Initially in each mission, the player is in control of several basic houses. Each house produces money (the only resource in the game) and can produce the basic soldiers, but that's all it can do. However, for a large sum of money you can turn a house into a village, a city or a fortress. Each of three types of settlements allows you to build different units and buildings (Note that the three civilizations also have varying units and buildings). Within a settlement, you can recruit units and construct buildings: mines and farms (that give you money), defense towers that fire at enemies, and facilities that allow the settlement to build a specific unit - e.g. you cannot recruit a war bear until you build a bear's cave.