I have always used tradition without fail as my 1st policy, a question

[Leathaface]

Tradition i've always used. I look at Liberty as the only other valid option.

Would it be wise to choose another policy tree as your very first policy? I've never tried it once, so I don't have a clue!

 

[Tachii]

War games: Tradition opener -> Liberty tree (or just start with Liberty, but I always like to try my hand on Hanging gardens, so tradition opener is great).

Science/culture game: Tradition tree.

Diplomacy: You can do whatever.

Honor and Piety are both underwhelming.

For Germany/Songhai/Montezuma, you can go Tradition opener -> honor opener -> Tradition tree since knowing barb camps and getting early culture for them is usually a decent strategy.

 

[Rathelon]

I like to build wide and tall, so I take them both.

 

[mrwho]

I think Honor is underrated. If you're going for domination it's the best way to go, as you probably won't even settle four cities yourself (and tradition applies to the first four cities you settle), and the extra promotions and combat bonuses you get are very useful. I very very rarely use it as I very rarely even attempt domination games.

Liberty is very useful for going wide, of course, but even for tall games it can be useful. If you're under a lot of pressure to expand and the AI are threatening to close you in, it's probably best to go liberty, although not finishing it, before going back into tradition.

Piety is pretty good for religion, but I just don't see how it can make up for losing out on a tradition open. Unless you're going for an extremely religion-heavy strategy I'd give it a miss. The AI seem to love it though for some reason.

 

[Cicerosaurus]

I take tradition to get the culture, but my second choice is normally honour However, that is because I play with raging barbarians and have the Mod of unlimited experience against barbs, so for my game there is a benefit (that can backfire if you find yourself on an Island with no barbs).

I find the difficult choice is when you have to go for Exploration, Rationalism or Aesthetics.

 

[Halcyan2]

Honor opener is a lot stronger in BNW, given how dangerous barbarians are to trade routes.

 

[sonicandfffan]

Honor opener is a lot stronger in BNW, given how dangerous barbarians are to trade routes.

I disagree, Barbs will not affect your early trade routes because it's optimal to trade internally early on, sending food to your cities for the growth boost. So your routes should pretty much stay within your territory unless you aren't very good at settling cities (via cargo ships as well, so the only barb units you need to worry about are coastal).

 

[tedoll78]

I love tall games with a very strong capital city in each, so it's always been Tradition for me. Honor and Piety seem underwhelming, but I still take their openers if I'm in a wonder whory mood, usually after going into Patronage.

If I'm looking at a Cultural Victory, Aesthetics is next.. but filling it isn't as high a priority as getting into the Rationalism tree, which is filled in all of my games, regardless of play style or end goal. Exploration is pretty unremarkable, but I'll open it along the way if I want The Louvre.

 

[ahawk]

I break down the 4 policy tree choices at the start as follows:

80% - Tradition: 8 free buildings is a huge boost (4 aquaducts, 4 cultural buildings), and the happiness boosts in Tradition are usually the best of the early SP trees, since you get extra happiness in the capital per every 2 citizens and extra happiness per every 10 citizens in every city. Moreover, you get a food boost in the capital and extra gold there, too, which is vital in order to have internal trade routes early on before linking all your cities with roads.

15% - Liberty: A free Great Person with the closer is still fairly handy for grabbing wonders out of the later portion of the early game, or even for founding a religion in some spots. The free settler is helpful in isolated starts. Often, I go Liberty when I find myself on a small continent alone or when I know I need a viable early wonder (GL is never possible, but usually by Chichen Itza I can rely on the GE from Liberty for it). Also, the extra production per city can be useful right away in jungle starts.

~4.5% - Honor: I rarely open Honor first unless it's just for the opener, which I only do when I know a lot of open land will be around for some time in which barbs will spawn. Generally, I only go all the way through Honor as my first tree when I am a civ with a very early melee UU (Greece, Rome, Persia) or a very powerful melee UU that occurs later (Impi, Samurai, Berserker). The main problem with Honor is that it doesn't boost happiness much at all now (IIRC, it used to include happiness either per wall/castle or barracks/armory, which got moved to Autocracy).

<.5% - Piety: Opening Piety and going all the way through is something I've done once in BNW (out of maybe 20 games ranging from brief Duel games to Standard-sized normal ones). The only time I opened it, I was playing Poland and started very close to a faith mountain. Because I knew I could recover if going Piety wasn't useful via Poland's UA, I went Piety and worked the mountain and succeeded in hard-building Stonehenge. I then bee-lined to a Reformation and took Jesuit Education. This was the only time I opened Piety, and it worked fairly well. But this was highly, highly unusual. Opening Piety is something that I'd only see doing in situations like this, where I know I'll have both a cultural boost (Poland's UA) and a faith boost (faith-yielding natural wonder) in order to both found a religion as well as quickly start on Tradition or Liberty as my 2nd SP tree. Otherwise, Piety is the worst to open, as it provides zero happiness and doesn't directly aid production, food, or expansion whatsoever. In general, I tend to open and go through Piety as no earlier than my 2nd SP tree, since I often won't have a religion and/or high enough faith yield until completing my 1st SP tree anyways. Piety is a good tree, and a great one to back-track to, but a terrible one to open.

 

[MarshalN]

I often focus on tradition. Sometimes I might dip into liberty or honor, and if I'm poland might even finish liberty

 

[DemonMaster]

I usually go for Tradition, sometimes Liberty, depending how many neighbours and how much space I have that is "mine". I (usually) open honor fairly early so I'm only one step away from Warrior Code, if I need it or an opportunity present itself that I can't refuse. I haven't (so far) tried Piety as a starter.

 

[Loucypher]

I like Liberty a lot more then most, I guess, but I'm no deity player so take my words for what they're worth I guess. The Free Settler/Free Worker may not seem like much but you do get a discount on later ones too which is handy as is. The extra happiness and lower policy cost both help as well.
I also play on Huge maps where the science penalty isn't as big, so that helps.

 

[Mozzington]

The last few games I have found myself opening tradition and then going through liberty. G&K it was always tradition only. Still not convinced about taking honour though.

 

[Nivrax]

I take Tradition 'nearly' every time. Only switching to Liberty if I want to be aggressive this game and knock someone over near ~60 turn (extra hammer for more archers + possible forward settled city + faster improvement on new lands + happy per city connection for empire I will hopefully conquer later).
Honor, on left side, isn't half bad (general and extra xp for units), but right side is pretty terrible and not worth finishing until much later, while Liberty opener will give that Engi for wonder or Scientist to recoup for turns 'wasted' on producing units.
Piety is still weak since religion is wonky on Immortal+, although I could maybe see it useful instead of Honor if going wide through Lib/conquest (+2 faith per city adds up, more if you lucked on religion with buildings).

 

[Vidszhite]

I disagree, Barbs will not affect your early trade routes because it's optimal to trade internally early on, sending food to your cities for the growth boost. So your routes should pretty much stay within your territory unless you aren't very good at settling cities (via cargo ships as well, so the only barb units you need to worry about are coastal).

Only true of a tradition game, since more pop means more gold, and you won't be settling many cities anyway. If you use liberty, you can't use them internally unless you settled on many luxuries for gold tiles (not always your lucky day), nor until youve got a mercantile ally or your happiness infrastructure all set, otherwise unhappiness will strike and waste your trade route. Barbs can also disrupt internal trade routes if your army isn't up to snuff, as they can enter your land and the spaces between cities, and armies cost gold.

 

[erisiamk]

Usually I go for a Tradition start, but that's only because I like playing tall and I usually end up going for a Cultural or Science Victory. I tried an Honor start on a Duel map with 12 civs once and it worked pretty well... everyone's capital was within 10 hexes of each other, and I just did the Hun Horse Archer rush, before turning it into an Artillery rush towards the end of the game. There was hardly any space to found a second city, the entire map was full by 1400 AD!

 

[Vidszhite]

I like Liberty a lot more then most, I guess, but I'm no deity player so take my words for what they're worth I guess. The Free Settler/Free Worker may not seem like much but you do get a discount on later ones too which is handy as is. The extra happiness and lower policy cost both help as well.
I also play on Huge maps where the science penalty isn't as big, so that helps.

I'm an immortal player and I almost always take full liberty. Free great person is a HUGE boost, and as an example, an academy that early on can stack with nat college and easily catch you up in science. Makes up for the lack of a 30 pop capital. Liberty comes in handy later on if you end up going to war, so it is a good warmonger tree if you have a late game UU, for example.

 

[Merciorum]

I normally pick Tradition. If I play as Byzantium, though, I'll open with Tradition (and maybe take Aristocracy) before going full-on Piety, and then picking away at the rest while going to one of the later ones (depending on which victory I'm aiming for).

 

[Andy06r]

Full Liberty most times.

#1 Never have to hard build a worker (and pyramids is occasionally available)
#2 Cheaper policies
#3 Synergizes well with production builds
#4 Good colonial expansion phase on appropriate maps

The free great person is nice. I find myself often taking a great prophet to enhance my religion since my FPT is shrines + Stonehenge, depending on faith neighbors. Settled great scientist is obvious, as is a engineer. An engineer this early can also be settled in a port city to help build it up if your capitol is inland.

The left side of honor gets taken with Songhai and Rome.

I'm not as good with tradition as I probably should be...

 

[FrostK]

To choose between Tradition and Liberty, I often ask a question to myself: "Do I really want my capital to be 10+ before turn 100?". So if I have more then 10 good tiles, I go tradition. Liberty otherwise.
Also it is a question when u want go for war, before turn 50 - tradition, between 50 and 100 - liberty.

I think starting with piety doesnt worth it, unless you are playing again humans, smth like Celts vs Byzantium vs Maya. When it is quite obvious that everyone will go religion, then going piety may really help you to select right beliefs.