It’s weird that their flaming arrow is both a cannon and a culverin unit. It already seems redundant because of their Yabusame who can already nuke enemy artillery.
If I had to make one change to Japan’s military power, it would be to reduce either the FA’s range or splash damage against infantry, and make it either more like a cannon or culverin, but not both.
And it’s not like Japan needs to have amazing artillery despite lower than average infantry. It’s the contrary, as their infantry and cavalry are great, Ashigaru may even be overtuned a little.
So I think a nerf for flaming arrows (and shrines) would make Japan a powerful but more balanced civ to play against.
4 Likes
Flaming arrows are literally one of the few units japan has that is balanced, I agree it is redundant because of the yabusame but I don’t think it really warrants a change because they are a pretty middle of the road unit that has flexibility but not raw power.
8 Likes
I would say they have too much power and flexibility. They are cheap and it’s easy to make a bunch, mobile since they don’t have to pack up, they have very good damage when massed, and on top of all of that, each one acts as a culverin. If we think about just a single flaming arrow, then yes, they have low damage. But most of the time they are in a group of 5-10, giving them the ability to micro very well against most civ’s artillery. Just a slight range advantage renders enemy falconets useless, while also granting massive damage against infantry. I just don’t see how that’s balanced at all.
3 Likes
Well flaming arrows are worse than culvs because range and artillery multiplier, they are essentially haudensaunee light cannons, what I’m trying to say is that japan is an OP civ, but their power doesn’t rely on flaming arrows, it relys on economy, ashigarus, and yabusames, flaming arrows are no where near as strong as the other Japanese units, but on the scale of units of other civs flaming arrows are above average.
5 Likes
Flaming arrows are only relevant because the meta slowed down and most fights are in industrial age now. Otherwise they’d be as useful as samurai.
4 Likes
Yes that’s true, a single flaming arrow is worse at killing cannons when compared to culvs. Their base range is 28 vs culv 34, and there’s no multiplier for FA. However, more often than not, flaming arrows outnumber culvs. and falconets 3:1, mainly from the lower cost and the (2x) 4 flaming arrows shipment. In AOE 3, the victor is mainly decided by who can kill the other guy’s cannons first, and flaming arrows excel at that, purely based on the fact that they have more range and are more numerous than falconets. Flaming arrows don’t need to be better than culvs. to outmatch falconets, which they do by a lot.
You mention that flaming arrows are nowhere near as strong as other Japanese units, but in my experience the main combination of units usually includes Ashi/flaming arrow mix in nearly every game. Never been in a game where Japanese didn’t abuse flaming arrows.
I’m really just asking for a range reduction to 26 so they don’t make enemy cannons completely irrelevant. They will still have great units like the Ashigaru and Naginata, and be able to counter any artillery with Yabusame, but the anti-infantry/anti-artillery duality that FAs have is currently broken.
1 Like
I agree that their use has shifted in DE, but I still encounter this problem in 1700-1800 ELO, 2v2, 1v1, age III matches very often.
Japan has btter than average Infantry. Japan literally has better everything, that is why it is OP.
3 Likes
Nobody has ever thought of that before. Perhaps they should do something.
The power isn’t the flaming arrow, it’s the ashigaru, think of it like this, a flaming arrow is worse against infantry like skirms than a normal falc, but it’s much better against artillery than a normal falc, the ashigaru is much better against skirms than any other musk
( excluding age 4 corolean ) but ashigaru are still countered by artillery the same amount as most musks essentially flaming arrows look strong when paired with ashi only because the ashi counters everything except falc, and flaming arrows counter falc.
So to summarize everything, flaming arrows look strong with ashi because even though a flaming arrow can’t counter skirms like most musk cannon civs need it too, ashigaru is a good counter to skirm so it makes up for it, meaning that the only weakness of the ashi is falcs, and flaming arrows counter falcs.
3 Likes
His empire upgrade also increases his range by 2. From 28 to 30
I know, I am late to the party… but can I use this as a signature?
On the flaming arrows, I don’t know. The thing with them is that 2 flaming arrows don’t one shot a falconet, but two falconets do one shot a flaming arrow, so I guess that the slightly better range is needed so they don’t lose every single artillery fight.
1 Like
True, like I said flaming arrows are above average but when compared to the rest of the Japanese units they aren’t very good, I think it’s still safe to say they counter falcs because not only the range but the not needing to pack, obviously not as good as culverins though.
I messed up my wording there, I was saying Japan does have amazing infantry. My bad. I was saying they don’t need it in addition to flaming arrows lol.
Amm no, the only thing they have better is the musketeer, everything else is either strong or good, but their units are also one of the most expensive in the game so if you don´t overlook that, only their musk is better.
I’d say the yumi are an s tier unit as well. Not that I think japan are op and the flaming arrow certainly isn’t, they are in a good spot after the most recent nerf making the shrines a little easier to siege.
2 Likes
Hmm i like the yumi a lot, and it´s probably one of the best counters to ranged cavalry, and in that regard it might be s tier but generally is used to counter HI and although it does it well it´s not like the skirmisher so i think it stays a little behind in it´s main purpouse
pretty much any Japanese unit gets pretty s tier when you stack all their available cards, techs and auras, but there’s no way you actually fit every upgrade card in a deck. you’ll be missing out on something in a normal game or have 0 eco upgrades available, which is bad considering how expensive all these units are. Flaming arrows are probably your weakest unit tbh, they don’t even one shot some of the tankier heavy infantry (only 225 damage per volley, with a very low rate of fire). They are a bit more massable but they have very low dps
1 Like
Yeah, that´s exactly what i always try to point out! Japanese military cards are kind of unfair, and i know i might get a lot of hate here xd but if you compare their cards with pretty much every other civ, the age 2 cards buff +15% hp or atk to 2 units, sometimes 3, sometimes even more than 3 (Dravidian arts buff 4 units + the other units although it´s not really relevant), some age 2 cards buff 3 units but hp AND atk (just like boyars), now, i´m not trying to take the exception and making it the rule, i understand those cards are pretty rare, but i think all euro civs and even all others i think get at least for 2 units, and i know also that when is a package it should be more total benefit, meaning that it cannot be +30% hp for 1 unit rather than +15% for 2 units, because it´s often more comfortable the 1 unit buff, but +20% seems a little low, and worse, some cards like the ashigaru one is +15% so with every other civ you get +15% for 2 units with 1 card and japanese needs 2 cards for the same effect, so i have some suggestions but that´s for another topic xd