policy choosing practices

[akasha27]

I'm wondering how you (experienced players) tend to choose the policies.

I mean, in my last games I feel more tempted to open several branches instead of finishing them, for example, even if I go for might, I open first tradition to get the opening bonus.
At some point of the game, I eventually have opened tradition, might, piety, patronage (to get the forbiden palace and consulates) and even aesthetics. Only at middle/late game I'm finishing the chosen trees.
What are your insights about this?

thanks

 

[Finarvi]

Openings and finishers are worth more so it's not bad to open certain tree for it's initial bonus (for example for some useful wonder). I just avoid leaving trees partialy finished.

 

[giggsidan]

Usually I'll open a tree and finish it asap for the bonuses. Often I'll go with liberty unless the civ I'm playing as benefits hugely from tradition, honour or piety. I'll only ever not complete the tree if something changes in my plans, like a nearby warmongering civ declaring war on me - in which case I'll shoot for honour, for example. After the first tree though, I find myself doing the same as you - opening trees for maybe 1 or 2 good policies - and then perhaps never finishing it. I find the mid-game trees pretty bland and not too helpful to my kind of play style, so often I'll skip patronage and aesthetics completely and maybe finish tradition until I can get access to commerce and rationalism.

 

[Funak]

I have opened some trees for the opener wonder and maybe one early policy, mostly Patronage, where I feel the +4 votes wonder and the +2 votes policy being way powerful early on, and the rest of the tree being boring as hell.
I've also done this with the renaissance era trees, since all their unlocked wonders are fantastic, and there are some really powerful policies early on in each of them.
Exploitation in Imperialism, the one buffing investment in industry and the one buffing specialists in Rationalism being top value picks.
Don't get me wrong however, unlike Patronage I usually go back and finish the Renaissance era trees later on, as they are all really nice.

Other than that I usually just open a tree, fill it, finish it and open the next one.

 

[Stalker0]

I've definitely been trying more "sprinkle strategies" with my policies lately just to see how it goes.

In terms of initial picks, I find all of the 3 initial trees are good. Tradition is good for wonder rushing and GP pushing. Might good for early expansion/conquest, or if I'm in barb hell. Liberty is a good default, gets the job done.

 

[akasha27]

thanks for your inputs. AI however always follows a tree until is finished right?

 

[Funak]

thanks for your inputs. AI however always follows a tree until is finished right?

I've seen them sprinkle some, so I don't think that is impossible.

 

[Growth]

A few points hopefully helpful.

• When you find yourself with no particular reason to choose one branch over another, what you can do is look at Diplomacy Overview then Global Politics and see what the others picked up and pick something else or counter strategic, then you are guaranteed to have time to build whichever wonder it provides if any. Sometimes if i have to rush 2 wonders at the same time, I look up if one of the 2 are tied to a branch or ideology only I have and queue that one second, or later and not stress about it.
  
• If you play on unbalanced maps or when you find yourself isolated with little prospect of frequent barbarian spawn, no need to open Might. Btw, I play with Allow Policy Saving because sometimes it makes real sense to hold on to it. For instance you might get an Ancient Ruins that boosts for a policy very early, without having knowledge of your surroundings and landscape.
  
• If I have 3 close neighbors that all got Might, are also somewhat hostile and expanding aggressively, I will think hard about getting Might as well or definitely build defense buildings early.
• There is no way I don't finish Piety once opened and leave those open:
  
  • Holy Sites produce +4 and +4
    191.43 WLTK Force-fed population, but you could already guess that from my screen name.
    
    Spoiler :

    
    
    and
  • Cities that follow your Majority Religion generate +1 of every Yield.
• You want your game to be as synergistic as possible and leverage branch/nodes. For instance, National Treasure gives you a Great Person of your choice. I usually go with the most expensive listed that I would otherwise have to buy with , ex: A Great Prophet at 31680 rather than a GA in the 5-7K range. Or even sometimes a GA which will give me another work for Tourism that matches my Civ and Era for the Tourism bonus in Museums, if you are too lazy or can't swap artwork.
  
• When I hit ideologies and I find myself way ahead of the other civs, because they linger or had to reset ideologies, I will go back to the Social policies instead of picking a useless ideology tenet for the era or situation am in. You can be ahead a few Social Policies from wonders and WC projects. And you can also play defensively this way.
  
• As someone mentioned in an unrelated thread, Industry provides you with good flexibility. Prior to the latest fix for unit upgrade costs, I found myself having to choose it often.