Is Malta even playable in Treaty?

So I’m a casual player. I play this on and off, so if I miss anything, be sure to point out how much of an idiot I am.

However, lately I’ve been playing around with Malta in Treaty but I’ve been really unsuccessful. It’s been quite disastrous as a matter of fact. The Maltese economy seems fine compared to other civs. I am relying on the settler wagons though. And that’s where the problems seem to start.

If you max out on villager population (with settler wagons) to max out your economy, you end up having a total of 111 population. That leaves only 89 pop for your army. If the Maltese military units didn’t require 2 population by default, it wouldn’t be that big of a deal. There is of course the archaic infantry, but if those are the units you plan on using, then you’ll run out of wood really fast, even with a factory constantly working for wood. The archaic units aren’t particularly strong either so Hospitallers and Sentinels it is. The problem is that having a maximum of 44 military units doesn’t give you much of a presence in the game at all.

You could use the commanderies to get units from other civs, but there’s a build limit to the commanderies, which makes them very inconsistent. Not to mention that they’re also the only way to train cavalry so you’re pretty much forced to have a couple in your own base and your allies’ base. That only really leaves you with a couple (usually 2-3) of commanderies to attack your opponent, which simply isn’t enough. You need more than 2-3 stables/barracks to attack your enemy in Treaty. On top of that, the only unit that doesn’t cost 2 pop from the commandery is the cassador. It’s a good skirmisher unit, but again your options for training a less pop heavy army are extremely limited.

If Maltese units were able to be trained faster, then it wouldn’t be that massive of a burden either as you would be constantly replacing the units that died but training the units takes longer than most other civs. The forts are the most reliable way of producing units, but forts also take a really long time to build. It’s time you simply don’t have in Treaty. By the time you’re half way building your fort, your army will be gone. Forts aren’t really a viable option in Treaty in my experience.

Some of the other civ bonus units are pretty gimmicky too and don’t really help the civ. The gunpowder depot doesn’t really do much. Sure, you can try and build it against enemy walls, but what’s the point really? If you want to blow it up, any other civ just brings petards or a couple of mortars. Meanwhile your hero is out there building a depot, praying for his life and hoping that your opponent is too blind to see him. The Maltese also have fixed guns, which sounds really fun. I wouldn’t know because only a madman sacrifices another 7 pop for a single canon.

TL;DR:
So in my experience, the Maltese are a pop heavy civ with low training speed and gimmicky civ bonuses. The fact that they’re a pop heavy civ and that the training speed of military units is slow contributes to the Maltese having a very neglectable presence or impact in a Treaty game. As I said, I’m a casual player so I could have missed something.

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u need the infinite food-wood trade card if you going to be playing archaic units

malta is played slow push style, you have 2-3 culvs in the back with a mass of xbows backed up by static defenses + the occasional fixed gun. the gunpoweder depot effectively acts as a boost for your defenses since it also boost the fire rate of your static defenses, forgot if it works on culvs or not and you basically snipe artillery using the culvs while the xbow attack units and bulding from range

Having gunpowder depots near your own units seemed too risky to me considering it would take another century to replace the units that died, but maybe I’m just overestimating the damage it would do. Either way, I’ll try it out more defensively.

As for the archaic play… Sure, but the archaic infantry in the end is still relatively weak compared to your opponents units, or the other Maltese units. Maybe I just need to completely ignore the Hospitallers and Sentinels and send the archaic home cards instead to bring them up to par with the rest.

Either the archaic or culv strategy aren’t particularly bringing anything unique or new to the table though. Like… I still don’t see how it’s beneficial to bring Malta to a Treaty game compared to Italy for example. I suppose fully relying on the archaic units does make the Maltese “playable” though so there’s that I guess. I’ll try it out.

Its definitely no riskless but good placement and enough defenses(outpost-forts etc) + fixed cannon and culvs are deterence.

The xbow is their royal guard unit and you get 3 stats card+ all the extra HP from the maltese bonus, I think lategame the xbow gets to like 300 hp and like 36-40 atk if you build your deck right

they key also is that they are cheap and your opponent has to spend a lot more resources then you to kill units that you can rebuild really easily

they can also siege from range which is something not a lot of skirms can do though that has been nerfed

yeah but it works and you dont really need more then that

Malta are D tier in treaty. Even in late game 1v1 you get the issues with pop space so in treaty it’s far worse. Settler wagons and fixed guns take up too much pop, sure the wagons make up for loss of a second factory but a factory would not take up 12 pop space.

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tenho esses mesmo problemas o seus lançador de fogo e o sentinela sãos muitos bons mais essas unidades decentes custam 2 de população joguei muito pouco com malta em tratado todas as vezes que joguei perdi, os dev deveriam diminuir a população dessas unidades e pelo menos diminuir as estatísticas delas, voce jogar com malta em tratado acaba jogando com Portugal e Espanha usando apenas CASSADOR e LANCEIRO 21 21 21 21

In My opinion The sentinela should be only 1 pop they are not too strong like soldados .

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I agree, their age IV card could make them 2 pop with the increased stats, but it so annoying to build them early on when you only get a regular musketeer that gets you housed, Malta is already pretty wood heavy early on.

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malta is in the limit of a viable civ in treaty, they are bad of course but playable, not like Italy. Its economy is good. Sentinels are extremely bad, as Musk is a useless unit. Hospilaters are situational and the army relies on the firethrowers and their micro. In nats, they are not too bad.

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Malta is fun, not strong, in Treaty. Just make greater the wall bonus and give it to Forts, Fixed Guns, Hospitals and Towers

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