Which policies and tenets would you skip every time?

[Peng Qi]

To be fair, you could say that higher difficulty levels are also an afterthought: I know for a fact that higher difficulty AIs don't always know how to make use of their actual bonuses

Case-in-point: The game where the Immortal AI Celts chopped their starting forests with their free worker before they got a religion.

 

[RuleroftheHex]

The problem here is that, as you said, lots of things in SP are facades in MP. That means it's hard to develop a reasonable mod that would work to improve both game modes. They're different, but you can't have one mod to change both for the better, because there is no way to balance the priorities fr each. I'd say that the ony policies that are bad in both modes are Fine Arts, Artistic Genius and Covert Action, but who takes those anyway?

 

[LordBalkoth]

Sadly when it comes to civ5, I'm probably not the only one that thinks MP feels like an afterthought.

Amen.

A lot of mechanics don't make much sense in a MP environment like RA, Venice or tourism with open borders

Indeed. Or international trade routes, or the city state "warblocking" mentioned, or defensive pacts, or intentionally cancelling trade deals with war, etc. Frankly the game's pretty terrible and uninteresting if your goal is to play it in the most cutthroat manner possible in multiplayer. So many idiotic mechanics slapped onto a poor combat engine.

Which really is a disappointment...I was hoping for "Civ V -- but with other humans!" and not "Civ TOTAL WAR -- ignoring 80% of the game."

In SP it's the player experience that matters, giving him the civilization builder experience with friendly Gandhi and angry Shaka.

Or letting him BE friendly Gandhi or angry Shaka. Seems the more "competitive" the multiplayer gets the more everyone has to be angry Shaka. And the less like Civ it becomes.

I'd say that the ony policies that are bad in both modes are Fine Arts, Artistic Genius and Covert Action, but who takes those anyway?

So you don't complete Aesthetics when going for a Cultural Victory in single player? Yeah, they're generally bad policies, but they're still required to finish the tree.

 

[Carl5872]

Religious Tolerance. THIS THIS THIS!

Every time I go down Piety, I see this and just get that disappointed, sinking feeling I do every time the Cleveland Browns disappoint me with soul crushing losing year. Well, I guess this is a building policy and we'll have to wait for the next one to get better.

 

[Delnar_Ersike]

Again, my point was more to emphasize that it is a bad idea to base design decisions on situations where one player has a severe yield handicap compared to all other players.
It's why I included the policies people disagree with me on in the "Usually bad policies" list, not the "Flatout Terrible Policies" list: they still work under certain circumstances, but those circumstances are so specific, eg. Deity Singleplayer, Germany on a land map with Raging Barbarians, extremely successful [coastal] Liberty empire, having your neighbors' religions' pantheon not be useless, etc., that they should still be changed in some way to increase the amount of situations where those policies would be useful. For example, Consulates on its own might be useful in certain scenarios, but having higher resting influence lower your influence decay will make it a useful policy to have in a lot more scenarios without making the policy overpowered. Navigation School is, again, useful only in certain situations, but increasing Great Admiral movement speed over the course of the game to let it keep up with naval units will make the policy (and Great Admirals in general) useful in a lot more situations. Expanding viable player options generally improves the MP experience, but it doesn't always have to come at the cost of reducing the player immersion factor in SP.

As for policies that are flatout bad in both SP and MP, my shortened list is: Entrepreneurship, Fine Arts, Artistic Genius, Merchant Confederacy, Covert Action, Economic Union, Resettlement, United Front, Oligarchy, Military Caste, and Creative Expression. Explanations are found in my original reply here. My guess is that Oligarchy seems like the odd one out to most people, so I'll repeat my reasoning for it quickly. Oligarchy's +50% ranged combat boost is actually just a +20% boost due to the fact that cities have their strength reduced to 40% for attacks and only takes effect when attacking, and the +20% strength boost converts to a 10.77% damage boost: you get more damage out of having an extra Chariot Archer than you do from this policy. As for the reduced maintenance, you'll maybe save 4 gold per turn on unit upkeep as a Tradition player, which is pennies.

 

[reddishrecue]

I usually skip tradition and liberty a lot. Skipping these social policies usually becomes costly because these social policies have better economic benefits. Piety I skip a lot because there's always a religion and a faith income of some kind.

 

[Peng Qi]

My guess is that Oligarchy seems like the odd one out to most people, so I'll repeat my reasoning for it quickly.

Oligarchy has one major benefit to singleplayer players at high difficulty that makes it have a short window of extremely large usefulness, namely that the boost gives a significant advantage to fighting off early barbarian invasions as well as unitspam AI rushes. The maintenance cost reduction is also extremely powerful in the very early game.

So whereas it's wasteful for the majority of the game, for the first ~50 turns-ish it's very useful.

 

[RuleroftheHex]

So you don't complete Aesthetics when going for a Cultural Victory in single player? Yeah, they're generally bad policies, but they're still required to finish the tree.

Aesthetics isn't required to win a CV. In fact, don't consider opening Aesthetics as being necessary, although it is helpful. If anything, it's worth throwing policies into Commerce and Rationalism rather than Aesthetics (aside from the opener), since only the last policy and the finisher directly effect your Tourism output. Rationalism is more important and will earn you more Tourism faster in the long run. Aesthetics is quite unbalanced, actually, and it isn't necessary at all.

Back to the topic at hand, Oligarchy is really weak, especially due to its placement. Honestly, I think that buffing it is out of the question, however, since the rest of Tradition is so overpowered that you can't really have every policy be good. The opener is so strong that it's worth taking even if you aren't going for a Tradition game. Legalism, Landed Elite, and Monarchy are all so overpowered that Oligarchy is the perfect level of weakness to (somewhat) counteract it. Aristocracy is (in my opinion) perfectly placed, since it's a slower, long-term bonus that ends up helping just enough. Oligarchy is a way to "tip the scales" in Tradition, because if Oligarchy were actually powerful, Tradition would almost feel like cheating.

 

[Acken]

Cultural center gives a good amount of free hammers at a crucial time (renaissance). The free GA and boosted culture is pretty good. And the finisher is necessary for the GM buys.

Aesthetics isn't bad overall. You will still go into rationalism starting renaissance but extra policies usually go there.

It's only problem is the same as the other secondary trees. They pale in comparison to rationalism. But when 5 trees pale compared to another one I'd think the problem is more with Rationalism than these trees.

If I were to do it Rationalism would lose the science bonus. You'd instead get bonuses to science stuff rather than direct science, or at least reverse it where the science bonuses are at the end.

 

[RuleroftheHex]

The problem with giving bonuses to science stuff is that you end up with a lot of Sovereignty-esque policies. No one likes Sovereignty, let's be honest, and I wouldn't like a policy tree made out of Sovereignty-like things any more than I do the policy on its own.

 

[Acken]

Sovereignty is a pretty decent boost to gold output. But yes it's not as good as the rest... thankfully.

But it doesn't have to be bad bonuses I'm not sure where you got that from ?

 

[RuleroftheHex]

Sovereignty is a pretty decent boost to gold output. But yes it's not as good as the rest... thankfully.

But it doesn't have to be bad bonuses I'm not sure where you got that from ?

I don't take Rationalism for the bonuses to Science buildings, because if you want culture, happiness, etc. from them, then just take another policy tree. Rationalism would be suboptimal.

 

[Acken]

?

Not sure what you're talking about here. The specifics haven't been given I don't see the point of talking about what would be optimal or not. But you're free to also explain how you'd change rationalism.

 

[RuleroftheHex]

?

Not sure what you're talking about here. The specifics haven't been given I don't see the point of talking about what would be optimal or not. But you're free to also explain how you'd change rationalism.

The point is, Rationalism is a general science boost. Your idea is focused around a very specific part of science output, which considers the buildings itself. Most policy trees are based on a victory type, not a single aspect of a city. It would be hard to sell me on a tree that focused mostly on bonuses to a certain type of building, because even Exploration, which focuses on sea-based buildings, has other perks, like Maritime Infrastructure. I just don't see a building-based policy tree working well with other trees.

 

[Acken]

Huh ? You're the one talking about bonuses to buildings specifically. Never restrained the changes to that. Stuff != buildings.

 

[RuleroftheHex]

I thought you meant it was related to Science buildings only...

*facepalm*

Sorry

 

[Delnar_Ersike]

Oligarchy has one major benefit to singleplayer players at high difficulty that makes it have a short window of extremely large usefulness, namely that the boost gives a significant advantage to fighting off early barbarian invasions as well as unitspam AI rushes. The maintenance cost reduction is also extremely powerful in the very early game.

So whereas it's wasteful for the majority of the game, for the first ~50 turns-ish it's very useful.

Republic is more useful for defending against barbarians (the +1 hammer lets you get your first military units out faster), and the first 10 turns after unlocking Monarchy provide more gold than the first 100 turns after unlocking Oligarchy. Now, if this policy were in the Liberty tree, it would be a lot more useful, since Liberty has a lot more cities with which it can use the ranged combat bonus and a lot more units weighing down its treasury with maintenance.

Back to the topic at hand, Oligarchy is really weak, especially due to its placement. Honestly, I think that buffing it is out of the question, however, since the rest of Tradition is so overpowered that you can't really have every policy be good. The opener is so strong that it's worth taking even if you aren't going for a Tradition game. Legalism, Landed Elite, and Monarchy are all so overpowered that Oligarchy is the perfect level of weakness to (somewhat) counteract it. Aristocracy is (in my opinion) perfectly placed, since it's a slower, long-term bonus that ends up helping just enough. Oligarchy is a way to "tip the scales" in Tradition, because if Oligarchy were actually powerful, Tradition would almost feel like cheating.

Rationalism is an overpowered policy tree, yet we still talk about Sovereignty and Scientific Revolution being terrible policies.
Policies should ideally be able to hold their own, regardless of what policies they unlock. Humanism might unlock the much better Free Thought, but it is still a good enough policy on its own. Republic is a very useful policy on its own, even if it unlocks the even more useful Collective Rule.
The problem of Tradition being too powerful is not solved by making one of their policies terrible, but by making their powerful policies less powerful (eg. Monarchy's happiness changed to 1 for every 4 citizens in your capitol).

Cultural center gives a good amount of free hammers at a crucial time (renaissance). The free GA and boosted culture is pretty good. And the finisher is necessary for the GM buys.

Aesthetics isn't bad overall. You will still go into rationalism starting renaissance but extra policies usually go there.

Maybe, but you have to go through quite a few useless policies to unlock the finisher, while Commerce really only has one useless policy (Entrepreneurship). Religious Tolerance is the worst policy in Piety, and even that's often more useful than Fine Arts.

It's only problem is the same as the other secondary trees. They pale in comparison to rationalism. But when 5 trees pale compared to another one I'd think the problem is more with Rationalism than these trees.

Commerce and Piety might pale in comparison to Rationalism, but they are still quite useful: Piety's buffed Holy Sites and Reformation beliefs are the saviors of lategame wide Liberty, and Commerce's gold bonuses are useful for everyone. Patronage's opener is also useful for everyone. Hmm, now that I think about it...

If I were to do it Rationalism would lose the science bonus. You'd instead get bonuses to science stuff rather than direct science, or at least reverse it where the science bonuses are at the end.

... the problem might actually be the fundamental organization of policy trees. Policy trees that specialize in their own areas of gold, culture, science, and CS diplomacy make sense on paper, but in reality all that happens is that policy trees that boost the potential of all gameplay strategies become overpowered compared to policy trees that either don't boost all gameplay strategies or don't provide as big of a boost. Unless you're playing on a map that will probably end in the era in which the science policy tree becomes available, science is something that every strategy needs. Even if Rationalism were changed to give benefits from science stuff, it would still be overpowered, as science stuff is something everyone will be doing in earnest: Libraries, Universities, Public Schools, and Research Labs are buildings that everyone is going to prioritize regardless of Rationalism, so even if Rationalism were to give similar bonuses to these buildings as Commerce does to financial buildings, Rationalism would still be the better tree because of how important these buildings are anyway.
Commerce, Piety, and Patronage opener work because the bonuses they give are useful for every strategy. Commerce's gold bonuses can be spent on purchasing CS votes, buying and upgrading military units, buying science buildings, and buying cultural buildings and cultural CS allies. Piety's faith bonuses mean more faith to spend on Great People, while their Reformation beliefs have options for every strategy and Temple gold is useful for the same reason Commerce's gold bonuses are. Patronage's slower decay makes sure you keep CS allies longer, getting the most out of the influence you earn with them through gold, gifting units, or CS quests.
Tradition and Liberty work because they dictate the "how" part of strategies, not the "what" part, so they are useful for all endgoals. Granted, the way that wonders work, the way that specialists work, the way that happiness works, the way that building maintenance works, the way that city connections work, and the interplays between Secularism and Tradition mean that Tradition is more useful than Liberty the majority of the time, but that's a separate issue for a different thread (short version: tall vs. wide is terrible as an irreversible gameplay decision, and Civ5's policies, unlike Civ4's civics, are irreversible gameplay decisions).

The only way to truly balance the policy trees is either to ensure that all policy trees provide equal benefits to all gameplay strategies (which, among others, means that in a science-dominated game like Civ5, there can be no dedicated Science policy tree) or that every policy tree has at least one gameplay strategy to which it gives huge benefits and one gameplay strategy which it does not benefit.

We're meandering a bit off topic though: the thread was supposed to be about policies that are flatout bad, not on how policy trees should be balanced.

 

[Acken]

Maybe, but you have to go through quite a few useless policies to unlock the finisher, while Commerce really only has one useless policy (Entrepreneurship). Religious Tolerance is the worst policy in Piety, and even that's often more useful than Fine Arts.

Fine arts is crap, agreed. But for a CV you'll get more finishing aesthetics than commerce. Cultural centers is good, the finisher is good, the opener is good, Flourishing of the arts, Cultural exchange... There's a lot more useless crap for a CV in Patronage, Commerce and Exploration not just Entrepreneurship. Come on. Or I'll be interested to see the performances of those peaceful culture victories finishing Patronage, Commerce or Exploration instead of Aesthetics. I'll agree that Aesthetics pales compared to Rationalism but not compared to Commerce, Exploration or Patronage.

Commerce and Piety might pale in comparison to Rationalism, but they are still quite useful: Piety's buffed Holy Sites and Reformation beliefs are the saviors of lategame wide Liberty, and Commerce's gold bonuses are useful for everyone. Patronage's opener is also useful for everyone. Hmm, now that I think about it...

I'm not aware of these great Liberty games that involve Reformation AND finishing Piety for buffed holy sites (besides ICS SS). What kind of rationalism timer you're looking at here ? You'll note that once again Rationalism appears in my critique. Commerce mercantilism is one of my favorite policy so I won't argue there. Investing in the whole tree is mostly a domination strategy. The happiness is seldom needed for peaceful play by the time you can finish that tree since you have ideologies for that and the rest goes to rationalism meanwhile.

... the problem might actually be the fundamental organization of policy trees. Policy trees that specialize in their own areas of gold, culture, science, and CS diplomacy make sense on paper, but in reality all that happens is that policy trees that boost the potential of all gameplay strategies become overpowered compared to policy trees that either don't boost all gameplay strategies or don't provide as big of a boost.

True. Which is why I'd remove/diminish direct science boost (or make them harder to get) from rationalism. Or make the other victories less reliant on science but I think that would require a bigger change.

Unless you're playing on a map that will probably end in the era in which the science policy tree becomes available, science is something that every strategy needs. Even if Rationalism were changed to give benefits from science stuff, it would still be overpowered, as science stuff is something everyone will be doing in earnest: Libraries, Universities, Public Schools, and Research Labs are buildings that everyone is going to prioritize regardless of Rationalism, so even if Rationalism were to give similar bonuses to these buildings as Commerce does to financial buildings, Rationalism would still be the better tree because of how important these buildings are anyway.

Well I agree with the beginning. But it wouldn't necessary be the best policy tree. It comes down to numbers at that point. While all strategies have a university, the bonus for university is not necessarily as good as a bonus to operas in another tree for a culture victory. Timing is also important. The later you get direct science bonus the worst they become. Right now what is bad is that 2 of the best policies overall are available at the start of the mid game.

Commerce, Piety, and Patronage opener work because the bonuses they give are useful for every strategy. Commerce's gold bonuses can be spent on purchasing CS votes, buying and upgrading military units, buying science buildings, and buying cultural buildings and cultural CS allies.

Yes but you must also value the fact that you unlock some other policies and start progress in a tree. If the opener is great but the rest is poor for your strategy this may not be the best option. I will never start to open Piety in the middle of a Culture game. Aesthetics is a better options.

The only way to truly balance the policy trees is either to ensure that all policy trees provide equal benefits to all gameplay strategies (which, among others, means that in a science-dominated game like Civ5, there can be no dedicated Science policy tree) or that every policy tree has at least one gameplay strategy to which it gives huge benefits and one gameplay strategy which it does not benefit.

Trees should be designed so that they reward a type of strategy. Liberty should reward wide, tradition should reward small, honor should reward agressivity etc. The problem with Rationalism is that is rewards everything, the rest aren't so bad... Tradition vs Liberty is more a wide vs tall debate like you said.

We're meandering a bit off topic though: the thread was supposed to be about policies that are flatout bad, not on how policy trees should be balanced.

To me this is on topic. We're speaking of what we feel works and what doesn't. At page 2 it's more interesting than everyone providing their list with no discussion.

 

[Delnar_Ersike]

Fine arts is crap, agreed. But for a CV you'll get more finishing aesthetics than commerce. Cultural centers is good, the finisher is good, the opener is good, Flourishing of the arts, Cultural exchange... There's a lot more useless crap for a CV in Patronage, Commerce and Exploration not just Entrepreneurship. Come on. Or I'll be interested to see the performances of those peaceful culture victories finishing Patronage, Commerce or Exploration instead of Aesthetics. I'll agree that Aesthetics pales compared to Rationalism but not compared to Commerce, Exploration or Patronage.

Patronage opener's decay slowdown is useful for more happiness into golden ages and more turns of increased food from Maritime CS. More turns of faith or culture from Religious or Cultural CS is probably negligible for CV, but Forbidden Palace isn't, given that +2 votes could let you pass an early World Religion and the less unhappiness from population is always useful (especially for GA).
Commerce's gold bonus helps with purchasing, both science buildings for faster tech and cultural buildings for more culture.
If you're going to CV, you're probably not in a position to ever pick up Exploration anyway: the policy tree is pretty much reserved for [coastal] Liberty empires only, and if you're going Liberty, it's generally a better idea to chase DomV or SV anyway. I honestly thing Firaxis designed Exploration's finisher for horsehockys and giggles anyway.

I'm not aware of these great Liberty games that involve Reformation AND finishing Piety for buffed holy sites (besides ICS SS). What kind of rationalism timer you're looking at here ? You'll note that once again Rationalism appears in my critique. Commerce mercantilism is one of my favorite policy so I won't argue there. Investing in the whole tree is mostly a domination strategy. The happiness is seldom needed for peaceful play by the time you can finish that tree since you have ideologies for that and the rest goes to rationalism meanwhile.

It only works for certain civs (Maya, Ethiopia, Celts, Poland, Byzantium with a good start, Spain with Natural Wonder) and/or on good faith pantheon starts. Opener liberty into collective rule, followed by opening Piety into Mandate of Heaven. Pick up Pagodas as first religion, Mosques on Enhance (Monasteries as backup), Byzantium gets wild card for Bonus Belief. Place cities the minimum distance apart from each other so you can stuff as many cities as possible into the smallest amount of space, you'll usually have 8-10 cities when you stop; you'll usually be keeping cities at the population of their local happiness. Since you'll have a lot of cities in a small space, Initiation Rites is actually useful (you'll need the +100 instant gold more than the +2 gpt from Church Property). Purchase Pagodas and Mosques with faith after enhancing, netting you +40 to +50 faith per turn just from those buildings alone; with shrines and temples and Organized Religion, you'll have +80 to +100 faith per turn, assuming no UB shrines or UB temples. If you go Jesuit Education, you make up for your science penalty (from less effective NC and having more cities) by purchasing Universities with Faith; in fact, the science boost you get from this is sometimes worth delaying finishing Liberty for its GS in favor of picking up Jesuit Education. The only other option is Glory To God, which lets you pump out GP's in Industrial Era without having to rush finishing Rationalism. I guess you could also try going for a Sacred Sites that generates 40 tourism per turn in medieval (10 cities with 2 faith-purchased buildings each), but that's an all-in that doesn't usually pay off; if you plan on Sacred Sites, Cathedrals may be better than Mosques provided you can fill their Great Work slots (you usually can't, since you won't have the specialists to work Guilds). As an added benefit, your faith buildings will generate so much culture that you'll often get one or two more policies than if you went for Temple happiness, Guruship, or any other Liberty-favoring follower beliefs, which is usually enough to either finish both Piety and Liberty or be one policy off finishing one or the other by the time you unlock Rationalism (timing is very map- and civ-dependent). You can also put off Secularism because you won't have the specialists to make full use out of the +2 science immediately (man, I miss Civ4's and Civ3's wonders, buildings, and civics that gave you a free specialist). You'll be generating so much faith per turn that it's inevitable that you'll be getting at least 4-7 prophets before hitting Industrial, all of which you'll be planting; picking up Messiah as Enhancer gets you roughly 2 more prophets, but picking up Texts or Preachers will let you spread to CS faster, which means getting more gold out of your Founder, so it's wild card.
Needless to say that this doesn't work on high difficulty level AIs because the bonuses they get at the start of the game make it very difficult to ensure you get the beliefs you need while also staying science-competitive despite. It's also fairly difficult for more than one person to pull it off successfully in multiplayer, seeing as how much the strategy relies on faith buildings. Still, some of the funnest games I've had were when I was going for this strategy: it works so oddly and the fact that it does is bizarre that people often don't know what to do against it (your cities are dead weight to them because you're relying so much on Faith).

Well I agree with the beginning. But it wouldn't necessary be the best policy tree. It comes down to numbers at that point. While all strategies have a university, the bonus for university is not necessarily as good as a bonus to operas in another tree for a culture victory. Timing is also important. The later you get direct science bonus the worst they become. Right now what is bad is that 2 of the best policies overall are available at the start of the mid game.

I honestly don't know for a very important reason: CV through anything other than Futurism (and maybe Sacred Sites) doesn't work in multiplayer, so it's difficult to judge how shuffling around Rationalism's policies would affect CV (since CV is so closely intertwined with how the AI behaves, which is not always how a player who wants to win will behave).

Let's assume though that CV through non-Futurism tourism is viable in multiplayer.
By pushing the science bonuses to a later policy, options would be constricted instead of expanded. Since the best policies in the tree are available right at the start, players only have to dedicate 4 points to the tree to get its full bonus, which can usually be done before ideologies. If you were to push the best bonuses to the end, players who could get to the end of the tree faster would have a huge edge of people who lagged behind, especially because policy costs scale with each policy you unlock, so the turn difference between Rationalism opener and Secularism is a lot smaller than the turn difference between the penultimate Rationalism policy and the last one. It also cripples the Glory to God reformation belief, whose benefit lies in the fact finishing Rationalism is primarily useful for purchasing GS with faith, so forcing players to have to complete Rationalism ASAP to get the most science out of it instead of letting them get the science boosts out of the first few policies kills the biggest benefit to Glory to God.

Yes but you must also value the fact that you unlock some other policies and start progress in a tree. If the opener is great but the rest is poor for your strategy this may not be the best option. I will never start to open Piety in the middle of a Culture game. Aesthetics is a better options.

I meant Patronage opener, a lot of the Piety tree, and a lot of the Commerce tree. Piety opener is indeed quite terrible on its own later in the game, but Patronage opener remains useful throughout the game, especially if key CS's (eg. the only two Maritime CS in the game) have Hostile personality.

Trees should be designed so that they reward a type of strategy. Liberty should reward wide, tradition should reward small, honor should reward agressivity etc. The problem with Rationalism is that is rewards everything, the rest aren't so bad... Tradition vs Liberty is more a wide vs tall debate like you said.

We're in disagreement here, and it all lies in the irreversible nature of policy trees. Since policy unlock options cannot be reversed, policy trees that double-down on a specific type of strategy should be avoided; otherwise you'll end up in situations where a player may get a policy or two, then realize their strategy won't work out, and be at a permanent disadvantage for the rest of the game because there is no way they can undo those two policy choices they made assuming their initial plan would work.

It's why I think wide vs. tall decisions for policy trees are a terrible idea, especially when they are supposed to be the first policies that you unlock: it forces a player to double-down on one of two mutually exclusive strategies (wide or tall, no middle ground), and if they realize that their decision was wrong in the next couple of turns, there is not only no way for them to undo their policy choices, but the now-useless policies also handicap their ability to acquire the policies they now actually need due to the way policy costs scale. This is especially true with going Liberty initially and trying to transition back into Tradition, since policy cost increasing with city count punishes bad Liberty starters more than bad Tradition starters.
BNW's ideologies are an improvement over the 3 endgame policy trees in G&K and vanilla solely because they don't box the player into a specific type of strategy as much. Sure, Autocracy might still have the tenet that reduces the gold purchase cost of units by 33%, but it also has a tenet that gives +2 happiness from Barracks, Armory, and Military Academy, which lets them get huge amounts of happiness that is useful for any victory type.

This is why I view the necessity of Rationalism as a double-edged sword: sure, it forces people to always pick up Rationalism instead of experimenting with other policy types, but because it rewards every strategy type, players do not suffer from the fact that the tree doubles down on science. Even if they end up having to switch strategies mid-game, eg. aiming for CV to aiming for Info Era DomV, Rationalism remains a useful policy tree, while Aesthetics would just become dead weight.
The patronage tree might double-down on hoarding CS allies, but the opener is useful enough for all strategies that it also doesn't punish players for having to change plans.

Oh, and for the record, I prefer Civ4's civics to Civ5's policies solely because Civ4's civics are reversible while Civ5's policies are not. In Civ4, if you were initially aiming for a wider empire with Universal Suffrage and Free Speech but end up not having enough tiles to maximize the usefulness of Towns, switching to a small-and-tall strategy is just a turn of anarchy away via Representation and Bureaucracy. If something similar happens in Civ5, the only thing that can save you is a restart.

 

[Acken]

I'll just respond with bullet points to cut down on the wall of text.

-Yes some policies are useful. Not the whole trees are useless for Culture. But the whole trees... urrh. And finishing Aesthetics for musician is better anyway. No time to get policies from the other trees. If we had more policies overall (of if the game was longer) then yes the other trees would get more love while playing culture.
-Ok but that's more a piety game than liberty then. Sadly I don't see this being really that efficient to begin with because of how wide usually suffers. Especially 10 cities wide. On high difficulties you have a high chance to miss the beliefs and on low difficulties go Sacred Sites spam if you're going for liberty + piety.
-It should be clear that when talking with me I'm not talking or even considering multiplayer at all. No offense but keep that in mind. If secularism was at the end of rationalism it would make artillery domination not care for the tree at all. That is just my point, the policy itself loses in value and can get below a threshold for some strategies. If getting it is still a necessary move then yes you have achieved nothing. I'm only mentionning that as an option.
-Yeah I obviously disagree with the last part there. If you badly planed your policies and it all sucks then for me that's just the game deal with it. That seems to be how the game was intended to be so I'm fine with keeping this idea of specializing your civ. However I'd agree with you that policies cost too much and I'd like more over the course of the game. That'd increase flexibility at the same time.
-Another argument I'd have to nerf down secularism is that it would make the AI less left in the dust everytime it doesn't take it. I guess you could start to increase the flavors for it to also always take it but I'm starting to not see the point. Just remove the tree and diminish tech costs post renaissance by 20% :/