Mid game I too would go back to Abus Guns. Early game, though, meaning early Colonial to early Fortress, I would take the Strelets or Skirmishers in a heartbeat.
Why? Because these units can fight off other light infantry a lot more effectively, are massed much faster, train much faster. Meaning I can have a hell of a lot more of them ready by the time Mr. Aztec shows up with 10 Macehualtin, 3 Jaguar Knights and 5 Janeys, or Monsieur Frenchie shows up with 20 Crossbows faster than I could've ever believed possible.
Why do you think I use minor native light infantry instead of Abus Guns whenever they are available on the map? Because they're cheaper? Not really, considering the wood cost on most of them. Paying 60 food / 60 wood for a Cherokee Rifleman isn't that far off from 50 food and 100 gold for an Abus Gun. No, it's because I can have the building training them ready even before Colonial, I can have 10+ of them by the time the above forces show up, and they don't cost me 2 pop each (indeed the cost me no pop at all!).
Abus Guns weaknesses stack up really badly very early on. You're under pressure, yet you need to have a crapload of housing space, you need to find the wood for the foundary and barrack and stable now, you need to find the gold somewhere before you can ship in 700 (910) gold or the trade route resource generation kicks in (5:30 earliest).
And then even if you get your first 5 Abus out, you'll have a hell of a time protecting them from focus fire by light infantry or from melee units such as Rods, Pumas, Warclubs, Janeys, etc. All the 5+ speed melee units with 10+ attack own Abus so hard it's not even funny, while on paper Abus are supposed to own then (well except the Janeys).
So yeah, I'll take the Skirmishers or Strelets, please, early on. Or Cree, Cherokee, Carib and Klamath.
Please don't bring up the paper stats of what takes how many shots. They are irrelevant when people actually micro their units. You won't be standing there trading shots with Skirmishers. You'll be trying to keep your Abus awayfrom hand cavalry, while enemy 20+ range infantry are firing on your Abus. You'll only be taking shots between movements, assuming you're in range. Whereas before you could keep enough of the Abus Guns alive long enough for your meatshield to kill off the enemy melee cavalry, these days it is no longer possible. Your survivor Abus (if any) get overwhelmed by the enemy surviving light infantry fire.
And early on in Colonial when fighting Dutch Skirmishers, or in early Fortress fighting other civs skirmishers, Wakinas or Forest Prowlers, before hand cavalry is on the scene, you'll get hit and run by these units. They'll come in, 10 of them fire off, kill one of your Abus, and if you're lucky one or two of your Abus will fire a shot back, not even killing a single enemy unit.
At my level of play, a mere 2 difference in range can be very significant. Because people micro their units.Go ahead, try to use Hussars to slow down the enemy LI. By the time you add your hand cavalry, the enemy adds his. And now you're screwed into the above situation.
This is what actually happens in game in 1.03. Something paper stats will never show.
Lastly, as for what's wrong with making cavalry or artillery to fight light infantry, that works great until you get killed by mass ranged cavalry. Especially painful if you face Sioux or Aztec.
You need to get Abus Guns in fairly large quantities to protect against ranged cavalry. Which takes away from the amounts of artillery, hand cavalry or meatshields you can produce. A smart opponent will capitalize on such a weakness. He'll see that you don't have a strong enough meatshield, and overwhelm you with mass hand cavalry (it happened). Or as said above, with ranged cavalry (happened). Etc.
I can't get away with lacking in any area when I fight 2k+ opponents. Hell even most 1900s will punish you for it.So my answer in 1.03 has been to:
1. Use native light infantry to defeat early rushes.
2. Use high quality troops in the limited numbers I can afford them. Thus I use Ronin/Swiss Pikes/Corsairs and upgrade them at the Arsenal. I use Falconets and upgrade them with 2 cards. I use mercs like Mamelukes, Stradiots and Spahi and upgrade them with cavalry combat. And I try to get enough Abus Guns present so that I can fight off ranged cavalry spam by focusing fire with the Falconets and Abus (doesn't work against Aztec, thanks to their bleeding Arrow Knights).
3. Use melee cavalry, Hussars and mercs, as pseudo anti-cav, in an attempt to have generalist units that can do multiple jobs, such as take on light infantry (not so well), take out Culverins or Falconets and intercept enemy hand cavalry. This, again, doesn't work so good when your opponent realizes you have no protection against ranged cavalry. So Abus are needed again.
Ottomans need their Abus Guns to be effective and not so god damn fragile, because it's our ONLY way to fight ranged cavalry spam. Something most people tend to forget ...
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