Liberty AND Tradition (2013 BNW)

Am I wrong to go for both Libery and Tradition? I know I probably shouldn't, but I keep doing it..!!

I love the free worker, free settler and free GPerson in Lib (they all turn up pretty much when i need them if I go Lib first), but I also love the Wonder boost, free cultural buildings and faith buying of GE's in Trad.

Someone pls tell me i'm a idiot and give guidance to what I should do instead.

With BNW, the AI always seems to go Piety, is this optimum?

I love the piety tree but it has a very high opportunity cost which just makes it not worth it in BNW.

I usually go for some hybrid of Tradition and Liberty to start with (open tradition first, you get a +3 to culture, which means your next policy opens very quickly), but I don't usually bother with the free worker in liberty because you can rushbuy/kidnap a worker in the early game. It also means forgoing that nice great person but it's not something I find game changing.

I like to go Tradition - Liberty - Republic - Collective Rule then max out the tradition tree because of:

-Free aqueducts and culture buildings in your first four cities.
-You can buy great people
-Growth bonuses

By the time I finish tradition it's usually time to open patronage because the Forbidden Palace is awesome (+2 delegates and being host basically means your first two propositions should pass the congress, if you get world religion in that time you should dominate the congress for most of the game, that's without mentioning the bonus happiness you get from it) and also because the reduced decay with city states is very nice.

After opening patronage you can either start to focus on another tree or save your policies for Rationalism. If I'm going culture I tend to unlock Aesthetics and Exploration for the extra art slot wonders, if I'm going diplo I might continue down patronage, if my religion is solid I might head down Piety and if I need a GP for something I might finish up Liberty. But saving the policies for rationalism isn't a bad shout because if you spend your policies on other things, you will usually manage to unlock your ideology before you can finish that tree.

Well culture and policies are a little easier to come by now with BNW. I tend to do the same thing - usually I start with Trad and then pick a few from Liberty like republic and collective rule. It seems that now you're encouraged to do this more, unlike before where it was better to stick with and finish a tree at a time.

With Poland it's safe to go both (though I would pick 2 patronage personally), else you can't finish both before rationalism opens.

Falconiano said:

With Poland it's safe to go both (though I would pick 2 patronage personally), else you can't finish both before rationalism opens.

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If you generate enough culture it's possible you will have unlocked 14 policies by the medieval period, depending on whether you're beelining.

I just don't think that the liberty finisher is good enough to justify wasting 4 policies on, I'd definitely use 3 to get the free settler and the faster settler spawn rate so you can churn out your cities early (also, 5% production for buildings is a nice boost as well on the way there).

BTW, given the tradition opener's boost to culture production, it's probably faster to go Tradition - Liberty - Republic - Collective Rule than it is to go Liberty - Republic - Collective Rule

I think Tradition opener is ok for better border expansion but I wouldn't go back to Tradition after half or full Liberty.

Free aqueducts are pretty worthless after turn ~ 120. By now, your core cities should already have an aqueduct. And the rest of Tradition isn't that great either compared to later policy options.

Edit:

sonicandfffan said:

BTW, given the tradition opener's boost to culture production, it's probably faster to go Tradition - Liberty - Republic - Collective Rule than it is to go Liberty - Republic - Collective Rule

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No, it isn't. This is a common misconception.

RealHuhn said:

No, it isn't. This is a common misconception.

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Yeah I think taking tradition first delays it by 8 or so turns on standard speed. The real benefit to going Tradition opener then finishing Liberty is getting the 4 opera houses before rationalism opens up

As to OP, Tommy has a Poland social policy build order that is pretty effective.

I go both fairly often:

Liberty and Tradition both have the best happiness SPs until Commerce's for +2 happiness per luxury, with the only exception being if I intend to conquer puppets, in which case Honor is good for happiness, too.

After I finish liberty I sometimes open tradition if only to give my workers some land to improve. Later on I'll maybe pick up free opera houses or museums. Most times I prefer two in patronage instead for automatic CS friends. I'll never actually finish tradition with a liberty start. And I'll never open liberty if I've started tradition.

I'll often pick up the Tradition opener after finishing Liberty, just for the faster border growth, but I generally find Piety to be a better combination with Liberty in my games.

Resipsa said:

Yeah I think taking tradition first delays it by 8 or so turns on standard speed.

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any calculation on this specific matter

andrew00100 said:

any calculation on this specific matter

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On standard speed, one city, the first for policies cost 25-30-60-105 culture.

So if you just go Liberty, and start with a Monument, you get 10 turns of 1 culture, then 5 turns of three culture when the Monument is finished until the Liberty opener, then you have 4 culture for the remaining 2 policies that cost 90 altogether, so another 23 turns, 38 turns altogether.

If you go Tradition opener first, and start with a Monument, you get 10 turns of 1 culture, then 5 turns of 3 culture when the Monument is finished until the Tradition opener, then 5 turns of 6 culture to open up the Liberty opener, then you have 7 culture per turn to fill up 165 culture for the 3rd and 4th policy, which will take 24 turns, so 44 turns in total.

Calouste said:

On standard speed, one city, the first for policies cost 25-30-60-105 culture.

So if you just go Liberty, and start with a Monument, you get 10 turns of 1 culture, then 5 turns of three culture when the Monument is finished until the Liberty opener, then you have 4 culture for the remaining 2 policies that cost 90 altogether, so another 23 turns, 38 turns altogether.

If you go Tradition opener first, and start with a Monument, you get 10 turns of 1 culture, then 5 turns of 3 culture when the Monument is finished until the Tradition opener, then 5 turns of 6 culture to open up the Liberty opener, then you have 7 culture per turn to fill up 165 culture for the 3rd and 4th policy, which will take 24 turns, so 44 turns in total.

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So you get it 6 turns later, but you get 1 more policy, 19 turns of improved border expansion (with more to come later), and an unlocked Hanging Garden.

I say it depends on your overall strategy, those 6 turns of delay might be worth it.

at any rate if you plan to mix tradition and liberty to begin with, then

Tradition - Liberty - Republic - Collective Rule
is certainly faster than
Liberty - Republic - Collective Rule - Tradition

I got Liberty and Tradition on many of my games on Emperor. Which is my relaxed happy difficulty level.

It's just a very nice all-rounder. Liberty for early Rexing ; Tradition for 'free' broadcast towers/museums right around the culture boom/tourism rush and mad growth for the capital.

The free GP from Liberty is also a nice way to grab an early wonder if on Immortal+

If playing tall, I may go Tradition and open Liberty later; but I just find tradition bonuses just as strong later in the game as early in the game, so I sometimes still go Liberty for the free worker/improved workspeed; and free GP in the early game. It's just much better pace especially on immortal for an early wonder.

Tradition IMHO you have to be absolutely dedicted to no 2nd city until much later. Even on Venice free MoV from Liberty is hard to beat that early.

The increase in worker speed is actually a big boost, so it's not just about a free worker

I generally find they work against each other, and I just haven't really been needing the tradition growth boost lately what with internal trade routes pumping apples. It still helps a LOT with building up the capital but if you go tradition you will probably have the option to choose something with a lot more return on the culture investment, like Patronage or Rationalism. I've been favoring a liberty and piety mix lately, as a strong religion can far outweigh any benefits of social policies.

SolDelta said:

I generally find they work against each other, and I just haven't really been needing the tradition growth boost lately what with internal trade routes pumping apples. It still helps a LOT with building up the capital but if you go tradition you will probably have the option to choose something with a lot more return on the culture investment, like Patronage or Rationalism. I've been favoring a liberty and piety mix lately, as a strong religion can far outweigh any benefits of social policies.

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My strategy is a complete opposite. There's not much of my games I do not start with Tradition. Having a strong religion is nice but lately in BNW I am quite sick with the GPP and Missionary bombard from the AIs. AIs seems to have faith advantage over humans and kicking out missionaries and GPPs every other turn.
My core SPs for most of my games are Tradition and Rationalism. This combo is always viable for a tall empire and compare to Liberty and Piety its benefits come more steadily.

My most recent game I went with Tradition and Liberty, with great success:

Venice, social policies in this order:

1. TRADITION Opener
2. LIBERTY Opener
3. TRADITION Legalism (free culture building)
4. TRADITION Landed elite (growth)
5. TRADITION Monarchy (gold, happiness in capital)
6. LIBERTY Republic (production in cities)
7. LIBERTY Collective Rule (Great Merchant of Venice)

Then I finished Tradition, did NOT continue Liberty, then went on to star and finish Patronage and start but not finish Freedom

Surprisingly effective for me, but I'm sure there are better combinations and order

Oh, absolutely agreed, tradition is still great, it really just depends on what you want to do. I've been learning to play a bit wider than I normally do, which particularly suits a religious playstyle, as you have more cities to exert pressure and soak up missionary barrages (plus with religious tolerance you can micromanage a little and Put a couple of minority religions where their pantheon would help.) Tradition favors a more, well, traditional approach, with a couple of big cities taking the brunt of the work and wonderspamming. But with this approach, liberty just doesn't really help apart from some early game hammers, a paltry amount of extra hammers and happiness...I struggle to see the two policies working together more effectively than the alternatives.

EDIT: that said, Venice is a pretty big exception to the rule. The growth and the one (two if you finish it) great merchant can do wonders and set you up beautifully for a sprawling puppet empire.

Legalism is just as strong in the late game too. Imagine 4 broadcast towers free!