Great Northern War

The Great Northern War was a series of battles fought to contest the Supremacy of the Swedish Empire in Northern and Central Europe. It originally pitted Russia, Denmark-Norway, Poland-Lithuania and Saxony against Sweden. The result was a bloodbath that saw Poland switching sides twice (both cases saw the election of a new king), Russia to modernize under Peter I (aka Peter the Great) and the death of the Warrior King, Charles XII and the empire he built with it.

3 treaties followed the conflict, Russia gains Ingria, Estonia and Livonia (essentially the area around St. Petersberg and the 2 modern-day Baltic states of Estonia and Latvia), as well as some territory in Northern Russia (near modern-day Finland). Prussia gains the Swedish Pomerania (in the eastern coasts of modern-day Germany), Hanover (who joined the war in 1715 alongside the British) gained Verden and Denmark gains Schwelswig-Holstein (where they hold on to until 1864).

Tropes include:

 * Badass: Both Peter and Charles
 * Badass Army: The Drabants, Charles bodyguard, strike unit and ad-hoc Officer Candidate School.
 * In a sense, you could just apply it to both the Swedish and Russian Armies
 * Perhaps but if you apply this to every army you rather deflate the idea of the trope.
 * Averted with the Danish army. They were defeated in less a month after the war started.
 * Blood Knight: Charles
 * Cool Versus Awesome: Charles versus Peter.
 * Disproportionate Retribution: Arguably Charles could have gotten a favorable peace after he had slapped the Russians and Saxons about a little in the early part of the war, and it would have been more to Sweden's interest.
 * The Empire: The Swedish Empire. Russia became a empire after the war.
 * Guile Hero: Charles XII of Sweden
 * Charles is probably an epitome of Action Hero, I mean the guy lived for fighting.
 * Heel Face Revolving Door: Great Britain. In 1700, they helped Sweden to make siege on Denmark's capital city Copenhagen, but couldn't do much more due to the War of the Spanish Succession. In 1715 they joined the war again...on the Anti-Swedish Alliance's side. In 1721 they were ready to join Sweden's side again but then the war had ended already.
 * Kick the Dog: During the war, Russians occupied Finland (a land belonging to Sweden at the time) for seven years. The occupation was so strict and destructive that Finns still refer to it as "The Great Wrath".
 * Magnetic Hero: Peter and Charles
 * Mother Russia Makes You Strong
 * An Offer You Can't Refuse: After the War of Spanish Succession, both Great Britain and France threated to join the war on Sweden's side if Russia didn't accepted the peace truce. They did.
 * Poles With Lances
 * Royals Who Actually Do Something: both Peter and Charles
 * Peter was more versatile then Charles and had an interest in a number of crafts including, interestingly enough, seamanship. Some might say that his nautical interests were bad for Russia in the long run and the example got Russia in more fights then needed by competing with maritime states in their own area of expertise. Still Peter did do much to increase the independence of Russia and perhaps his eccentricities had something to do with it.
 * Snow Means Death: The Poltava campaign.
 * Not to mention the bright idea to march across The Scandinavian Fjells the New Year 1718/1719, in a blizzard that raged for three days. The result: 3900 men froze to death, 600 more were crippeled for life. Only 1500 were more or less unharmed.
 * This was the war that started the idea that invading Russia in the winter is a Really Bad Idea. Interestingly, Napoleon took along Charles' account of the war in a bid to avoid the same mistakes. He failed.
 * Swedes with cool horses.
 * Real Men Love Jesus: Charles XII had a Stonewall Jackson style piety.
 * Teen Genius: Charles XII. His genius lay in killing people.
 * He was a pretty good tactician but not really much of a strategist.
 * Warrior Prince: Charles XII

Depictions in fiction

 * Sabaton album Carolus Rex is partially about this, mainly from King Charles' perspective.