Traditional Progress: An Alternative Opening

So the question is how subtle is the difference. For example, lets say a Tradition player gets their 3rd policy just a few turns ahead of a progress player. If they are both culture strained on a wonder, that means the Tradition player can start the wonder 2 turns earlier. Now progress perhaps has better production....but its probably not enough to make up for 2 turns. So both start the wonder, the Tradition player gets it...and suddenly the snowball begins.

Occasionally glancing at the leader board and looking at policy numbers, it may not look that different (in fact the majority of the time all of them may have the same policy numbers as you mentioned), however, a few turns could be making a big difference when it comes to things like wonders.


Then again...maybe it is the free population. We need to test out some of these ideas, and I think I have a way to do it, I'm going to ask the devs.

 

I don't think the early wonders are needed to start a snowball at all. I also think that tradition because of higher growth, higher population and justice policy with engineer specialist, soon maybe manufactory, will have better production. In fact, it will have much higher yields at capital thanks to both free buildings and specialist in them. Culture from the opener helps, but royal chapel and artist is what makes the difference, then writer policy.

 

So I've tried this opener out on a lot of starts. Honestly, not too impressed at the moment.

Yes it does kick start you off a bit faster, but the fact that you lose the 3 food/science until later erods your initial pop boost, your delayed worker delays your infrastructure, and your delayed progress left side erods your culture gains. I've done the start at least 4 times, and every time I've been dead last when the dust settles, which is not normal for my plays. It feels like your trading a bit of an earlier start...but that start erods faster than I'd like, and I don't feel I get enough to show for it.

 

I mostly agree with you after trying it some more. I think straight tradition or straight progress is overall better, I think the first game I tried this I just had a great capital and overall good land (Grand Mesa is second city).

With progress I'm actually looking to just hit the medieval era really quickly so I can take Fealty/Statecraft/Artistry instead of the final progress. Then I finish progress whenever you need happiness.

 

I think a big part of doing it is when you select tradition you need to have two good tiles for those new citizens to work, that makes it much more of an early steroid. I did it with the Huns in another Immortal game I'm playing now and with the big expansions early and then the quick Ekis you can get the population really does a lot of work. It was quite good land both early and late with a 3 tile lake nearby and lots of dry flats available as well as some elephants.

Progress was nice for getting those Ekis going faster but I think without the early pop boost it would've been a lot worse.

 

I made T1 A6 with Rome at some point with a flood plain start with limited production, I thought I might as well grow quicker to use specialists. A very strong game, impossible to lose by industrial era. But I can't tell if it was because of the opener or just because of Rome ^^. But maybe it helped for early settling to find iron (first neighbour was hard to reach so war was quite late), while giving the capital a 2 pop head to minimize the time I got "romed" (having to start an important building in expo that Rome had not finished yet)..

 

I think the other misconception here is that Tradition 1 is culturally better than Progress 1, and I don't think it is necessary true. For example in my last game, I got 45 immediate culture when I took the Progress founder. If we assume the normal 6 pop tradition capital, it would take 15 turns just to match that ... and of course Progress will get another tech by then to push further the lead. Progress can get its 2nd policy pretty darn quick.

Its Tradition 2 where the culture advantage really takes off, so without it, I don't think 1P5 has a strong culture push.

 

Tradition 1 followed by progress 1 has a lot more culture than 2 in progress does. It should reach at least the 3rd policy faster than progress would.

You also should not put down your settler until after you claim your 3rd policy in this approach. By doing so, you pay 10 less for the third policy, compared to settling earlier.

The more I play the more I like delaying settler like this with any policy tree.

 

Delaying settlers in order to get through the early policy trees is solid. But the challenge is then founding a religion also, so...

 

On the other hand your giving up faith that an expansion + shrine would grant (not to mention if the pantheon would generate more faith for you if you got the city up quicker). And of course the possibility of losing sweet real estate due to an AI sniping it from you. Sure you could war for it, but that's a lot of of investment that a slightly earlier settler could have saved you.

Not saying that tactic isn't good, but I don't think its always the right call.

 

I think there's a world of difference in settling pressure based on map and difficulty. If you play Deity in relatively crowded conditions (ie High Seas, Terra-type maps, blocky Pangeas even) and then get a start in the midst of a lot of civs, delaying a settler till the 3rd policy is going to get a lot of prime real estate in your first ring already taken, because your first ring is maybe some other civs' first ring as well.

I wonder how much this creates stealth extra difficulty, where certain maps are much harder on Deity (and in some cases even Immortal) than others because of settling pressure passing a critical level and forcing you to settle faster than is desirable to get any good dirt at all. The extra space on Continents might make it typically a lot easier than Pangaea for this reason, I'd be interested if anyone plays both frequently.

 

Its a bit of both. Pangea is easier to do a bulk religious conversion (or be converted in turn), you also get access to a lot more trades earlier in the game. Continents generally gives you more space to expand.

Which one is ultimately "harder" .... hehe I don't play enough Pangea to say

 

People are talking about 1T before 1P, but I wonder if it is better to mix the other way around. The progress opener gives you a good deal of flat culture so the 2nd policy comes faster. The time it does take could give you an extra pop point in the capital, so that the +2 pop with the 2nd policy punches above its weight. And you still get the culture for those two pop points, just at a 75% rate. I'd at least consider taking the progress opener first if I were trying this.

 

I recently rolled Russia at random and decided no civ is better to try this out. Here is the initial save. Settings: King, communitas, huge, huts on, otherwise standard. I describe my first 100 turns in the next post.

 

Russia benefits from more cities growing borders faster, and can stand it if you don't focus on early science. Russia also has a good chance of getting gold to help buy buildings and workers. I started out assuming that mixing Tradition and Progress would be painful in some ways but getting a nice land grab would later pay off in part because of this civ's uniques. I theorize that if this doesn't work with Russia it doesn't work with anyone.

Spoiler First 100 Turns :

Quick summary: I found myself on an isolated peninsula of a large landmass, with pearls, fish, and atolls nearby as well as a couple of plantation resources. I wouldn't call it great or bad dirt, but it is somewhat strange dirt. I got no huts due to my odd capital placement. The initial isolation won't last long but barbs aren't a problem and Assyria and Siam have been at war, so I have a very skimpy military for now. We are also worker light, with so many sea resources and the need to get the pearls monopoly going ASAP. I wound up only getting them a couple of turns before founding, but it made the difference between 2nd found after India and being 4th/5th.
Capital Build Order: Monument, Shrine, Granary, Worker, work boat, work boat, settler, well, archer, settler, settler, work boat, settler, Great Lighthouse, cargo ship, market, council.
Satellites: mostly monument first, after that granaries, shrines, or lighthouses depending on terrain. Starting on councils/wells where possible now.
Policies: Progress Opener, Tradition Opener, Sovereignty, Organization, Expertise. I'm trying to get the policies that help with culture first to partially make up the cost of this approach. On turn 101 I'm at 326/1135 for the next policy, and ~50cpt between normal culture and instant yields from making buildings.
Tech Path: Pottery, Fishing, Animal Husbandry, Mining, Bronze Working, Trapping, Trade, Sailing, The Wheel, Calendar, Mil. Theory, Iron Working, Construction.
Religion: I was tempted by having four wheat between near the first two cities, but still went with God of the Sea, which I think was a stronger choice. I think the Tradition dips were helpful here due to +3 faith and a stronger capital for fast settler building. Took Holy Law and Cooperation. I'm hoping to get some good yields by spreading Orthodoxy early and wide enough in my own cities for Cooperation to pay off, and probably reform before enhancing. Not sure what reformation I want in this situation.
Evaluation: Compared with pure progress, I think I'm ahead in religion but way behind in science. I have more raw culture but am likely to be a policy behind normal in the medieval trees anyway. Production is going fine but I'm not sure that has much to do with these policy choices. All may turn out okay. It will be close. However, I'm not too impressed by this build, even with Russia.
Plan: I have three things to do: Build more cities, build a military, and try to grab Fraternity and the Fealty Opener soon to start rocking beakers.

 

Guys, I called this an alternative opening for a reason. It's being as good advice for new players, but I wouldn't recommend it. Your default plan should be to take all of progress/tradition/authority. A mix like this is more of an experiment.

 

I found this opening works great with Maya. Tradition is not good for jungle starts and you need that extra population to finish Stonehenge on time because jungles are low prod. Then you are in position where as Progress you can't spam settlers asap as you need to rush Construction for Kuna and you don't have Pottery yet. Then you transition into Progress and produce workers for Kuna, research Pottery and only then start spamming settlers. So between picking Tradition opener and actually expanding your extra population already produces lots of yields with Renewal, extra culture from Tradition and helps with production.
Also, as Maya I advance Progress in different order than other civs: I go Liberty first, then Organization, because I'm not concerned about roads (Kunas give way more science) but I need that production badly and movement boost helps build Kunas faster.
It's a very fast start that gives Math consistently before turn 62

 

I think it works best if you can reach 4pop before picking the Tradition opener. Also with Maya it helps that you don't need 4 cities to found, you are more limited by number of Kuna that you can build and shrines only help marginally. My last Maya game I never went below 6 pop in the capital, which means that +2 pop from the opener was a great investment and I didn't waste it on settlers.

 

I think this is the key to tradition (or a tradition progress mix). 6 is just the magic number. 8 is too hard to reach, and 4 or 5 don't give enough culture. The extra citizens also provide production and a small amount of science.