Double stable into mass knights makes a lot of sense early on to contest the Torguud effectively as well as the Khan.
Would you place a barracks here as French? Never.
And these long fights do work out in favor for the Golden Horde. As long as the Batu Khan is alive, he's going to be continuously throwing out these attack signaling arrows, which if the fight goes long go all the way up to I believe it's like 30% bonus damage that the units do.
When Golden Horde goes up to Castle Age, that might give French the timing point to pull the trigger.
The School of Cavalry finishes before the Golden Horde age up, so the first knight can decide to go straight for the base.
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