Compare Liberty and Tradition, Head-to-Head

I've been reading several threads recently about the merits of Liberty vs. Tradition, and this quote (from the thread I struggle when adopting Tradition) stuck with me:

shaglio said:

One of these days, if I ever find the time, I’m going to do an experiment. I’ll start a game on Standard speed, Prince level, Continents map. Then, as soon as I settle my capital, I’ll make 2 save files: “Liberty” and “Tradition.” I’ll play each one until I complete the corresponding SP tree. Then, I’m going to compare both games....

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A couple of days ago, I started a game on King (not Prince, however), continents, random civ, standard size, standard speed, and "legendary start" resources. The random civ turned out to be the Ottomans. After a little bit of exploration, I thought it might be a reasonable start for a Liberty game. So, I played until I hit a culture ruin, and then saved the position twice. Once with Liberty selected, once with Tradition. Both saves are attached. I also attached a screen shot of the current position on Turn 14.

And so, the questions are:

• If you play out both versions (where your first policy choices must complete the tree that was already started), which one was more successful?
• Which one did you play first (since the second presumably benefits from knowing the terrain and opponents)?
• Which was more fun, and why?
• When did you complete each of the starting trees? How many cities did you have at that time?
• How did the initial SP trees affect your decisions and strategies for the rest of the game?

Ok but to do what ? Liberty will bury tradition for a domination on Prince.

Acken said:

Ok but to do what ? Liberty will bury tradition for a domination on Prince.

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It's actually King, not Prince, but your point still holds. And if true, it casts an interesting light on all the threads that favor Tradition over Liberty....

You can set the criteria: fastest win? highest score? largest population?

And you can decide if it has to be the same VC in both versions, or if you can choose the VC that you think best fits the opening policy.

The real point is to see how the opening SP choice dictates what you do the rest of the game, and so I didn't want to specify a particular VC up front.

Tradition is better than Liberty hands down in an FFA setting. In a head to head duel, sure liberty will probably win because it gets a jump start however once you get to the medieval era tradition starts pulling away.

As a liberty player you can't kill everyone in time and that tradition guy is going to be miles ahead of you in everything.

krc said:

And if true, it casts an interesting light on all the threads that favor Tradition over Liberty....

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Well, it's not secret: liberty is better for early wars and fast domination, tradition in everything else.

I really wouldn't say that tradition is better at everything else, kind of a useless generalization in my opinion.

Liberty is also better for early expansion. Liberty helps with low production cities. Liberty will snowball really fast if you have good dirt. Liberty has so much more room, not only more room to build additional units, but also more opportunities: after founding your religion, use the Liberty finisher for another great Prophet and take all good beliefs from the AI, crippling them. Steal a key wonder, for example Macchu Picchu, easily one of the best if not the best wonder for a domination victory and usually available when you finish Liberty. Since Settlers are built faster settling a mountain should not be a problem. You can also get a really early academy up, giving you faster Universities or Crossbows. You could use the Engineer on National College, too, so you can settle more cities after. Pyramids + the reduction from the Social Policy works insanely well with pillage-repairing, especially later in the game when you have mounted units. Building roads is much easier, way faster and therefore cheaper. There are so many minor things that people tend to forget about, I could list a lot more but I think I get my point across. I really don't think you can make a case for any of the two being straight up 'better'.

If you're measuring fastest win, then Liberty will win all VCs faster, provided the player isn't a peacenik who refuses to use conquest. Saying that Tradition can win a faster SV ignores the fact that the Liberty player could have total domination way before any SV is possible.

So Tradition > Liberty ONLY if its specified that the game must be peaceful.

This looks like a job for MadDjinn!

I saw a video he did comparing using food or production focus and which got you better. Can you please make one for tradition vs. liberty too? Far too long since a beyond the monument!!!

yung.carl.jung said:

I really wouldn't say that tradition is better at everything else, kind of a useless generalization in my opinion.

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Tradition is better( for me better = faster) in Science, Diplomatic and no domination type culture victory (also there are hard maps when even in domination victory tradition is better)

consentient said:

If you're measuring fastest win, then Liberty will win all VCs faster, provided the player isn't a peacenik who refuses to use conquest. .

So Tradition > Liberty ONLY if its specified that the game must be peaceful.

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Really don't know what you want to say

Do you really think that with conquest you achieve faster Science or Diplo victory?

Carl5872 said:

This looks like a job for MadDjinn!

I saw a video he did comparing using food or production focus and which got you better. Can you please make one for tradition vs. liberty too? Far too long since a beyond the monument!!!

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He doesn't do anything Civ V related for a long time(except Polycast or other shows I think). He did a BE LP , but his last BNW LP was his India game I think.

I guess he figured the game out and that he knows how to every inch and square on how to play optimally and efficiently, that the game probably doesn't seem fun to him anymore. It's a shame, I really liked watching his LPs, I would love to watch more of his play.

There have been lots of interesting comments here, but I have to admit, I wasn't trying to create yet another theoretical "tradition vs. liberty" thread. I was hoping someone would actually play the same game both ways and report their results....

I've started playing the Liberty game. So far, I have founded seven cities, and I can see reasonable sites for a few more. That's with only a couple of border skirmishes with Indonesia (first to steal a worker, then to make sure none of their settlers were going to claim territory in my part of the continent. And my main conclusion at this point is that it's more fun than the stereotyped Tradition-Rationalism games I've been playing. Of course, that may be because I've been playing Civ since the first version was released, and I remember when "bigger was better" and many strategies centered on rapid expansion.

IronfighterXXX said:

Really don't know what you want to say

Do you really think that with conquest you achieve faster Science or Diplo victory?

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No, I'm sorry, perhaps I phrased it badly. What I mean is that if you use conquest you can finish quicker as DomV is the fastest VC, and CV, DiploV and SV become a doodle if you have no time limit cuz no one else can win.

krc said:

There have been lots of interesting comments here, but I have to admit, I wasn't trying to create yet another theoretical "tradition vs. liberty" thread. I was hoping someone would actually play the same game both ways and report their results....

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Yes I understand you, I'm also not a big fan theorycrafting without evidence. However I don't think you will find many players in your challenge because:
a) it's boring to play same game twice
b) if player prefer eg. liberty and always play it he will probably find liberty easier and better just because he get used to it.
c) one pop capital on 14 turn doesn't encourage to play (Why is it? Did you move your settler few turns?)

krc said:

And my main conclusion at this point is that it's more fun than the stereotyped Tradition-Rationalism games I've been playing.

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Unfortunately amount of fun can't be comparable so I personally would prefer measure efficiency between tradition and liberty.
Last sentence (really don't want to intercept your thread) If some had game when he think liberty was faster than tradition in Science, Diplomatic and no domination type culture victory please make another thread and post starting save.

IronfighterXXX said:

Yes I understand you, I'm also not a big fan theorycrafting without evidence. However I don't think you will find many players in your challenge because:
a) it's boring to play same game twice
b) if player prefer eg. liberty and always play it he will probably find liberty easier and better just because he get used to it.
c) one pop capital on 14 turn doesn't encourage to play (Why is it? Did you move your settler few turns?)



Unfortunately amount of fun can't be comparable so I personally would prefer measure efficiency between tradition and liberty.
Last sentence (really don't want to intercept your thread) If some had game when he think liberty was faster than tradition in Science, Diplomatic and no domination type culture victory please make another thread and post starting save.

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The main point of my thread wasn't to play both games from start to finish, but rather to play the Liberty one until the Liberty tree was finished and the Tradition one until the Tradition tree was finished. Here's my original thread for reference:

One of these days, if I ever find the time, I’m going to do an experiment. I’ll start a game on Standard speed, Prince level, Continents map. Then, as soon as I settle my capital, I’ll make 2 save files: “Liberty” and “Tradition.” I’ll play each one until I complete the corresponding SP tree.

Then, I’m going to compare both games:
On what turn did I finish the tree?
How many cities do I have and how big are they?
How much did I get to improve the surrounding tiles?
What is my Happiness, and how much Gold/turn, Culture/turn, and Science/turn do I have.

I’m sure it would make for some interesting analysis . . . if I ever find that elusive time.

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shaglio said:

The main point of my thread wasn't to play both games from start to finish, but rather to play the Liberty one until the Liberty tree was finished and the Tradition one until the Tradition tree was finished. Here's my original thread for reference:

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I have done this a few times with my own games. I don't find it boring to play the same game twice. This is how I convinced myself that Tradition is stronger, even when I found my Liberty runs feeling like they working better!

I am sorry to say I didn't keep save and notes, since that is the kind of thing I would probably enjoy reading. That said, lessons learned with King and Legendary Starts are not necessarily generalizable to Deity on a standard start.

Liberty is great if you have lots of good land and unique luxuries for happiness and gold and a nearby civ to kill. Unfortunately these circumstances are few and far between. Tradition is better in all other circumstances.

It is often the case that you can't even find room to settle 4 cities due to ocean, mountains, CS, other players and junk land being in the way. If you can't even found more than 4 cities then liberty is completely inferior compared to tradition.

A wide open map with tons of luxuries and resources everywhere will benefit liberty. If liberty can't obtain ample happiness and gold then it is dead in the water.

Actually, CraigMak, there are plenty of circumstances where you have poor starting dirt and would want to go Liberty in preference, so you can make a 3-city empire early before expanding through conquest. Sure, if you want to stay at peace then Tradition will always be better, but that's excluding the most powerful dynamic of the game.

consentient said:

Actually, CraigMak, there are plenty of circumstances where you have poor starting dirt and would want to go Liberty in preference, so you can make a 3-city empire early before expanding through conquest. Sure, if you want to stay at peace then Tradition will always be better, but that's excluding the most powerful dynamic of the game.

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If my starting location is that bad I expend a couple of turns to move to a superior location. It works wonders. Then my expansion goes where my settler originally started because spawns are usually at least decent.

I find that there are less than 4 good city locations in 80% of games I play. Due to obstacles, CS or other players being in the way. If you can't make more than 4 cities then liberty is just plain fail.

If you spawn right next to some one then yeah, liberty is the way to go because it will definitely escalate into war.

CraigMak said:

If you can't make more than 4 cities then liberty is just plain fail

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Nonsense, sorry. I regularly build 3 and conquer the rest.

CraigMak said:

Liberty is great if you have lots of good land and unique luxuries for happiness and gold and a nearby civ to kill. Unfortunately these circumstances are few and far between. Tradition is better in all other circumstances.

It is often the case that you can't even find room to settle 4 cities due to ocean, mountains, CS, other players and junk land being in the way. If you can't even found more than 4 cities then liberty is completely inferior compared to tradition.

A wide open map with tons of luxuries and resources everywhere will benefit liberty. If liberty can't obtain ample happiness and gold then it is dead in the water.

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The way Liberty works for conquest is it allows you to rush build your earliest empire and invading force and roll whoever happens to be caught flat footed