First things first.
1. What is the length of your stack from top of stove to cap?
2. What does the stack pass through, and how much is inside a warmed space versus outside a warmed space?
3. What type of pipe is it (i.e. single wall, double, triple, grandpa's old dryer pipe . . .)?
4. How high does the pipe stick out of the roof and where is it relative to the roof lines?
5. How many SF is your cabin, what is the height, and how tight is it?
These questions are preliminary, and critical.
If you have a short/cold stack, the answer to your question is going to be different than if you have a long/warm stack.
IMO, a properly installed wood stove and stack will draw well, on a day near freezing, without any issue and without prewarming, with the only exception being if you have a crappy stove or a tight house or both.
PE is a great stove, so that's probably not your issue.
Finally, top down fires are the only ones that make sense, if you understand the underlying physics.
Things don't "catch" fire. Things combust because their temperature rises to their combustion point.
If things "caught" fire, then you could light an oak log with a match. You can't. You must bring the log up to its combustion temp. You don't need flames to do this. You could make a log burn simply by placing it in a proper oven and raising the temp until the oak reached its combustion point, and then voom, flame on!!
So when you do a paper-on-the-bottom fire you are falsely hoping that the flames from the paper will make the kindling "catch." Piling all that crap on top of the paper has the net effect of reducing the ability of the paper to burn, thereby releasing heat, thereby heating up the kindling to combustion point, thereby releasing heat, thereby raising cord wood temp to combustion point.
4 or 5 splits on the bottom.
4 or 5 kindling splits on top of that, tightly together.
A handful or two of very small kindling - I use a small section of 2x4 - maybe 5 inches long, no knots. Use axe to break into 20 or so pieces.
Keep kindling in house for several weeks so it gets really dry.
Light small kindling with blow torch (get trigger start). Blow on small kindling to get fired up.
If you want to just light it and walk away, then use 3-5 bowtied newspapers on top of small kindling.
Paper/blowtorch heats small kindling to combustion point, which burns and forms hot coals that heat the middling kindling to combustion point, and repeat.
Works every time as long as you have seasoned wood and dry kindling.
