Why do people say that Germany and Japan perform badly?

I'm not really an advanced gamer, so I'm not in a position to doubt advanced gamers, but I'm curious: why is it?

Germany is one of my favorite ones to play. Of course, I set the map on "Raging Barbarians", so I can get the full benefit. Just take Honor, build a couple of warriors, and I can get my early army for free. (Also super fun to have an axe thrower)

The 25% discount on land units would seem pretty useful, since gold is difficult to get.


Japan - I don't know. Maybe it's all in my head, and Bushido isn't really helping my armies to be effective like I think it is?

Germany's UA is situational. The discount is not that great and on higher levels you can't depend on camp busting to get units (ai goes after them with its extra units. The unique pike is okay, but if you build a ton like you should you get screwed when they all upgrade into lancers, which are decent but you only need like 2. The panzer is awesome but comes too late.

Japan's UA encourages suicide units, and you will probably do better if you fall back and heal most times. It also makes little practical difference in the field. The samurai is great but requires you to have iron and to tech at the bottom of the tree, away from great techs like education and astronomy. The zero is just bad. Few have ever used it and it's never made a key difference in any battle.

Also in BNW the German UA means you get less money from camps but more upkeep cost, with gold gone now from river and sea tiles you will be bankrupt really fast

From a pure gameplay perspective:

Germany: Landsknecht is a melee unit with no special perks other than cheaper, and considering how anti-melee the game is, the UU doesn't help much. Also on a garbage upgrade path. Panzer is a late-game UU which generally isn't factored into what people consider a bonus. A bit unfair, but the reasoning makes sense: most games are more or less decided by modern era, and any UU's at that point are just for flavor.

UA is decent. You will hear people complain about it, but it generally comes from people who don't war-monger anyway, so take it for what it is worth. (Of course it is a weak UA if you sit on two archers for the entire game). I do understand how the random nature of it can irritate some people though. Can't decide if it took a bit of a hit with BNW or not. On one hand, there are more barb units available for conversion. On the other, gold is tighter in the early game so conversion can actually hurt instead of help.

Overall, I'd like to see them changed in the fall patch more for design purposes; I'd rather see them portray modern Germany a bit more with bonuses that are useful for the entire game.


Japan: Again, Civ 5 in its current iteration isn't melee friendly, so Bushido has limited use. If you are sniping units with CB's, artillery, and bombers, you aren't even using Bushido at all.

Samurai is decent, although swords/long swords are in a rough place so Civs with UU's on this path are generally ranked lower (Iroquois, Denmark, etc)

Zero is garbage. Rarely do you ever need fighter planes and the Zero doesn't help much in any other way, so it is also ignored most games.

In the end you have a UA and UU that doesn't get used most games, and another UU that is on a tech path considered very low priority. While I'd like to see both Civs updated and re-balanced in the fall patch, Japan is the one that needs it most.

Probably worth mentioning that both were much better back in basic vanilla for various reasons. They just haven't kept up with the expansion/patch changes very well.

My first Civ5 game in vanilla was with Germany. I had a huge barbarian army that rolled over Japan and Egypt in quick order - while suffering very little financially. If I had the same army now that early in the game, I'd be -10 gold a turn and forced to disband quite early.

Matthew. said:

Japan: Again, Civ 5 in its current iteration isn't melee friendly, so Bushido has limited use. If you are sniping units with CB's, artillery, and bombers, you aren't even using Bushido at all.

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I figured out after a while ago that Bushido's best use isn't for helping your melee. It's for helping your ranged units. If even a heavily damaged catapult is dealing out full damage, then I might as well keep it in position until it's ready to die.

Same goes for archers. The AI for Japan almost always builds the Great Wall in my games, even though I have "random personalities" checked. I think the Devs see that angle too.

Samurai is decent, although swords/long swords are in a rough place so Civs with UU's on this path are generally ranked lower (Iroquois, Denmark, etc)

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Yeah. I always build those with the intention of promoting them before I use them.

A Berzerker, Samurai, or (Whatever the Iroquois one is called - I forgot) that is promoted to Musket retains most of its special abilities.

MarshalN said:

My first Civ5 game in vanilla was with Germany. I had a huge barbarian army that rolled over Japan and Egypt in quick order - while suffering very little financially. If I had the same army now that early in the game, I'd be -10 gold a turn and forced to disband quite early.

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Definitely want to take Tradition, and unlock the garrisons civic with Germany. If you're smashing barbarians enough, you'll probably have enough culture to fit it.

(Though I play on Raging Barbarians, so maybe there aren't enough of them on the normal setting?)

Matthew. said:

Japan is the one that needs it most.

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I Agree. Maybe a unique building will do instead of the crappy Zero; Dojo, a replacement for Barracks? Experience + Culture??.
And for the UA i got an Idea, Japan got and era which they isolated their empire to the outside world? what do they called that again?, that would be a nice UA. Japan "Gains Gold half the amount of Food or Production from trade routes it sends within its Empire"(what i mean is, if Osaka send +8 production/food to Kyoto, an additional 4 gold also would be gain from it) this would be cool if Japan is in time of war,who cares if you embargo me?

Edit: i just google it, they call that era on Japan as "Sakoku"

knightmare13 said:

I Agree. Maybe a unique building will do instead of the crappy Zero; Dojo, a replacement for Barracks? Experience + Culture??.
And for the UA i got an Idea, Japan got and era which they isolated their empire to the outside world? what do they called that again?, that would be a nice UA. Japan "Gains Gold half the amount of Food or Production from trade routes it sends within its Empire"(what i mean is, if Osaka send +8 production/food to Kyoto, an additional 4 gold also would be gain from it) this would be cool if Japan is in time of war,who cares if you embargo me?

Edit: i just google it, they call that era on Japan as "Sakoku"

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Great idea!

knightmare13 said:

I Agree. Maybe a unique building will do instead of the crappy Zero; Dojo, a replacement for Barracks? Experience + Culture??.
And for the UA i got an Idea, Japan got and era which they isolated their empire to the outside world? what do they called that again?, that would be a nice UA. Japan "Gains Gold half the amount of Food or Production from trade routes it sends within its Empire"(what i mean is, if Osaka send +8 production/food to Kyoto, an additional 4 gold also would be gain from it) this would be cool if Japan is in time of war,who cares if you embargo me?

Edit: i just google it, they call that era on Japan as "Sakoku"

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Would be cool if they did that, and then removed Bushido and/or had Bushido only apply to Samurai and/or Zeros. (It's really badass on planes.)

knightmare13 said:

I Agree. Maybe a unique building will do instead of the crappy Zero; Dojo, a replacement for Barracks? Experience + Culture??.
And for the UA i got an Idea, Japan got and era which they isolated their empire to the outside world? what do they called that again?, that would be a nice UA. Japan "Gains Gold half the amount of Food or Production from trade routes it sends within its Empire"(what i mean is, if Osaka send +8 production/food to Kyoto, an additional 4 gold also would be gain from it) this would be cool if Japan is in time of war,who cares if you embargo me?

Edit: i just google it, they call that era on Japan as "Sakoku"

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Yes please. Lovin' this idea.

Japan is considered weak because they don't have any economic advantage and their fighting bonuses aren't that useful. "Range ball" armies (which are the most effective armies since G&Ks) don't take much damage and thus don't gain much from Bushido. Japan's unique units are also far off the science line (education -> Scientific Theory -> Plastics) making it hard to do a timing attack with them without delaying your science and making you weaker in the long run.

Germany has more economic benefits but those benefits are modest. Unless you are playing with ranging barbs you can only expect 2-3 units and 50-75 gold from camps (clearing 4-6 camps). This isn't much gold (see Spain discovering a Natural Wonder) and the units are likely to be of minimal value. Comboing Germany with Honor is not recommended because Honor is much weaker than Tradition or Liberty.

The advantage of Germany is the reduced land unit maint which counts your civilian units (workers, great generals, idle scientists). It saves you ~5 gold per turn early on but can scale up to ~25 GPT later on. This isn't much though as it is probably less than China's +2 Gold per city via Paper Maker.
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As for changing Japan, giving them a Dojo that provided culture would be trivial. Changing how internal trade routes worked would be tricky, if possible.

knightmare13 said:

I Agree. Maybe a unique building will do instead of the crappy Zero; Dojo, a replacement for Barracks? Experience + Culture??.
And for the UA i got an Idea, Japan got and era which they isolated their empire to the outside world? what do they called that again?, that would be a nice UA. Japan "Gains Gold half the amount of Food or Production from trade routes it sends within its Empire"(what i mean is, if Osaka send +8 production/food to Kyoto, an additional 4 gold also would be gain from it) this would be cool if Japan is in time of war,who cares if you embargo me?

Edit: i just google it, they call that era on Japan as "Sakoku"

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Excellent idea!

Machiavelli24 said:

Germany has more economic benefits but those benefits are modest. Unless you are playing with ranging barbs you can only expect 2-3 units and 50-75 gold from camps (clearing 4-6 camps). This isn't much gold (see Spain discovering a Natural Wonder) and the units are likely to be of minimal value.

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About on par with any other gold bonuses in the game. Brute/Archer is 200 gold, anything else more than that. Unless you are on a very crowded map, you should be able to net 400-600 gold minimum worth of units every game. Combined with the GPT on unit maintenance saved, it equals out to Paper Maker.

Although with the shift to range focus, there is still too high of a random factor for a lot of people. Converting 5 brutes is probably going to do more harm than good. Of course they could just boost melee a bit...

I'm all for changing Germany, but people underestimate the gold potential way too often. Landsknechts have limited use and Panzers come late, but the UA is decent as far as gold is concerned.

Also not sure why people keep mentioning raging barbs... I was under the impression that only changes how frequently a barb pops from a camp, not how often they spawn. So it would actually be in Germany's interest to have less barbarians on the map (less opposition to clear camps = more camps cleared).

A brute or archer may cost 200 gold to purchase, but that doesn't mean getting a free brute is "worth" 200 gold. 500 gold early is great because it is enough to buy a worker, settler or ally a city state. While (like you said) 3 brutes early is of marginal value (though 3 archers are nice).

I do agree that Germany's maint discount is pretty good but it isn't enough to make Germany better than below average. I've been working on a mod that alters Germany:

Trait: Realpolitik: +1 Delegate (World Congress) for every Major Civ Capital city they control (including their own).
Building: Colliery (replaces Windmill): Same as Windmill but provides +1 Coal.
Unit: Panzer: Same, but starts with +1 attack.

The Panzer is actually much better thanks to BNW. Rushing to Tanks and coupling with Autocracy makes a panzer rush extremely deadly. The things can pillage so damn much they're nearly impossible to take out before the rage through the enemy's lands, wiping out farms and units left and right. Get blitz and they're amazing.

Other than that, everything about these two civs is terrible. Well, bushido is solid for bombers, so everything aside from those two things are terrible

MarshalN said:

Also in BNW the German UA means you get less money from camps but more upkeep cost, with gold gone now from river and sea tiles you will be bankrupt really fast

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Umm, you still get the 25 gold from the camp if you get the unit. And the river and sea tiles not having gold isn't that big of a deal with trade routes included in BNW except for the early game which I personally make up for by trading my luxuries for gpt although social policies and religion can help as well.

I've actually played as Germany in BNW and I don't understand the complaints either. Are Japan and Germany boring to play as? Probably, I mean they have been around since vanilla and more interesting features and civs have been added since then. Are they bad? I don't think so, at least not as bad as people say.

With BNW I feel like barbarian camps spawn more often so Germany's UA got a boost with that. It's not hard at all getting about 4 free units. And if you do it right, you can just leave space open for camps to continue spawning so you can continue gaining units. Plus there's 25% discount on land unit maintenance so Germany's UA is perfectly fine for a Warmonger.

The rest of their uniques are two units which again for a warmonger is perfectly fine. I think Landschneckts are underrated. Ok, sure they're just cheap pikemen, and they upgrade to lancer. But pikemen are a pretty good unit at the time you get them, and being able to produce them at half the amount of time is great. They make very good bullet sponges to allow you're army of CB's to take the enemy out, and since they're so cheap, they're also very expendable. Don't need that many landschneckts anymore?? Just throw them into the frontline. You should have already gotten your use out of them so anymore units they kill is better for you. Also leaving a few to upgrade to lancers isn't that bad of an idea either. On a side note from personal experience landschneckts make for a very good counter against the zulu impis.

Panzers are good but come late as mentioned before. At that point of the game you should be close to a domination victory so to me the Panzer is more of a fun unique unit that helps you stay in control militarily. I have not played as Japan yet in BNW but I'm pretty sure if people actually tried them they would find that they're not as bad as they thought.

Besides just being on the weak side, both Japan and Germany are very boring. Such major civilizations that aren't strictly warmongers should have something more to them than basic military advantages.

Machiavelli24 said:

Japan is considered weak because they don't have any economic advantage and their fighting bonuses aren't that useful. "Range ball" armies (which are the most effective armies since G&Ks) don't take much damage and thus don't gain much from Bushido. Japan's unique units are also far off the science line (education -> Scientific Theory -> Plastics) making it hard to do a timing attack with them without delaying your science and making you weaker in the long run.

Germany has more economic benefits but those benefits are modest. Unless you are playing with ranging barbs you can only expect 2-3 units and 50-75 gold from camps (clearing 4-6 camps). This isn't much gold (see Spain discovering a Natural Wonder) and the units are likely to be of minimal value. Comboing Germany with Honor is not recommended because Honor is much weaker than Tradition or Liberty.

The advantage of Germany is the reduced land unit maint which counts your civilian units (workers, great generals, idle scientists). It saves you ~5 gold per turn early on but can scale up to ~25 GPT later on. This isn't much though as it is probably less than China's +2 Gold per city via Paper Maker.
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As for changing Japan, giving them a Dojo that provided culture would be trivial. Changing how internal trade routes worked would be tricky, if possible.

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why do ppl suggest things here which arent true?

raging barbs never ever correlated with camp spawning rate just with barbs only spawning from camps. in addition its really easy with germany to clear like 15-20 camps up to turn 50 on quick speed. maybe you should focus on movement then on other aspects (go for horse units or optics on hvy water maps). if you need 5 turns or 3 till u reach camp, what would u prefer?

germany is one of the best warmonger civs ingame, im really happy if they get even a stronger boost. but hello if imba warmonger gets more imba? i see ppl complaining then...

bonafide11 said:

Besides just being on the weak side, both Japan and Germany are very boring. Such major civilizations that aren't strictly warmongers should have something more to them than basic military advantages.

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thats something i would quote for truth. if i play especially germany (maybe even rolled it random in MP) it takes hours to finish my turns because i have just to move all these low tech spam units.

something to add here: i heared stupid ppl complain about too many units for germany? ever thought about 5 influence for a city state? i bet they did never...