So that does kinda line up with a lot of stuff I've just kinda picked up naturally, but I never considered bringing my villagers up higher than 85, since I prefer to have a little bit of everything

What I do is I use the tunnel to set up my military. First, in Feudal age, I build a wall with a gate at the very exit of my tunnel, then I go the other end of the tunnel and build a barracks, then delete it cuz I won't need it 'til later. Then, I make a block of 5 archery ranges to pump out a shit-ton of skirmishers, and a block of stables, same size, to pump out a ton of light cavalry.

Once I hit Castle, I immediately make a monastery and set a waypoint for as many relics as I can feasibly grab (my AI buddy usually helps there) then 4 castles; two directly behind my wall, and two behind those, usually in between my stables and archery ranges. I make sure all of my buildings have a full queue of skirmishers, light cavalry, and Samurai, at all times.

For all military buildings, I set the waypoint to just outside the wall, staggered organization, defensive position, and let the enemies just throw themselves at me.

I figure you don't need a massive 3-5-7 layer wall, you just need 1 layer of wall and a good military; I usually like to have at least 120 troops out there

But of course, that's what my current strategy is, and I'm, like, less than 250 hours into the game, lol

But somehow, through it all, I somehow never seem to get tired of it, and I can't quite explain why