Ah, thank for for the clarification regarding the abatis-es Ashanta

Do you know if traps do this range-setting as well, even if the attack is all-cav? I figure having a few would be a good backup if I'm trying to eat up multiple waves spaced only a few seconds apart IF they happen to kill all the abatis and the traps would keep the rest starting at 5k range.

Also - I wish I didn't have to worry about taking losses But I can only build about 10k archers per day. Which gives me lots of time for reading up on combat and calculating, but not a whole lot of fightin' time if I get it wrong and I lose my army.

What you're telling me about the mostly archers plus small layers seems to be the best advice, so for the next few days I'm just taking the hits with gates closed and building my archers until I have 25k or so.

Regarding the layers: I was wrong about how the abatis works, but is that how it works for the other troop types? I.e. the attacking cavalry stop for a round to fight the warrior, stop for a round to fight the pikeman, etc.?