Main base

Your main base, the fortress of **Osterberg**, is your center of operations for your quest to bring down the Crimson Dominion and restore the Iron Empire. It is here that you build all of your buildings, collect resources, hire troops, and research technology.

Your base has a number of empty spaces on which you can construct new buildings. Most spaces can hold any building, but there are a few spaces on which you can only build one specific building, and that building can only be built there. These include your command center, warehouse, treasury, barracks, tank factory, academy, alchemy lab, tower of alchemy, quarters, and grotto.

At the beginning of the game, only a small portion of your base is available to be built on. You may expand your base by unlocking new areas, but this is a complicated and expensive process. To unlock a new area, you must do the following:

* First, pay the cost to unlock the area. This requires a significant amount of steel, fuel, and city plans.
* Once the area is unlocked, three or four enemy squads appear wandering around the area. These must be defeated in normal battles (costing 25 fuel) in order for the area to be usable.
* In many cases, some or all of the spaces in the area will require additional clearing before you can build on them. This consists of a number of stages, with each stage requiring an investment of more resources and time.

The table of unlockable areas is below. In all cases, you must unlock these areas in the order given. The "clearing" column indicates if any slots must be cleared, and how many stages of clearing are required (e.g., "1/3" means that one slot needs to be cleared, and this clearing takes 3 stages).

[\*] The second building spot requires clearing two piles of rubble, each with five stages (thus making it considerably more expensive than the first spot in this area). There is also an additional pile of rubble with three stages of clearing, which does not need to be cleared in order to build (so the only reason to clear it is to get the random rewards from clearing).

[\*\*] The large pile of rubble blocks both of the two left slots, and must be cleared in order to build on either of them. Conversely, the rightmost slot is blocked by both of the other two piles, so both of them must be cleared to use it.

[\*\*\*] Although the area includes two slots, one of them is occupied by the Temple itself (which does not currently do anything), so only one slot is available for building.

Your journal has this to say about Osterberg:
*Many years have passed since the time of the massacre at Grimhelm, which became the turning point of the First Occult Wars. Sons of the Empire fought bravely, but were doomed long before the battle began. We underestimated the power of the Dark Gods and cruelly paid for it. Thousands of fighters died, more were taken into slavery or Occult faith, the Empire fell and its name was forgotten. For many years we lived in fear under the Dominion rule. But the number of those who were dissatisfied with the regime and ready to fight grew every day. So the resistance was born. In order not to endanger the civilians, we had to go to the mountains, where we found the ruins of the Osterberg fortress. Now our wanderings have come to an end. We found a new home, we pay for it in blood and steel. It was worth it, because today will be remembered as the beginning of the Iron Empire Renaissance.*