Perks are a big way on how you can improve the damage you deal, the number of resources you work, how many units/resources you can store in storage, and how cheaply you can produce weapons. There are three perks, being strength, education and endurance. Increasing your strength will allow you to do more damage in wars/military training. Increasing your education will allow you to increase your maximum work experience , which increases the amount of cash/resources you make per energy. Increasing your endurance will decrease your energy cost (important), and it also increases the damage you deal in wars/military training. To level up your perks, click on the Profile tab. Select which perk you want to increase, then you can either spend cash to level up, or gold to level up faster. As a new player, it is recommended to level up to level 50 endurance as soon as possible, before focusing on other perks. It is also recommended that you spend cash on perks until you reach level 100, as the perk training time scales up exponentially.