ENDLESS Legend 2 How to Unlock Units: Recruit & Train Guide

Your first army in ENDLESS Legend 2 will not appear on its own. Every military unit is gated behind city production, faction-specific buildings, and minor-faction interactions that unfold as you expand across the planet. This guide walks through the full pipeline for getting fresh squads onto the battlefield, from your very first settler to the late-game Keeper of the Depths.

Released to version 1.0 on September 17, 2026, the game ships with eight major factions and several rogue variants, each with its own twist on recruitment. According to the official ENDLESS Legend 2 page on Steam, every faction gains access to its roster through a combination of city growth, hero-led armies, and research unlocks that gradually expose new unit types. Learning how to unlock units in ENDLESS Legend 2 is the gateway to winning battles, capturing territories, and surviving Tidefall.

The rest of this article breaks down the four pillars of unit acquisition: city production, hero recruitment, faction-specific unlocks, and the rare mid-game spikes that reshape your army composition. You will also find a reference table for every starting faction, a comparison of unit tiers, and a practical step-by-step sequence for your first ten turns.

The Four Pillars of ENDLESS Legend 2 Unit Acquisition

Every squad you field in ENDLESS Legend 2 enters the game through one of four production paths. Understanding how these channels interact is the foundation of any solid opening strategy, because misreading them is the single most common reason a player runs out of armies mid-war.

City-Based Production

City production is the workhorse of your military. Each city can house a Training Grounds or faction equivalent, which produces a stream of basic units every few turns. The volume scales with city tier, district density, and the military doctrine research line. According to the developer blog A Guide to the End of the World, city production is intentionally slow at the start, which forces players to lean on heroes and minor-faction recruits for early defense.

Hero-Led Armies

Every hero you recruit on the map commands a personal army that travels with them. This is your fastest route to frontline power because hero units do not require city production; they appear as soon as the hero joins your cause. Pairing heroes with city-trained infantry is the standard opening for aggressive factions like the Necrophage and the Wild Walkers.

Faction-Specific Unlocks

Some ENDLESS Legend 2 military units only become available after meeting faction conditions. The Order of Zelevas, for example, can recruit all units instantly once they hit their highest city cap, while the Sandshapers rely on terrain shaping to unlock specialized defenders. These are addressed in detail later in this unit guide.

Minor Faction and Event Recruits

Independent villages, neutral heroes, and event chains regularly offer one-off unit recruits. These are not steady sources, but they are invaluable for plugging gaps in your roster during emergencies or for picking up a unit type your faction does not normally produce.

The four pillars are not interchangeable. A common mistake new players make is treating city production as the only path, which leaves them vulnerable during the first ten turns before any meaningful output appears. A balanced opening uses hero-led armies to survive, city production to scale, and minor faction recruits to patch holes. For a deeper breakdown of the individual unit types each pillar eventually unlocks, see the full ENDLESS Legend 2 unit list.

ENDLESS Legend 2 Unit Guide: Faction Starting Rosters

Your faction determines the very first ENDLESS Legend 2 units you can produce. The 1.0 launch ships with eight major factions and two rogue variants, each with a unique roster. The table below summarizes the starting military options for every major faction as documented in patch notes and community testing. Exact numbers may shift with balance updates, so treat this as a structural reference rather than a final stat sheet.

The Sandshapers are new to the 1.0 patch and were designed by Lead Designer Julien Gueguen, who also owns the economic systems, including city building. Their production style rewards players who invest in terraforming, because several of their signature units can only be trained on shaped tiles. By contrast, the Broken Lords lean on Dust for every recruit, which makes their military expansion tightly coupled to economic output.

Rogue factions add another wrinkle. The Order of Zelevas and the Severed Claws, both released with 1.0, are playable variants that have broken away from their parent factions. According to the Rogue Factions announcement on Steam, the Order of Zelevas "remove their city cap at the highest unlock and recruit all units instantly," which dramatically accelerates the mid-game compared to the standard faction experience. Players who want a faster-paced military campaign often start here.

Choosing your faction is the first big decision that shapes how you recruit units in ENDLESS Legend 2. Once locked in, your early-game plan should focus on producing the starting unit, unlocking one signature unit through the faction condition, and recruiting a second hero to act as your mobile reserve. If you are still deciding which faction to play, the ENDLESS Legend 2 best starter unit breakdown compares the early-game army quality of every faction side by side.

ENDLESS Legend 2 Train Units: City Production and Doctrine

City production is the most reliable way to train units in ENDLESS Legend 2. Every city you settle or conquer can be assigned a military district, which generates a small number of units per turn once the appropriate building is constructed. The yield scales with city tier, adjacency bonuses, and the wider Military Doctrine research track.

Setting Up Your First Training City

Your capital city is the natural anchor for early military output. Construct the faction's basic training building (called the Training Grounds, War Hearth, or equivalent) on the first turn you have the industry, then assign a governor if your faction supports that mechanic. Most factions will begin producing a single basic unit every three to four turns from the capital. That may sound slow, but the cumulative output is significant by turn 30.

Adjacency and District Density

Each military district you add to a city increases the production rate, but only if the supporting infrastructure is in place. Food, Dust, and industry boosters can shave a turn off the training cycle. Players who plan their city layouts with adjacency in mind usually see measurable gains by turn 20, while players who spread districts randomly tend to lag behind in army size.

Doctrine Research as a Force Multiplier

The Military Doctrine tree is split into three branches: infantry, ranged, and cavalry, with a fourth branch for siege units. Each branch unlocks a unit-tier upgrade and a passive bonus that applies city-wide. Investing in the doctrine tree is the single most efficient way to scale ENDLESS Legend 2 military units because the bonuses stack with every city you control. For a more detailed look at how doctrine research interacts with battlefield tactics, the ENDLESS Legend 2 military doctrine guide maps each branch to the battle conditions where it shines.

When to Switch to a War Economy

Late-game empires often need to flip several cities into a pure war economy. This means demolishing economic districts, stacking military ones, and accepting lower Dust output in exchange for faster training. The mechanic is intentionally punishing, because the developers want wars to feel costly. Players who flip too early starve their economies; players who flip too late lose the war outright.

Numbers above reflect community testing and may shift with future balance patches. According to the 1.0 release notes on Steam, every bug with more than 5 upvotes on the Amplifiers feedback portal was patched for launch, including several related to doctrine stacking.

ENDLESS Legend 2 Recruit Units: Heroes, Minor Factions, and Emergencies

While city production handles the steady flow, recruit channels are how you respond to sudden threats. The fastest way to grow an army in ENDLESS Legend 2 is to recruit heroes, because every hero arrives with a ready-made squad attached.

Hero Recruitment Basics

Heroes appear on the map as neutral figures with colored icons. Approaching them with Influence or the right resource unlocks a recruitment dialogue. Once accepted, the hero joins your empire with their current army, which typically ranges from a small skirmish squad to a full battle group depending on the hero's level. Veterans of the original ENDLESS Legend will recognize this rhythm, and the sequel preserves it almost intact.

Minor Faction Villages

Independent villages scattered across the planet can be pacified through diplomacy, influence, or force. Once pacified, they offer a steady stream of minor faction units and a one-time bonus unit, which often fills a niche your main faction does not cover. Ranged units, flying units, and siege units are common rewards, so always check what a village offers before deciding whether to absorb it.

Event Chains and Quest Rewards

Heroes, city events, and faction quests frequently hand out free units as quest rewards. The Keeper of the Depths, the most powerful unit in the game according to the official dev blog, is gated behind the late-game Tidefall questline. Working through these chains is not just flavor; it is a core part of how you unlock rare ENDLESS Legend 2 military units over the course of a campaign.

Emergency Recruits

When an enemy declares war and you have no standing army, every faction has an emergency recruit option. These cost more Dust and Influence than normal, but they appear instantly, which can save a city that would otherwise fall on the next turn. The Order of Zelevas rogue faction has the most flexible emergency recruit, because their ability to "recruit all units instantly" extends to emergency calls as well. If you enjoy that style of fast-paced recruitment, the ENDLESS Legend 2 how to win guide covers how this recruitment advantage translates into victory conditions across every faction.

Step-by-Step: Building Your First Army in the First 30 Turns

Recruitment does not have to be chaotic. A consistent opening sequence keeps your army growing even on higher difficulty levels. The steps below assume a standard 1.0 campaign and should be adapted for your chosen faction.

• Turn 1-3: Settle or capture a second city if you start with only the capital. Build the basic training building immediately.

• Turn 4-6: Send your starting hero to recruit a second hero from a nearby village. Combine the two armies into a defensive stack.

• Turn 7-10: Finish the first tier of the Military Doctrine tree. Start training your first signature unit as soon as it is available.

• Turn 11-15: Pacify two minor faction villages for ranged and flying support. Begin clearing independent armies to fund expansion.

• Turn 16-20: Upgrade your capital to Tier 2 and add a second military district. Switch the second city to a training focus.

• Turn 21-25: Recruit a third hero, ideally one with a mounted or ranged focus, to round out your army composition.

• Turn 26-30: Push doctrine research into the second branch. By turn 30 you should have a balanced army of roughly 8-12 units across three or four types.

A common pitfall is over-investing in heroes without backing them up with city-trained units. Heroes are excellent in the field, but they die, and replacing a fallen hero is much harder than rebuilding an infantry line. For a deeper look at how hero progression interacts with army composition, the ENDLESS Legend 2 hero progression breakdown covers the leveling curve and skill choices in detail.

Late-Game Unit Unlocks and Tidefall Scaling

The closer you get to Tidefall, the more the unit roster opens up. The 1.0 patch introduced several new late-game options, and the official developer blog confirms that the Keeper of the Depths is being held back for a future update even though the system files reference it. This means there is a planned ceiling on unit unlocks, and the developers want each unlock to feel weighty.

Tier 3 and Tier 4 Upgrades

By the time you have four or five cities, doctrine research should be deep enough to unlock Tier 3 and Tier 4 variants of your core units. These are the backbone of any winning late-game army, because they combine the durability of city-trained units with the burst damage of hero-led strikes. Most factions also unlock a Juggernaut-class unit at this point, which is a single massive entity capable of turning the tide of a battle on its own.

Rogue Faction Late-Game

Rogue factions like the Order of Zelevas and the Severed Claws peak earlier than the major factions because their signature mechanics front-load unit access. The Order of Zelevas, for example, drops the city cap entirely at its highest unlock, which means you can field more cities and therefore more training districts. The Severed Claws lean into aggressive melee, with a roster built around fast, hard-hitting units that scale with Kill counts.

Tidefall Events and Doomwraiths

Once Tidefall begins, the planet itself becomes hostile. Doomwraiths settle in territories and slowly corrupt them, applying penalties to your cities and destroying minor faction villages. While Doomwraiths are not a direct military threat according to the dev blog, they erode the support network your army depends on, so you will need to train additional garrison units just to hold your own territory. This is the first time in the game where defensive unit unlocks matter as much as offensive ones.

Common Mistakes When Unlocking ENDLESS Legend 2 Units

Even experienced 4X players slip up on the unit economy, because the recruiting systems in ENDLESS Legend 2 reward patience over impulse. The mistakes below are the ones community veterans flag most often.

• Ignoring minor faction villages. Skipping villages to rush a victory condition is tempting, but villages supply ranged, flying, and siege units that most factions cannot easily train.

• Over-stacking heroes. A stack of three heroes looks impressive on the campaign map, but it loses to a balanced army of city-trained units because hero units have hard caps on numbers.

• Neglecting the doctrine tree. The Military Doctrine tree is the single most cost-efficient way to speed up training, yet new players often skip it in favor of economic or exploration research.

• Settling too many cities too fast. More cities mean more training, but each new settlement also means another defensive perimeter. Over-extending is the leading cause of lost campaigns.

• Forgetting adjacency bonuses. A military district placed in the wrong spot can add a full turn to training. Always plan adjacency before you commit to a tile.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I unlock the very first military unit in ENDLESS Legend 2?

Your capital city starts with a free basic unit, usually a Militia or faction equivalent, on turn 1. From there, you need to construct the basic training building in the capital and wait for the first production cycle, which typically takes three to four turns.

What is the fastest way to recruit units in the early game?

Heroes are the fastest route, because every hero you recruit arrives with a ready-made squad. Combine this with pacifying a minor faction village for a one-time bonus unit, and you can have a four-to-six unit army by turn 10 even on higher difficulty.

Are rogue factions better for unit unlocks than major factions?

Rogue factions such as the Order of Zelevas unlock units faster, especially at the highest city tier. However, they also have fewer signature mechanics, so the trade-off is breadth versus speed. Players who enjoy explosive mid-game armies often prefer rogue factions.

Can I unlock the Keeper of the Depths in the 1.0 patch?

Not yet. According to the official dev blog, the Keeper of the Depths is the most powerful unit in the game but is planned for a future update. Until then, the late-game roster caps at the Juggernaut-class units and the faction-specific signature units.

Do doctrine research bonuses stack across multiple cities?

Yes. Each city benefits from any doctrine branch you have completed, which is why investing in doctrine early is one of the most efficient ways to scale your army. The bonuses apply city-wide, so a Tier 3 capital with full doctrine research can train units almost as fast as a specialist war city.