You seem to really like late-game warmongers with really late-blooming Uniques.
For Sweden:
Without question, the only good answer for starting policy on Sweden is Authority:
- The consistent +1
from the scaler is very useful in every city to get your feet under you, especially if you are on an aggressive, crowded continent.
/
/Heal on kill from Dominance and the opener allows you to capitalize on your UA's higher risk bonus on attacks
- +10% CS on all units is very flexible for a civ who is most geared towards a domination victory
- Most importantly the finisher allows you to purchase Great Generals with Faith.
- This gives Sweden a "heal the entire army and give everyone 15XP" button that you can use 3-4 times in a game
- This one policy alone makes authority the best pick for Sweden, you can eliminate downtime on a big conquer push for healing, or make a complete reversal on a pitched battle. This gives Sweden a level of strategic control that no other civ can match.
For second policy tree, the choice is between Fealty and Statecraft
- If you managed to found a religion then Fealty could be a strong pick. It has some strong options for shoring up defenses, and general boosts to infrastructure. In general, however, the tree doesn't offer much focus for Sweden.
- Statecraft can be surprisingly nice if you are in a position to take advantage of city-state diplomacy. In my opinion, it has the best scaler of all the medieval policy trees, and the bonuses to strategic resources from city states can be very important for Sweden, since later era siege units require strategics. In general, I think warmongers can do really well with Statecraft, if they can spare the attention to maintain CS allies.
- Artistry has little to offer a warmonger like Sweden. You probably won't be focusing too much on great people, great works, guilds, or world wonders if you are building a war machine.
For third policy tree, The most obvious choice is Imperialism, but there's an argument to be made for Rationalism as well. The biggest determining factor is how big your empire is at Industrial. If you have already knocked out 2-3 other civs, then Imperialism is your boy. If you have been on the defensive, and you're still relatively small, Rationalism might be a stronger choice.
Imperialism:
- A huge bonus to unit production and much cheaper unit upgrades are very good options for Sweden
- +1
from constabularies pairs well with the +3
from Statecraft.
- If you have already managed to conquer quite a bit, Colonialism and Exploitation really help consolidate your gains. These two policies probably tile happiness more than any other policies in the game, since they put the more constant yields onto the map than any other policies.
- Lastly, Regimental tradition puts your GG boost to +40%, with a radius of 3 tiles, and you can get +33% to GG production. This is HUGE for your UA.
Rationalism is less obviously useful, but it has a deceptive amount of synergy with Sweden
- First, Sweden's Skola generates incredible amounts of
and
, but depends heavilly on your cities'
populations to get those yields. Rationalism's finisher, and the Enlightenment policy, both give hefty bonuses to
growth, which pairs very well with your UB.
- The scaler is a % modifier on
science generation, which further compounds the impact of your Skolas to help pull you ahead of the pack for science. If you haven't been doing well with conquests, but have managed to keep up in techs up until now, Rationalism has a lot of tools to help you pull ahead in tech, and either ravage the world with high-tech units, or go for a science victory instead.
For ideologies, I'm going to be a bit controversial and say that I actually favor Order a bit over Autocracy. It might come down to personal preference between those two, but I think you can safely ignore Freedom
- Autocracy has a lot of straight steroids to your unit production and unit power, but Order provides the infrastructure for a massive war machine. To me, picking Autocracy on Sweden is a bit of overcommitment. You've already got some of the strongest, most dangerous units with your GG boosts and your +20% on attack. What you need now is economic supremacy to either sustain your lead, or go to SPAAAAAAACE.
- Most importantly, Order allows you to default to your second-best victory option: Science Victory. Autocracy offers virtually nothing to help you clinch a spaceship.
- Some greatest hits with Order tenets:
- synergies with Sweden's Skola, with "Peace, Land, Bread" and "People's Army". Worker's Faculties capitalizes further on sweden's huge
generation with the +10%
on factories.
- a lot of wide production and happiness management with tenets like "Five Year Plan" and "Party Leadership"
- If you've been sanctioned by the world congress at this point, "Iron Curtain" and "Nationalization" have you covered.
- "Great Leap Forward", "Academy of Sciences" and "Spaceflight Pioneers" all help you clinch a science victory way better than anything that Autocracy offers.