Controls & commands
TORRENT is built for commanding hundreds of units with a light touch. Per-unit orders are deliberately minimal — there are no activatable abilities to babysit — so all the depth is in composition, positioning, and the quality-of-life commands below, which are day-one features, not stretch goals.
Keybinds
The inputs listed here are the ones fixed by design (shift-queueing, drag-to-line, mouse-wheel zoom, control groups 0–9, double-click select). Specific letter keys for individual orders are conventional RTS defaults and remain assignable/final-tuning while the prototype develops.
Orders
The full order set. Every order can be queued (see shift-queueing below).
| Order | Input | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Move | Right-click ground | Move to a point. Units path there as a group via shared flow-fields. |
| Attack | Right-click target | Attack a specific unit or structure until it's destroyed. |
| Attack-move | A + click | Advance toward a point, engaging anything encountered on the way. |
| Patrol | P + click(s) | Loop between waypoints, attacking and (for constructors) reclaiming/repairing en route. |
| Fight | F + click | Attack-move that also reclaims wreckage and repairs allies along the path. The constructor's favorite order. |
| Guard / Assist | G + click target | Follow and support a unit — repair it, or add build power to whatever it's building. |
| Hold position | H | Stay put; fire on anything in range without chasing. |
| Reclaim | E + click / drag | Stream a target (wreck, tree, rock, structure) back into resources. See reclaim. |
| Repair | Click damaged ally | Constructors restore health by spending metal and energy. |
Stances
Stances set how units behave on their own, without new orders. They come in two independent pairs/triples:
| Stance group | Options | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Fire discipline | Fire-at-will / Return-fire / Hold-fire | Whether units shoot anything in range, only shoot back when hit, or never fire until ordered (useful for ambushes and to keep artillery from revealing itself). |
| Movement | Roam / Maneuver / Hold-ground | How far a unit will move on its own to acquire targets — chase freely, reposition modestly, or never leave its spot. |
Targeting itself is automatic: units auto-acquire by a threat-and-proximity heuristic, rescanning a few times per second. You choose the composition and the stance; the units handle who to shoot.
Quality-of-life commands
These are the commands that make commanding an army of hundreds feel like commanding one thing. All are core, day-one features.
| Command | Input | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Shift-queue | Hold Shift | Chain any orders into a queue — move here, then attack there, then patrol. Works for everything, including build orders. |
| Line-move | Drag a move order | Drag to paint a formation line; units spread along it in formation instead of piling on one point. |
| Area reclaim | Reclaim + drag a circle | Reclaim everything inside an area — the fast way to eat a wreckage field after a battle. |
| Area repair | Repair + drag a circle | Repair every damaged ally in an area. |
| Area patrol | Patrol + drag a circle | Constructors patrol an area, auto-reclaiming and repairing within it — set-and-forget economy upkeep. |
| Factory rally point | Right-click from factory | Send freshly built units to a point, with multi-waypoint routes. |
| Factory build queue | Shift-click build items | Queue a production list, with a repeat mode that loops the queue forever. |
| Control groups | Ctrl + 0–9 / 0–9 | Bind a selection to a number key, then recall it instantly. Ten groups. |
| Select all of type | Double-click a unit | Select every unit of that type currently on screen. |
| Strategic zoom | Mouse wheel | One continuous camera from close tactical view to whole-map icon view — no separate minimap mode. |
Build-order aids
Construction has its own set of guides so you place things right the first time:
- Ghost previews — constructors show a translucent ghost of what they'll build before you commit.
- Queued buildings render as ghosts on the map, so you can see your whole planned base at a glance.
- Illegal placements show in red — off a metal spot, blocked by terrain or other buildings.
- Drag-to-line — drag while placing walls or solar farms to lay a whole row in one motion.
Unit toggles
There are no activatable abilities on regular units — no spells to time, no cooldowns to track. The only exceptions are three simple toggles:
- Cloak — on units that have it (notably the Commander). Cloaking costs energy continuously and has decloak-radius rules when moving.
- Shield — on shield units like the Vantage Aegis. Toggling the projectile-stopping dome on draws heavy energy.
- Self-destruct — deliberately destroy a unit (it still leaves reclaimable wreckage; a crawling bomb's whole purpose).
Everything else — every counter, every clever play — comes from what you build, where you put it, and how your economy is flowing.
Reading the battle
The interface is built so you can read a 200-unit fight in a second:
- Player color tints every unit; faction determines the silhouette family (angular Vantage vs rounded Feral).
- Past ~40% zoom-out, sprites become strategic icons — shape encodes role, color encodes player, and a ring shows health.
- Projectiles and explosions always render, even at full icon zoom, so the battle stays alive-looking from orbit.
- The two resource bars sit at the top of the screen at all times, color-pulsing when you stall or overflow. They're the two most important elements in the UI — see the economy guide.