As your battle starts, you will first choose what ships to buy, and where to place them on the map.

 When learning the game (or if you want to get to the action quickly), you can let the computer automatically buy your forces for you.  Otherwise the game will help you create a plan of what nearby cities to conquer, and with what ships.  You can customize how this menu works, choosing between five different views to suit your exact preferred style of buying units.

The more cities you can reach and control with your ships, the more victory points you will earn. Beware nearby enemy owned cities where his ships may fight yours for control of that area.

During setup you can also make customized Flagships using special points you have won from previous battles.  These Flagships are much tougher than normal ships, have a variety of unique abilities, and give you an edge in tight fights.  Complete special missions to earn these command points even more quickly.

Special abilities include:

• Neutralizing nearby enemy cities to deny their Victory Point value to the enemy.
• Repairing nearby friendly units, or even building new units for your side from time to time.
• And better regular abilities such as moving faster, spotting enemy units further out than normal, being tougher to kill, and more.
• Many other abilities that you can discover over time when you purchase LAR and progress through battles.