The focus of Japanese civilization should not be on ninjas, because Japan does not need ninjas at all, and the most important thing that Japan should strengthen is the regular troops, not those special units that are completely useless.
Japan is now unable to defeat the Dragon Knights and civilizations such as England, France, and Mongolia, because the regular troops are too weak and consume a lot of resources, which makes Japan very passive in the early and middle stages.
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what elo are you? maybe its just about learning to adapt
Japan trades resilience and strength in feudal age for faster movement speed. I’ve had more success in feudal by opening with Shinobi and supporting them with yumi, onnabugeisha, and horsemen (w/ bannerman support, composition depending on what I am facing). It is very difficult to counter armored forces though, if my opponent goes to castle before me it leaves me with few responses. That’s normally when I lose games, so I have had to plan for going to castle quickly.
I do find it interesting that you say that their regular troops consume a lot of resources. While they are weaker, in some ways their resource cost is lower than average. Onnabugeisha cost the same amount of resources as spearman, and the yumi cost less and train faster making them easy to mass. When facing unarmored forces they can be very effective, and Japan has a (slightly) easier time killing retreating forces because of their enhanced movement speed.
In castle age their knights are very powerful. Being able to negate the first attack and getting an attack damage bonus from bannermen is huge.
But I wouldn’t say no to a buff to Japan!
Well, if you want advice for 1vs1:
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Order of the Dragon: Only case to go fast castle with the Temple of Equality, whose Buddhist monks with “sohei Sutras” are able to reduce the attack power of enemy units so much, and even more: because the Order has less army than other civs, the monks have to aim at fewer targets. And don´t forget to steal al the relics in the map.
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French: I’m not entirely sure here. Although the Japanese economy is better than the French, their rushes are really heavy. The best counter I know is to go Fast Castle and produce Mounted Samurai (III), which are well below the early Royal Knights (II) because they are one age above, and unlike France, with the Floating Gate you can mass produce them, as well as onna musha.
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English: It depends, if they rush you, do the fight in feudal with horsemen and samurai, the first ones boosted by their respective Bannerman. If they boom you economically, go to fast castle and harass them with early knights and a massive production of units.
What I would ask for Japan are two aesthetic changes:
1.- Change the Ashigaru Handcanonner for Ashigaru Gunner or Arquebusier. Give Arquebuses or Muskets (Tanegashima Matchlook) to this unit.
2.- Give “Japanese Castle” style walls to the japanese Stone walls.
Currently Japanese walls are Chinese walls with “Black paint” on the roofs of the gates and stone towers. They need a unique arquitecture like the Malians Walls.
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