Most Reliable Method?

I've played the game a number of times now and formed some tentative opinions, most of which are no doubt questionable. My goal is to play a solid safe game at emperor level, not risking an early exit, and to win a high percentage, not to fool myself into thinking I can beat deity just because I got lucky once.

Here's what I think I found out.

1. Even with a UU designed to take cities early, it's still more likely (on a percentage basis) that you will win if you do a good land rush and then defend a 4- or 5-city civ efficiently. Otherwise, AI civs brand you a warmonger, become recalcitrant on the trade screen, and gang up quite nicely when you push them too hard. So, wiping out your civ neighbor often makes life harder rather than easier.

2. Your social policies should be geared to get that free settler and then to fall back on tradition for monarchy -- then you should go for patronage.

3. The game seems to substantially favor builders over warmongers, the various peaceful victory options seem much easier than dominance, and control of the city states is very powerful.

I'm mindful that this is a one-dimensional game plan. But it seems to be a good way to start on most map types and in most situations.

So, I guess the question, you knew there would eventually be one, is whether experienced players find themselves focusing on one general strategy in Civ V or do they quickly go in a different direction depending on what they find the early situation to be in the game setting?

That is actually really solid plan to start out game. Only if there's some fast expansionist nearby, for example Rome, then getting early settler is even more important than "normally". If there's small empires nearby I don't think you necessarily need that free settler from liberty. Getting the growth bonus policy from tradition allow you to train settlers quite fast since you have more workable tiles in the capital. Finishing tradition early is a huge boost for those early cities because of that nice finishing bonus with free aquacuts and growth bonus. That way you don't need to research construction to get those aquaducts which can further boost your science and culture because you can focus on the upper part of the tech tree.

This seems pretty good to me. While every situation is different, the most solid plan I've found so far involves going tradition/patronage (for consulates), and then getting rationalism after consulates. The patronage tree is also actually really good by itself, so you can also go full patronage before starting rationalism (and ally all city states), and still be just as good, if not better. This strategy usually involves getting about 3-4 cities in your empire.

For building options, I generally go food/production/science in that order early, and then late game I put food down a little, and production/science up a little in preference. Culture can come from cultural city states, and you're still good in that regard, although if you want a cultural victory those buildings probably become more important.

Now, this is just one plan though that's fairly easy to pull off, keeps you safe, and puts you in a strong tech position. I'm doing a similar plan with Ethiopia right now on immortal, and it's working out quite well. You still want to build settlers really early in this plan though. You'll feel awkward early because you'll be at a population disadvantage if you do this, but a 2 or 3 very early settlers (buying and building) are important for this.

There are lots of really good potential civ plans though. Liberty/Commerce/order (skyscraper policy in particular) has a nice synergy to it, and can make you buy every building you ever want to in any city. Piety can be useful, but it can backfire so easily, so I wouldn't recommend that.

Good luck! I think your plan is pretty solid overall, and you can definitely win on Emperor playing that out.

I generally buy my settlers, and ignore Liberty always. I lean towards.. full tradition, then full patronage, then I buy my friends and we go to war with the world. If I have a religion that can dominate, I pick up a few in piety for cheap missionaries, then finish the tree for reformation and buy my great people with my filth points.