How to beatJapaneseas Sengoku Daimyo

With the Matsuri acting as an early market, you can mass gather wood, sell it to age up, and avoid gathering gold. This helps against early Japanese spearman pressure that might interrupt gold operations.

Japanese gets the Onna Musha. Sengoku daimyo do not have the Onna Musha available to them.

One thing to keep in mind is that Sengoku can heal his knights with his priest, whereas with Japanese, he really cannot. So these trades where they both lose HP but nothing dies are actually good for Sengoku.

Up to 17 Onna Musha now, so right around the point where you can start one-shotting the mounted samurai.