Civilization 6 national parks are a special type of tourist tile improvement you can add to your civilizations. This improvement adds a national park to four tiles with naturally appealing landscapes. It is an attraction that generates tourism and attracts foreign visitors to your nation. Thus, national parks are important for players seeking to win cultural victories in Civ 6. However, setting up a park isn’t always straightforward. This is how you can make your nation’s tourist industry boom with Civilization 6 national parks.
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Is it Worth Making Civilization 6 National Parks?
It is worth making some Civilization 6 national parks when pursuing the Culture Victory condition. A national park will generate tourism equal to the overall appeal rating total of all four tiles it contains. Players have shown off screenshots of their parks attracting as many as 28 visitors.
Aside from attracting visitors, Civilization 6 national parks also provide amenity benefits to your nation. The city that includes the national park gets a +2-amenity bonus from it. A national park also gives the four nearest settlements beyond its home city a +1 amenity. These additional amenities enhance population growth for their settlements.
The Steps for Making Civilization 6 National Parks
First, you need to unlock the Conservation civic that enables you to recruit the Naturalist units required for founding Civilization 6 national parks. Conversation is a Modern Era that’s some way down the civics tree. So, most players probably won’t be able to make national parks until the mid-game period.
The Conservation civic
With the Conservation civic unlocked, you will need to purchase a Naturalist with faith. A Naturalist unit costs 1,600 faith in the vanilla Civilization 6 game. However, the faith cost for a Naturalist is only 600 in Gathering Storm. Click the Purchase faith button on the production sidebar for a city and select Naturalist to buy that unit.
The Naturalist unit will appear within the center tile for the city you purchased it. Select the Naturalist unit to move it. Look across the map for four highlighted white tiles within your civilization’s borders. The highlighted areas for national parks will always be vertical diamonds with two tiles in the middle, one at the bottom, and one at the top like the one at the top, like the one shown in the screenshot directly below.
A Naturalist and national park tile area
These highlighted tiles are areas that meet the requirements for establishing national parks. You can only establish national parks in tile areas that meet the requirements for them. These are the tile requirements for making national parks:
- All four park tiles must have at least a charming appeal rating.
- The four tiles for Civilization 6 national parks always have a vertical diamond-shaped area.
- None of the tiles in a park area can include any kind of improvements, wonders, or districts.
- The four tiles for a park cannot be shared across cities, meaning they must be for a single city only.
If you can see a highlighted diamond tile area for a park, move your Naturalist onto it. Click the Designate National Park option when the Naturalist is standing on one of the highlighted tiles. Your civilization will now have a new national park that looks something like the one in the screenshot below.
A Civilization 6 national park
How to Make Suitable Areas For Civilization 6 National Parks
If you don’t do any area planning before purchasing a Naturalist, there might not be any suitable area in your nation for making a Civilization 6 national park. However, this doesn’t mean you’ll never be able to establish a park. This means there is currently no suitable four-tiled area for establishing a park.
First, check the appeal of your civilization’s tiles by clicking the Lens button above the mini-map and selecting Appeal. This will show you the appeal of all tiles within your civilization. Light and dark green tiles are charming and breathtaking ones that are suitable for establishing national parks.
The Appeal lens
You may need to increase the general appeal of tiles in your nation to establish Civilization 6 national parks. The best way to do this is to build the Eiffel Tower. That wonder will immediately increase the appeal rating of all tiles in your civilization by +2.
The Eiffel Tower
Try modifying tiles to further enhance their appeal for park areas. You can do this by planting woods on tiles, which increases their appeal ratings. Also, remove rainforests and marshes that diminish tile appeal.
A Builder’s Plant Woods option
If your civilization has many charming and breathtaking tiles, it could be the case that some improvements are preventing you from making parks. Check the tiles for a potential national park area to see if they include any removable improvements. If they do, remove all the tile improvements with Builder units to make the tiles suitable for your Civilization 6 national parks.
It’s better to plan for making Civilization 6 national parks before unlocking Conservation. Avoid adding districts to suitably appealing tile areas where you can establish parks in the future. Remember there’s no way to remove districts after placing them.
Your nation will be more appealing for tourists to visit when you’ve added some Civilization 6 national parks to it. Foreign tourists will flock to your national parks to marvel at their beautiful landscapes and scenery. Although not necessarily essential for securing Culture Victory, national parks can give your tourist industry a considerable boost alongside museums and wonders.
