Beginner Guide:

A guide for lower level players:
First off, i recommend you go to the help section and read tutorial. If you need more  information, scroll down to the bottom and tap the link about the tutorial. The first thing you want to work on is the task list. I recommend you get the main building and the warehouse to lvl 5 first. The warehouse is for rewards from task list and all of the resources made over time. The main building is for more workers. You will notice that you will run out of workers fast that are needed to make troops and upgrade buildings. Work on the task list now, don't worry about combat for now. BIG TIP: Don't get 3rd baron yet. Let the whole week of beginner's protection end first.

Now you work on task list. After getting a decent level on main building and warehouse, work on getting resource fields to lvl 2 each individual field. Once you run out of resources, accept the rewards from the task list. Make sure you don't go over your limit.  TIP: if you go over your resource limit, you will get the max amount and lose all of the extras. Once you have all of ur resource fields at 2 or higher, work on all of the other buildings. Level up the barracks only once for now. 

Defense: defending is easy. Some defensive things that you can use are troops, traps and turrets, and your cranny. The higher level your cranny is, the more resources it can protect. For example, if your cranny can hold 50,000 resources and your at 24,000 and get attacked, your resources will not be taken unless the other person has really high break cranny skill. Now on to traps and turrets. Traps are useful because they cannot be destroyed without the attacker losing troops. The attack needs to have his or her troops walk on the traps to destroy them but lose troops in the process. Turrets are different. Turrets can be destroyed with archers or catapults (cats) without the attacker losing troops. I recommend using turrets when you have a high shooting skill. The last defense you have is optional, troops. You may hide them or you may defend. Its up to you.

Combat: combat is a nice way to gain prestige and resources. To do combat, you first need troops. Cats and archers are long range troops which make them very useful. Cats are the strongest of all troops but they are hardest to make and consume the most crops individually. When fighting another person with troops, its the best idea to command your troops. To command troops, go to your actions tab and choose command once your attack hits the enemy (0:00:0) it is the best way to win a battle against troops. 

General information: 
Alliances: joining an alliance is a good way to make friends and give/receive support from them. 
New cities: you start off with only 1 city capacity. At every 3rd rank( 3rd baron, 3rd earl, 3rd viscount, 3rd marquis, etc. You may make a new city).
Letters: letters are in-game received notifications. Don't worry about deleting them. Eventually, new letters will take place and the old ones will disappear. 

World chat: world chat is one of the best features in the game. This allows you to speak to other members all around the world. Take this to your advantage and ask questions, gather information, or just talk. General start up strategy is to complete the tasks and collect the rewards and upgrade along the way. Remember to upgrade your warehouse (they will warn you anyway). Later strategies, I am occupying oasis to supplement my resource income. Always not enough resources so use the daily gift to buy resources for the upgrades.