Mali Science Victory Strategy?
- Thread starter jsurpless
- Start date
Mostly because I wanted to try playing them and I'm not crazy about Religious Victory... also have heard that Diplomatic Victory can be frustrating
In fact, one of the reasons I've delayed really playing them has been because I've struggled trying to identify a good victory strategy for them
The Highwayman
King
In my Mali game I won a science victory. You should be able to buy a builder per turn along with producing builders in your high production cities. Just make sure you have Public Works slotted. It really didn’t take me that long to build the projects, since those don’t suffer from the production Malus. And of course chops help tremendously. Mali can be very scientific
Socrates99
Bottoms up!
Build the royal society, I believe that's the name of it. It's the gov plaza district that let's you rush projects with builders. Then you just buy builders and rush all the space projects. You'd be shocked at how good Mali is at SV.
Mali's 30% production reduction does not affect projects. Mali is arguably just as competitive as any other civ for a science victory (Mali gets extra traders per golden age and Democracy provides plenty of production per trade route), their -1 mine production does impact them slightly however. This reduction can be countered by building Ruhr Valley in your spaceport city. Additionally they are capable of large faith generation which can be used to buy scientists and engineers that boost space project production. The builder charge to production conversion has not been a deciding factor in my Diety games (I couldn't be bothered to micro that). The biggest factor is getting an engineer that can you boost you thru launching the mars colony and exoplanet expedition. (This saves around 20 turns on standard speed with a high production city. The builders only save around 5 turns if you spam them endlessly.) If you have a city with high enough production you can 1 or 2 two the lagrange laser projects (rendering the builder charge method almost useless at this stage of the space race). The real hard part of SV with Mali is getting the damn campuses up for science. In the early game you MUST land the golden ages so you can get the bonuses that gives science for commercial hub adjacency. If you form Holy Site/Suguba diamonds you can generate enough science and resources until you have enough housing/population to get the third district (a campus or industrial zone). I typically get the indusrial zone because Mali has so many mines you can get some really nice industrial zones. Then when I finally get campuses as a 4th district, the golden age science bonus is gone but I can instantly build campus buildings with faith (with the right follower belief) or just gold. Its also important to discover Capitalism so you can get the policy card the gives +2 science to trade routes. Putting all of this together along with other potential strats (+2 science to medieval walls/Scientific CS + kilwa/Research Alliance/Enlightenment cards that boost science/Smart district placement for high science yields/buying specific buildings/units/districts for 40% boosts) you can achieve a diety SV. You just need to play efficiently and plan your districts out early.
EpicWestern
Warlord
- Joined
- May 6, 2015
- Messages
- 258
Agreed. Instantly buying all your universities and research labs is pretty sweet but the early game acceleration is just too poor. If you're going peaceful you won't be able to max expand before other civs take too much territory, and if you're going domination route your "knight" rush will be slower. Love the music and gameplay concept of Mali, but like the Maori, being radically different from the other civs turned out poorly for them strength-wise.
DrCron
Prince
- Joined
- Dec 25, 2012
- Messages
- 449
They don't really have a good victory:
Domination: bad because of bad early game means slower conquest (not to mention wars=fewer trade routes=less gold). And early on you won't have enough gold to rush anyone.
Science: bad because slower early game means it takes longer to tech, also less prod from mines, also you can't get wonders with gold (securing Ruhr valley is easier with pretty much any other civ).
Religion: the religious early game is slower. Mali's early game is slower. Combining those two has to make deity survival very unlikely (though I guess if you somehow survive then you shuld be ok in late game, I never actually tried this tbh).
Culture: no specific bonus. And as mentioned before, harder to secure wonders with less production.
Diplomatic: harder to secure statue of liberty, plus you can win the helping others competitions easily with any civ, you don't need Mali's gold.
In theory it is fun to try Mali for a different playing style, but in practice the slower early game makes them extremely weak. The first 100 turns are always very important, and they will always be slower with Mali. Your first slinger, builder, settler... will all be slower, there's no way around this.
Socrates99
Bottoms up!
Lot of comments about the slow early game holding them back. I do think it's what keeps them from pulling out of average but it's not enough to make them bad. I had zero trouble getting a sub 300 science victory with him. Probably could have done it faster if it wasn't my first SV in GS.
EpicWestern
Warlord
- Joined
- May 6, 2015
- Messages
- 258
The Mali buy reduction gets applied to religious units. So if you survive and are not crippled by early game (which is a big if), Mali's middle and late religious game is actually insanely good. Overall I think they're probably better than average for religious victory.
