Played Mali for the first time. So fun!

[The Technomancer]

I play on Immortal, Standard speed, C&I, Huge, 12 total civs.

A friend of mine and I decided to go random leaders for our latest game, and I ended up with Mali. As I had never played them before, I was pretty excited to try them out.

My impression of them from this game and another single player one, same rules:

- Both times, I founded my cap on turn 4. Songs of the Jeli quickly made up for that minor handicap.

- Early rush from the AI is a larger danger than normal, especially from strong ancient civs like Aztec and Macedon. Not enough income yet to buy enough units for defense, and the 30% prod hit is felt here.

- Got the settler pantheon both times. Neither of my deserts were big enough to go for Desert Folklore.

- Expanded away from threatening civs, slowly, until Mandekalu Cavalry.

Once that income comes rolling in, along with a strong Petra city, they become a powerhouse. Via my founded religion (obtained by faith buying the GP), I had Jesuit Education, so between that and Monumentality, I was buying a settler every four or so turns until I had expanded to 16 cities and getting science up to speed quickly.

With Mandekalu Cavalry, I took out some bordering CPU cities that were worth snagging, and played out a science victory from there.

I really enjoyed the games, although the income and purchasing discounts is borderline OP!

 

[ShakaKhan]

Nice evaluation. I don't have GS yet, but this civ is so right in my wheelhouse. Unless I'm playing a deity speedgame, I prefer to play with building up a strong econo-industrial infrastructure that just explodes into buying several units or further infrastructure upgrades every turn and 1-3 turn build times. Definitely love to try this civ with R+F rules and disregard all the carbon emissions/sea level nonsense.

So quesetion - on immortal, how did your early game have to change to accommodate his stiff penalties. It seems that his design is that you buy what you can instead of building it... The problem is that the strong purchasing abilities and discounts that he has come a little later whereas the building penalties that compensate hit you at turn 1.

 

[The Technomancer]

I built a small military and kissed up to the AI with gold gifts until I could afford an army large enough to defend myself.

 

[Leucarum]

I feel like the settler pantheon has really improved Mali! They are one of the most likely civs to get first shot at a pantheon and it really helps make up for their production malus. Even if the desert pantheon is also always tempting...

 

[blackcatatonic]

I'm playing them right now. They are the last GS leader I haven't yet won as. I'm glad I waited until the Religious Settlements buff! It's almost like playing Civ V Spain

 

[Basajaun]

Motivated by your post, I started a game with them too, as I have never tried them before. Man Im having a blast, I could have made my way to victory much more clear, but Im starting to get a strange pleasure out of the loop of, place suguba, buy buildings with faith, buy holy site with gold or faith, and buy the holy site buildings with gold again, boosting furthermore the speed at which I can expand, and develop my cities. Managing all those trade routes intimidated me at first, but its not such an annoyance as I thougt.

Also, this absolute unit of starting location I got. Quite small desert, but big enough to boost my capital with +4 faith and gold, and allow it to produce quite fast because I got some woods, and a copper mine that cannot be seen behind Niani's nameplate. I honestly barely noticed the production deficit, because the capital grew so quickly that it was able to work the surrounding tiles much faster than with other civs I tried before. This civ is absolutely crazy.

Civ6Screen0018

• Basajaun
• Dec 6, 2019

Fooling around with Mali

Edit: Just chipping in to comment. This game ended as an unexpected Diplomatic victory, 6 turns away from culture victory, when I just launched my first Lagrange into space. Talk about overdeveloping

 

[KayAU]

Yeah, Mali is pretty great. I'm really pleased about Gathering Storm introducing some truly unique civs: Mali, who thrive in deserts and base everything on gold, the Inca, who can work mountains and build taller faster than anybody, and the Maori, who start out in the ocean and love unimproved tiles. Mali is really fun to play for me, since instant gold purchasing is so satisfying, especially on Epic speed where production takes a long time.

 

[Tuvok694]

Unfortunately I cannot share your enthusiasm. If I could not see it in Youtube videos, I would not believe that anyone can win any game as Mali above level king. Just today I gave it another try, really made an effort to "play by the book". I was scientifically not even that far behind in the medieval era, and I had a good gold income. I had iron, I could buy swordsmen, but Lautaro didn't care at all. I tried to take back the first of my cities that he had captured, but his crossbowmen just annihilated all of my swordsmen. There was no chance at all that I would recover from losing almost all my military in a few rounds, and so I gave up again.
As Mali you have to build holy sites and sugubas to be able to buy things with faith or gold (because production is worthless). You cannot build campus districts at the same time, so you fall behind in science. Then it doesn't help me if I am able to buy tons of units which get killed immediately because they are hopelessly inferior to the enemy's more modern units. I have no fun playing as Mali. That production penalty totally ruins the game (especially the early game) for me.

 

[enKage]

I don't share your entusiasm on Mali. You can brake religious game with them, but otherwise just an average civ.

What I don't like is that they basically have antysynergy in traits, so at least one is wasted.
Gold from desert on international routes is a trap. You can earn much more gold by working mines supported by food from domestic routes. You still have at least the same amount of gold and hammers on top of it, so you save even more on purchasing

OTOH they are one of only a few civs (Cree, Persia, sometimes Poland?) who can turn Sankore from a weak/average wonder to a magical wonder.

 

[playshogi]

The biggest problem with Mali is finding a solid desert start because without that this civ is hopeless. I solved that problem by playing on the 7 seas map. A nice large desert start is practically guaranteed. The second problem is defending against an early rush. Practically impossible on deity, but the solution here is to start in the classical era. Starting with a spearman, scout, and builder enables the player to not just survive, but thrive..

 

[Sostratus]

You don’t need or particularly want a desert as Mali. Because deserts have no yield.
The only reason you would want it is to get the turn 1 faith generation to lock down a pantheon- but you only need a few tiles for this. Likewise, you only need 1 desert city for the trade route bonus.

The real power- suguba adjacency stacking- doesn’t require deserts at all, and you can easily manufacture +5-10 sugubas anywhere you have a river. I wrote a guide about it!

Personally I find the choral music belief to allow you to go suguba/HS/campus to cover With just size 7 cities. Keep expanding your carpet of gold and faith generating cities, and you eventually just become unstoppable- gold and faith can be used in any city, so it’s 100% transferable. Production can’t do the same thing.

 

[playshogi]

Thank you for chiming in and pointing out how the desert only has limited use for Mali. However, the HS/Suguba thing isn't as strong as CH/Hansa because it hurts to put a suguba on a hill to get 5g when a mere mine gets 4g and other yields too.

 

[Sostratus]

Thank you for chiming in and pointing out how the desert only has limited use for Mali. However, the HS/Suguba thing isn't as strong as CH/Hansa because it hurts to put a suguba on a hill to get 5g when a mere mine gets 4g and other yields too.

When combined with the Free Imperial Cities ability, literally nothing in this game is as good as CH/Hansa. I should know, I’ve written several guides on the topic!

But, Gold & Faith can be used in any city while production cannot- so even though you’re taking a big output hit by getting gold adjacency instead of production, you can use this to rush districts, units and buildings absolutely anywhere. This is a lot stronger than people give credit for once you have a few cities going because it scales up forever, whereas eventually you run out of things to produce efficiently (conversion rate on city projects is like 15% or about 1/7.)

 

[lotrmith]

Unfortunately I cannot share your enthusiasm. If I could not see it in Youtube videos, I would not believe that anyone can win any game as Mali above level king. Just today I gave it another try, really made an effort to "play by the book". I was scientifically not even that far behind in the medieval era, and I had a good gold income. I had iron, I could buy swordsmen, but Lautaro didn't care at all. I tried to take back the first of my cities that he had captured, but his crossbowmen just annihilated all of my swordsmen. There was no chance at all that I would recover from losing almost all my military in a few rounds, and so I gave up again.
As Mali you have to build holy sites and sugubas to be able to buy things with faith or gold (because production is worthless). You cannot build campus districts at the same time, so you fall behind in science. Then it doesn't help me if I am able to buy tons of units which get killed immediately because they are hopelessly inferior to the enemy's more modern units. I have no fun playing as Mali. That production penalty totally ruins the game (especially the early game) for me.

I think your problem is not only that you had inferior swords out in the open against crossbows, but that you may have had a golden age which gives Mapuche a combat bonus against you. Just stick an archer inside your city and maybe hard build walls. Easy enough.

Also you should have teched towards Crossbows yourself building/buying archers in the meanwhile. You can easily afford the upgrades.

Also there's nothing stopping you from building one or two early campuses.

 

[playshogi]

One problem with desert folklore is that dust storms are constantly pillaging your holy sites in the desert if you put one in the middle to get +6 adjacency.

 

[The Technomancer]

One problem with desert folklore is that dust storms are constantly pillaging your holy sites in the desert if you put one in the middle to get +6 adjacency.

Take the settler instead. City #2 gets slingers going. You’re going to be swimming in faith already.

Never underestimate the yields of a large desert + nazca, especially if you can get Granada as well.

 

[playshogi]

The game I am playing has Nazca. It's a great start location. I just don't know how to play it.

 

[Disgustipated]

I'm getting killed trying the Mali again after a long time (I wanted to fill out my hall of fame). Recent patches have made them difficult on higher levels since the AI just crushes me. Doesn't help I'm playing a mod called Steel and Thunder. Nubia's 2nd unique unit just absolutely crushed me. I also had another fail with a unique unit from that mod (I think it was Zulu) tearing me apart. You can't stand up to those units with warriors and archers.

I haven't been able to get out of the early game with Mali. Even worse it takes like 7 restarts to even get desert in my city radius. I just feel like a noob player failing 2 games in a row. Mali is just wicked hard. Funny thing is I don't remember struggling with them after GS came out. They actually hold top spot in my Hall of Fame for a domination victory.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

If you meet 2 war carts at T10 you won't be saying that kind of things.

Anyway if you survive the first 50 turns without falling severely behind, Mali starts to yield similar to a normal Civ.

 

[The Technomancer]

Mali can settle on turn 3 or 4 on Deity and still land the first pantheon/not fall significantly behind. On immortal, I’ve done turn 6 for a particularly good spot.

Settle city #3 in the starting spot.