The Chinese are a civilization that focuses more on economy than military. As such, they have many economic bonuses, and are a "jack-of-all-trades" civilization that can specialize well in both defense and offense. Due to the civilization's unusual startup, the civilization is designed more for experienced players rather than beginners.
They start out with extra villagers and their Town Centers support extra population. This gives them an edge early in the game as they can gather resources more quickly. They can also research technologies at cheaper prices, allowing them to divert the saved resources into either more villagers or extra military units. In terms of military they have many options. They have full archer and infantry technologies so foot soldiers will compose the majority of a Chinese army most of the time. Their unique unit, the Chu Ko Nu, is a crossbowman with a short range but shoots multiple arrows at a time. In groups these can provide powerful close range support. They have access to all siege weapons except the Siege Onager and the Bombard Cannon. Their unique technology, Rocketry, makes their Chu Ko Nus and Heavy Scorpion potentially deadly and allow them to excel in long range sieging.
The disadvantages of the Chinese is that their late game cavalry is weaker than their infantry and archers. They are missing both the Paladin and Hussar putting both their heavy and light cavalry at a disadvantage late in the game. However they can train camels, giving them fast anti-cavalry capabilities that their infantry lack. In addition while they can attack and defend about equally well they don't stand out in either as they lack military bonuses.
They also lack two important late game gunpowder units such as the Hand Cannoneer and Bombard Cannon (which is ironic, since the cannon was invented in China). However, the Chu Ko Nu and their Heavy Scorpions can do a similar job like the Hand Cannoneer and Bombard Cannon in a somewhat weaker degree. Their Heavy Scorpions are not as good as they could be, since they lack Siege Engineers.
The Chinese are also known to be incredibly difficult to play properly because of their unusual startup of having three extra villagers, but 200 less food and a 50 less wood. This requires a lot more micromanagement in the early game for the tradeoff to pay off. Inappropriate Dark Age micromanagement of the extra Villagers will cause the Chinese to fall greatly behind in the early game. Under skillful hands, however, the Chinese are a solid jack-of-all-trades civilization that is similar to the Byzantines.
Chinese have a much different start-up than other Civilizations. Starting with extra Villagers but no food and less wood means that they can't immediately make any Villagers. So the Chinese must start by researching Loom since the Town Center will be idle. Having extra villagers could help to find the sheep sooner, and then the Chinese must set some Villagers (usually all six) to start harvesting them. Before the player finds the sheep, their Villagers can chop some of the wood near the Town Center, build houses, forage for berries, or a mix of those. Extra Lumberjacks are important, since Chinese start with less wood. Chinese farms also have extra food, making Dark Age farming a more viable tactic.
Chinese are a rather versatile civilization, being a jack-of-all-trades civilization that is capable of using many different strategies. Cavalry Archer and Knight rushes are viable tactics due to cheaper costs of the related upgrade techs, despite missing out on the Paladin upgrade and Parthian Tactics. The Chinese have a reasonable Monk rush strategy thanks to cheaper Monastery techs and having nearly every Monastery tech except for Block Printing and Heresy (which is ironic, considering that Block Printing was invented in China). They truly shine in the Post-Imperial Age, though. In a team game, Chinese players should typically try to be in the pocket position (between two allies) and have a large economic boom. In the Imperial Age, Chu Ko Nu is extremely deadly when massed, even cutting through foes with high pierce armor such as Paladins and Eagle Warriors. Even Rams fall to Chu Ko Nu in mere seconds. The Chu Ko Nu, combined with their Rocketry technology, their Heavy Scorpions, and the Trebuchet, makes Chinese one of the best civilizations for long range sieging rivaling the Mongols, Huns, Britons, Turks, and the Japanese.
Most of the threats to Chinese come early on, while they are trying to boom. So the player must wall off with buildings and Palisades to try to keep out early-game rushes and age up quickly.
Chinese have an excellent navy on water maps. Fish provide a potent supplement to their already great economy and should be taken advantage of. Chinese Demolition Ships are also a good unconventional surprise for careless opponents. By the time the horn sounds they've already lost a large portion of their navy, assuming that it wasn't spread out. Using multiple Demolition Ships from different angles at the same time is especially powerful.
Chinese new Tech Great Wall allows them to make good and strong defenses, the Chinese already have Architecture and other building techs. Their new bonus of +5 line of sight for their town centers makes them even better.
The introduction of the Demolition Raft in the Feudal Age gives the Chinese navy an early naval advantage as this vessel benefit from the Chinese hit point bonus for demolition ships.
The Chinese works well with different civilizations and can fit into different variety of playstyles. Regarding Archers, allying with the Britons allow archery units like Elite Skirmisher and Heavy Cavalry Archer be trained faster and add more variety in their long range sieging, although it should be noted that Chu Ko Nu can only be built in the Castle and is far more superior than the Arbalest. The Vietnamese also get on well with them, not only because the Imperial Skirmisher upgrade (which for Chinese the upgrade is cheaper due to the technology discount bonus) but also can bankroll them with the Paper Money technology, allowing more Chu Ko Nus, Scorpions and Heavy Demolition Ships to be assembled in a short period. The Saracens are also a good choice as an ally as the Chu Ko Nu can benefit from the bonus damage against the building, hence allowing them to destroy towns more quickly. The Magyars are also useful allies, as their team bonus can improve the Chu Ko Nu line of sight. Having a Berber ally also means extra tricks in the Chinese players' sleeves: team-wide Kasbah upgrade allows them to spawn both Chu Ko Nus and Trebuchets quicker; nimble, gold-free, fully-teched Genitours for counter-archer measure to safeguard Chu Ko Nus and other Chinese foot units, is also worth mentioning that as Berber villager move faster this has an impact on farm collection rates and the Chinese team bonus also grants another boost for Berbers in that regard.
Regarding their siege line, allying with the Celts will allow the player to build Heavy Scorpions faster, while the Khmer grant range boost for Rocketry-enhanced Chinese scorpions.
In regards for being one of the few civilizations that have camels, having a Indian player as ally will grant Chinese camelry anti-building attack boost, while also Indians will benefit from the better farms considering they also get cheap villagers enabling to improve their boom.
For defensive gameplay, allying the Mayans is a good choice as it makes the wall cheaper combined with the Great Wall unique technology. Malians team bonus greatly benefit the Chinese since they already have most of university technologies and good defensive capacity thanks to having access to nearly every building upgrade and the Great Wall unique tech while all of these technologies are also cheaper so the Chinese can out-tech their opponents even faster.
For economic boom strategies the Spanish and the Incas are good choices as the Spanish provide more gold through Trade Carts, and they build farms faster. The Inca and the Chinese team bonuses have great synergy with each other, as it give the Inca farms more food and the Inca's farm building speed bonus will help the Chinese to offset the already lower food output of their farms due to their team bonus and the lack of access to Crop Rotation. The Teutons strongly benefit from the farm bonus due to their already cheaper farms, and the Teutons' conversion resistance is somewhat beneficial since the Chinese lack Heresy and thus it helps to have some of the more expensive units such as Knights, Scorpions, and Cavalry Archers less vulnerable to conversion. Slavs can also can exploit to a big scale the Chinese team bonus as their farmers work faster.
When playing on water maps in a team game it is recommended to get a Malay ally as their team bonus allows them to spot invading ships quicker, thus amass Demolition Ships on time to disrupt any water rush or hostile armies crossing nearby shallows, Vikings are also a good ally in these maps, since they drop the cost of docks and the wood saved by that team bonus can be invested in more ships included their powerful Demolition ship.
The Chu Ko Nu being a ranged unit that fires multiple arrows counters almost all types of infantry even the infantry from prominent infantry civilizations like, Teutons, Burmese, Malay, Vikings, Japanese, Aztecs and Celts, with the exception of the Goths' Huskarl, the Eagle Warriors all Malian Barracks infantry (as they have a large amount of pierce armor) and the Gbeto (see in disadvantages). They even can kill well rounded cavalry and Rams even Persian War Elephants, South East Asian Battle Elephants, Indian Elephant Archers, Korean War Wagons, Slav Boyars, and Khmer Ballista Elephants, especially if deployed in large groups and with proper support.
Being a civilization with good mid and late game and able to boom their economy they can defeat civilizations that fare otherwise in closed maps like Black Forest (regular or bad late game, regular mid game, but good early game) like the Aztecs, the Huns and the Malians, especially if starting at Castle Age onwards.
As they have a fairly open tech tree and cheaper technologies and improvements, they can effectively counter civilizations more limited in that regard like the Goths, the Mayans, the Magyars, the Britons and other "specialist" civilizations
Regarding the naval Warfare they are in advantage against civilizations that rely on close range ships or masses of ships and docks as their demolition ships have more hp, Even the navy of civilizations like Byzantines, Koreans and Vikings may have trouble against Chinese Demolition ships especially in large numbers.
Defensively they have an advantage against civilizations with mediocre siege workshop or proper anti-building units thanks to the Great Wall Technology (without considering the Trebuchets which every civilization have access to). these includes Britons, Japanese and Magyars (of course once they get to Imperial this advantage is no longer a problem for them)
Since they don't get access to gunpowder aside from petards, cannon galleons and demolition ships they have a disadvantage to civilizations that get access to it like Turks, Portuguese and Spanish, especially if the game starts at Imperial Age onwards.
Malians can be a very unpleasant rival for the Chinese archery as their infantry bonus can partially negate the Chu Ko Nu effectiveness vs infantry while also became more resilient against regular archers. Malians also have the Gbeto which despite being infantry they move fast and have better range than Chu Ko Nu archers as base stats, however fully upgraded Chu Ko Nu are arguably in tie with fully upgraded Gbetos. Similarly Goths can counter a Chinese Archer army by swarming Huskarls as they have attack bonus vs Archers and high pierce armor, Huskarls are also a threat to Chinese Scorpions as they deal pierce damage (which Huskarls can resist effectively) and to Chinese Walls and Towers even with their bulkier HP, as Huskarls have attack bonus against buildings.
Mayans, Incas and Aztecs have Eagle Warriors that can effectively counter both Scorpions and Archers, Both part of the core units of the Chinese. Regarding the Scorpions similar logic can apply to light cavalry civilizations such as Magyars, Huns and Mongols as light cavalry can catch them with ease and destroy them.
Vietnamese Rattan Archers, and Imperial Skirmishers can counter a Chinese archer army perfectly and to some extent their Scorpions. Indeed, Vietnamese as a rival for the Chinese can prove to be a huge threat as they also get Battle elephants and gunpowder limiting the Chinese responses especially in the late game. Similar logic can apply to the Berbers as they got Genitours.
Civilizations with good Onagers are also a counter to Chinese Archers and Scorpions if they decide to go for masses of Chu Ko Nus backed by Scorpions, these include, Celts, Ethiopians, Mongols, and Koreans of course.
Despite having good start up Bonuses and good economic bonuses they have a disadvantage in open maps like Arabia against Civilizations with early aggression such as Huns, Aztecs, Magyars, Mongols and Goths since most of the Chinese bonuses start to kick out in the Castle Age onwards.
Persian paladins have attack bonus against archers this of course puts the Chu Ko Nu and the regular Archers at disadvantage.
Despite their Demolition ship are strong, the Chinese navy are still at disadvantage in water maps against civilizations that either have a sustainable economy in the late game (like Malays and Portuguese with their unlimited resource bonuses so they can respawn their navy faster than the Chinese), or have good Galleons that can hit-and-run the Demolition ships (Berbers galleons being an interesting case as they are faster), or have good defensive towers and Castles (like Teutons, Byzantines, Koreans and Japanese as they can kill the Demo ships and still stand out the blow if some of them sneak to the shore), this also considering that Demo ships can only be used once as they explode.
As they start with three additional villagers Chinese have a very distinct advantage in Nomad maps as they are technically ahead over their rivals (despite starting with less resources). If they encounter an enemy villager, they can kill them with their numeric superiority.
In Budapest map as every player have double start up (2 town centers double villagers and 2 scouts) they also get an advantage as they start with 12 villagers (while other civilizations in that map starts with 6) and still getting the penalty of starting with - 200 food and -50 (but not -400 food -100 wood) also as they get double town centers they make their way faster to increase their population without needing to build houses too soon (this cause their Town centers hold more population space).
In amphibious maps (especially in the maps included in the "Rise of the Rajas" expansion) their tankier Demolition Ships have a nice advantage against masses of land units or clusters of buildings.
In closed maps like Black Forest, Chinese have an advantage on those kinds of maps thanks to their bulkier Towers and walls, so they can make their way to Imperial Age and boom.
In enclosed maps like Fortress, Arena and Hill Fort their unique technology " Chinese Wall" also gives them an advantage as walls and in Fortress case towers are already placed. Also in Fortress players start with farms instead of sheep and boars so their team bonus also gives them another advantage there. Their bulkier Towers and Walls can give the Chinese an edge in "King of the Hill" and "Defend the Wonder" game modes.
In the game mode "Sudden death", the increased Line of Sight and population space of their Town Center can give them an advantage, as in this game mode players are limited to just 1 Town Center.
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The Age of Kings
The Conquerors
The Forgotten
The African Kingdoms
Rise of the Rajas