What should I do if I play tradition civ on large uncontested land?

[Racky]

Civs like Arabia/Austria/Korea, tradition is kind of main opener for them. so they mainly choose tradition. but what if there is big land for no contested until AI navigation tech/ or random polynesian comes, then should I change my strategy to get progress and settle the whole land and prepare for mid-game conquest/diplomacy victory? because in many circumtances, the wide it is better in vp, because player can effectively participate the mid-late game competition.(like CS diplomacy, congress project etc, war etc..) but It also says that there will be some 'inefficiency' for civ ability and forced to use the 'bigger civ' strategy, and civ's main advantage becomes just small bonus. so for those civs favor tradition, will it be good choice for pick progress and expand?

or take the only lands for monopoly and stick to tradition? but It should leave the empty lands so that some random AI will get the empty lands.
and space between cities makes them vulnerable and makes army positioning harder. so that will be weak tradition civ if I space them farther (and can't use the good tiles among cities, If I place cities 4~5 tiles nearer)

there can be another plan that starts as normal tradition, but settle more land later. but it hurts the tradition by itself making cities makes science/policy/tourism +7% per cities. there won't be good bonus for new cities/more cities(like science per cities) unlike progress. also there can be chance the random fast developed AI comes and settle down.

what's your opinion?

 

[Drakle]

Yeah, I expanded out big as Tradition Egypt and hit a major wall of unhappiness in the Renaissance-Industrial. Part of the issue was Artistry, which synergises with Egypt's artifacts, but is weak in terms of wide happiness.

Faith of the Masses might be a good reformation belief to rush for. I went for a different one, but had enough cities and converted AIs and city-states that it would have added a lot of happiness.

 

[tu_79]

Use your extra population for 2 early cities, just after you're done with the wonder. 3 cities is the adviced minimum.
Afterwards, you might settle one or two more, just for the extra land and manpower to protect yourself. Then, it's all puppets and vassals, except if you want a diplo or a domination victory.

 

[Racky]

Yeah, I expanded out big as Tradition Egypt and hit a major wall of unhappiness in the Renaissance-Industrial. Part of the issue was Artistry, which synergises with Egypt's artifacts, but is weak in terms of wide happiness.

Faith of the Masses might be a good reformation belief to rush for. I went for a different one, but had enough cities and converted AIs and city-states that it would have added a lot of happiness.

I think there won't be a good thing If I expand bigger when I picked tradition, It makes tradition's good thing weaker. so potential limiting policy it is..

Use your extra population for 2 early cities, just after you're done with the wonder. 3 cities is the adviced minimum.
Afterwards, you might settle one or two more, just for the extra land and manpower to protect yourself. Then, it's all puppets and vassals, except if you want a diplo or a domination victory.

so If I get like those big uncontested land on my screenshot as Arabia, or some kind of cultural/scientific tradition civ, is it better not to choose progress and expand?

 

[andersw]

"Civs like Arabia/Austria/Korea, tradition is kind of main opener for them."
They are very viable for authority play.

"but what if there is big land for no contested until AI navigation tech/ or random polynesian comes, then should I change my strategy to get progress and settle the whole land and prepare for mid-game conquest/diplomacy victory?"
I've seen some open tradition -> authority I dont think its worth dipping but that player did well, his reasoning for tradition opener was a food poor start.
Theres nothing wrong with some wars as trad or progress, but there are far less rewards to be had from non authority wars.
I wouldnt go progress for conquest.

But looking at the main question, yes you can go wide Tradition, but reconsider if your idea is to go artistry after tradition.
If you stay small, choose carefully where you settle.

One issue going very small and tall is the risk of extremely low army supply cap.

 

[InkAxis]

They are very viable for authority play

How so? These civs have explicit bonuses for the capital. For example, I'm playing an Arabia game right now where Spain spawned extremely close to me so that meant I had to reprioritize everything. Arabia gets bonuses for historic events, so mainly great people, wonders, entering eras, so I had to delay and GP and wonders which means I did worse because I had to prioritize war. Tradition specifically helps with GP and wonders so why would you go authority?

 

[andersw]

How so? These civs have explicit bonuses for the capital. For example, I'm playing an Arabia game right now where Spain spawned extremely close to me so that meant I had to reprioritize everything. Arabia gets bonuses for historic events, so mainly great people, wonders, entering eras, so I had to delay and GP and wonders which means I did worse because I had to prioritize war. Tradition specifically helps with GP and wonders so why would you go authority?

a) Any civ can go for successful conquest.
Both Arabia and Austria UU are quite good.

b) I think both authority and statecraft scales better with wide.
Arabia and Austria are very good state craft civs and you can go whatever -> statecraft.
As authority you get hammers (1/policy) in every city which is very strong for non capital cities.
Yields from kills, border growth, free units at pop 10 are all useful.
More cities provides more gold and hammers to get more CS allies and protect them if needed.
More cities makes yields from religion better (even more important for austria so you can pay for marriages).

c) You dont need a lot of wonders as Arabia for historic events (petra is very good one) if you finish a trade route in a city with bazaar it counts as historic event.
Wonder hoarding as a small tall civ can be very dangerous, its strong regarding yields but you're a juicy target with a risk of getting seriously ganked from several AI's at once at some point, but a good player can probably solve that too.
I think lots of trade routes is a better way, it also doesnt create hostility from AI.

Otoh I'm not as good with tradition (or progress).
It also depends a bit on map, map settings and game settings.
And you don't have to go one way in VP, I think either should be doable with practice.

 

[Favorius]

I would settle a little sparsely to cover all lands for a total of 7 cities as tradition. It is better to have some empty tiles rather than leaving AI a city spot. By the time someone discovered astronomy, all cities would be connected with a decent amount of mobile units to react any problem.

 

[Racky]

I would settle a little sparsely to cover all lands for a total of 7 cities as tradition. It is better to have some empty tiles rather than leaving AI a city spot. By the time someone discovered astronomy, all cities would be connected with a decent amount of mobile units to react any problem.

that'll be good, then mid-late game gears more toward to war/diplomacy than normal tradition aiming for extreme science/cultural thing.
like keeping victory condition by exterminate the #1 on that side.

 

[tu_79]

That's a different question. Imo, you should have one or two cities close to your capital, so they can work on juicy tiles when your capital switches to specialists. And also because they are easier to connect, less expenses, stronger conversion, but the rest of your cities can be settled far apart, so they cover more land. As tradition, you'll make better use of the terrain, you can have bigger farm clusters, more villages per city, and enough people to work in GPTI.

 

[Stalker0]

I would settle a little sparsely to cover all lands for a total of 7 cities as tradition. It is better to have some empty tiles rather than leaving AI a city spot. By the time someone discovered astronomy, all cities would be connected with a decent amount of mobile units to react any problem.

Agreed. While settling a few more cities does weaken your benefits, it dramatically reduces your weakness...military invasion.

For me, a science tradition civ on its own landmass is the scariest thing in the game. Water invasions are tough, and inevitably the only way to beat them is militarily.

So I would absolutely expand a bit more to cover territory (and buy tiles to ensure spots can’t be settled). I would then try to adapt my religion to provide more happiness coverage since that will be a weakness.

I would go for SV in such a circumstance. CV is tough as your going to have limited ETR potential, which negates a good amount of tourism.

 

[Melchizedek]

I am new to VP, but some advantages of this setup are that you can afford to take your time expanding, that you will need to invest in less early military, and that you don't need to prioritize early military techs. All these advantages seem to work well with Tradition. The approach that comes to mind is Tradition with a small empire like you would normally build if there were AI on your continent, and just enough military to defeat barbs, followed by Fealty with rapid expansion and using Monasteries / trade routes to get your new cities over the hump to being contributors. This means you get to roll science + culture early on without the expansion penalties, then minimize the suffering from those penalties once they are in place. It will also help reach the follower minimum for Reformation. If you can get Monasteries + buy Universities (Seowons?) with faith, the research penalty would be mitigated quite a bit. Meanwhile, you can be sure to build and work guilds / culture buildings because of all the things you don't have to build. I'd invest heavily in religion as soon as possible in this case, because a strong religion would be crucial for this to work at all.

Another approach would be to just conquer AI cities once they do get founded, of course.

 

[Rick Drayson]

Tradition is a powerful early start and you can still go wide with it.

Just use the early power invested in your capital to produce a lot of wonders and upgraded units while relegating your second city to produce the settlers (settle on high hammer location)

Around medieval age you should be stronger than progress civs and have similar tech.. (for now) use this window to push.

Also note that trad->fealty works better than trad=>artistry IMHO.

 

[Melchizedek]

Could someone explain the mechanics that make Progress stronger than Tradition after medieval? You have more effective workers, +10% to buildings, some culture/science/production synergy, and bonuses to connected cities, but all of those things seem just as good early as late. So if a wide Tradition civ is stronger in Medieval, what would make a Progress civ catch up in the late game? Is it just that your secondary cities have had more time to grow? Only the happiness from Progress seems directly geared to get better with time, but there are other sources of happiness.

 

[InkAxis]

Could someone explain the mechanics that make Progress stronger than Tradition after medieval? You have more effective workers, +10% to buildings, some culture/science/production synergy, and bonuses to connected cities, but all of those things seem just as good early as late. So if a wide Tradition civ is stronger in Medieval, what would make a Progress civ catch up in the late game? Is it just that your secondary cities have had more time to grow? Only the happiness from Progress seems directly geared to get better with time, but there are other sources of happiness.

I believe it's because of the science bonuses. Compared to Tradition I think both scale well into the late game, I think people mostly compare it to Authority, as both are wide policies. Like authority giving production - that is a massive bonus early but in the late game one or two production doesn't matter.

 

[Melchizedek]

I believe it's because of the science bonuses. Compared to Tradition I think both scale well into the late game, I think people mostly compare it to Authority, as both are wide policies. Like authority giving production - that is a massive bonus early but in the late game one or two production doesn't matter.

I understand compared to Authority. Compared to Tradition, Progress generates +3 bpt/city plus other bonuses that have secondary impacts on science. Tradition gives you 3bpt in the capital plus 1bpt from all councils, plus much earlier scientists. Are the secondary impacts from progress large enough to outdo the earlier academies?

 

[Stalker0]

Could someone explain the mechanics that make Progress stronger than Tradition after medieval? You have more effective workers, +10% to buildings, some culture/science/production synergy, and bonuses to connected cities, but all of those things seem just as good early as late. So if a wide Tradition civ is stronger in Medieval, what would make a Progress civ catch up in the late game? Is it just that your secondary cities have had more time to grow? Only the happiness from Progress seems directly geared to get better with time, but there are other sources of happiness.

Gold. Progress finishers gives you heaps and heaps of it, so you can purchase things all the time.

Happiness scales a bit better with progress.

Building production bonuses tends to scale well into late game.

The big one: Ability to buy Great Writers. Gives you a tremendous culture shot in the arm during the Industrial Era.

 

[Cokolwiek]

In addition to what @Stalker0 said, the fact that you have more tiles, and earlier worker, so more yeilds.
I don't know how you see tradition, especially wide tradition (what? it is like cutting the wings on which it flies) better than progress until medieval.
Tradition have no direct bonuses to wide play in early game apart from faster growth expansion.
Progress main strength in the early game lies in its plus three food and science on city in the early game, coupled with free worker along with two production and two gold per city. Against what, plus five science in the capital for tradition?
Competitive science and culture and better production and gold than tradition is from ancient, not medieval.
And yeah, progress finisher is great.
Tradition in order to capitalize on its only strengths should go tall and focus on specialists and great people, stay in range of three to six cities, not try to go wide. It doesn't have any instruments to succeed at it. The answer to the topic should be stay tall and eventually capture and puppet any cities that will be settled.

 

[Necamijat]

Wide Tradition and Wide Progress have different gamestyles due to how their bonuses are oriented. Most of Tradition's bonuses are centred on the Capital, while only one of the Progress bonuses are capital-only (Science on capital growth).
That being considered, the end result is that in wide Tradition, your non-capital cities will have to be supported by your capital to not fall behind (as that will cause a heavy Unhappiness dip), where for Progress most of your cities can start supporting your capital or central city core to push them ahead (Guild-oriented cities etc.).
I would argue that while Tradition clearly flagposts a Tall playstyle with a focus on a small (4-5) number of cities, none of the policies nor the VP design as a whole clearly makes one policy tree oriented more towards Tall or Wide gameplay, as the end result of any general VP gameplay is a mix of both (consistently wide empires in which most of the cities could be considered tall-like).
Actually, with the current system, Tradition has a much easier time going wide early, catapulting the capital output, then focusing on getting the infrastructure up to date in other cities, compared to Progress which really begins to shine after you've completed 5 policies in it.
In essence, each game will present you with choices to make on what you want to focus on, and it's up to you to see how to make the most of it.

 

[Stalker0]

Tradition has a much easier time going wide early, catapulting the capital output, then focusing on getting the infrastructure up to date in other cities, compared to Progress which really begins to shine after you've completed 5 policies in it.

I will agree with your first point and argue the second. Tradition does expand out quicker than Progress in the early game. However, its the infrastructure part that Progress shines in. Progress has more workers, more gold, more production, and more food for those satellite cities. Progress satellites gain infrastructure at a faster pace than Tradition ones do, that's its main strength.