There's nothing Abbasid loves more than getting away with a three or four TC player and just booming, but when you're against the French, well, that's easier said than done.

Opening with a stable as your first production building is great to move across the map and start putting some pressure on the French, exactly what you want to do as the Abbasid.

It's quite difficult to play Abbasid effectively without that second town center. The feudal age tends to fall behind a lot of others, especially a feudal king like the French.

It's quite an expensive upgrade to get Phalanx, but once Abbasid has a mass of spears, it's so deceiving. That one extra poke can take down a lower health knight and make sure Chivalry doesn't heal them back to full.

Getting the first camel archer in will apply the anti-cavalry aura, giving minus 20% damage on enemy knights. That's going to be quite nice.