10 Ways to Trigger a Civ 6 Culture Bomb in Civilization 6

Culture Bombs are special effects that enable you to claim some additional territory (tiles) outside your territory in Civilization 6. Triggering a Civ 6 Culture Bomb is the only way you can take non-neutral territory in Civilization 6 outside of war and establishing more cities. When a culture bomb is triggered on a tile, it can annex up to six surrounding tiles outside your territory (excluding those with districts and wonders). These are some of the ways you can trigger a Civ 6 Culture Bomb in Civilization 6.

Build Holy Sites With the Enhancer Belief

You can trigger a Civ 6 Culture Bomb in the vanilla Civilization 6 game by building Holy Site districts with the Burial Grounds Enhancer Belief. First, you must establish a religion and then select the Burial Grounds Enhancer Belief for it. If you can’t select Burial Grounds from the outset of founding a religion, recruit an Apostle unit when you can to utilize its Evangelize Belief action. Then, build some Holy Site districts near your borders to annex territory with Culture Bombs.

Build Encampments or Forts With Poland

If you have the Poland Civilization & Scenario Pack installed, try triggering a Civ 6 Culture Bomb with the Polish Golden Liberty civ ability. To do so, build Encampment districts along your border to claim surrounding tiles when playing as tiles. Build an Armory in your Encampment district so you can recruit Military Engineers. Then, you can trigger more culture bombs by adding Forts to tiles with your Military Engineers, but make sure you place them close to borders where they can absorb tiles outside your civilization.

Activate Mimar Sinan in Rise and Fall

Mimar Sinan is a great person, an engineer with whom you can trigger a Civ 6 Culture Bomb in Civilization 6: Rise and Fall. First, you’ll need to attract that engineer to your civilization by building more Industrial Zone districts. When you have Mimar, try building an Industrial Zone near your civilization’s borders to activate his Civ 6 Culture Bomb effect in Rise and Fall.

Build Harbors With the Netherlands

The Netherlands is a civilization in Rise and Fall that makes it easy to trigger Culture Bombs (primarily for coastal tiles) with its Grote Rivieren civ ability. To do so, build Harbor districts in your coastal cities when playing as the Wilhelmina Netherlands leader. Then, those Harbor districts will claim surrounding tiles, which will probably be coastal or sea ones.

Add Fishing Boats to Tiles With Māori

The Kupe Māori civilization in Gathering Storm has the Mana civ ability that has a Civ 6 Culture Bomb effect. To trigger that effect, add Fishing Boats to crab, fish, whale, pearl, amber, or turtle sea resource tiles. Adding Fishing Boats to tiles is quite a simple way to trigger Culture Bombs in Civilization 6 that will mostly annex more sea tiles.

Add Pastures to Tiles With Australia

If you have the Australia Civilization & Scenario Pack, try playing as the kangaroo boys for some Culture Bombing. Australia’s Land Down Under civ ability enables you to trigger Culture Bombs by adding Pastures to horse, sheep, and cattle resources. However, this isn’t as flexible as Culture Bombing with Poland or the Netherlands because you’ll need to find suitable horse, sheep, and cattle resources for Pastures with which to trigger Culture Bombs. Nor can you choose where to trigger the Civ 6 Culture Bomb in any way.

Build Holy Sites With the Warrior Monks’ Belief in Gathering Storm

If you’re a Gathering Storm player, you can trigger Culture Bombs by building Holy Sites with the Warrior Monks belief selected. Establish a religion and choose the Warrior Monks’ Follower Belief for it. Then, build Holy Sites along your civilization’s border to annex some more territory.

Build Preserve Districts

Players with the Vietnam & Kublai Khan Pack can trigger Culture Bombs with the Preserve district. First, unlock Preserves with the Mysticism civic. Then, build the Preserve district within a city to initiate a Civ 6 Culture Bomb.

Vote for a Border Control Treaty Resolution

In Gathering Storm, the passing of a Border Control Treaty resolution (with your civilization selected as the target) in World Congress will enable you to trigger Culture Bombs. The Border Control Treaty enables the selected target player to trigger Culture Bombs by building districts. Thus, that treaty gives you a more flexible way to Culture Bomb because districts can be built on many tiles. However, that passed treaty comes with the caveat that cultural influence won’t expand the target player’s borders.

Build Holy Sites With Jayavarman VII

The Jayavarman VII leader from the Khmer and Indonesia Scenario Pack makes it easy to trigger Culture Bombs with Holy Sites. His Monasteries of the King leader bonus enables you to claim surrounding tiles with Culture Bombs by building Holy Sites. It’s as simple as that because you don’t need to have any belief selected for that Civ 6 Culture Bomb leader bonus effect.

Culture Bombing is a good way to expand your territory in Civilization 6 without fighting wars or settling more cities. Although there are numerous ways to trigger a Civ 6 Culture Bomb, most of them are for Rise and Fall, Gathering Storm, and scenario pack leaders. So, you’ll need the Gathering Storm and Rise and Fall DLCs to trigger Culture Bombs with most of the methods covered above.