The New Jomon?

[kianduatha]

I've been tempted more than once to make a mod where Jomon just plain starts in the water and gets a Dragon King pretender--then they can retake the land and free the people from bondage to the Bakemono. That comes after a general rebalance, though.

Jomon has most all of the tools it needs to survive--it just doesn't all mesh together nicely. You can do a ton of things--but not all of them, and not as well as other nations. They're more than adequate for single player, but tend to be a penny short in MP games if that makes sense.

As far as your build goes...I tend to shy away from Turmoil-Luck for Jomon if just because I know how incredibly money-hungry the nation can get. Sure, all your mages are cheap--if you discount your 500(!) gold Ryujin, which is your only mobile mage-support. They even do that super-duper well(in a current MP game I crushed EA Ulm by essentially having a floating pool of 7 Ryujin giving unexpected mage support in every battle I needed them for, usually bouncing 3 or even 4 provinces every turn). Ideally you want a dozen of them raiding and laying down heavy artillery, but those guys don't come cheap.