Tips for new players

If you have a ready supply of resources, and need those advanced buildings, then by all means just go for a lvl 7 building.

But if you have in any way limited resources it is better to go with even level up.

This is so I can get Adv Res Buildings

Let me put it this way: If you invest 20,000 resources of each type into either levelling up a) one resource producing building of each type, or b) all of them simultaneously, variant b) will give you the higher production rate / h in the end (considerably higher).

If you do this without help from outside, you will also have finished faster, as - again - your production of resources is greater in b) than in a) on every stage.

For "lone wolf" players, unlocking advanced technologies is not a priority, because they won't have the resource income to build the necessary secondary buildings anyway. Yes, you will be able to level up to lvl 7, but then you will have loooong periods waiting for enough resources to be produced to build your secondary buildings. It gets worse if you invest resources to increase your research production - and without an increased research production, you won't be able to research all these shiny new technologies anyway.

Of course this all does not apply if you have unlimited resource injection from outside. In that case, I would recommend as well levelling up and increasing research production as fast as possible.