue as computer players.
• In a loaded game lobby, Claim Player lets the manager or an already-joined browser claim another saved player seat for same-browser play.
• Start Campaign begins the game using the current lobby setup.
• Invite Friends to this game copies a direct lobby link so you can share the current table with friends. Private games still require the room password.
• Table Rules opens optional Accords that human commanders vote on before launch. Rules activate with more than half of human commanders voting for them; if an even number of human commanders splits exactly, the manager's vote decides. Active rules stay locked for that campaign. Accords can delay human-vs-human attacks, protect starting countries, avoid boxed-in island-chain human starts, enable Spies, enable ICBMs, enable Airforce, switch Grand Master elimination loyalty into spoils mode, limit ICBMs to AI-held targets, or force AI Fast mode. Strategic rules include dropdowns for deployment cost and how many reserve armies can be added per turn.
• Anyone entering after a campaign has started joins as a viewer. Viewers see the map and full game log, but do not receive game controls or game chat.

Leaderboard

• The lobby leaderboard records the top 100 winning campaigns on this host and ranks them by Accord Score.
• Click a leaderboard entry with a replay to watch the recorded game from the start. Ranked replays stream the full campaign battle by battle; the host keeps replay files for the top 100 leaderboard games.
• The lobby preview and Frontier Accord TV feature public live games first. When no public game is active, they rotate between Hall of Accord replays and the computer demo.
• Frontier Accord TV runs regular field briefings that explain reserves, deployment, attacks, battle odds, captures, continent control, and army movement for viewers.
• Replay links can be shared directly, and ranked victories are announced in Discord with a final screenshot when Discord announcements are enabled.
• Major campaign moments, including full continent captures and game wins, are posted in Discord's screenshots-and-replays channel with a link back to the game or replay.
• Replay controls let you pause, rewind, fast-forward, slow down, speed up, scrub through the match, and close back to the main lobby. Battle explosions show where replay clashes are happening; the Zoom checkbox controls whether the replay camera follows those battles automatically.
• Accord Score rewards harder AI, more opponents, human opponents, captures, player eliminations, completed continents, armies defeated, and the largest captured army stack.
• Accord Score subtracts for turns taken, battle time, and armies lost, so a fast Easy win will not automatically outrank a hard-fought Grand Master victory.
• Demo Mode games are not ranked, so computer-only showcases will not fill the human leaderboard.

Map Controls

• Click a country to select it. The whole country is clickable, and very small countries have a larger invisible click area.
• Country borders show political leaning in the colour of the player that country favours most; stronger leanings are brighter and thicker.
• French Guiana is a separate South American country; it does not create an attack route directly into France.
• Use the mouse wheel to zoom. Drag the map or use arrow keys to pan while zoomed in.
• On mobile, use two fingers to zoom and one finger to drag the map around.
• After you press End Turn, the map follows the active turn and battles. If you manually pan or zoom, follow stays off until one of your local players presses End Turn again. The Zoom checkbox turns this automatic following on or off in live games and replays.
• When one player controls every country in a continent, the continent receives an outside border highlight in that player's colour.
• The right-hand country list shows every country grouped by continent.

Turn Flow

• When your turn begins, new armies are added to your reserve. You can spend them now or stockpile them for later.
• Your draft increases by 1 for every 2 countries you own. If you own an entire continent, you gain another 1 draft for every 4 countries in that continent.
• The top bar shows Reserve, Countries, Round, Country Cap, turn Clock, total Battle time, and the active Turn player.
• The turn clock counts down. If a human player runs out of time, their turn ends automatically.
• Pause freezes battles, AI turns, the turn clock, and the battle clock until a human player resumes.
• AI Fast speeds up computer-player turns and battles once every living human player has opted in. The button turns gold while waiting for more votes and green when active; hover over it to see who has opted in and who is still waiting.
• Fast UI speeds up your own manual battles. It runs fastest while the attacking country has a large army stack, then gradually slows toward normal speed once the attacker drops near 10 armies so you can still stop before falling to one army.

Action Buttons

• Deploy sets the normal desktop selection mode for choosing your countries and reinforcing them.
• Attack sets desktop attack mode. Select one of your countries, then click a neighboring enemy or neutral country to attack.
• Fortify sets desktop movement mode. Select one of your countries, then click a neighboring country you own to move armies.
• Route March moves armies over a longer owned route on desktop. Select the source country, press Route March, then click an owned destination connected through your own countries.
• Reinforce opens a dialog asking how many reserve armies to place in the selected country.
• Stop Battle stops your current battle after the current clash resolves. You can also right-click the map during one of your battles to stop it quickly.
• Save Game asks the server to create a compressed encrypted .FA save of the current game, then downloads it to your browser so it can be loaded later.
• Surrender removes you from the game and turns your countries neutral.
• End Turn passes play to the next living player.
• If surrender or battle leaves only one player alive, the remaining neutral countries automatically join the winner and the game ends.

Strategic Table Rules

• Spies, ICBMs, and Airforce are optional Table Rules. Spies can be enabled on Hard or above, ICBMs can be enabled on Grand Master, and Airforce can be enabled on any difficulty.
• Each strategic rule has a deployment cost and a per-turn training limit chosen in the lobby before the campaign starts.
• Spy Train moves reserve armies into Spy Training. Once the chosen cost is reached, Release Spy sends a spy cell into enemy territory.
• Released spies move automatically on your turns. You cannot steer them. Each successful infiltration cuts the current holder's country loyalty by up to 45% and then the spy looks for another target on a later turn.
• Players can see when a spy cell is inside one of their countries. A country recovering from spy damage shows a loyalty recovery line in the country details.
• To rebuild loyalty after spy damage, hold the country with at least 10 armies stationed there for 5 of your turns.
• ICBM Build moves reserve armies into the ICBM Pool. Once the chosen cost is reached, select any allowed country and press Launch ICBM.
• An ICBM strike makes the target country neutral, sets it to 10 unaffiliated armies, and resets that country's persuasion to neutral values.
• Airforce Train moves reserve armies into the Airforce Pool. Launching an Airforce attack costs the chosen deployment amount plus the airborne armies you commit to the landing.
• Launch Airforce can target enemy or neutral countries anywhere on the map. Airborne armies fight using the normal loyalty odds, and any surviving attackers land in the captured country.
• Spy Withdraw, ICBM Withdraw, and Airforce Withdraw move stored reserves back into your normal reserve if you need armies urgently.
• When a player is destroyed in Grand Master, their remaining loyalty fractures evenly across surviving factions instead of transferring to the destroyer. The optional Elimination Loyalty Spoils rule changes this: loyalty shifts to the eliminator, except countries held by another survivor with more than 10 armies keep that loyalty locally.

Mobile Controls

• Tap a country to select it. If you have selected one of your countries, tapping an adjacent enemy or neutral country starts an attack.
• During one of your battles, tap a country again to stop the battle after the current clash resolves.
• Double-tap your selected country to reinforce it from your reserve armies.
• Select one of your countries, then double-tap another country you own to move armies there. Neighboring countries open Fortify; farther connected countries open Route March.
• Two-finger pinch zooms in or out. One finger drags the map around.
• On mobile, the Deploy, Attack, Fortify, Route March, Reinforce, and Stop Battle buttons are hidden because those actions are controlled by touch gestures. Save, Surrender, and End Turn move to the top bar near Pause.
• The mobile Continents and Moves buttons open scrollable panels for the country list and the move log, keeping more of the map visible.

Battle Rules

• Each clash removes 1 army from either the attacker or defender.
• The base chance is 50/50. Country ideology compares attacker persuasion against defender loyalty: favorable persuasion makes capture easier, but a country loyal to its holder is harder to take.
• Normal captures do not change a country's loyalty. When a player is destroyed, their remaining loyalty is removed: on Easy, Medium, Hard, Hardest, and Master it transfers to the player who destroyed them; on Grand Master it is evenly distributed across the surviving factions unless Elimination Loyalty Spoils is active. With that rule, the eliminator receives it, but a surviving holder with more than 10 armies in a country keeps that country's eliminated-player loyalty locally. Surrendered loyalty disperses because there is no destroyer.
• Attacking into a continent fully owned by the defender from outside that continent reduces the attacker's win chance by 20%.
• A battle stops automatically if the attacking country reaches 1 army, because at least 1 army must remain behind.
• When the defender reaches 0 armies, the country is captured and the Capture Move amount moves in if possible.
• Battle flashes and sounds mark each hit. The Sound checkbox in the top bar turns battle audio, the victory tune, the generated dynamic music bed, and limited commander voice announcements on or off.

Moving Armies

• Fortify moves armies only between neighboring countries you own. It does not reduce your turn clock.
• Route March can move armies across multiple connected countries you own, as long as every country in the route belongs to you.
• Route March asks how many armies to move, obeys the Country Cap at the destination, and always leaves at least 1 army behind in the source country.
• Route March reduces your remaining turn time by 10 seconds for each country crossing in the route. If that uses the last of your clock, your turn ends after the move.

Shortcuts And Panels

• While in Attack mode, right-click a neighboring country you own to open Fortify quickly, or right-click a farther owned country to open Route March when a continuous owned path exists.
• Route March shows a convoy animation across the chosen path and flashes the moved army count at the destination.
• The right-hand panel changes to the active local player's color when it is their turn.
• The move log records recent turns and battles. The chat box lets connected players talk during the lobby or game.
• Lobby returns everyone to a fresh lobby and ends the current game.