Sigh,
This is an ARCHER world - 5k ARCHERS in your nukes FTW
Oh, back to the original question, if you're starting now, you'll be starting out a long way to the rim, so you won't have that many active players around you. On that basis, I'd go for "max farming power" (a couple of hundred spears at first, then LC as soon as you can.)
One piece of advice for rim, though, don't actually build your academy until you have a full nuke, and enough cash stored up to churn out (at least one) noble straightaway.
There are players who keep an eye out for villages that jump up 512 points at once, and noble them out as soon as the academy is built...