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Tinto Flavour #4 - 31st of January 2025 - Mali

Hello, and welcome one more week to Tinto Flavour, the happy Fridays in which we take a look at the flavourful content created for the super secret Project Caesar! But before we start, I want to share with you that we have a new job opening in Paradox Tinto: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/come-work-for-tinto.1727521/

Today we will be traveling throughout the Sahara toward the Sahel, where the Empire of Mali stands, ruled by the infamous Mansa Mūsā:

"The mighty Mansa Mūsā Keita of Mali astonished the world one decade ago, when he performed his Ḥajj ('pilgrimage') to Mecca. Such an event was recorded by chroniclers and chanted by minstrels, and it served to establish his fame as the richest man as he spread his prodigality, gifting Zakāh ('almsgiving') gold wherever his long and luxurious courtly caravan passed by.

This display of splendor might have reflected the richnesses of the Malian lands, after its Empire expanded and consolidated under the Keita dynasty. However, one day Mansa Mūsā will pass away, and his successors may not find it so easy to rule over his very diverse holdings..."

Country Selection.png

The mighty Mansa Mūsā is still ruling Mali in 1337 (we don’t know exactly when he died, so we decided to have him as the ruler at the start of the game). As usual, please consider the UI, 2D and 3D art as WIP.

And here are the lands of Mali:
Mali.png

Some more fun camera rotations this week! Today, with the flat map mode on again.

Mali starts with one Vassal, which is Jolof:
Jolof 1.png

Jolof 2.png

Let’s take a look at some Government-related features of Mali, which can be checked in the Estates window:
Estates.png

There is one starting government reform for Mali, the Manden Kurufa:
Manden Kurufa.png

You might also notice that all Estates start with a privilege with the same icon, as it’s a similar one, made to portray the religious diversity of Mali, a country ruled largely by Mande-speaking Sunni people, but with a fragmented, but tolerant, society:
Protected Faith.png

Religions.png

The second screenshot comes from a tooltip on the Religious panel and shows the religious distribution of the country. Please note that we’ve already done the ‘Pagan’ split, but haven’t yet incorporated feedback from the West African Tinto Maps, nor reviewed the starting population.

There are also a couple of unique privileges for the 'Umarā', the Nobility of the country, that may be available later on after an event triggers:
Office of the Farima-Soura.png

Office of the Sankar-Zouma.png

Mali also starts with a couple of unique policies enacted, the first for the Distribution of Power estate law, and the other for the Levy Law military law:
Gbra.png

Ton-tan-jon-ta-ni-woro.png

Mali also starts with 3 Works of Art:
Works of Art.png

Let’s now take a look at some unique advances:
Koroukan Faga.png

This advance is the one that unlocks the Manden Kurufa government reform.

Gold of Bure.png

Mali is famous for its gold exports, yeah…

Mali has a bunch of unique units, also:
Mandekalu Levies.png

Here are the Levy units unlocked by it:
Mandekalu Infantry.png

Mandekalu Horsemen.png

You might note that the description of these two levy units refers to the Farari Corps, which is the following advance:
Farari Corps.png

That unlocks the following Regular units:
Farari Infantry.png

Farari Cavalry.png

Another unique advance:
Kele-Koun.png

That unlocks the Jonow Auxiliary, an Auxiliary unit:
Jonow Auxiliary.png

Finally, another military advance, that unlocks one more unit, and two more buildings:
Sofa Levies.png

Sofa Infantrymen.png

Sofa Barracks.png

Sofa Stockade.png

Let’s now take a look at the narrative content. This event will trigger while Mansa Mūsā is still alive, as an announcement of the potentially harsh time to come:
Zenith of the Mali Empire.png

This is the disaster that may end up triggering for your country, ‘Decline of Mali’:
Decline of Mali 1.png

It will trigger a number of nasty events, such as:
A fragmented realm.png

This event allows you to start playing with Songhai instead of Mali if you select the third option.

If you overcome the disaster, you’ll get a reward, in terms of Prestige, Stability, etc. (we need to do some balance tweaks on it, so there might be more!).

Nonetheless, besides the disaster, you can also get nicer events while playing as Mali, such as some about the development of Timbuktu:
Bolstering Timbuktu.png

And that’s all for today! I hope you enjoyed it! Next week we will travel back to Europe, to the lands of the Crown of Aragon! Cheers!
 
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I'm not sure if you're still gonna have that "Inflation due to gold reliance" factor from EU4 (perhaps not, since PC has a more Victoria style economy), but maybe a better way of doing this benefit would be to reduce the impact of that on Mali, rather than a straight, flat inflation reduction.

That way, if I conquer Zimbabwe with Mali, for example, its gold's inflation impact would also be reduced, but it wouldn't make it seem so like Mali is better against any and all sources of inflation just because it has "Gold drug tolerance"
 
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How many states break away during the decline of Mali disaster?
Besides the break-away countries coming from the regular rebel mechanics, there are unique events for Tuareg, Fulo, Kaabu, and Songhai splinter countries.
 
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View attachment 1249409
I'm not sure if you're still gonna have that "Inflation due to gold reliance" factor from EU4 (perhaps not, since PC has a more Victoria style economy), but maybe a better way of doing this benefit would be to reduce the impact of that on Mali, rather than a straight, flat inflation reduction.

That way, if I conquer Zimbabwe with Mali, for example, its gold's inflation impact would also be reduced, but it wouldn't make it seem so like Mali is better against any and all sources of inflation just because it has "Gold drug tolerance"
There have been some recent changes to how inflation works in the game, @Johan will talk about them sometime in the future.
 
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Why Umara and Ulama are in inverted commas? Other unique names of estates don't use them.
Because it's how it's spelled in Arabic.
 
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I hope the rise of Great Fulo/Denianké, Jolof/Kaabu/Timbuktu growing autonomous, and Mossi raids will all pose challenges to Mali in addition to the rise of the Songhai.

I assume it's unlikely to change before release (which is perfectly fine) but you should be aware that that court room art looks very much Akan specifically and wouldn't be typical for West Africa at large - it's the swirly designs and the golden stool that give it away. I do understand that it's one of the best documented styles of West African architecture. The outfit of the mansa himself looks good though.
 
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Disappointed that Mali doesn’t start with more vassal states, especially since Europe is so granular
We haven't yet reviewed the setup feedback suggestions from the Western African Tinto Maps.
 
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I like the new icon for tools! The one for cooper looks like arm wrestling tho

What do the new top icons mean?
The one with the red banner behind it? It's the Building Category, which is 'Military' for the Sofa Barracks, and 'Defensive' for the Sofa Stockade.
 
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