Poland makes this precisely possible in a certain way: make sure the industrial-age freebie is Mercantilism to enable the discount right when we need it. A non-Jesuit game will need to buy public schools with cash. The rest of the plan comes from working backwards from one particular point later on. Then we avoid the hollow interior of Tradition (Oligarchy is blank, Landed Elite is small, Legalism is merely okay) in favor of other options. So will the Tradition opener for border expansion, which is needed all the more, when all the maritime-frontloaded growth means the cities run out of workable tiles. What Aristocracy doesn't do is frontload, since the happy doesn't activate until size 10 and the wonder bonus only matters once there's a baseline of hammers to multiply. Each half of it could be worth a policy in itself the happy aspect is worth 1/city like Meritocracy, and the wonder bonus is roughly comparable to Republic. Aristocracy in particular is a gem I wish I could use more often. We always observe how all Tradition's power is in the finisher, but in fact there's a decent option with just two policies there. The other two-deep dip I want is Tradition to Aristocracy. The Patronage+Consulates part of my last game was solid, so keep that, but of course I want more. Instead of Jesuit Education or full Tradition, use Poland's extra policies for a grab-bag greatest-hits polymath approach from all the trees. Which merged with another game idea I'd had for a while.

I wanted to try one more game without that.

That approach consumes five policies into Piety for no other purpose all the policies before Reformation don't do anything besides throw more faith and discounts into the Jesuit plan. It's effective, but not all that interesting. So I've been relying so heavily on Jesuit Education for the speed runs. Turned out I had to try at least one more game, even after getting the science win date down to 176 turns.

Civ 5 workable tiles