[Public Research] Sweden

[Maltacus]

There were very few regiments that were full-time professionals. Most notably the guard regiments, which also served as testers for new tactics and equipment, as well as a training unit for junior officers. Why not have each of those represented instead of combining them as anonymous värvade troops? There should be more than enough unit slots, and elite and illustrious regiments always add a nice touch to any mod.

"Värvat" can be roughly translated as "recruited"/"hired" as opposed to the indelta (meaning something like divided) which were essentially conscripted. Albeit with a level of motivation, training and zeal which exceeded any common conscripts.

@WinsingtonIII:
I have only heard of named elites being "värvade", like the royal bodyguard. What other kind of units were there?

[WinsingtonIII]

Yes, there should not be very many Varvat/Varvade units. It was a general term used for the enlisted guard regiments, but it was also used to describe 8 regiments that were not guards but rather standard line who were enlisted and paid in money instead of using the allotment system.

Check out this description: http://www.kronoskaf.com/syw/index.p...y_Organisation

If you want more information on the individual Varvade regiments, here's another link from which you can find info on many Indelt and Varvade regiments: http://www.kronoskaf.com/syw/index.p...#Line_Infantry

It seems they were generally raised somewhat later, but as long as the campaign goes past 1720, I think they should be included, perhaps as a higher tier unit that becomes recruitable later in the campaign.

As for uniforms/equipment, as far as I can tell, they would have been outfitted the same way as the Indelt, but I am having trouble finding sources on the subject (I can't read much Swedish, so someone fluent in Swedish will probably have more luck finding sources).

As for stats, their stats really depend on the stats you plan on giving the Indelt. They should basically be a step above the Indelt in discipline, training, accuracy, reload speed, and melee attack and defense stats, however, they should be a step below in morale, as they have less religious/patriotic fervor to fight (they are fighting for money, and some of them are foreigners, usually Germans). Both Indelt and Varvat should used primarily as melee assault troops, only firing a close volley or two before charging in with bayonets (and supported by pikes as an offensive weapon in the early days). As such, their range should probably be shorter than other line units, and they should probably carry less ammunition, just to encourage the player and AI to use them properly.

Additionally, Sweden had problems with its small population, so one way to represent this is to make the number of men in these Swedish infantry units less than the number of men in the line units of other nations. This is an idea ripped off from Imperial Splendour, but it's a good way of accurately representing Sweden's historical problems with small population and also balance out the factions (because the Swedish infantry have such high stats).

EDIT: If you click on the links for each individual Varvade regiment in the second link I provided, you can see some uniforms to pick from. It seems you might want to make them essentially the same as the Indelt infantry uniforms except with white trim instead of yellow.

[Ataegina]

nice find with those links

well theres 10 factions to focus so for logical reasons for first version it wont feature every single existent regiment, but i can assure that will be fair number of regiments to give the faction more variety.

[WinsingtonIII]

Yes, of course I would not expect each regiment to represented, but I thought that the three unit types, the Swedish Indelt Infanteri, the Finnish Indelt Infanteri, and the Varvat Infanteri, could represent pretty much all of the standard Swedish line troops.

Beyond stat differences, you could have area or recruitment (AOR) differences. The Swedish Indelt infantry would have an AOR of Sweden, the Finnish Indelt infantry would have an AOR of Finland, and the Varvat infantry would have an AOR of Germany (4 of the 8 Varvat regiments were German), Sweden, and Finland.

[Maltacus]

Yes, there should not be very many Varvat/Varvade units. It was a general term used for the enlisted guard regiments, but it was also used to describe 8 regiments that were not guards but rather standard line who were enlisted and paid in money instead of using the allotment system.

OK, now I see what you mean. I was too focused on the starting year 1700 to think of the later military organisations.

@Ataegina:

As WinsingtonIII stated, they appeared later than the Great Northern War, except the guard regiments and garrison forces. It does make sense in a way to include them then since they appeared at that time. I would however vote against including "värvade" in the first release. The reason is the historical accuracy, or rather historical logic;

After Sweden lost the Great Northern War a major political change made the king feeble compared to the carolean Karls and also changed the military organisation. The "peace-party" reigned and the state downsized the army. The higher proportion of enlisted and expensive regiments, tied to nobles more than the king, was a return to the state of affairs before the military reforms of Karl XI. This makes sense in the light of the rennaisance of nobles power after the death of Karl XII. My point is that this was a clearly different policy than that of Karl XI-XII. It would hardly have come to pass if Sweden had emerged victorious from the war and had Karl XII survived.

Therefore, these kind of regiments should become available at the appropiate time (1720-1740:ish) only if Sweden has taken the path of a peace-oriented diplomacy instead of continuing on the strong military way. This could be represented as a scripted event (choose between peace and war party) or be tied to having/not having certain regions. Or something else that symbolize a loss of imperial status and royal power.

This is complex and tiresome work and that's why I think it is best to leave such things to later releases.

The whole issue is of course ultimately a matter of taste. I personally prefer a historically correct start and then only game-affecting historical events that are beyond the players control - like the mongol invasion from foreign lands in M2TW. Other things like peasant rebellions were products of the kind of areas the player is supposed to control, like taxes and public order and such. The rise of the new "värvade" regiments were a product of events that a Swedish player is supposed to be able to prevent. It does not make sense to defeat Russia and then start to recruit troops whose historical background is tied largely to Russia defeating Sweden.

I do of course understand completely if you prefer differently. I represent one of the extremes when it comes to historical-accuracy-taste, and there are many others.

Happy new year everyone

[WinsingtonIII]

@Maltacus

If we want a very strict historical interpretation, then they should indeed only be available if Sweden loses the Great Northern War. But, in my opinion, I would argue that if we are to go that far in limiting the ability to recruit them, we might as well script the entire Great Northern War. I would also argue that the rise of enlisted regiments could have happened even if Sweden did not lose the war.


The Swedes always had problems with small population and thus a small army. Recruiting enlisted regiments to supplement the Caroleon system would be a logical solution to the problem (even if it is an expensive solution). There are a myriad of different paths the war could take, and I see no reason why Sweden could not come to the conclusion that they needed to recruit men to supplement their army.

If you want to link it to some sort of script, I would think linking their recruitment to Sweden having been at war for a prolonged period of time would be good enough. The pressures of prolonged war on the small population could easily have led to the decision to recruit troops to supplement the army.

But, ultimately, it is the decision of the mod leaders. Happy Holidays, everyone!

[Maltacus]

The Swedes always had problems with small population and thus a small army. Recruiting enlisted regiments to supplement the Caroleon system would be a logical solution to the problem (even if it is an expensive solution). There are a myriad of different paths the war could take, and I see no reason why Sweden could not come to the conclusion that they needed to recruit men to supplement their army.

If you want to link it to some sort of script, I would think linking their recruitment to Sweden having been at war for a prolonged period of time would be good enough. The pressures of prolonged war on the small population could easily have led to the decision to recruit troops to supplement the army.

So you mean like some sort of mercenary/auxilia, in the sense that they complement the ordinary army? The situation you describe (and I agree with your point) sounds very much like the one in the 30-years war when Sweden depended heavily on foreign mercenaries much due to the reasons you mention.

Having professional/"värvade" troops for those reasons makes sense to me, since then they are not linked to the post-carolean regiments that appeared historically.

Shouldn't this be a kind of mercenary unit? Since they are recruited to "spare" the already small Swedish population they would have to come from outside, right?

[Ataegina]

first of all merry christmas

well first of all for first release the units with priority are units wich fits on early period 1700-1720. late units aren't excluded but without compromise historical accuracy i believe would make sense in a post-gnw war expansion of the mod.

but since in m2tw we've mercenaries those units maybe and i repeat maybe can have a shot. but i wonder if would be correct to instead force such late units to fit on the era if wouldn't be a alternative to have "regiments aor" give ability to raise native regiments on conquered areas?

[Maltacus]

IMO aor units are usually very good to balance gameplay and accuracy. I definitely like that idea.

Speaking of this, should indelta units have a religion requirement? Since the native Swedish army was motivated like few others thanks to the state-controlled church it would make sense to tie recruitment to protestantism in some way as the kingdom expands. Or perhaps recruitment should require a special building that represent the investment in assimilating the region and spreading the propaganda?

[Ataegina]

yes it's possible both.

[WinsingtonIII]

The AOR system of regional line infantry might indeed be a good solution to this. Given that half of the Varvade units were German anyways, regional German line units could stand in for them. Even better, other nations could utilize these AOR units as well, which makes sense, because Germans were regarded as good line infantry and would have been found in other foreign armies as well.

[Ataegina]

i'm now working in the "core" units and implementing the models/stats/ui stuff.

at moment swedish aor (wip):

wallack hussars (poland area)
cossacks (ukraine/black sea area)
varvade (germany area)

[WinsingtonIII]

That AOR sounds pretty good to me, but others might know more.

Looking at the artillery thread, I was reminded about some of the unique aspects of Swedish artillery in this era. Apparently, Carl Cronstedt invented something called the "Geschwinda Skott" (literally "fast shot" I believe), which was a wax cartridge that allowed artillery to fire at the insanely fast rate of 8-10 (some even say 12!) shots per minute. The drawback of this was that the cartridge limited the amount of powder that would be used, so the range of the guns were significantly reduced. However, their rate of fire easily made up for this in close range. These cartridges were actually used during the Great Northern War, and played a major role in the 1712 Swedish victory at Gadebusch, to name one battle.

Unfortunately, sources on this seem scarce (and Swedish), HERE is an article (in Swedish unfortunately, but Google translate does the job OK) that verifies the information.

This is also another feature of the Imperial Splendour mod, so you can read a bit about what they did to represent it here.

[Ataegina]

yes but i'm worried that reload and speed is tied to the animations itself (i might be right or wrong) i don't know.

[WinsingtonIII]

yes but i'm worried that reload and speed is tied to the animations itself (i might be right or wrong) i don't know.

Hmm... that would be problematic. Does that just mean that the animation for long it takes the artillery team to reload the guns is simply how long it is going to take? That would be annoying, I've noticed that those guys are pretty slow in their movements while reloading.

Well, hopefully that will turn out not to be the case...

[Ataegina]

about varvade and looking at dates the varvade regiment will be Hessensteinska Infantry

This permanent "Varvade" regiment was initially formed as a training unit in Västgöta. In 1719, it was stationed at Göteborg. It consisted of troops from Västgöta, Västraskånska, Östraskånska and mountain troops. It counted 1,088 men in 2 battalions of 4 companies recruited at Göteborg. Each company had 125 privates and 11 officers, NCOs and musicians.

[WinsingtonIII]

about varvade and looking at dates the varvade regiment will be Hessensteinska Infantry

Sounds good, does this mean it would be a Swedish AOR unit instead of a German AOR? Considering that it was recruited in Goteborg.

[Ataegina]

but also we can add a regiment that have germans like Löwenfelska Infantry

[Maltacus]

Looking at the artillery thread, I was reminded about some of the unique aspects of Swedish artillery in this era. Apparently, Carl Cronstedt invented something called the "Geschwinda Skott" (literally "fast shot" I believe), which was a wax cartridge that allowed artillery to fire at the insanely fast rate of 8-10 (some even say 12!) shots per minute.

Correct, it means "fast shots". Carl Cronstedt was said to be feared and despised by his subordinates. If he is included he should have "good with artillery" and "harsh taskmaster" traits.

Another important invention was a kind of screw-gearwheel mechanism invented by the inventive Christoffer Polhem. It alloved cannons to be elevated much faster and more precise than before, when the crew had to use wedges to get the right angle. I don't know if this made Swedish artillery unusually accurate but maybe it can be represented as a major increase in accuracy for Swedish artillery after a certain date? It may have been added 1712 but I am not sure.

How about extra movement speed? The horses and man-powered shafts that were used to drag the cannons powided increased speed compared to most contemporary artillery. IMO all lighter artillery should be more mobile than heavier, and the Swedish light artillery more mobile than most. That would give the fast shot-artillery a kind of speed advantage, to compensate for the weaker attack.

[Ataegina]

well swedish roster is nearby completion also without promising nothing because it will need testing the mobility speed and the speed between shots may be possible, representing with more accuracy each faction artillery skills (movements between locations for firing and reloading skills making more fast or more slow between shots).