Japan/ForumTitle

[nandoray]

I was thinking about it after looking at the civ tiers thread and I started thinking Japan has a tech that rivals

almost every civ. It can get exp from its shrines which trumps native exp dance, shrines are also practically mini

factories, less vils like dutch in fact japans existence just makes dutch look dumb to me, it can train in batches

of 10 which hurts russian strelets feelings.. yumis come off as Longbows, sams kill dops cost and skill wise so

im sorry but they do since Japan eco can allow you to field 30 pretty much just as vils and you will still have full

armies.. sending shipments twice kills any other civs best shipments.. im sure there is more..

but to end my rant.. why is my forum title crossbowman? i am not that. help me change it!

[Goodspeed]

Japan is strong but be careful, it's very easy to overrate them if you don't use the right builds against them. Japan has a weakness early game, you have to do timing pushes to kill them before they get rolling. Many civs have a good opportunity to kill Japan before they get scary, but you need to know what to do.
What civ are you playing?

As for your title, it will change to stronger units as you post more ')

[[Armag] diarouga]

Japan is quite strong but they just loose to iro/otto/india/azzy and sometimes to russia.

[Nymphomaniac]

Japan looses to otto, iro, aztecs for sure. Even French and Germany have very good initial-mid game vs Japan. I think u can even outboom Japan with France, Germany and Britain of course, if u keep their shrines in check and don't loose entire army right-clickcing on their base.
But I don't think India can do anything against Japan. Like Japan their eco also takes time to kick start and Japan has better OP units which get even stronger the more the game progresses.

[_venox_]

Well, their early-game economy sucks and the enemy dictates them the early and mid-game. Samurai aren't as strong as doppels and the exp card isn't that useful. What makes them strong is their infantry death-ball backed up with flaming arrows, the many infantry upgrade cards, that they aren't as reliant on the map (auto resources from shrines) and that they get 2 shipments and a Daimyo and cheaper units after aging to the industrial age. And twice a bad shipment doesn't mean it beats the best shipments, they are just more flexible with it. They have their options and different styles, but they can't copy every other civ. And the only way to change the Crossbowman is to have over 50 or over 100 posts.
BTW if you could, what would you change it into?

[Nymphomaniac]

Samurai aren''t as strong as doppels

Samurai beat doppels, although doppels are better unit vs cav due to their area damage. Doppels might become stronger than samurai after shipping that 4th age card which increases their attack by 35%(approx) but reduces their speed as well...

[iNcog]

Don't Samurai have area damage?

[_venox_]

Well, I thought that Samurai just had 20 damage and 1 less AOE, but they have 25 vs the 20 and 10% higher meele resist. Another jap unit which beats it's counterpart. (ashi>musk, samurai>doppel, yumi>xbow)

[_venox_]

I don't know japan that well, but against a strelet rush they can surely start stables and send 600 coin to fuel 10 naginata. And even if they are pressured in their base, their monks can still spam shrines all over the map, which can be hard to kill and deny you some hunts. Japan can also wall himself off a bit to trap enemies better with a batch, a shipment, mm and consulate. I don't say it's easy to play japan against somebody who pressures, but japan still got it's trump cards. Also at minute 5 or 6 they sure got many shrines up, when another civ like portus (with 17 vills) second tc finished building and they can start training 2 vills at a time...
Also what about civs that have trouble pressuring japan, or what if the map is really defensive? Then their boom potential really comes to shine.

[Papist]

Japan is strong but be careful, it''s very easy to overrate them if you don''t use the right builds against them. Japan has a weakness early game, you have to do timing pushes to kill them before they get rolling. Many civs have a good opportunity to kill Japan before they get scary, but you need to know what to do.
What civ are you playing?

As for your title, it will change to stronger units as you post more ')

Please tell me curiassier is one of the titles

[Mitoe]

A lot of people have made some really good points in this thread' especially SirCallen. I would just like to add that Japan is also one of the easiest civs in the game to scout out what they're doing. This is due to the fact that they're actually quite limited in their early game options, and if you take a look at their deck, any cards that they have sent will no longer have the small x2 icon in the corner. This means you can tell exactly what they're shipping, and can react accordingly.

For example, many people have said that Japan is weak to early pressure because their early economy is fairly weak and requires quite a large investment to get going. So in general a fairly good strategy vs Japan is to build a forward base, and plan to rush with infantry, but before you do anything make sure you take a look at their deck to see what they're shipping. Any combination of 600w, 4 villagers, or 5 fishing boats likely means you can expect them to be booming, and you'll have the advantage with early military, meaning you're free to go poke at their villagers, try to kill a couple or just force garrison time or even deny their military buildings for a while longer (it's also a good idea to have some pikes or muskets sieging shrines behind this). Be sure to continue checking their deck so you know what's coming.

If, however, they decide to ship something like 600c (could be for Nagi, but be careful of sneaky age ups as well. Try to scout their military building.), 5 ashi, or 5 yumi (all of which you can tell simply by looking at their deck when they hit age 2), that means they're going to be sacrificing their economy for early units. In this instance you might want to take a slower and more economic approach to early colonial, and instead of pushing on their base just go siege shrines and gear up for a strong timing push around 8-9 minutes (where they'll have to start booming again because they've shipped units), where you'll have the stronger army because you were booming in the early game, whereas they were not, and harassing their shrines.

Other things to look out for if the game goes longer than 12-15 minutes are their second/third gold mines. Sure, Japan doesn't need hunts but they do still need gold if they want to produce heavily on ashi/nagi (or samurai, lolz), and sending a few cav to harass these mines is a good way to keep yourself in the game and hurt their economy. Also keep in mind that Japan has to ship orchards eventually (usually around 11-13 minutes I believe?), and so any early FF business is only going to be followed up by 1 or 2 military shipments before they HAVE to ship orchards. And this means you usually have a good timing window where you can punish their age up shenanigans.

Just be careful not to overcommit under their town center, especially if they've shipped a card like Enlist Irregulars (you can tell by seeing if their TC is doing 90 dmg or 135 dmg [< this means they sent it]), and continuously harass shrines whenever possible, these are important buildings for Japan and even if you can only kill a few of them it's good to do so.

[Good ol Ivan]

tl'dr Jap has a really OP late colonial game and overall is a really OP civ - but they have a weak early game and are pretty vulnerable to early pushes.
They shine more in a 3v3 than in a 1v1.

[iNcog]

Very nice discussion here, it really allowed me to pinpoint some things about Japan which I noticed from my own games.

I feel as if the right way to play Japan is to balance out units versus boom just right so that you can just barely survive the early game and then enter your comfort zone with premium, upgraded infantry units and a crazy economy to back it up. The right way to play against Japan is to prevent them from getting to their comfort zone while going for your own (fortress or colonial boom, I guess).

The thing I've failed to notice about Japan is that I'm not sure what to go for when playing against Japan. Shrines can take time to get down and even if their initial army isn't impressive, they still have defender's advantage and the TC to work with. Tricky playing Japs.

[[Armag] diarouga]

Very nice discussion here, it really allowed me to pinpoint some things about Japan which I noticed from my own games.

I feel as if the right way to play Japan is to balance out units versus boom just right so that you can just barely survive the early game and then enter your comfort zone with premium, upgraded infantry units and a crazy economy to back it up. The right way to play against Japan is to prevent them from getting to their comfort zone while going for your own (fortress or colonial boom, I guess).

The thing I''ve failed to notice about Japan is that I''m not sure what to go for when playing against Japan. Shrines can take time to get down and even if their initial army isn''t impressive, they still have defender''s advantage and the TC to work with. Tricky playing Japs.

Imo big rush like iro/azt?que win easily. 8-9 min timings like bow/pike, jan/abus/cav or fast ff also works very well.

[nandoray]

It is not like I always lose to them! After reading everything you guys have said it seems like the shrines act as both a weakness and a strength for Japan. As for the Sam/Dopp comparison I just wanted to add' the katana and the greatsword are both fantastic. I love the Souls series on ps3 so both the units come off as extra bad ace to me. XD rods are cool too.

If I could choose my own title.. 8( that is a tough question LMAO! This is off the top, but maybe Thugee or Blind Monk. Haha Iron Troop? I just noticed these are all Mercs. Let me just say Warchief. ' )

How many posts do I have to make before I become a Dragoon. I could settle for dragoon I guess..?