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When you start a battle, you are either relatively close to the enemy (in range of artillery or archers) or pretty far away. Which do you prefer and why? I am guessing that the landscape might have something to do with it and maybe if you are attacking or defending but I don't have any proof to back it up.
I like to for everything to be "in range" at the start because I hate realligning my battle formations again.
When defending and if outnumbered (I rarely attack outnumbered, but it happens...), I like to place my infantry as far as possible from where the front of the enemy should be... I would leave my missile troops at a medium distance with some cavalry a little to stop charges on my missile units...I like to make the enemy walk before engaging...
I might even lure some of the enemy units with my cav to enable my missile units to fire on their flanks then turn around when the enemy stops chasing or chooses another target...
Thus when the enemy battle line reaches charging distance, its units are already depleted...
If attacking I tend to place my missile on the higher ground nearest the front line of deployment and adapt the rest of my units correspondingly...Generally I place my infantry to the back of missile units to provide protection against charges and my cavalry on one or two flanks according to the tactic I choose to employ...