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Rebel Command

Rebel Command — in-game A.R.C., for Arulco Rebel Command — is an optional strategic layer on top of the regular campaign. While your mercs do the fighting, the rebels of Omerta run a growing shadow administration that supports you with passive bonuses: country-wide Directives, per-town Administrative Actions, and temporary Agent Missions. Everything is managed from a new laptop website.

The feature was written by rftr and announced on the Bear's Pit in August 2021, with Agent Missions added in late 2022. It is one of the newer GitHub-era features: no wiki covers it, so this page is written directly from the current game data and source code.

Rebel Command is off by default. It deliberately makes the campaign harder in one area to pay for its bonuses: town loyalty rises at half the normal rate, and every town except Omerta has its maximum loyalty capped by difficulty until you invest in supply lines.

Enabling it

Set in Ja2_Options.INI, section [Rebel Command Settings]:

REBEL_COMMAND_ENABLED = TRUE

The same switch appears as Arulco Rebel Command on the second page of the new game options screen. The INI comment recommends starting a new campaign, but the feature can be enabled mid-campaign: the game then grants a starting stock of Supplies based on the current day and campaign progress so you don't begin from zero.

The master toggle lives in Ja2_Options.INI; all the numbers behind the feature live in a separate file, Data-1.13\RebelCommand_Settings.ini (the options INI comment calls it "RebelCommand.ini", but RebelCommand_Settings.ini is the actual file the game loads). See tuning below.

Unlocking the A.R.C. website

At the start of the campaign the feature is dormant. You gain access once you complete the food delivery quest for the rebels — the early Rebels need food quest that runs through Father Walker in Drassen (see the first steps walkthrough and the side quests page for details). When the food arrives in Omerta, a popup announces that the rebels have granted you access to their command system, and an A.R.C. bookmark appears in the laptop's web browser.

Keep Father Walker alive

In the source, the quest-completion trigger that unlocks the website only fires if Father Walker is still alive. If he dies before the food is delivered, the A.R.C. site never becomes available in that campaign.

The website

The A.R.C. site has three views. Buttons at the top switch between them, or use the keyboard:

Key View
1 National Overview — Supplies, directives, militia upgrades
2 Regional Overview — admin teams and Administrative Actions per town
3 Mission Overview — agent missions
Tab / Space Cycle views
A / D or Left / Right Previous/next region (in the regional view)

Most elements on the site have hover help text explaining what they do.

Supplies

Rebel Command introduces a new resource, Supplies — food, water, medicine and weapons the rebels gather on their own. You never haul these yourself; they accumulate daily and are spent on the website.

  • Daily income = campaign progress (0–100) × INCOME_MODIFIER (default 2), so income grows as your campaign advances. The Gather Supplies directive adds a flat bonus on top, and the Smugglers admin action adds a random regional trickle.
  • Every purchased, active Administrative Action costs a small daily supply upkeep (the rounded INCOME_MODIFIER, so 2 per action by default).
  • If your Supplies balance falls to zero or below at the midnight update, admin actions are disabled ("Insufficient supplies! Admin Actions have been DISABLED.") and you must toggle them back on once you're solvent.

Directive improvements and militia stat upgrades are paid with ordinary money instead; both show up in your finance history. Supplies only pay for admin teams, Administrative Actions and mission preparation.

Directives

A Directive is a single national policy — only one is active at a time. You pick it from a dropdown in the National Overview; a new choice takes effect at midnight. Each directive can be permanently improved several times with money, and improvements are remembered even while another directive is active.

Directives unlock as your campaign progress (0 = fresh start, 100 = endgame) passes a threshold. Defaults from RebelCommand_Settings.ini:

Directive Progress Upgrade costs ($) Effect (base → fully improved)
Gather Supplies always 5,000 / 10,000 / 25,000 +3 → +25 Supplies per day
Raid Mines 0 10,000 Steal 7.5% → 15% of income from enemy-held mines; each raid has a 15% chance to fail
Train Militia 10 5,000–20,000 (4 steps) Militia training cost ×0.95 → ×0.75, training speed +5% → +25%
Support Militia 25 5,000–20,000 (4 steps) Militia daily upkeep ×0.95 → ×0.75
Draft Civilians 25 7,500 / 15,000 Volunteers per day = 1 → 3 × campaign progress; all towns lose some loyalty daily
Propaganda Campaign 33 5,000–30,000 (4 steps) Loyalty gains ×1.25 → ×2.5
High Value Target Strikes 33 10,000 / 20,000 40% → 90% chance per specialist to strip enemy specialists (officers, medics, radio operators, snipers, heavy weapons) from groups
Create Turncoats 33 5,000–50,000 (4 steps) Turn 1 → 5 enemy soldiers per day in a random group; consumes 10 Intel per day
Spotter Teams 50 50,000 Approximate positions of unseen enemies shown on the overhead map (Ins in tactical); the upgrade makes them more precise
Deploy Elites 66 4,000 / 10,000 / 25,000 1 → 4 elite militia appear in Omerta each day

Requirements and cross-links:

  • High Value Target Strikes only appears if Enemy Roles is enabled (ENEMYROLES), and per the data file also needs enemy skill traits (ASSIGN_SKILL_TRAITS_TO_ENEMY) to have an effect; enemy officers and medics are recommended "for a better experience".
  • Draft Civilians requires the militia volunteer pool (MILITIA_VOLUNTEER_POOL) — see militia.
  • Create Turncoats spends the Intel resource from the covert operations feature; turncoats are hidden defectors inside enemy groups, the same mechanic spies use.
  • Spotter Teams is unrelated to the spotter support role — it works squad-wide with no binoculars needed, but only on the overhead map.
  • Raid Mines and mine income in general are covered on the economy page.

Create Turncoats crash (open bug)

As of July 2026 there is an open bug report of a runtime error at the midnight update caused by turncoat creation (source issue #463); a fix is in review. If you hit crashes at 00:00 with this directive active, switch directives and keep a save from before midnight.

Militia upgrades

The National Overview also shows a militia summary (counts, projected training totals, volunteer pool, resources) and an Upgrade Stats button. Each of the five upgrade levels costs money ($2,500 / 6,000 / 15,000 / 40,000 / 100,000 by default) and permanently raises every militia soldier's physical stats (health, strength, dexterity, agility) and marksmanship by +2 per level in tactical combat.

Administrative Actions

Administrative Actions are regional policies, handled per town in the Regional Overview. They require an administration team in the region:

  • Omerta is rebel HQ: it always has an active admin team and 100% maximum loyalty, but no regional actions are available there.
  • Deploying a team to another region costs Supplies: 10 × (teams already deployed)² — so the first team outside Omerta is free, the second costs 10, the third 40, and so on. You must control at least one town sector in the region first.
  • If the enemy retakes an entire town, its team goes inactive; reactivating costs a quarter of the current deploy price and again requires holding a town sector.

Each region offers six action slots: the first is always Supply Line, and the other five are drawn randomly from the pool when the campaign starts, so every campaign (and every town) gets a different spread. Towns with a mine can roll Mining Policy; actions tied to disabled features (militia resources, intel, volunteer pool) never appear.

Buying actions costs Supplies, and the price ratchets up: every action tier you already own anywhere adds 4 Supplies to the next purchase, and every tier in the same region adds another 7 (defaults) — your very first action is free. Each action has two tiers (buy, then improve once). Supply Line is the exception: repeatable until the town's maximum loyalty reaches 100%. You can switch any purchased action off and on freely (to save upkeep), and a purchased slot can be changed to a different action for $15,000, resetting its tier.

Action Effect (defaults per tier)
Supply Line +10 maximum regional loyalty per purchase (up to 100%)
Rebel Radio Town gains loyalty daily
Safehouses Chance (up to 75%, capped by loyalty) that bonus militia join battles in or next to the town — Tier 1 greens, Tier 2 regulars with a chance of an elite
Supply Disruption Enemies fighting in the region lose 4 points from their stats per tier
Scout Patrols Enemy groups are spotted one sector further from town per tier
Dead Drops Up to 10 Intel per day per tier, scaled by loyalty (requires the intel resource)
Smugglers Up to 10 Supplies per day per tier, scaled by loyalty
Militia Warehouses Daily militia gun/armour/misc resources (requires MILITIA_REQUIRE_RESOURCES, see militia)
Regional Taxes Daily income scaled by loyalty and by the town's item "coolness" — but the town loses loyalty every day
Civilian Aid Daily volunteer pool growth, scaled by loyalty (requires the volunteer pool)
Merc Support +25% effectiveness for merc assignments in the town (doctoring, repairing, militia training); doubled at Tier 2
Mining Policy +10% mine income (doubled at Tier 2); only offered in mine towns
Pathfinders Your forces travel 25% faster on foot around the town (doubled at Tier 2)
Harriers Enemy groups travel 50% slower on foot around the town (doubled at Tier 2)
Fortifications Friendly forces fight better in the town — autoresolve battles only

Hover the buttons in-game to see each action's exact area of effect: some apply to town sectors only, others reach one or more sectors beyond, growing with tier.

Agent Missions

Missions are powerful, temporary boons. Two missions are on offer at a time, and the list refreshes every 2 days at midnight. To start one:

  1. Pick a merc who is in a friendly town (loyalty 51+ by default) and not on another long-term assignment (such as a Mini Event). Alternatively send a generic rebel agent, who adds no bonuses.
  2. Pay the preparation cost in Supplies: 200 base + 100 for every mission already active or in preparation.
  3. The merc disappears for the preparation time (20 hours in the shipped data file), then returns. If preparation succeeded, the effect runs for the mission's duration.

Success is not guaranteed. Your merc adds +5% success chance per experience level, and specific skills add mission-specific success, duration or strength bonuses — Covert helps almost everything; Demolitions, Night Ops, Stealthy, Scouting, Survival, Radio Operator, Technician, Teaching, Deputy, Snitch and the weapon-specialist traits each boost the missions you'd expect. Several missions can run at once.

Mission Success Duration Effect
Deep Deployment 60% 72 h Much larger deployment area when attacking enemy-held sectors
Disrupt ASD 60% 48 h ASD income halved and no new robot/jeep/tank deployments (only offered if ASD is enabled)
Forge Transport Orders 50% instant An enemy transport group is ordered to the agent's location
Strategic Intel 60% 72 h Enemy movement targets shown in red on the strategic map
Improve Local Shops 80% 96 h Shopkeepers stock better inventories (+1 coolness level)
Slow Strategic Decisions 60% 72 h The enemy strategic AI takes ~10% longer between decisions
Lower Readiness 60% 48 h Unalerted enemies have 15% less sight range
Sabotage Equipment 60% 72 h Enemy weapons and armour spawn in worse condition (−10 quality)
Sabotage Vehicles 60% 72 h Enemy tanks/jeeps/robots have stats reduced by 20 (minimum 33)
Send Supplies 80% 96 h The town passively gains loyalty every 6 hours; ignores the loyalty-51 requirement
Soldier Bounties (Kingpin) 60% 48 h Kingpin pays per enemy killed ($100 infantry, $500 robot, $1,000 jeep, $1,500 officer, $5,000 tank), deposited at midnight, capped at $5,000/day
Train Militia Anywhere 60% 72 h Militia can be trained in uncontested sectors outside towns (1 trainer; 2 with Teaching)

Strategy notes

  • Budget for the loyalty squeeze. With Rebel Command on, loyalty gains are halved and capped (see below), which slows militia volunteer growth, town income and more. Supply Lines (to raise the cap) and the Propaganda directive (to raise the rate) are the antidotes — prioritize them in your income towns.
  • Maximum loyalty by difficulty (default): 80% Novice, 70% Experienced, 60% Expert, 50% Insane. Omerta is always 100%.
  • Your first admin team and first action are free — deploy into your first captured town (Drassen for most players) as soon as you take it.
  • Action prices ratchet nationally as well as regionally, so spread early purchases across towns rather than stacking one region, and buy the actions you really want first while they're cheap.
  • Regional Taxes and Draft Civilians trade loyalty for resources. On higher difficulties the loyalty cap makes that trade painful; on lower ones it is nearly free money.
  • Watch the Supplies balance in the site header — going broke switches every admin action off at midnight, and you must toggle each one back on manually.
  • Missions are cheap compared to admin actions. A high-level merc with the right skill often pushes success past 90% — check the "Agent bonus" line before committing. Sending mercs whose contract is about to expire is blocked.

Tuning: RebelCommand_Settings.ini

Almost every number above comes from Data-1.13\RebelCommand_Settings.ini, which is heavily commented and safe to tweak (see INI editing basics). Highlights:

Setting Default What it does
INCOME_MODIFIER 2 Base daily Supplies per point of campaign progress; also each action's daily upkeep
MAX_LOYALTY_NOVICE … MAX_LOYALTY_INSANE 80/70/60/50 Starting maximum town loyalty per difficulty
BASE_LOYALTY_GAIN_MODIFIER 0.5 Loyalty gain multiplier while playing with Rebel Command (losses unaffected)
ADMIN_ACTION_COST_INCREASE_REGIONAL / _NATIONAL 7 / 4 Supply-cost ratchet per already-purchased action tier
MILITIA_STATS_UPGRADE_COSTS 2,500…100,000 Cost ladder for national militia stat upgrades
*_PROGRESS_REQUIREMENT varies Campaign progress at which each directive unlocks
*_COSTS arrays varies Directive upgrade prices — add or remove values to change how many upgrade levels a directive has (the effect array must always hold one more value than the cost array)
MISSION_BASE_COST / MISSION_ADDITIONAL_COST 200 / 100 Supplies to prepare a mission, plus surcharge per concurrent mission
MISSION_PREPARATION_TIME 20 Hours the merc is away preparing
MISSION_REFRESH_TIME_DAYS 2 Days between new mission offers
MIN_LOYALTY_FOR_MISSION 51 Town loyalty needed to prepare a mission there

Per-directive, per-action and per-mission values (success chances, durations, skill bonuses, bounty payouts and so on) follow in the same file, one commented block each.

Sources