North & South Beginner's Guide: Scoring, Supply and Unit Matchups by the Numbers

How the score really adds up

Every point you own and nobody is contesting adds 1 to your score once per second. The match ends the moment either side reaches 180 or when the three minutes run out. There is no overtime: equal scores at the buzzer are a draw.

Holding one point for the entire match is worth exactly 180, so most games are decided on time. Two points held uncontested reach 180 in 90 seconds, all three in 60.

Capturing runs on a counter. Ground units standing in a point's 2.5-tile circle push it toward their side, and 4 seconds of that turn a neutral point yours. An enemy point has to be pushed back to neutral first, so taking it from them takes 8 seconds. A point stays yours after your troops walk away, and it keeps scoring until an enemy ground unit stands in it. Capture progress also stays where it was if everyone leaves. A unit counts only after its first second on the field.

Supply arithmetic

You start with 5 supply and can store 10. The base rate is one supply every 2.8 seconds. Each point you hold uncontested adds 10% to that, and each point your opponent holds beyond your count adds 60%. A contested point counts for neither side. In the last 60 seconds the base rate doubles, but the point bonuses do not.

Supply earned while you sit at 10 is lost. Each unit type also has its own redeploy timer of its cost plus three seconds: 5 seconds for Sappers and the Drummer, 6 for Infantry Squad and Medic, 7 for Cavalry, Sharpshooter and Artillery Strike, 8 for Field Cannon and Gatling Gun.

• Even, 1 point each: both sides refill at 110%.
• Behind 1 to 2: you refill at 170%, the leader at 120%.
• Behind 0 to 2: you refill at 220%, the leader at 120%, about 1.3 seconds per supply against 2.3.

Your first battle, step by step

The guided First battle uses normal rules on River Crossing and advances only when you do each step. Deploy your troops: tap Infantry Squad and place it below the dashed line. Advance on B: press the B Advance button (W on a keyboard) or tap the B circle. Hold 4 seconds to capture. If your troops take a point on their own before you give an order, the guide skips ahead.

The instructor waits until you own a point, or until 75 seconds pass. Then it sends Infantry Squads and Sappers in turn to B, at most one every 7 seconds and never more than six units on the field, and leaves A and C open. The next prompts ask for a Drummer beside your troops and an Artillery Strike on a group of enemies. The last, Widen the front, asks you to take A and C; the result screen then offers a real match against the Easy AI.

Where to drop units

Your rear zone is everything from seven tiles behind the points back to your edge. Units, but not the Redoubt or Supply Wagon, can also be placed within 3 tiles of a point you hold, as long as it is not contested and no enemy ground unit stands in its circle. That forward drop is the fast answer to a push on a point you own.

A new unit heads for whichever point is closest to where you placed it from left to right; a drop exactly halfway between two goes to B. Q, W and E always mean the left, middle and right point on your own screen. If you place a card before its supply or timer is ready, the game marks that spot and deploys it the instant it can. Only one such reservation exists at a time, a new one replaces it, Esc cancels it, and it is dropped with a message if the spot stops being legal.

The units in numbers

Level 1 figures; each card level adds 10% HP and damage.

• Infantry Squad (3): four riflemen of 190 HP, 44 damage every 1.2 s each, range 4.5. Hits ground and air.
• Cavalry (4): 980 HP, 150 damage every 1.5 s, melee, 2.0 tiles per second (only Sappers, at 2.1, are faster). After running 2.5 tiles its next hit does double.
• Field Cannon (5): 620 HP, a 230-damage shell every 3.5 s with a 1.3-tile blast, range 7, cannot fire inside 2 tiles.
• Sharpshooter (4): 300 HP, 270 damage every 3 s, range 7. Hits ground and air.
• Gatling Gun (5): 760 HP, 24 damage every quarter second, range 5, hits air.
• Sappers (2): two runners of 220 HP that explode for 480 in a 1.2-tile radius.
• Artillery Strike (4): 360 damage in a 2.5-tile radius, one second after you place it, on ground and air.

What decides a fight

Read the thresholds. One shell (230) or one Sharpshooter shot (270) kills a 190-HP rifleman, and an Artillery Strike (360) kills riflemen, Sappers, Drummers and Sharpshooters but leaves a Medic, Cannon or Cavalry standing. A charging Cavalry hit does 300, exactly a level-1 Sharpshooter's HP.

Cavalry within 9 tiles of an enemy ranged ground unit leaves its route and charges the nearest one, and Infantry Squads count as ranged. So a Sharpshooter behind a line of riflemen is not the first thing the horse reaches.

I ran single duels on River Crossing with the game's own simulation, level 1, one setup each. They show tendencies, not guarantees:

• Cavalry against a lone Sharpshooter: Cavalry won in 4.8 s with 440 HP left.
• Cavalry against a Sharpshooter screened by Infantry: the Cavalry died; the Sharpshooter took no damage and three riflemen survived.
• Field Cannon against an Infantry Squad, either side attacking: the Cannon won both times.
• Sappers against an Infantry Squad on a point: one explosion cleared the squad.
• Infantry against Infantry, adding a Drummer: the fight ended 3 s sooner. Adding a Medic instead: all four riflemen survived.

Support units and buildings

The Drummer gives allies within 3.5 tiles +25% speed and +25% damage. The Medic heals every injured ally within 3 tiles for 42 HP each second. Neither follows other units; each walks to its own assigned point, so place them right behind troops heading to the same point. While you hold one of them, the placement preview counts how many allies it would reach.

Buildings go in the rear zone only. The Redoubt (1,050 HP, 85 damage a second, range 6, ground targets) loses health steadily and falls after 40 seconds; from the rear it reaches only the near edge of a point's circle. The Supply Wagon costs 5 and delivers 1 supply every 7 seconds for its 60-second life, up to 8 if nothing destroys it.

Terrain on each map

Roads speed units up by 20%, forest slows them by 25%, fords halve speed and hills cost 15%. Forest cover cuts direct shots from Infantry, Sharpshooters, Gatlings and the Redoubt by 30%, but blasts (shells, bombs, Sappers and Artillery Strike) ignore it.

River Crossing has a two-tile rock in front of B and a strip of forest behind it on each side, with roads running to A and C. On High Ground, ranged units standing on the hill around B get +1 range and +20% damage. In Fortress Siege your own wall runs just in front of the rear zone with only two gates, one between A and B and one between B and C, so units placed in the rear queue through those gates. Dropping units next to points you hold skips the wall.

Reading the three AI levels

Since 2026-10-11, Easy no longer pushes a single point. It acts every 1.5 to 1.9 seconds, skips about a third of those turns, sends units to whichever point has the fewest of its troops and picks unit types at random. Normal acts about twice as often, skips 12% of turns and counters your army half the time. Hard acts every 0.4 to 0.8 seconds, never skips, grabs empty points, counters your main group and reinforces beside points it holds.

Only Hard uses Artillery Strike: when five of your units stand within 2 tiles of one of them, or eight if it has fewer than four units out. No AI level ever builds a Redoubt or a Supply Wagon. In my 100-game AI runs, Hard beat Easy 97 to 3 and Normal 83 to 17.

Practice keeps three stars per map and level on this device: Win, Full control (all three points held uncontested at once, counted even in a loss) and Rout (win with the enemy at half your score or less).

Online, events and friends

A ranked win pays 30 trophies, plus 1 for every 20 the opponent has above you or minus 1 for every 20 below, capped at 10 either way. A loss costs 30 minus that same adjustment. If no player is found within about 12 seconds an AI takes the seat and trophies are halved. Gold is 50 for a win, 25 for a draw and 10 for a loss before Supply Depot and event bonuses.

Events come in three fixed pairs that rotate at midnight Korean time: Supply Surge with Blitz, Standard Battle with Short Operation, and Fortress Battle with King of the Hill. In Short Operation's 90 seconds, reaching 180 means holding two points the whole match, so it nearly always comes down to the clock. Friend matches use a four-digit code or invite link, can be joined as a guest without signing in, and give no gold or trophies.