Man, I might be being a jerk, but I can’t stop laughing here. 
I didn’t came to the forum for a couple a months because the DLC was a turnoff, and them I come to back to the forum, and there is almost nothing about the African civs, but a ton of topics on Japan. I feel like I am in a total different matrix.
It’s like watching the flatearthers. I can’t believe on 2021, with African civs wondering about QSs people are talking about Japan with their slow-arse age up and eco.
I honestly feel I am in a total different matrix.
I don’t know how tournaments are being played in you dimension, but on mine there is a legacy tournament without the DE civs organized by Kaiserklein being played right now, and Japan is not picked super often how you make look like.
Swedes was indeed picked a lot on the Global Championship. But I honestly think that the fact that Fraser River was the first map had a lot of influence on it.
Just imagine if Texas was on the map pool. How many players that don’t play Russians will pick Russians too have the two blockhouses?
And to go further on that, you say that stats “don’t lie”, but if solely you look at the stats without the context, Swedes and Japan don’t have spectacular win rates like Russia and Haudenausanee, and Japan is not picked that often (Although Swedes was the second most picked behind Portugal)
I will link two topics with the numbers for you:
But again, just looking at stats whiteout context is silly, since they disregard variants like the fact that there was a lot of water maps (Which influenced Portugal being picked so often), the first map of the map pool being a dream map for Swedes, the presence of a lot of rusty old school players bringing down the stats of old school civilizations like France, etc, etc.
We can’t just say that the stats give a full truth without understanding actually understanding the context of which they are inserted on.
Because “high level” is somewhat static independent of the civilization.
Are playing against Japan more robotic than playing against a Russian player with forward blockhouse with 5 cossacks + 5 musketeers? Or a German player raiding with Uhlans to cover up a semi-ff? Or a Portuguese player water booming? Or a British player triple barracking double carded musketeers? Or a Dutch player doing a 4 banks semi-ff into skirmishers-ruyters?
I mean, if you dislike to play against this civilization in particular, that’s understandable. I also have civilizations that I don’t like playing against it.
But implying that just Japan is static and a crutch, it’s just not true. A lot of civilizations are somewhat static on the high level.