Civ 6 Settle Near Desert

Caroline Mae

2 min read

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05-01-2025

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Civilization VI presents players with diverse geographical challenges, and strategically settling near deserts can be a rewarding, albeit risky, endeavor. While deserts might initially appear inhospitable, with careful planning and strategic city placement, you can transform these arid landscapes into thriving hubs of production and culture. This guide will explore the advantages and disadvantages of settling near deserts in Civ VI, and offer tips to maximize your success.

The Allure of the Arid: Advantages of Desert Settlements

Deserts, despite their limitations, offer several compelling advantages in Civilization VI:

• Unique Resources: Deserts often harbor valuable strategic resources like horses, niter (crucial for gunpowder units), and even uranium (essential for late-game nuclear power). Securing these resources early can provide a significant boost to your military and technological advancement.

• Hidden Potential: The Oasis resource, unique to deserts, offers food and production, mitigating the inherent limitations of desert terrain. Multiple oases near a city can dramatically increase its growth and output.

• Strategic Positioning: Desert settlements can act as natural chokepoints, offering defensive advantages against enemy incursions. The terrain can significantly hinder enemy movement, buying you valuable time to prepare your defenses.

• Faster Expansion (Sometimes): Depending on the map and your chosen civilization, desert terrain may allow for relatively quick expansion without immediately encountering aggressive neighbors.

Navigating the Challenges: Disadvantages of Desert Settlements

Despite the potential benefits, settling near deserts presents considerable challenges:

• Limited Food Production: Deserts inherently produce little food, making population growth slow without careful planning. This requires smart resource management and potentially utilizing trade routes to import food.

• Vulnerability to Drought: While Oasis resources help mitigate this, prolonged periods of low rainfall can severely hamper your city's growth and production.

• Reduced Amenity Provision: Desert tiles often provide fewer amenities than more fertile lands, leading to unhappy citizens unless actively countered through policies, buildings, and wonders.

Strategies for Success in Desert Settlements

To thrive in desert environments, consider these strategies:

• Prioritize Oasis Resources: Target city locations with multiple oases to overcome the inherent food deficit.

• Utilize Irrigation: This crucial technology significantly boosts food production from desert tiles, transforming them from liabilities into assets.

• Embrace Specialization: Focus on production-based buildings and districts in desert cities. Prioritize districts like industrial zones and commercial hubs to capitalize on your strategic resource advantages.

• Trade for Food: Establish robust trade routes with civilizations possessing abundant food resources to compensate for the limited food production within your desert settlements.

• Consider Your Civilization: Some civilizations are better suited to desert environments than others. Those with bonuses to desert tiles or access to powerful desert-specific units can significantly improve your odds of success.

Conclusion: Calculated Risk, Rewarding Outcome

Settling near deserts in Civilization VI is a calculated risk. The challenges are real, but the potential rewards are significant. By carefully weighing the advantages and disadvantages, and employing smart strategies, you can transform seemingly inhospitable terrain into a powerful engine for your empire's growth and dominance. Remember to adapt your strategy based on your chosen civilization's strengths and weaknesses, and always scout thoroughly before establishing a city.