Nomad's build camps to generate gold. Each base camp produces +10 gold (Gold Camp + Gold Rush +12 gold, Gold Camp + Gold Rush II +15 gold).
You can only build 1 camp per island, so in order to expand your economy you need to capture new islands to build more camps.

Nomad's build units at the camp. Each camp when built (level 1) supports 2 units. The camp can be upgraded to level 2 (supports +1 unit) and then level 3 (supports +1 unit). You can also increase the number of supported units by gaining the Military Expansion upgrade from the Paths of Progress (supports +1 unit at each camp). Each unit costs 100 gold to recruit. Unlike the other races of Driftland, Nomads do not pay any upkeep cost for their units.

Nomad's cannot build bridges, but can use Gates of Thyr to connect islands together. You can improve the Gates of Thyr by gaining the Mana Charge upgrade from the Paths of Progress. This will prevent your Gates of Thyr from slowly losing health over time and collapsing. You can span large distances by placing multiple Gates of Thyr in a chain, which allows your units to traverse the map almost instantly.

Spells are essential for playing as Nomads. To expand to surrounding islands, you can use the Magic Eye spell to reveal an island so you can inspect if there are enemies on it, and how strong they are. The Magic Eye spell can provide visibility so you can use the Gates of Thyr on a new island. Spells can be cast within a range of your camps. You can increase this range by upgrading the camps to level 2 and level 3. You can increase the spell range of all your camps by researching Web of Wizardry from the Paths of Progress. Some landmarks you can capture on islands also provide spell casting range.

The Paths of Progress provides many useful upgrades for the Nomads. These make the Nomad's significantly more powerful. Important upgrades include:

• Shared Experience provides your heroes with +30% experience gain
  
• Mana Charge prevents your Gates of Thyr from losing health over time
  
• Greater Healing allows you to heal multiple units at once
  
• Web of Wizardry increases the range from your camps at which you can cast spells

Nomad's can capture nests of flying creatures. The Nomad's can summon flying creatures from these nests to fight with their heroes. Unlike the other races of Driftland, Nomads cannot ride flying creatures into battle, and the flying creatures summoned will remain as separate units that you can use. You can train 2 Ravens per Raven Nest, 2 Eagles per Eagle Nest, and 1 Dragon per Dragon Nest. You can increase the number of flying units supported per nest by gaining the Extensive Breeding upgrade from the Paths of Progress (+1 flying unit per nest).

The Tutorial mission is designed to teach the basics of the game to new players. The objective of this mission is to build 3 camps.

Defense missions require the player to protect an objective for a specified game time to win the game. Game time is measured in 'days'. In the top right you will see the 'days' increasing as the game is played. Check your objective to see how many days you need to hold out.

Exterminate missions require the player to eliminate a number of enemy units to win the game. Check your objective to see how many enemy units you need to eliminate to win.

Retrieve missions requires the player to reach a structure on the map. You will need to select a hero and right click on the structure to win the game. Check your objective to see what structure the mission requires you to reach and interact with.

Evacuate missions require the player to send units to a location on the map. The location is shown on the map with a purple circle once your units are sufficiently close to it. You will need to send a hero or flying unit to the specified location to win the game. The location is usually behind the main enemy base.

At the start of most missions you will have a single island with a camp and a melee hero. Nomad heroes can be from any of the races of Driftland (Human, Wood Elf, Dark Elf, or Dwarf), and the type of camp on an island is determined by the island's biome.

The type of camp is not really relevant to the strategy, especially in the early game. I will refer to the heroes by their classes instead of names so that this can be followed for any starting camp.

• Melee Hero - this is the Human Knight, Dwarf Berserker, Dark Elf Assassin, etc
  
• Ranged Hero - this is the Human Marksman, Dwarf Engineer, Dark Elf Huntress, etc
  
• Spell-caster Hero - this is the Human Wizard, Dwarf Geomancer, Dark Elf Warlock, etc

Melee heroes have higher health and deal close combat damage. Ranged heroes deal slightly more damage and fight at range. Spell-caster heroes can learn special abilities like freezing enemies in place.

Some missions may vary the start slightly, for example Defense missions usually have a second island connected with bridges that has the objective that you need to defend on it.

Select a camp and build a second hero, a Ranged Hero is a good choice for this. Scout your starting island for any items that can be picked up. These can provide experience for heroes, abilities for heroes, gold, mana, and Progress Points (used to purchase upgrades from the Paths of Progress). You may also find structures that can be captured which can provide these benefits and also can produce Wraiths. Wraiths are units which the player can control, and behave similar to Spell-caster heroes. You receive 2 wraiths on capture of a structure. They will respawn at the structure if they are killed. To pick up items or capture structures, select a hero and right click on the item/structure.

Once you've cleared the starting island, we next want to find a suitable second island. Look on the mini-map in the bottom left corner for a suitable island. Click on the Magic Eye spell, which will bring up your spell range on the game window and mini-map. You will need the island to be within spell casting range. Cast the Magic Eye spell on an island to see some of what is on the island. If there are enemies you can click on them to inspect their level. Minor faction units tend to show 'lvl' and then a number / number, which is the current level and maximum level for the unit (e.g., lvl 1/5 would be a level 1 enemy, maximum it can reach is level 5). Major faction units just show the current level (e.g., lvl 3 is a level 3 hero). You should typically have a higher total level than the island you are attacking. If you've picked up an experience pack item with 2 heroes, they would be both level 5. The new island might have 5 level 1 heroes on it. You should be able to win this battle.

Enemies may attack your Magic Eye and destroy it, in which case you can summon a new Magic Eye in a different location to continue viewing the island. If you decide you can win the battle, use the Gate of Thyr spell to summon a portal from the starting island to the new island, then select your heroes and right click on the new island to get them to move through the portal. Defeat the enemies on the new island, using the Heal spell as necessary to keep your heroes alive. Then collect any items that you find and build a camp on the island to increase your gold production. If there is not enough room to build a camp on the island, you will see a dashed green line showing the build areas of the island, hover over these areas and a popup will appear which shows how much gold to clear obstacles from the area. Find an area where you think you can clear enough space for the camp, left click to remove the obstacles, and when cleared place the camp (the trick is to find the lowest cost option for clearing space for the camp).

Heal up your heroes by selecting them and right clicking on a camp. The heroes will go into the camp and heal up. While this is happening, use the Magic Eye spell to locate a third island, and once the heroes are healed up, use Gate of Thyr spell to move across and take the island. Build a camp on this island to increase gold production.

Continue capturing islands and building camps on them. Eventually when you have enough gold income to continuously capture new islands and build camps on them, use your new camps to build more heroes. A Melee Hero and then a Ranged Hero is a good mix early game. Repeat this process until you have a group of 8-10 heroes. Then start to build up a second group of heroes and have two groups capturing new islands.

When you have enough Progress Points for an upgrade, the Paths of Progress will show a red icon with the number of available upgrades in it. Shared Experience is good early as your heroes will level up more quickly and become more powerful. Mana Charge is useful for preventing your Gates of Thyr from losing health over time (and requiring recasting of the spell). Once this upgrade is researched you can select a Gate of Thyr and click the Mana Charge icon to engage this. Improved Healing and Greater Healing are useful for keeping heroes alive. Faster Cooldown 1 and 2 allow you to cast healing spells more frequently. Military Expansion is useful for allowing you to summon more heroes once you have the gold income to do this.

Keep continuously capturing islands and building camps to increase your gold income. This is the most important aspect of the Nomad's economy.

If there is an enemy faction in the game, you will eventually encounter their islands. When you locate them, it is a good idea to try and secure as many islands nearby them to limit their expansion. If the enemy has an island close to one of yours build a tower on the island to reinforce your position. The tower should be slightly back from the edge of your island, on the edge near the enemy island. This allows your heroes to get in around the tower if it is attacked and defend it (if the tower is on the very edge then it can be hard for heroes to fight back against flying enemies that attack the tower).

Early game it is best to have half Melee heroes and half Ranged heroes. In the late game it is often better to have more Ranged heroes and some Spell-caster heroes as these are better at focusing down enemies. I try to have 2 Melee heroes to 3-4 Spell-caster heroes and 4-5 Ranged Heroes. Ranged Heroes are particularly good against flying enemies.

Sword of Trials and some structures provide heroes with upgrades. Some of these upgrades can be very powerful, e.g., freeze spell for Spell-caster heroes. Keep an eye out for the upgrades. If you hover over the upgrade with the mouse pointer you can see what the upgrade does and what heroes can learn it. Some of the upgrades are only applicable to certain heroes e.g., Geomancer Hero. Late game these can be very useful for improving the strength of your heroes.

Heroes which have levelled up are much better in combat. This goes for your heroes and the enemy heroes. You should try to minimise loses of your experienced heroes, and try to take out high level enemy heroes where possible. High level enemy heroes on flying creatures are particularly tough to fight. A large number of Ranged heroes and Spell-caster heroes are needed to fight against these, and they can very quickly disengage when they are low on health. Spell-caster heroes with the freeze upgrade are particularly useful for preventing them from retreating.

The Haste, Mass Haste, Slow and Mass Slow spells can be unlocked by the upgrade Chronomage from the Paths of Progress. Slow and Mass Slow can be useful for reducing incoming damage from an enemy attack and making it harder for enemy heroes to retreat and heal up. Haste and Mass Haste can allow your heroes to move more quickly into position and chase down fleeing enemy heroes.

Barbarian Encampments can randomly appear on islands. They will attack your buildings and Gates of Thyr and can also summon Gates of Thyr to attack other islands. Although they are annoying when they appear on one of your islands or on a nearby island, they can be useful as you get a good amount of resources for destroying their encampment. So if you have some heroes available it is worthwhile to go and destroy them.

You can use the Relocation spell to move an island towards the enemy. If this island has a camp or a structure that provides spell casting range, you can then cast Gate of Thyr to invade the enemy island.

You can select a Gate of Thyr that the enemy has summoned to see where the other end of the portal was cast. This is useful for locating enemy bases or using enemy portals against them. Your heroes can also travel through the enemy's portal which can be useful for attacking somewhere that is beyond your spell casting range. Be careful though as if the portal is destroyed (or the health decays to 0) then you will not be able to return through it, and if it is beyond your spell casting range you will not be able to cast your own Gates of Thyr spell to replace it.

As you expand, if you cast your Gate of Thyr spell with the first portal on your starting island, and the second portal on the captured islands, your units will be able to very quickly move from one island back to your starting island and then reinforce another island. The starting island is like a transit hub for moving between your other islands. Eventually an enemy faction will attack one of your islands, reinforce this island by moving all your heroes to this island to engage the enemy heroes. Use Heal or Greater Heal spells to keep your heroes alive. Try to prevent enemy heroes from retreating to heal if you have the opportunity to do this.

Once the enemy starts to retreat, if you have a significantly stronger army than the enemy, you can follow them back through their own Gates of Thyr and attack their base. Note the direction of the retreating units and try to follow them back through their islands. They should lead you in the direction of the enemy's castle. Target your heroes to destroy the enemy castle. Doing so will cause the enemy to be dethroned, this means that they will no longer be able to build anything and their buildings will begin to lose health, eventually collapsing. Once the enemy is dethroned, you can pull your heroes back to your islands to minimise your losses.

Keep in mind the objective of the mission, in most cases you don't need to defeat the enemy base. For example, if it is an Evacuate mission, you only need to have a unit reach the objective to win the game. A single flying unit can make its way around the enemy to the objective.

A Defense mission can be won by defeating all enemy factions. This can be a way to win a Defense mission before the countdown has finished.