Civilization 6 Rise and Fall: How to Increase Loyalty & What it Does

How to Increase Loyalty & What it Does in Civilization 6: Rise and Fall

There are plenty of exciting new mechanics to consider when playing a game in Civilization 6’s first expansion, Rise and Fall. Perhaps the most important though is loyalty. Loyalty is related to almost everything that was added to the game in Rise and Fall. Loyalty is a resource (of sorts) that affects cities. The higher your city’s’ loyalty, the more… well, loyal their inhabitants are to you. In other words, if their loyalty is high, they won’t rebel or cause problems for you.

However, if a city’s loyalty is low and left unchecked for turns on end, then a city can rebel against you and declare their independence, becoming a free state. As a free state, your former city will be total jerks. In addition to not being a part of a civ anymore, they may even decide to attack, essentially acting as a stronger version of the Barbarians. And if you don’t reconquer/reclaim its loyalty quick enough, they may decide to even join another nearby civ permanently.

There are a number of ways to increase your loyalty to prevent that scenario. The most direct way to increase loyalty is to build cities in close proximity to each other. That way, your own citizens can exert pressure on them to tow the line, as opposed to being sweet talked by enemy factions. Additionally, always try to assign your cities a strong governor. The presence of a governor will lead to sharp increases or decreases in your cities’ loyalty, and vice versa in their absence. Also, the happiness of a city’s population, determined by the presence of Amenities, also factors into a cities’ loyalty. So keep your people in good spirits whenever possible. Finally, the age that your civ is currently in will affect a city’s loyalty: dark age bad, heroic age good.

If you lose your city due to a rebellion, you can still reclaim it but it will require some work. You need to either take it back by force (the easiest way) or find a way to exert pressure on it so that it decides to rejoin you instead of another civ. The latter is more difficult since the reason you’re in this situation is that you lost it, to begin with. You can try founding a nearby city and producing the bread and circuses project or form a cultural alliance with your biggest threat to steal the city from under you (which prevents their citizens from exerting influence).

That does it for how to increase loyalty and what it does in Civilization 6: Rise and Fall. Best of luck out there civ fans!