It’s been a problem since the game first came out, being a problem to different degrees for different civs.
The Chinese and Xu Zhi lose the ability to build both landmarks and the ability to access the relevant Dynasty.
The Japanese are probably the worst hit though. If you start in Castle or Imperial Age, Japanese cannot build any religious unit and have no way to ever access one. They cannot contest sacred sites. Cannot collect relics. Cannot convert.
I don’t know what the best way to address this would be from a UX perspective. Maybe you have to build a Feudal landmark before you can build a Castle landmark, even if you started in Feudal. Or maybe it could look something like how the Chinese currently pick their second landmark, but showing a popup like the one that comes with the current age up.
We really need to have a way to build landmarks from earlier ages when the game starts in a more advanced age.
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An alternative would be to have chinese start in the dynasty of the previous age (so if you start in castle, you start in song dynasty). And option to build landmark of current age in the current UI. But you cant build previous age landmark like other civs,
And japanese should just have access to shinto priest (since they are the normal one with no power) if you start castle +.
That would be a lot easier for dev to fix this way instead of having to make specific ui.
I think specific UI for landmark choices would be nice. being able to build one landmark from the ages skipped for free. A lot of landmarks have a huge effect on play style and base building. The Aachan Chapel, the Grand Fulani Corral, and the Kremlin to name a few.
Landmark snipes are also too easy to do when starting in later ages
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Yeah exactly. Being unable to execute certain strats because it’s made unavailable to you. When they added Empire Wars to aoe4 they couldn’t have it start in Feudal like it did in aoe2, because how would you do that sort of early aggression without your School of Cavalry?
I don’t know whether building earlier age landmarks should be free, discounted, or cost the normal amount. But one of those has to be done.
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