Evolution Paths — Every Known Unit Promotion

The most underrated line in Command An Army’s official feature list is also the most important for long-term planning: units have evolution paths. A unit is not what it is — it is what it becomes. This page is the running list of every documented chain, updated with verification dates as the community maps the full roster.

Every documented evolution chain

Eleven evolution paths are documented as of October 18, 2026 — the official info channel’s evolution list (with the Flaming Archers extension folded into the Archer row it extends), the two evolutions the UPDATE 3 post added on October 3, 2026 (the Mace’s first chain and a third stage on the Spearman’s), and the chain the UPDATE 5 post announced on October 17, 2026 — the crossbow family’s first documented path:

Four things this list settles. First, the Archer chain grew a third stage: Flaming Archers is the evolution of the Longbowman (“Flaming Archers → Evo of longbow”), which is why a 3★ ranged unit arrived without a base form of its own. Second, the shield line and the cavalry line — previously community guesses — are real, three-stage chains (Shieldman → Imperial Wall, Scout Rider → Lancer). Third, the two UPDATE 3 evolutions (October 3, 2026) closed two standing questions: the Mace has its first chain — Mace → Morningstar — and the Spearman chain grew a third stage, Pikeman → Phalangite. Fourth, UPDATE 5 (October 17, 2026) settled the table’s longest-standing open question: the Crossbow — named in the September 13 patch notes and undocumented in every roster since — has its own chain, Crossbowman → Pavise Crossbowman, announced in the update’s launch post. The base Crossbowman’s acquisition, star rating, and stat lines stay undocumented (the Crossbow page carries the family record). Anything beyond this table — special-unit evolutions included — is unverified until seen in-game; the official materials note that Special units “do not follow the standard Evolution paths and may have different availability rules.” If you have evolved a unit not listed here, the fastest way to get it added is our contact page.

How do evolutions interact with the other upgrade tracks?

Evolution is the third leg of the upgrade stool (the whole system is explained in the upgrading guide):

• Ascension fuses duplicates into a stronger version of the same stage.
• Mastery levels a unit toward 20 through play — dealing damage, defeating enemies, being meaningfully deployed (all official wording).
• Evolution promotes the unit to its next stage along the chain — unlocked at Mastery Level 20, per the official info channel.

The design intent is clear from the Mercenary chain: you are not supposed to outgrow day-one units — you are supposed to grow them. Whether Ascension investment and Mastery levels carry 1:1 across a promotion — and whether evolving costs anything on top of the Level-20 gate — are the first exact mechanics this page will verify and document (the rarity guide covers why that answer changes recruiting math).

How do you plan around a chain? A worked example

Take the headline chain: Mercenary → Squire → Knight. The planning logic, step by step:

1. Slot it now. The Mercenary is a functional early unit — it fills a frontline or flex slot from your first matches, so the chain costs you nothing while it matures.
2. Feed it deliberately. Duplicates you would otherwise treat as clutter become Ascension fuel for a unit you have already committed to (the economy logic lives in the rarity guide).
3. Play it constantly. Mastery to 20 runs in the background of matches you were playing anyway — this is why chains favor units in your core four over bench projects.
4. Promote at the natural moment. Mastery 20 is the gate — when the unit hits the cap, it becomes eligible to evolve into a Knight, a heavy frontline form according to the chain’s own naming.

The point of the example: chain planning is not a separate activity from playing. It is what you were already doing — committing to four units, feeding duplicates, playing matches — pointed at a known destination.

What is being verified next?

The promotion condition is now officially answered (Mastery Level 20, see above). The open questions this page will answer as evidence lands, in rough priority order:

• Whether evolving costs anything on top of the Level-20 gate — Gems, items, or automatic
• Whether Ascension levels and Mastery progress carry 1:1 across an evolution or rescale
• Whether evolved forms unlock new formation behaviors or purely stat changes
• Chains for the rest of the roster — the Crossbow’s own landed with UPDATE 5 (above), and Special units follow different rules by the official description

When each answer is confirmed in-game, the row or section appears here with a dated note. Nothing ships unverified.

Why does this table deserve a page?

Because in a four-slot army, the promotion ceiling of a unit is a recruiting criterion, and right now the honest answer for most of the roster is “chain unknown.” That gap cuts both ways:

1. Units with known chains get a planning premium. A Mercenary you recruit today has a visible path to Knighthood — you know what your investment buys (army building builds on exactly this).
2. Units without known chains are judged on current value. That is fine for a flex slot, risky for a core slot — if two units fill the same role, the documented chain is the tiebreaker.

As patches add units and players document promotions, this page becomes the reference table the whole site links to.

What comes next for this page?

Unit-by-unit evolution pages under this category as they are verified, starting with the eleven paths above. If you want to speed that up: play the chains, note the stage names and any promotion costs you observe, and send them in — with a screenshot if possible (we only publish what we can see, the same policy that governs the codes page).

New to the upgrade system overall? Read the upgrading guide first, then the unit type overview for what each class is for — evolution answers “what does it become”, but roles answer “should it be in my four”.