Soldiers and Squad Roles: Work, Status, and Field Commands

The same population can appear in colony work, management, and first-person field command, but those views answer different questions. A soldier’s best work attribute does not automatically define a combat class, and a useful field unit can still leave a critical colony job uncovered.

Separate the three decisions

Colony work

Choose by the visible attributes: mining, logging, gathering, production, construction, research, cooking, planting, breeding, and carry load.

Long-term status

Inspect age, Aged status, relationships, loyalty/fear context, captivity or conversion state, and any other visible condition that changes reliability.

Field role

Choose by weapon behavior, survivability, position, command response, and the specific expedition threat.

Decision	Main input	Do not substitute
Work assignment	Aptitude plus colony need	Weapon appearance
Status response	Current state and colony context	Raw work score
Field role	Equipment, commands, encounter	Best colony job alone

Build a squad without breaking the colony

List the work each candidate currently performs.
Identify jobs with no substitute, especially food, hauling, research, and a chain needed for ammunition or equipment.
Move field candidates only after arranging coverage.
Choose weapons whose ranges and modes create distinct useful positions.
Set a return condition that protects both the squad and the unattended colony.

This is where Jobs and Production and Getting Started meet the combat loop.

Field command cues

Current field material shows multiple soldiers following the player and a command interface for organizing movement. Use commands to solve concrete problems:

Travel: keep the group together without trapping everyone in one line.
Approach: stop followers from entering a mine, projectile lane, or boss space before you read it.
Engagement: spread roles so one attack does not punish the entire squad.
Withdrawal: preserve a route and call the group before the player is the only unit leaving.

Current field command view with several soldiers

Aging is a planning signal

The current game includes an Aged status and lifespan-related change. That means a staffing plan should not rely permanently on one exceptional worker or fighter. Build redundancy before the status creates an emergency.

For each critical person, name:

the job or field role they cover;
the next-best substitute;
the cost of moving that substitute;
whether research, policy, reproduction, recruitment, or prisoner conversion can improve the replacement pipeline.

This is workforce continuity, not a hidden-stat formula.

Squad-role checklist by encounter

Encounter	Squad question
Dense projectiles	Can the group spread and withdraw without crossing lanes?
Mines or area denial	Can followers be held before entering the hazard?
Weak-point target	Which weapon and position can sustain accurate fire?
Capture attempt	Who can control surrounding threats while damage stops on the target?
Overlord	Does any planned control effect explicitly fail on this target?

No launch-day class tier list

The current material does not expose a complete, stable soldier-class catalogue with comparable inputs. This page therefore does not rank classes or declare a best unit. It gives a workflow for the information visible now.

Continue to Citizens for population signals, Prisoners for recruitment inputs, or Enemies and Sector Overlords for the threat the squad must solve.