Despite not being the most straightforward way to win in Civilization 6, winning by a cultural victory in the game provides its own kind of satisfaction and challenge. Cultural Victories have a lot of stipulations to be made for them to work, and they rely a lot on a player's ability to do diplomacy well with the other nations in the game.
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This is why it is important to know every little tip and trick that is out there so that any player deciding to play the game with the goal of a cultural victory in mind is ready for anything!
Updated May 8, 2021, by Jack Pursey: Winning a game of Civilization VI via Culture Victory can be the most rewarding experience that the game has to offer, especially when looking at how many Great Works and Wonders have been built over the many centuries. Since it's such a glamorous way of winning, Culture Victory is also one of the toughest to accomplish. This is especially true if other Civs are working towards the same goal. To offer better insight into how to earn a hard-fought Culture Victory, here are five additional tips for players.
15 Pick The Right Civilization
This list kicks off before the game actually starts. If a player wants to achieve a cultural victory, choosing a civilization and leader with the proper bonuses and unique buildings and units that can provide the player with easier paths to winning the game.
Certain civilizations have abilities and units that will really aid in a cultural victory. For example, China and Sweden give bonuses through their unique buildings that produce bonus culture and tourism.
14 Build Up Culture Early
This one might sound obvious, but it is crucial. Starting a city off with a focus on culture will go a long way into helping with cultural victories. The more culture a civilization produces, the more Civic Tree Inspirations boosts they will gain.
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This grants the civilization with more options when putting together their policy trees. this means that a player can add certain policies that will id in either a further production of culture or tourism later in the game.
13 Focus On Tourism
As mentioned in the last entry, tourism becomes very important in order to win a cultural victory. This means that a player needs to create as many Tourist Attractions as possible and manage Tourism Modifiers to earn as much Tourism-per-turn as possible.
Doing this will earn the player the Foreign Tourists that are needed for victory. Despite the importance of Domestic tourism, it is also important to maximize the amount of Foreign Tourists that visit a civilization.
12 Build a Seaside Resort
There are plenty of different ways to amass Tourism. One of these this is to build a Seaside Resort. Much like in real life, it's best to put a Seaside Resort near the most touristic attractions in the surrounding area.
Therefore, players should plan ahead and ensure that they gather their best wonders around where they plan to place their Seaside Resort. They should also ensure that less appealing structures like Nuclear Power Plants are kept far away. Building a Seaside Resort can be tricky, as they can only be placed on tiles with a Breathtaking Appeal rating.
11 Build A National Park
Similar to Seaside Resorts, building National Parks is easier said than done. They require tiles with an Appeal rating of at least Charming. Doing so is well worth the effort though, as National Parks provide Tourism equal to the Appeal of every tile within it.
To build a National Park, players first need to recruit a Naturalist. Naturalists are purchased with Faith and will form a National Park for players once they find a suitable location.
10 Train Archaeologists
Archaeologists are another great unit to train when trying to generate culture and tourism. Once an Archeological Museum has been built and Natural History has been researched, players can train an Archaeologist who can dig for artifacts.
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Uncovered artifacts are placed in Archaeological Museums under the banner of Great Works. If players are able to put three artifacts from different civilizations but from the same era into a single Museum, they will earn extra Tourism.
9 Research Computers
Thankfully, not all of the tips on this list are as convoluted as the previous three. Researching Computers is a relatively simple task with a relatively simple reward.
After researching Computers via the Technology Tree, players will increase their Tourism yield by a whopping 100% and can recruit an additional Spy. Unfortunately, the benefit of Computers takes a significant hit in the Gathering Storm expansion, as players will only increase their Tourism yield by 25%. Still, the venture is certainly worth the minimal effort.
8 Build and Improve Walls
Building the best wall available is another simple but effective way of generating Tourism, while simultaneously defending the city from enemy attacks.
First, players need Conservation. Then, they will earn 1 Tourism for having Ancient Walls, 2 Tourism for having Medieval Walls, and 3 Tourism for having Renaissance Walls. The Conservation Civic is also beneficial as it unlocks the ability to recruit a Nationalist, necessary for building a National Park as mentioned before.
7 Open Up The Borders
In order to make tourism successful, players will have to do some work on the diplomatic end. A player that wants to win the game via a cultural victory will need to work with other nations on a diplomatic level to encourage more tourism.
The most simple way to do this is to have an open borders agreement with every civilization the player meets. This will give +25% Tourism-per-turn from each nation that the player has an agreement with.
6 Acquire As Many Great Works As Possible
Great Works are great in so many different ways. Not only do they provide a civilization with a nice bargaining chip to help with diplomacy but they also provide the civilization that possesses them with culture.
Each Great Work owned provides a certain amount of culture per turn, depending on what kind of Great Work that it is. Great Works of Music and Great Works of Writing provide 4 culture per turn and Great Works of Art provide 3 culture per turn.
5 Pick The Right Government
The choice of government that players make doesn't really affect the game too drastically most of the time. However, it can have a massive effect on players who want to win through a cultural victory.
Picking the wrong form of government can drastically reduce the amount of culture per turn and tourism per turn that a civilization generates. This is why it is important to avoid choosing the racially-driven option of government, especially if other nations have chosen communism.
4 Pick The Right Policies
Like we mentioned earlier, picking the right policies and drastically help in one's efforts to win a cultural victory. The right policies can drastically affect one's tourism modifiers and therefore affect the tourism per turn of civilization.
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Certain policies like meritocracy help aid in the production of culture, providing +1 culture per turn for every specialty district that a city has. Other ones like trade confederacy provide culture per turn for international trade routes.
3 Make A Religion
Despite not going for a religious victory, making a religion could go a long way in helping a player that wants a cultural victory to achieve their goals. There is a fairly common strategy for a cultural victory in Civilization 6 called a religious rush.
This strategy revolves around founding a religion with the Reliquaries Belief, and obtaining as many relics as possible. This will massively boost the amount of tourism that a civilization produces, on to of the bonuses of having a holy city.
2 Destroy Enemy Culture Districts
This is where a player that wants a cultural victory might need to get a little dirty to achieve their goals. As mentioned in an earlier entry, Great Works are a great tool for any civilization to have for diplomatic and cultural reasons.
This is why declaring war on civilizations that have Great Works would be a good option for some players. This would also allow players to destroy the cultural buildings and districts of other civilizations, cutting off their supply.
1 Build The Right Wonders
Wonders are great to have overall. Even those that don't have a direct effect on the amount of culture a civilization produces can still be useful to players.
First of all, having any wonder next to a theatre district will automatically produce +1 culture per turn. Aside from that, there is a large number of wonders that directly help to boost culture output from the Cristo Redentor. This directly adds +4 culture per turn. Additionally, the Estadio do Maracanã provides +6 Culture in each city of a nation.