How dedicated are you in finishing trees?

[DonStill]

I personally always fully finish trees because I like the extra bonuses for finishing, but I've been seeing people say they'll take one or two policies from one tree and then swap over to another of the same or previous era for a certain synergy. How often do you guys do this? I imagine the policy increase for opening a new tree still applies, but how often will you drop the tree you're working on and move onto something else?

 

[amateurgamer88]

I personally always fully finish trees because I like the extra bonuses for finishing, but I've been seeing people say they'll take one or two policies from one tree and then swap over to another of the same or previous era for a certain synergy. How often do you guys do this? I imagine the policy increase for opening a new tree still applies, but how often will you drop the tree you're working on and move onto something else?

I've recently did that and regret it. Always finish a tree because cherry picking your policies makes you weaker in the long run. At least from my experience, those synergy are usually weaker than what you can get from completing a tree sooner unless you are snowballing out of control. If you want fun and try out new things, you can certainly try it. However, you will find yourself regretting it on higher difficulties as it means you finish the later trees much later than you'd like.

 

[Grabbl]

I almost always finish my trees, too. If I don't, it's usually a sign that something went wrong beforehand (either I took wrong decisions due to stupidity or incomplete knowledge, or extreme circumstances such as a non-ending barbarian invasion push me to open authority, either before opening the tree I truly want to play, or in between). I wouldn't dismiss the possibility completely, however. Especially in the medieval trees, for example, some policies are not always of good use while both the openers of Statecraft and Artistry can be really impactful, for example.

 

[vyyt]

Yep, I can confirm this, I almost always cherry pick and then regret it I guess, I'll never learn.

 

[psparky]

I do miss the vanilla game filler policies, usually 2 to 4 policies between completing the first tree and taking rationalism. They seemed to add flavour to the game. There were also strategies involving a mix of the early trees e.g. Tradition opener in a Liberty game or a Liberty and Piety mix, that I quite enjoyed.

This probably is the reason I occasionally cherry-pick instead of completing either the second or third tree (but so far I always completed first tree). This strategy can help to plug your weak spots, but I suppose that isn't optimal in a min-max oriented game. Maybe if you are playing the option where the victory condition is not revealed until later era it has more merit?

 

[Minh Le]

Always finishing tree because its much stronger. When I have all the tenets I need I will go back and open another tree base on the situation. Or in some rare cases when I have a lot of culture, I would mix fealty opener or artistry opener + the first policy which gives culture and go statecraft.

 

[Moi Magnus]

Always finish, and I like that it is an optimal strategy in most cases (I don't like the idea of not finishing a tree you started).

 

[pineappledan]

There is only ever 1 situation in which I will take a policy and not finish the tree: Byzantium and the fealty finisher. There are several reasons for this:

• I generally go tall Byzantium, so fealty isn't a great tree for that.
• Fealty's opener gives monasteries, which combine extremely well with 2 possible strategies with Byzantium: To the Glory of God GP purchases and Sacred Sites.
• Even ignoring that fealty is the wide medieval tree, the rest of fealty blows. Fealty is basically only good for the opener and finisher, unless you are Spain.

Some people talk about taking 2 policies into Tradition for more border growth as Russia, then finishing fealty. This is 2 policies, and that's a huge commitment that will put you far behind other civs for policy completion. It is never worth it.
The other possible one is Babylon and the +10% investment policy in Industry. Once again, this is a 2 policy investment, and the other 2 alternative trees aren't so good that they would convince you to abandon industry. Industry is a great tree to finish with Babylon for the scaler alone.

 

[Stalker0]

I will cherry pick in some cases, but by default finishing a tree is the way to go.