[Hellboy]

I'm far from an expert myself, and doubtless some more advanced player will come along soon enough, but in the meantime, I'll take a stab at some of your questions.

Sencha said:
Before I start I just want to say I did read through the manual and follow along with the tutorial that was included. So I do have a general understanding of the game's main concepts.

Good for you for reading the manual. That surely does not happen every time someone picks up the game!

Firstly, does the age you play in effect how difficult the game is? I've started out with early age games and having a somewhat difficult time establishing my nation.

Age (or era) should not directly affect difficulty directly, although your style of play may work better in one era than another. The general idea is that the later the era the more advanced the military units, and the less advanced the magic commanders and less available the magic resources. Since magic likely adds more complexity to the game than advanced military units, it might be the case that early era is somewhat more difficult to master than late era.

Secondly, how much does map size and player number effect the difficulty? I've been playing small maps with about three or four AI opponents.

The primary impact of map size should be game duration, but it is possible that on very small maps you'll encounter the AI much sooner than you would on large maps (the primary factor here will be the # provinces/player). OTOH very large or sparse maps could make it possible for a juiced up AI to build up large forces by the time it does encounter you.

There's just one more issue I'd like to bring up. When I take my turn, I'm doing everything in my power that my current resources and gold allow me to do. I build temples and fortifications when I can. I raise my pd, I am always recruiting, researching, preaching, and forming armies. So I think I'm doing everything right. Yet the AI, who I assume is doing the exact same things, under more or less the same limitations, ends up doing it far better. So I'm wondering if it knows something I don't?

Yes, the AI absolutely does know things that you do not. Dominions is a game now in its third generation and there is a huge body of knowledge on how to play this game well. While the expert players have a rather a low opinion on the ability of the AI, there is definitely some of that body of knowledge encoded in the AI (eg standard strategies, tactics and the like).

At the least, you're in the right place to tap into that body of knowledge, and you'll find lots of answers to your questions here. There are also various fan sites that have some of those answers, as well. One of the things that is common in Dom3 battles is that there are various combinations of tactics, unit useage and magic spells that are particulary effective (or in some cases particularly disasterous). You will certainly need to learn some of those combinations in order to play effectively. So, one way to start on that learning curve is to look for particular battle situations that are going badly, and ask specific questions about turning that around, here on this forum.

Anyhow, hope that helps, and good luck with picking something up out of that "huge body of knowledge"!