I’ve just caught a little glimpse of an upcoming feature in Empires & Allies that Zynga has in the pipeline and ready to drop: the introduction of Research buildings and the overall research options in the game, taking everything a little step further in terms of strategy and complexity of combat.
Research buildings will be specific for the units of your empire (Land, Sea and Air) and they will allow you to unlock bonuses to your units’ damage, research time and other stuff (most likely, increased revenue from buildings).