What Is the Kingshot Alliance Layout Planner?
The free, browser-based territory planning tool that lets several alliances draw their HQs, banners, bear-trap hives and war positions on the real Kingshot kingdom map — with every in-game placement rule enforced as you build. This guide explains what it is, who it is for, and how to use it step by step.
What is the Alliance Layout Planner?
The Kingshot Alliance Layout Planner is a free online territory planner for the strategy game Kingshot. In Kingshot, an alliance's strength on the map comes from its territory: banners you place claim the ground around them, bear traps earn rewards only from members inside that territory, and in KvK seasons the kingdoms with the cleaner map usually win the war. Until now, that planning happened in screenshots, spreadsheets and hand-drawn Discord sketches — all of which drift out of date the moment someone moves a banner.
This planner replaces that with a shared, live canvas: a 1200×1200 replica of the real kingdom map where the King's Castle, all 90 permanent structures, 6,499 resource nodes and the zone rings sit at their true in-game coordinates. You draw each alliance's HQ, banners, member cities and traps directly on it, and the planner checks every placement against the same rules the game enforces — nothing on structures or terrain, no alliance buildings in the Ruins ring, HQs only in the Plains and Badlands, banners blocked in outpost no-build zones. If the planner lets you place it, you can place it in the game.
Unlike single-alliance hive editors, it is built for kingdom-level planning: several alliances on one shared map, each color-coded, so R5 and R4 officers can divide territory, coordinate fortress assignments and prepare castle sieges together — and export the result as an image or a re-editable file for the whole kingdom.
What can it help your alliance do?
Prepare KvK like a command staff
Before the KvK season starts, map where every alliance sits, which fortresses each one will attack, and where the kingdom draws its defensive line. A shared layout turns "meet in Discord and argue" into a picture everyone can follow.
Build tighter bear-trap hives
A bear trap only pays out when every member city sits fully inside banner territory. The planner ships two solver-optimized hive layouts (swirl and banner-pad) where no city sticks out and no banner is wasted — then you drag the whole hive anywhere on the map.
Coordinate without confusion
Export the plan as a PNG with an alliance legend and post it in alliance chat. Because every coordinate in the tool matches the in-game X:Y axis, members can navigate to "banner at 512:394" without asking what you mean.
Onboard new members faster
New R4 officers can see at a glance where their hive is, which outposts their alliance owns, and where the next banner should go — instead of reverse-engineering a kingdom from memory.
What the planner can do
🗺️The real kingdom map under your plan
The planner draws the verified fixed Kingshot map: the King's Castle with its four turrets, all 90 permanent structures (4 fortresses, 12 sanctuaries, every outpost and frontier lodge), 6,499 resource nodes, mountains, lakes and the concentric zone rings from Badlands to the Forbidden zone. Terrain and nodes are unbuildable, exactly like in the game.
🛡️Multiple alliances, one shared map
Add as many alliances as you need, each with its own name, color and visibility toggle. HQs, banners, member cities, traps and alliance nodes all draw their territory in the alliance color, so overlaps and gaps between neighbors are obvious at a glance. Per-alliance caps (100 member cities, 285 banners) are enforced live.
🐻Solved bear-trap hive layouts
Two ready-made hives — the flush swirl (50 cities, 7 banners) and the banner-pad (50 cities, 10 banners) — were computed with an exact set-cover solver, so every city sits fully in territory with the fewest possible banners. Place one as a single group, rotate it in 90° steps, and drag it to any clear spot.
⚡Auto-config: a full alliance in one click
Pick a hive style and the planner drops a complete alliance at one of the four best spots near the King's Castle: 1 HQ, 2 bear traps, all 100 member cities and every connecting banner (14–18 depending on style). You preview a green/red ghost first and commit only when the spot fits.
⏱️March times from every member city
Select any bear trap and the planner draws dashed march lines from each member city of its hive with travel times — so you can prove the trap is reachable in time before the rally starts, not after. The march speed is calibrated once in Settings to match your server.
📡Live kingdom layer (Pro)
Import your kingdom's real players by kingdom number: every city appears at its true coordinate, colored by alliance, with Town Center badges, power, shields and city skins. Click any player for an in-site profile — power, kills, kingdom ranks, heroes and gear — without leaving the page.
✋Editing tools that feel like a map editor
Undo/redo, drag to move, box-select, group and ungroup, pick up a selection and carry it with live validity feedback, rotate in exact 90° steps, and stamp a columns × rows block of member cities in one click. Alliance award statues (2×2 each) place inside territory for the extra buffs.
💾Save, load and share
Plans auto-save in your browser, download as .json files your co-leads can load and edit, and export as a PNG with the alliance legend ready for Discord. Nothing is charged for exporting or sharing — the map and every planning tool stay free.
How to use the Alliance Layout Planner, step by step
- 1
Open the planner
Go to the Alliance Layout Planner and wait one second for the real kingdom map to load — you will see the King's Castle in the center, the zone rings, and every resource node. No account or download is needed to start planning.
- 2
Create one row per alliance
In the Build tab, use "+ Add alliance" for each alliance in your kingdom plan. Give each a short name and a distinct color, then click its row to make it active — everything you place now belongs to that alliance.
- 3
Place the alliance HQ
Pick "Alliance HQ" from the building palette and click the map. The planner only allows HQs in the Plains and Badlands rings, mirroring the game, and rejects illegal spots with the exact rule that blocks them.
- 4
Add member cities
Place 2×2 member cities one by one, or use the TC block stamp to place a columns × rows batch in a single click. Double-click any city to type the member's name — it renders inside the city square and below it when zoomed out.
- 5
Connect territory with banners
Place banners and watch the alliance-colored territory grow from your HQ through every banner. The live counters (TC x/100 · B x/285) show how much room your alliance has left, and the planner warns you when a banner claims an outpost your alliance already owns.
- 6
Drop a solved bear-trap hive
Instead of hand-placing a hive, click one of the two bear-trap presets: a 50-city swirl or banner-pad hive lands as one movable group with every city fully covered by territory. Rotate it with R and drag it into position.
- 7
Or place a whole alliance with Auto-config
Choose Swirl or Banner-pad in the Auto-config panel, click one of the four ranked spots, and check the green/red preview. "Place here" commits a complete alliance — HQ, two traps, 100 cities and all banners — as a group you can still move or ungroup and edit.
- 8
Check march times
Switch to the Select tool and click a bear trap: dashed march lines with travel times appear from every member city of its hive. If one member is too far out, drag their city closer and watch the time update.
- 9
Import your kingdom (optional, Pro)
In the Map tab, enter your kingdom number to import the live player layer — every real city at its real coordinate, filterable by alliance. Clicking a player opens an in-site profile with power, ranks and heroes. You can also name your planned cities after real members and the planner links them automatically.
- 10
Share the plan
Hit 📷 PNG to export an image with the alliance legend for Discord, or 💾 Save to download the .json file and send it to co-leads, who can load it and keep planning from the exact same state. Your work also auto-saves in the browser as you go.
The fastest way to learn is to open it and place ten buildings — the planner explains every rule it enforces right where you click.
Open the Alliance Layout Planner →Tips for better kingdom plans
- ✓
Call positions by the coordinate readout (X:Y matches the in-game axis exactly), so members can type coordinates into in-game search and arrive at the right tile.
- ✓
Hide member cities and territory shading (👁 buttons) to check that every banner connection is real — territory that only "looks" connected is the most common hive mistake.
- ✓
Calibrate march speed in Settings against one real in-game march; after that every travel time the planner shows matches your server.
- ✓
Plan against the live layer: import your kingdom first, find an empty pocket near the castle, then drop your hive there — no more plans that collide with a power-8 tower you did not know about.
- ✓
Save a .json snapshot before big reworks (KvK phase changes, post-war reshuffles). Versioned plans are how R5 teams keep history of who moved where and when.
Free vs Pro
Free — everything you need to plan
- ✓ The real kingdom map with all rules enforced
- ✓ Unlimited local alliances, buildings, statues and naming
- ✓ Solved bear-trap hives and the TC block stamp
- ✓ Auto-config full alliances with preview
- ✓ March times with a calibratable speed
- ✓ PNG export, .json save/load, browser autosave
👑 Pro — the live kingdom layer
- ✓ Import your kingdom's real players by kingdom number
- ✓ Every city at its true coordinate, colored by alliance
- ✓ Power, Town Center, shields and city skins on the map
- ✓ In-site player profiles: ranks, kills, heroes and gear
- ✓ Auto-link your planned cities to real members by name
Alliance Layout Planner or Kingshot Map Builder?
Both tools are free and made by the same team, so the choice is just about scope. The Kingshot Map Builder is a quick single-hive editor: perfect when one alliance wants to sketch a bear-trap layout in two minutes. The Alliance Layout Planner is the kingdom-level tool: multiple alliances on one shared real map, in-game placement rules, march times, full-alliance auto-config and the optional live player layer. A practical rule of thumb — sketch the hive in the builder, coordinate the kingdom in the planner.
Planning your bear trap damage as well? Read the Kingshot Bear Trap guide for rally composition and reward strategy, then bring the hive layout back here to place it.
Frequently asked questions
Is the Kingshot Alliance Layout Planner free?
Yes — the map, every building tool, bear-trap hives, Auto-config, march times, PNG export and .json save/load are all free, with no account required to plan. The only optional paid part is the live kingdom layer (importing your kingdom's real players), which is a Pro feature.
Do I need to connect my game account?
No. The planner never asks for your Kingshot login and nothing you do in it affects your game account. Planning is fully local in your browser; the optional live layer only reads public kingdom data through our own proxy — never your credentials.
Can several officers edit one plan together?
Not live in the browser at the same time. The workflow is file-based: save the plan as .json, send it to your co-leads (Discord works great), and they load it and hand it back. Because the format is exact, everyone sees the identical plan and you avoid version chaos.
How accurate is the map and are the placement rules real?
The fixed map skeleton — castle, 90 permanent structures, 6,499 nodes, terrain and zone rings — is community-calibrated and spot-verified against in-game landmarks, and the planner enforces the same placement rules the game does (King's zone, Ruins restrictions, HQ rings, outpost no-build zones). Footprint and territory sizes are editable estimates, since they can vary slightly by server generation.
Can I plan a bear-trap hive for my own alliance with it?
That is one of its main uses. The two built-in hive layouts (swirl and banner-pad) are solved so every one of the 50 cities sits fully inside banner territory with minimum banners; place one as a group, move it anywhere, or use Auto-config to lay out a complete 100-member alliance around two traps in one click.
What is the difference between this and the Kingshot Map Builder?
The Kingshot Map Builder is a quick single-hive editor for fast bear-trap sketches. The Alliance Layout Planner is a full kingdom planner: multiple alliances on one shared real map, in-game rules enforced, march times, auto-config and the optional live player layer. Use the builder for a 30-second sketch, the planner for kingdom-level coordination.
Does it work on mobile?
Yes. The map supports touch panning and pinch-zoom, and the control sidebar collapses into a drawer on small screens — enough to present or tweak a plan from a phone, though the full editing experience is most comfortable on a desktop.
Ready to plan your kingdom?
Open the planner, add your alliances, and put the first HQ on the map — it takes less than a minute, and the plan you export is one your whole kingdom can actually follow.
Start planning — free, no account neededKingshot is a trademark of Century Games. This is an unofficial fan tool built on the open-source Alliance Layout Planner (MIT).