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Kanbei is a broken-tier CO whose units are more expensive and much stronger than regular units. As a result, he does not appear often in regular play. Rather, he has situational use in casual play and catered competitions.

Strategy[]

Predominantly, Kanbei's strength arises from his additional defense, which ground units can stack with the defensive bonuses from terrain to become almost impossible to trade evenly against. His early game is subject to a vehicle count disadvantage due to increased costs, making early fighting for distant contested properties more difficult and encouraging focusing on nearby properties for stable funding first. Contested properties will be easy to recover later on.

Kanbei may have to build more Infantry and fewer Tanks overall, given the limits of funding. However, the strength of his units will more than compensate for the lower vehicle count. Units of most COs will actually take more damage than they deal in same-unit matchups, even when they get the first strike. As a result, they may tech-up sooner to Md. Tanks and sometimes even Bombers and Neotanks in an attempt to overpower your vehicles. Conservative use of Tanks, Anti-Air, Artillery and the occasional Md. Tank with footsoldiers as shields will be sufficient counters, as it is still very difficult for these units to push through his Infantry walls.

Kanbei's Samurai Spirit (SCOP) should be used over Morale Boost (COP) in most situations. Although both powers on their own are relatively weak for their costs, Samurai Spirit's additional defense stacks again with the defense from his day-to-day and terrain and will make his units invincible on 4-star terrain and near-invincible on all others, essentially granting a turn of complete damage immunity to all but direct-damage CO powers and missiles.

Notably, his SCOP can allow a unit to achieve 100% damage resistance on the enemy Headquarters, effectively guaranteeing victory if a full hp Infantry is able to begin a capture when he uses his SCOP, as very few things can stop the capture from completing on the following turn (only global damage CO powers such as Drake's, and direct damage from a Missile Silo or Black Bomb).

Kanbei may have issues on maps where he has to build transports; building them will take a large cut from the funds he needs early on. Reconsider before picking Kanbei on such maps.

Playing Against[]

Kanbei's sheer stats make his units incredibly difficult to combat for most COs, and indeed on small maps with little funding he is arguably the strongest CO in the game. As such, very little can be done to effectively stop him unless playing another broken CO.

Of the broken COs, Hachi or Colin have the best chances; while not able to fight Kanbei early, their incredible funds-based powers allows them to tech up and obtain a huge numbers advantage and/or powerful units to more evenly fight back against Kanbei's army in aggregate. Javier, on the rare maps with 2 Comm Towers per side, does extremely well against Kanbei once he can secure both towers - despite having noticeably weaker stats, he pays no additional cost for his units and Tower Shield is functionally almost a stronger Samurai Spirit for less than half the price, letting him outmuscle Kanbei through frequent 'free' turns.

For the other broken COs or for non-broken COs, they should only be picked on maps very unfavourable to Kanbei. Any very large maps with lots of funding and a heavy encouragement of air or even naval combat will leave Kanbei disadvantaged, as these units are generally very expensive and do not benefit from terrain, reducing his ability to buy large numbers of them and the potential of his day-to-day to reach enormous defense levels. In these matches, players should seek unequal matchups (such as Fighters vs B-Copters) as much as possible to prevent Kanbei from leveraging his stats optimally.

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