Buildings are the key to winning the game. There are three types of buildings, each of which provides you with a unique advantage, and each of which has an associated unit type.
Every building has a number above it – the building’s population. When you include a building in a move order, half of the building’s population will become units and move to the location you specify.
Each building has two limits on how much population it can hold – a soft cap and a hard cap. If you go over a building’s soft cap, then it will slowly lose population over time until it reaches the soft cap. The building can never go over its hard cap at all – any additional units that arrive are lost forever.
Houses
Houses are the most common building type, and the backbone of your civilization. Houses automatically generate new units over time, up to their soft cap.
Because Houses are the only building that can generate new units, they are critical to any civilization. However, they are especially valuable to civilizations focused on troop production rather than magic, as they are the main source of your military power.
Level 1 House
Unit: Infantry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 5
Soft Cap: 20
Hard Cap: 30
The Level 1 House is the smallest building in the game, and is generally not particularly useful after the game’s initial levels, due to its small population size. In the final levels of the game, Level 1 Houses cease to appear at all. Level 1 Houses are most useful offensively when you deploy from several of them at once.
Level 2 House
Unit: Infantry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 10, 20
Soft Cap: 40
Hard Cap: 60
Initially, Level 2 Houses are strong points, the centerpieces of tactical movement. As the game progresses, more powerful houses are introduced and their importance degrades – by the final levels, they replace the Level 1 House as the most common and weakest building. Even toward the end of the game, Level 2 Houses remain useful as offensive bases, as they can deploy a fairly large amount of infantry at once.
Level 3 House
Unit: Infantry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 15, 30, 60
Soft Cap: 60
Hard Cap: 90
Level 3 Houses begin the game as critical positions, strong points that dominate the game map. A full Level 3 House can send out a platoon of 30 Infantry – enough to crush a Level 1 House on its own. As the game progresses, Level 3 Houses will always remain critical, even as more powerful houses will appear. Even in the final levels of the game, when they are overshadowed by some of the more powerful buildings, they remain critical for territorial control and launching offensives.
Level 4 House
Unit: Infantry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 20, 40
Soft Cap: 80
Hard Cap: 120
When they first appear, Level 4 Houses take the niche previously left only to Level 3 Houses – rare strong points, control of which can dominate the game. As the game progresses, they become rarer, and instead become the standard “starting building,” with each civilization on the map starting with control over one Level 4 House, and no others on the map.
Level 5 House
Unit: Infantry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 30, 50
Soft Cap: 100
Hard Cap: 150
The largest houses, Level 5 Houses are always of critical importance whenever they appear. Controlling them is almost always key to victory.
Infantry
Base Attack: 1
Base Speed: 1
Infantry are units deployed from Houses. They have no special bonuses of any kind, moving at a moderate speed and being capable of eliminating only a single defending unit with a defense equal to their attack.
Despite this, infantry are the unit you will see and use most often - they are produced directly by Houses, with no further processing required, meaning that they will be cheaper – as you do not need to waste time moving them to a Tower or Crystal, first – and more convenient than your other units. Because high-level Houses can hold more units than any other kind of building, Infantry can also attack in the largest groups.
Shrines
Shrines are key to your crystal production. The more population your shrines have, the faster they will generate crystals, and, in turn, the more magic you will be able to use. Even if your army does not rely on magic, shrines can still be useful tactically, as they produce cavalry.
Shrines do not produce population on their own, and so must be reinforced if they are attacked or under strength.
Small Shrine
Unit: Cavalry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 5
Soft Cap: 20
Hard Cap: 30
Small shrines only allow a small population, and therefore are most important for their ability to generate crystals rather than offensive capabilities. Control of a game rarely depends on small crystals – they are there only to enable magic use.
Medium Shrine
Unit: Cavalry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 15
Soft Cap: 40
Hard Cap: 60
More valuable than their smaller cousins, Medium Shrines not only provide you with the ability to generate more crystals, but can also make for an effective cavalry base for supporting an infantry offensive, or for launching a sneak attack on a poorly-defended enemy building.
Large Shrine
Unit: Cavalry
Base Defense: 1
Neutral Population: 25
Soft Cap: 60
Hard Cap: 90
Large Shrines are fairly rare, and usually highly contested when they appear, but they can also be highly valuable due to their large populations. Not only do they generate more crystals than the smaller shrines, but they can also house an attack force of up to 30 permanent cavalry – a considerable force that can be the key to a blitzkrieg offensive or a sneak attack.
Cavalry
Base Attack: 1
Base Speed: 2
Cavalry are units deployed from Shrines. They are no stronger than infantry, but they are twice as fast. Because of this, cavalry are useful for strategic attacks – they can be deployed to hit enemy buildings that are under strength, and with high speed upgrades can be expected to reach their target before it can be reinforced. The high speed also makes them useful at attacking bosses or towers, as they are less exposed to ranged attacks.
Towers
Rarest of the three building types, Towers do not generate population or crystals – Towers are instead a strictly military building. Towers will fire ranged attacks at enemy units nearby, allowing you to destroy the enemy before he can even reach your buildings. The more units in a Tower, the more powerful these attacks. Towers can dominate a defensive region, but you must take care to keep them supplied with troops.
Towers also allow you to deploy heavy infantry, which can be useful in attacking enemy strong points. The heavy infantry bonus also applies defensively – each unit of population in the tower is worth two attacking units.
Small Tower
Unit: Heavy Infantry
Base Defense: 2
Neutral Population: 0, 5, 10
Soft Cap: 10
Hard Cap: 15
Small Towers are generally not worth bothering with – they simply don’t have the population size to be very useful. Their range is short and generally doesn’t cover a wide area. They are worth taking simply so that they will not harass your units, but don’t rely on them for defense.
Medium Tower
Unit: Heavy Infantry
Base Defense: 2
Neutral Population: 15
Soft Cap: 25
Hard Cap: 37
Medium Towers are fairly rare, and not much more useful than Small Towers – they still have too small a population size to be used offensively, but are at least more capable defensively. Medium Towers are most useful when in strategic positions, surrounded by more valuable buildings.
Large Tower
Unit: Heavy Infantry
Base Defense: 2
Neutral Population: 25, 50
Soft Cap:
Hard Cap: 75
The rarest and by far most valuable building, Large Towers are both incredibly powerful defensive tools able to destroy entire enemy offensives with their ranged attacks alone, and the only real viable staging point for a Heavy Infantry offensive, making them key to both standing your ground and carrying out a successful attack.
Heavy Infantry
Base Attack: 2
Base Speed: 1
Heavy Infantry are deployed from Towers, and are twice as powerful as infantry and cavalry. This would make heavy infantry ideal for offensive pushes, if not for the generally small population caps of most towers. When you
do have medium or large towers available, heavy infantry become a powerful offensive tool, able to break even the most fortified enemy position.