AOE3 Forums

Japan is still considered as a OP civilisation, but I enjoy playing with it so i want to share some important tips with everyone:P Anyone can give more tips based on my guides. Please DO NOT FLAME ON MY THREAD. thx

I have won over 60-65% of my japan games in teams and also most of the time there is a mirror japan to balance.

If you have 300 wood for start making consulate and chop 6 wood for ports you should maintain settler production.

1: Normally always go to colonial with 13 settlers! Some comment on 16-14 but that is way too slow. Always age with 3 settlers and only in emergency 4!

2: NEVER go colonial with the great budda wonder.

   Basic Wonder guide for japan:

   Torii gates: This the wonder you use when you are doing cavalry as your main army or when you want to go aggresive with yumis or ashis. Also can be used as a combo for TPs and colonial xp card for japan.

    Shogunate: ONLY use this when you know that your opponents are rushing quick. Your first 2 cards can be army and you can spam units just enough for rushing civs.

     Big Shrine Wonder :P cant remember: lol well use this wonder at maps where you can get 8 cows or yaks also making shrine booming includes this.

     Pavalion: This is a very nice wonder and I use it alot for Ashigaru spamming.

 Cards at the first age 75% heavenly kami because shrines are keys for japan. 2 exeptions rushing quick n hard you must use the 300 wood and when using yumi get 20 % wood cutting as first card and heavenly kami as second. Also chonindo is a good card for boosting econ but it wont effect your total game play that much. I rarely use this because there much better crads to send since japan should always trty sending shipments. I dont see many people sending more helpful cards like the cherry 15% boost or wood 20% boost or the basic mine cards plus marcket is really effective. My opinion on chonindo is after natutal resource is down.

 I would very happy to learn new stratedies form forumers and I will post more about sea next time and also improve this a little.

OP sea guide :P

The basics: Always have 2 decks for food sea and coin sea.

Big shrine wonder= TEAM or shrine boom strats.

1st card in team: TEAM chronido (perhaps i got wrong name but it enhances all type of ressource gathering).

1st card in 1v1: no idea :P perhaps heavenly, but its too slow IMO.Id like sending in 2 villagers:it give a poor (bcause other civs has 3 vills) but decent early economy boost

1. on a sea map, three boats and five boats shipment plus portuguese let u have 21 fishing boats for free. this lets you conclude the lesser food problem of japan.

2.along with the 21fishing boats method, u construct toshogu shrine for the second age, and then u immediately can get 3 boats from consolute coz u get 200 export for bonus of toshogu shrine after built.

3.the card called fish market makes japan so *** op in a sea map coz u have 21 fish boats and 50 total percent of gathering enhancement.

4.about military, yumi is the second strongest light inf against light inf and cavs. the strongest one should be portuguese skirmishers but if u consider the amount of hitpoints in later age, yumi should be the best coz with full upgrades and those consolute, daimyo enhancement, and golden pavilion makes yumi's physical damage up to 55 and 260 of hitpoints.

5.yabusame archers are the best cavs against artilleries with the strong armor against range damage, the quick shooting rate, 8-9(by shipment) times bonus against artilleries with 18ranges.

6. morutaru is the second bast motor for range but in my opinion the no.1 motor ever with its mobility, 46range(by shipment), and the pop cost, just 3!!! 

7.samurai is physically the strongest heavy inf if its totally upgraded and being under the best condition which enhance its power:daimyo, shogun, golden pavilion, and consolute(japanese isolation). because samurai has the high physical damage like 77 in the 5th age with 200 soemthing of siege attack, its also strong against other heavy infs except those mercenaries like hatamoto samurai... although samurai has less bonus for cav and light inf but good armor, hitpoints, and physical damage.

8. but for musks, ashi is the most badass ever. by shipment, 4,5times against cav by melee attack. and 87range attack at maximum with one pop brings u euphoria if u just crush ur ashis against enemy musks. even not so, inf vs inf, how can u usually be beaten with ur ashis? even the opponents have a lot of skirmishers, as long as u succeed in melee combat by ashis, u can own skirmishers. (btw 87range damage means almost same as skirmishers range attack against heavy inf... so hardcore )

9.if u are annoyed by a fort of enemy, u get a shipment from portuguese. the shipment of a battle ship with three petards inside. if u get a shipment, by exp, that makes ur inf's siege attack 33percent more, ur petard's siege attack becomes 2600 to 2700 something like this. ur three petards beat a fort from a behind while ur enemy is attracted by some shots of ur flaming arrows against the fort. 

those strong military and dependence on fish boats are the specific points of japan i guess. 

This game is not about comparing units though:P

Yumi reaches 54 btw

and ashis arent as affective as anti cav as doppels and samus but many other say so.

rescawen:

This game is not about comparing units though:P

Yumi reaches 54 btw

and ashis arent as affective as anti cav as doppels and samus but many other say so.

i dunno, but whenever i play, yumi definitely reaches to 55 with the shipment that enhances 20 percent of damage, a daimyo, golden pavilion, and japanese isolationism by consolute. then its always 55. i dunno how you let yumi reach to 54 but not 55. it sounds weird for me. anyway whatever.

and about ashis. it depends on situations. absolutely, doppels and samurais are so good as we can see how quickly enemy horses are dying in a combat. but when it comes to a bunch of enemy horses and in the condition u have artilleries and yumis, like 10 or 15 of samurai cannot really cover every single horses to protect ur yumi and artilleries. but ahis are very good with its strong melee attack bonus, cheap costs, lower pop than samurais, and more or less, having range attack; that means free ahis can still shoot from somewhere near enemies. but samurais are kind of useless when enemy has too many horses and artilleries. so i mean depend on situations. but definitely they are so powerful i agree with it. moreover, when u wanna do fish boom, u usually have to give up for japanese 25 pop advantage coz u have fishing boats to have more eco. so if u use samurais so much, sometimes, its difficult to deal with some sort of combats especially like a lot of artilleries by enemy. ahis are just more flexible and actually tough enough. in this sense, ashis are quite useful. i really love samurai combat though :p

This is supremacy and the speed of samurais makes them more powerful than ashis. I never said that i would use samurais as an cover for cannons and yumi since they do take 2 pop.

NEVER EVER USE japanese isolation in supremacy unless you have reached the very end of sup games. Usually spain or dutch are much helpgul. Since in "sea" games you need shipments it is stupid to use japan iso. Also 1age you can consulate 680 age up.

btw !: once 1v1 french his 15 cuirs at 3gae onwed more than 35 ashis at colonial but 15 20 samus would had a chance.

I cant believe im going to feed this japan guide but anyway...

Im not a japan expert btw but this is what i know

The Big shrine is nearly always the best choice I think and actually plays quite a large part in why japan are OP. And Japan isolation is great too because you can train single units unlike the other options. This in a way makes it quite OP. plus theres an attack bonus i think which is also nice.

Agreed u are noob japan most people wont use japanese iso exept:

1: late game

2: doing fighting against Ranged Infantry. y???

   heres the strat for 1v1 or 2v2 not 3v3: get 13 then 2 age: keep ratio 2:1:2 and get consulate cards spam cons units and nagitas !!

yes the single unit is cool man and should be nerf since the shinobi ultra pwners!!

your calling me a noob? Have you ever heard of the japan consulate rush?