Mali is how I imagined all of AoE IV would be

Basically all units are unique units. Great landmarks. I think I even saw same type units with different skin shades when zooming in, great detail! Even their architecture is great and their mechanics and feel are also very unique. It doesn’t even matter that they lack many techs.

In contrast, Ottomans are yet another copy paste of the existing civs: MAA, pikeman, knight, archer, xbow… etc, with uninspired and weak unique units and landmarks. A shame given the potential of their real world civ counterpart.

22 Likes

Man, I agree all of you said and I said them before. Espacially Ottoman landmarks are the worst.I say again devs dont make efforts to make otto land mark. Do you think do otto landmarks shine as Mali and other civs. No. They are just normal building, worst detailled just worst buildings. According to who play the otto civ, they arent historical. Why dont jans use sword? Why do Ootmans have cav archer?

5 Likes

I’ve not played yet but simply from watching a lil of beasty stream i can legit say you do NOT have a strong grasp of the OP potential of the ottomans!! Simply fast castle jans mango springs has gg written all over it… then you make a drumer to give all the units extra range armor and now you have mangos that can clean up all enemy range; jans (musk) that can eat all cavalry up close or at a small range, springs that can snipe enemy springs ANDA JANS can REPAIR seige WHILE BODY BLOCKING against cavalry charges???

2 Likes

You’re talking about how competitive they (potentially) are. I am not.

6 Likes

If this term “weak” used in your description is NOT referring to power level?? What is it referrijg to?

3 Likes

Ottoman drummer unit is a very unique one and the vizier system itself is a very cool addition. Mali is still of course the most diverse both visually and with units and mechanics. This kind of matches with how culturally different it is from the more euro-centric civs at the time as well.
Personally I like the balance they’ve struck with unique units across the game. Some are same, some have different characteristics but occupy the same niche and some are truly unique. It would be a nightmare for balance and for new players trying to get into the game if 10 civs all had completely unique units and you had to remember all that for every combat situation.

6 Likes

I couldn’t agree more with a couple of sentences on the Age of Empires forum.

2 Likes

Would you or someone else mind running me through the Malian tech tree — buildings, units, etc. I have not installed since august 2021 and don’t want to until I’m sure there’s a civ for me. Thanks!

You might as well play aoe3de, where can you find a better ottoman civ

5 Likes

Barracks produce Donso and Musofadi Warrior. Donso is a spear equivalent that also comes with a throwing javelin. Javelin has a cool down between uses. Musofadi is a quick female unit that has a short lasting stealth ability that can be activated.

Archery range produces archer and javelin thrower. Javelin thrower has an anti archer bonus. In imperial they can produce the Musofadi Gunner which is a hand cannon with the same stealth ability as the Musofadi Warrior.

Stable produces Sofa Horseman and Scout. I think the Sofa is a cross between the horseman and knight. Also, they get a Warrior Scout upgrade that makes their scouts useful in combat.

Pit mine is a building that is placed on gold deposit and produces gold passively. Adjacent houses and mining camps make it produce gold faster.

Mills can train cows costing gold.

Livestock Pen can garrison up to three cows and they passively produce food. Or you can kill the cows like a barbarian.

Outpost is replaced with Toll Outpost that gives additional gold when trade carts pass by.

Like other Muslim empires they cannot collect from Boars.

And of course they get a choice between two unique landmarks to advance each age.

Houses are half price, half health, and half population verses other civs.

Plus a few unique techs like one that allows buildings to be repaired twice as fast.

6 Likes

They also get poison arrows for their archers. This makes them much better than regular archers against armored units which is probably good since they isn’t get crossbows.

They can build one pit mine per age (so max 4).

Their musofadi gunner is faster moving than other hand cannons. I think it’s weaker on some stats but I’ll have to check.

Yeah the Sofa is basically a weaker cheaper knight, but it is also gets some bonus damage against infantry. They also have a tech that increases the movement speed of your infantry near a Sofa.

2 Likes

What about siege? Please tell me there isn’t a springald or culverin or ribauldiquin to be seen. Freaking english and french siege everywhere else

I hear the ottomans (ottomen?) are same drivel level stupid. The irony of AoE3 more artfully nailing the same civs is lost on nobody.

But I hold hope for the Malians.

4 Likes

Isn’t learning all those nuances what makes RTS fun?

Even though I dearly love AoE 2 I hate the 99% identical civs with one or two unique units logic.

Let’s say we live in a world where people don’t play the new civs beforehand to familiarize. If you are facing a new unit with unknown weaknesses and strengths, you throw a few units of your own at them and see how they perform. Depending on the outcome you now know how to counter. I don’t know about you but facing the unknown is where a lot of the fun comes from. Not the “oh… here comes the horseman/archer combo… how fresh and exciting… :expressionless:

9 Likes

It is this backwards thinking that completely ignores every age game except aoe2 that put us in this horrible hole to begin with. Please stop telling the developers to cowardly run from intelligent civ design. This is not 1999, and we players are not fools. We can figure out cool civs, just like we have for 20 years since AoM was released in 2002.

16 Likes

Sadly that’s where they fall short. I’m no historian but I’m pretty sure Malians didn’t use identical siege as HRE, English, French… I keep saying that if they ever release Mesoamerican civs, they will have frickin’ springalds and trebs. There are way more creative ways to address civs with little or no historical siege engines/techs.

On the plus side, their naval units/techs are realistically limited.

Having multiple unique units, that’s very ##### ### it breaks the game and now the civ is broken and it’s going to be hard to balance.

If asymmetric civs like that continue to release, competitive will die and unfortunately go the way of AoE3 in popularity. I hope they control the asymmetry better.

2 Likes

FFS those siege units break my heart. Copy and paste the Europeans everywhere. Rinse and repeat since 1997.

5 Likes

Play Chinese for the Nest of Bees. I love that unit, just because of how cool it is.

1 Like

I don’t think you get what OP is saying.

Malians feels like a unique civ that feels fresh to play.

Ottomans feel like old stuff by comparison, though better than, say, English.

It doenst matter if Ottomans are OP, it doesn’t matter if the only way to win is to play Ottomans. They are made in the stale AoE4 formula. Malians are unique!

1 Like