How to get a Military Victory in Civilization 7

A Military Victory in Civilization 7 is all about conquering your enemies with your raw might and having as many settlements in your empire as possible — which will then help you conquer even more civilizations. But this victory is less about fully eliminating your fellow leaders and more about building the biggest stick you can so nobody will mess with you.

In this Civilization 7 guide, we’re going to give you a broad idea of how to win a Military Victory and then give you an age-by-age walkthrough on how to make it happen.

How to get a Military Victory in Civilization 7

Broadly speaking, you’re going to be at war a lot as you pursue your Military Victory path. But that’s totally okay, as you’ll get a lot out of it early on in the game. You can also ally yourself with other warmonger civilizations in the game, who will be all too happy to declare wars on enemy civilizations and pull you into them.

At the start of the game, you want to start researching technologies that give you better and stronger units, as well as ships for coastal wars and faster training times. If you can get out in front of your enemies with better units that just deal more damage, you’re going to stomp over their smaller towns and settlements before they can properly defend themselves.

Unlike some other victory conditions, the Military Legacy Path is very tangible and straightforward. Essentially, you’re just looking to boost your settlement count by any means necessary, and that includes both diplomacy and violence. Wiping a civilization out isn’t nearly as useful as taking one town by force and then getting another from them during peace negotiations, so keep that in mind as you progress through the ages.

As you move through the ages, your goals stay similar, but have a grander scale. Instead of conquering your homeland, you’ll conquer across the seas. This does require you to secondarily prioritize a bit of Science, as you’ll need to advance through the Tech tree to get your armada up and running.

Your capture spree continues into the Modern Age, but you’ll need to capture civilizations with different ideologies than your own so you can shock the world with your irresponsible and destructive powers. To achieve that goal and win, you’ll need to build The Manhattan Project.

Military Victory walkthrough in Civilization 7

As described above, a Military Victory is all about conquering pieces of other civilizations around the map, enabling you to become such a godlike entity that nobody would dare challenge your position on the world stage.

Below, we’re going to give you a bit of more structured advice for each age to help you push through the game’s objectives and complete the Military Legacy Path, which will help guide you to completing the Manhattan Project in the Modern Age.

Before we get started, here’s a snapshot of what the Antiquity Age looks like for a Military Victory:

In the Antiquity Age, you want to meet civilizations, court alliances, and build up a technologically superior army as quickly as possible. Start with building up a scout and sending them out to see the world and introduce you to other civilizations.

If you’re familiar with the leader types the AI is playing — or your friends — you can probably discern who the other warmonger civilizations will be. Look for a civilization that is close to your home city and is going for a non-Military Victory (and ideally non-Science, as they’ll have access to strong units early as well) and start tanking your relationship with them. Woo any fellow allies with diplomatic actions — especially a Cultural Exchange to boost happiness before your war begins.

As you’re surveying the land for other civilizations, start making your way to the Discipline Civic so you can unlock an army commander. Build an army commander and train a siege unit. Once you’re hostile, start moving your units toward your target city and declare war.

Blitz the city with your units, destroying its defenses — if they have some already — killing any nearby units, and capturing the district. Hold the city and heal up your units (while making sure your cities are also protected). Once your units are healed, start moving toward the next city in that civilization’s empire. Eventually, you’ll either take multiple cities or they will ask for peace. If they ask for peace, decline unless they offer a city. If they offer one city, ask for another. There’s a fine art to this, balancing how much more your army is capable of taking — and your citizens tolerating — versus what another civilization is willing to give you for peace.

With your new cities, start building up happiness and generating gold, buy yourself some new units, upgrade your existing ones, and do it again. Your entire goal here is to have 12 Pax Imperatoria points by the end of the age. You get one point for just founding a settlement of your own (meaning it’s a good idea to build some settlers in addition to those military units), but you get two points for conquering another civilization’s city or town. So repeat what you’ve already been doing and you’ll head into the Exploration Age with a Golden Age of Military prowess.

Before we get started, here’s a snapshot of what the Exploration Age looks like for a Military Victory:

In the Exploration Age, your main goals and turn-to-turn gameplay change very little.

In the new Tech tree, you’ll want to take the top path, quickly looking into Machinery, Castles, and Heraldry. However, your main focus should be on Shipbuilding and Master Shipbuilding, both of which you need to get ASAP. Once you’re able to move all of your units across the ocean safely, you’ll want to send a settler over to the other continent — the “distant land” — and make a new town. The more you can do this the better, as it’ll help generally through the age.

Once you’ve settled a town on another continent or island, start sending out scouts to meet the other civilizations there and see what’s around you. Like before, you’ll want to pick out a foreign civilization to target and then tank your relationship with them. When you’re ready, move your army across the ocean and stage them in your new town. Declare war and get to work conquering in a new land.

Something to consider here, as you go, is that you’ll need to defend yourself at home as well, and account for how much longer your reinforcements will take to travel to reach the war. So keep sending units from your home cities before you need them in the foreign lands.

To complete the Military Legacy Path in the Exploration Age, you’ll need 12 Non Sufficient Orbis points. And like the Pax Imperatoria points in the Antiquity Age, you’ll earn one for founding a settlement of your own on foreign soil, and two for taking one from a foreign civilization.

Just keep going to war and you’ll enter into the Modern Age with a Golden Age.

Before we get started, here’s a snapshot of what the Modern Age looks like for a Military Victory:

Things get a little more diplomatic for the Military Legacy Path once you reach the Modern Age, and your goals will begin to center around ideology as much as military strength.

First, you need to push into the Political Theory Civic, which will give you access to an Ideology. You can then pick your Ideology — Fascism is probably your best bet, unsurprisingly — and evolve it over the game. You’ll also want to make your way to Combustion on the Tech Tree and then eventually to Flight.

Once you have your Ideology in place and the power of Flight — ideally before your enemies — you’re back to conquering other civilizations. This time, you need to earn Ideology Points, which come from capturing settlements that either don’t share your ideology or don’t have an ideology at all.

You’re doing the same thing as before, basically, but you’ll want to alter your tactics a little bit. Ideally, you want to focus on civilizations that have a different ideology, as they’ll give you more points. Plus, if they’re looking for a Culture Victory, they likely have much weaker Science intake, and therefore worse units. While you can go after civilizations that don’t have an ideology — and there is merit there, considering they are behind in the Civics trees — consider that they could develop an ideology mid-war, and then you’d be stuck getting no points if they picked the same as you.

Once you’ve earned 20 Ideology Points through capturing settlements, you’ll unlock the ability to build the Manhattan Project Wonder in one of your cities and then initiate the Operation Ivy project in that city. When the project ends, nuclear weapons will be introduced to the world, and you’ll win the game — but at what cost, reader?

For more Civilization 7 guides, read our guides to all Legacy Paths and all victories or our detailed walkthroughs on how to get an Economic Victory, a Science Victory, or a Culture Victory.