I’m going to be unprofessional here, but Poseidon is the most bullshit God in the entire game. Greece has a whole isn’t a problem it’s just he’s incredibly overtuned compared to his brothers and sister. For one his bonuses cator towards calvery, caravans, and myth units, providing them with a speed boost which each respective age making his calvery and myth units such as his centaurs difficult to pursue. His unique tech “Lord of Horses” allows his calvery to have passive regneration and once paired with Hermes’s “Spririted Charge” and Dionysus’s “Thracian Horses” makes his calvery practically immortal even with counter-calvery units and nearly impossible to run down due to the fact they outpace every other unit in the game. His economy is utterly ridiculous as not only are his caravans faster (as mentioned earlier) but his markets are 30% cheaper and provide a 15% increase in exchange. His stables are also 30% cheaper and whilst you’re defending an onslaught of horses he can easily surround your entire base with stables and citadels without taking a sweat. In turn, you’re fighting for your life trying to get enough gold to advance to the next age, whilst simaltanously churning out units to defend yourself, and before you know it you’re overun with calvery and siege. He also ranks number one in terms of winrate and outranks every other respective God in the game. Not to mention his uniuqe unit, Hetairos, do AREA DAMAGE for literally no reason whatsoever. As they can mow down entire armies with ease whilst passively regenerating their health back to full with the correct mythological techs. Overall what more needs to be said on how broken and overtuned Poseidon as a God is? I struggle more with Poseidon out of any other God in the game, as my winrate against him is incredibly low. Why you may ask? Well, almost every game I’m quite litterly overrun with horses almost immedietly once he advances to the classical age. His horses are quite literally a cancer, and can’t be stopped once they get going.
This seems to be a common feeling for a bulk of the playerbase, since aggresion is usually easier to manage than defense until you get to a certain skill level, which is why you can see Poseidon sucess as top 1 declines after a certain elo and other gods take its place.
Its something common that happens in most RTS. In Aoe4 for example french (cav civ skin to pos) are usually hated equally due to the same dynamic. Doesnt matter if its currently the Best god / civ and top levels, raids and constante aggresion are things newer/ less skilled players struggle to deal with.
Pos has some bad match ups, shennong being one of them, if you are still playing him. But its very true that theres a wall to bridge in terms on knowledge and skill to get good at defending and beating more aggresive civs what aggresive gods like Poseidon needs to learn to do his basic dynamic.
I lost to Posiedon once as Shennong on one particular occassion as he surronded me with citadels and spammed Heterios. I couldn’t keep up and ran out of gold even with a trade route. I was spamming siege, tiger calvery, and Halberdier. They all kept getting mowed down regrdless because they do area damage and manage to heal up back to full with the “Thracian Horses” tech. I do not understand why they do area damage, it simply does not make any sense. My opponent also had 2 plenty vaults which also didn’t help as his economy was far superior then mine. Not to mention all gold mines on the map have been mined as all. Overall, excusee my French, but Heterios are utter bullshit.
I understand the frustation, happens to all, to be beaten several times by one thing. Hetairoi are quite strong, shennong Just has bettereams to deal with them along with a better quality army, but thats all assuming it goes evenly.
Being favored in a match up only applies if you know how to play it. No god has a guaranteed win vs another, specially at more common elo range where its usually fundamental mistakes that determine who wins.
Closed base, proper use of invis farms, good scouting with pioneers and good unit placement can help you reach your ideal game plan without losing villagers.