[GS] Mali Discussion Thread

[Steamboat Willem]

Or TR benefits.

More useful. Unless you have Petra you might as well run a specialist instead of working a flat desert tile with a city state improvement. The yield is pretty much the same, and you save yourself a builder charge.

Mali's bonusses do not come as much from working desert tiles, as they come from being surrounded by them.

 

[Deggial]

No, but I do think military units should be able to link up with traders, making escorting them less tedious.

Traders don't care about closed borders, though. Military units do.

 

[Krajzen]

I love everything abiut Mali other than -30% production. This worries me greatly. Every time any civ5 or 6 civ is is announced fanbase tends to overestimate its power, I fail to recall any of later failures being detected at preview level (Norway, France, Georgia).

One more thing annoys me: compare this civ design to Canadian design.

 

[darkace77450]

Traders don't care about closed borders, though. Military units do.

Good call. That's a point I overlooked.

 

[Pietato]

Televangelists would make a great economic policy card though (gain faith and boost religious pressure from broadcast towers).

At the cost of gold...

I love everything abiut Mali other than -30% production. This worries me greatly. Every time any civ5 or 6 civ is is announced fanbase tends to overestimate its power, I fail to recall any of later failures being detected at preview level (Norway, France, Georgia).

One more thing annoys me: compare this civ design to Canadian design.

We knew most of Georgia's bonuses would suck, but we had no idea what Golden Ages would do. So it was hard to tell, overall. Same with France and Spies.

 

[Pietato]

Their unique unit requires horses. Did they change them all to require resources, or is it an OP Knight thing?

 

[Sostratus]

I’m not even sure they really need to settle many desert cities anyway, contrary to the first look video. I mean, wouldn’t you be better settling just one which you run all your trade routes out of, and then settle the rest in, well, normal locations? Grassland and Plains hills will be better for mines, even if you only want them for gold. Your Commercial Hubs and HS also don’t need any deserts.

I think the theory was like canada- you can play pretty normal (mali obviously with a focus on buying stuff) but you can also just slap down a bunch of cities in useless desert and fill it with CH/HS. Canada can throw down some cities in the tundra for their UI. Mali gets heaps of easy faith and gold, Canada has the cultural bounty of dirty dangles and sick snipes.

 

[Leathaface]

The +1 trade route slot is permanent.

This could be a very good ability. Obviously the sooner you enter a golden age the better. Mali will have a crazy amount of gold long as they survive the early game.

 

[bite]

 

[Ferocitus]

This could be a very good ability. Obviously the sooner you enter a golden age the better. Mali will have a crazy amount of gold long as they survive the early game.

I'm not sure what you mean. It's not that hard to get a golden age early.
Sustaining more than a few in a row can be tough, and buckets of spondulix will help.

 

[NegativeZero]

They do have a 4 tile range (8 if you add both sides) so you could just have a couple and have them in strategic locations

It would be rather hilarious for Mali's traders to have an entourage of hostile Barbs trying to pillage it each turn. I'd just let those fellows get funneled into the neighboring civ I was trading with and let nature takes its course.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

It would be rather hilarious for Mali's traders to have an entourage of hostile Barbs trying to pillage it each turn. I'd just let those fellows get funneled into the neighboring civ I was trading with and let nature takes its course.

O
M
G

I love this idea so much. It reminds me of old school Everquest when you get a bunch of high level monsters to chase you into the newbie garden.

 

[Sagax]

It would be rather hilarious for Mali's traders to have an entourage of hostile Barbs trying to pillage it each turn. I'd just let those fellows get funneled into the neighboring civ I was trading with and let nature takes its course.

O
M
G

I love this idea so much. It reminds me of old school Everquest when you get a bunch of high level monsters to chase you into the newbie garden.

Ehhhh hold your horses. If the barbs are stupid enough to follow an immune trader all the way to the AI city, then chances are they are also stupid enough to keep following it back, without switching priorities.

 

[NegativeZero]

Ehhhh hold your horses. If the barbs are stupid enough to follow an immune trader all the way to the AI city, then chances are they are also stupid enough to keep following it back, without switching priorities.

Very true, but on a long trade route (ones that should net the most gold) you'll know they're coming while the neighbor wouldn't.

A couple fortified units on the boarder to hold out till the trader exits once more could work. Several units from a prior era could pull it off.

 

[Tobizi]

Ehhhh hold your horses. If the barbs are stupid enough to follow an immune trader all the way to the AI city, then chances are they are also stupid enough to keep following it back, without switching priorities.

The trader "disappears" in the city and all barb units are going crazy "Where is this trader? Raid! Pillage! Kill!"

 

[KayAU]

Well, if it goes more than 4 tiles into AI territory, it will not be protected by your Mandekalu Cavalry any more. Anyways, while fun to think about, I don't consider this a very likely scenario.

 

[caiman0815]

So a desert hill with petra wonder is about 2f3p8g for mali?

Sounds powerful.

And seems like the -30% is only for buildings and units, not for wonders. So you can set your cities to district and wonder production and buy your units and buildings with gold and faith ...

 

[ChocolateShake]

So we can get a super suguba

+2 gold for each holy site, +1 gold for every 2 adjacent districts and +1 gold for a river edge

Surround it with 6 holy sites for:

+12 gold from the holy site + 3 gold for the adjacent districts and say you only got one river edge for +1 = +16

If the double adjacency card kicks in for all of these bonuses it could mean +32

Not very realistic but fun though.

Overall this is a great civ for builders! I'll have an excuse to go on a wonder building spree And if any AI gets any ideas, instant army.

Funny how Mali combined two expectations for the Ottomans and Phoenicia, i.e. the unique commercial hub and the incentive to buy an army. Overall I think they'll be a lot of fun to roleplay:

 

[MarigoldRan]

I love everything abiut Mali other than -30% production. This worries me greatly. Every time any civ5 or 6 civ is is announced fanbase tends to overestimate its power, I fail to recall any of later failures being detected at preview level (Norway, France, Georgia).

One more thing annoys me: compare this civ design to Canadian design.

+6 FOOOOOOOD. +6 FAAAAIIITTTTHHHHH. Goddess of the HAAAAARRRRVEEEESSSTTTT. Or Pantheon of +25% Military Production. Ooooo la laaaaaaaaaaaa.

-30% production is nooooottttthhiiingggg.

 

[Harlequeen]

Is he the Amadou of Amadou and Miriam? Checks, no. That's another Malian Amadou.
Also, Afro Celt Sound System are superb.