Decent Army?

I know this may sound like a stupid question, but what would be a good army to have?

The question I ask myself is always "If I attack Me, would it be value for my time and effort?"
For the kind of resources that you have, you need a relevant amount of troops to protect it.

Imagine someone with lvl 10 Rally spot and is considering to attack you for (example) 20Million food you have.
After they scout you, they find you have 15k AT and 200k archers.
Now, I personally don't think it's worth the effort at all!

Next I come to war.
War is something we lose all rationale of "Value".
You expect to see a coordinated effort against you.
I personally expect to receive at least 3~4 waves of 125k archers (Rainbowed) if warring faction wanted to take me out.
I'm still working on massing my troops but my first milestone will be 300k archers, 100k warriors (cannon fodder), 30k ballistas and 5k cataphracts.

I think this might be a good milestone for anyone who's losing direction on what they should do.
300k archers - enable you to take your first lvl 10 NPC!
30k ballistas - enable you to send to an approximate of 40 farming waves daily! (continuous farming will give you high ATT heroes you'll need in NPC battle and war)

Depending which style you are playing really. I like to classify it under PvE and PvP. To began, there really isnt a number to put to it. Big army may hold different terms for different people. Players will keep improving & thus the scale will change again in a few months. But I do have a set of minimum numbers that u can refer to as a reference for the next 1 month to come.

For PvP, Player vs Player, mainly for war. You will need a war city - Basically a city that will teleport immediately to the frontline when there is a war.

The minimum, decent amount of troops it should contain are :

100k of scouts
100k warriors
100k swords
100k pikes (optional)
300k of archers
100k of light/heavy cavalry
Transporters 3200, ballistas 3200
Including a lvl 10 fully filled out wall and a lvl 10 rally point.

For PvE, Player vs environment(npcs) : for an example to take down a lvl 10 npc

refer to Adock's guide on troop number here.

of course, all the above is just a guide, not a rule for u to follow. My mentality is that its never a mistake to have a big army. They take time to build, and lotsa food to upkeep, but its all worthwhile the effort comes the day u have to use it to protect & help others.