I make no claims to this being optimal, and I do it more for fun than anything.
The way I like to play Sweden is I just sort of watch the world unfold, and intervene militarily whenever I see things getting out of hand.
I befriend as many Civs which are going for peaceful objectives as I feel I can get away with. I wait for (or gently encourage) warmongers to start warmongering, then I declare war and liberate some cities and city states.
It allows you to play at war while not taking on the burden of actually capturing and maintaining cities. It's a good way of playing a peaceful style game with some incentivized action to spice it up.
Admittedly I've only ever won a game once doing this (immortal 13 civ), but it's a lot of fun, non-the-less.
been there, tried, been anoyed to do something useless.
Now why would I advice others in a forum to do something anoying and useless?
Espacially in the strategy section of the forum.
"Fun is subjective, and whatever you think is fun." aside...
Possibly it's because playing sub-optimally is a fact of life and conducive to fun if you embrace it. It is arguably the definition of a game, an artificial rule-set self-imposed for the sake of entertainment.
If you go out for a game of golf with your niece, are you going to refuse her a handicap, try your absolute hardest, then rub her face in the sand after the 18th green to really push home how well you played? Would this be satisfying for you? You'd be playing optimally, but I can't think of anything more boring and shameful. How is doing this to, an AI no less, any better?
It sounds to me like you challenge yourself only against absolute standardized values, the only benefit I could see to doing this is to pad your ego or garner recognition against a widely acknowledged watermark. I can't imagine you're as short sited as you claim though, I assume you take on the handicaps above (prince?) without any complaints, so what's your problem with imposing your own? How is it any different? How do you justify those being okay, while any self-imposed handicaps are not?
Many of us use our own rules, relative to our ability or self-imposed standards, in order to best challenge ourselves to adapt to novel circumstances. Because fun is a function of self-improvement and a tenacity of wit, not trouncing an inferior opponent with the rules which make them the most trounced while still making us seem skillful for the trouncing.
There is a joy to be had in knowingly burdening yourself with self imposed restrictions, or a sub-optimal play style; and still succeeding, or just not losing quite so badly, or even just seeing how things play out under such circumstances. That's creating resistance, there's no competition or challenge without resistance.
An interesting example; I have a cousin, he's jacked, huge guy, works out every day, can't even lower his arms for all the muscle. If we're moving furniture, or doing
anything practical that requires a degree of physicality, he's utterly useless. His muscles only work under the very specific circumstances his exercise equipment provide. As such, his muscles only exist to boost his ego and make people think he's powerful, when in reality he's weaker than those whom don't go to the gym at all. This is because he does not train himself under a wide enough variety of resistances. He does not seek out new ways to challenge himself. Honing himself only against a single circumstance.
