The Arab armies were not prepared for the colder weather of Gaul at tours. I think a case could be made that Arab military traditions should probably be penalized in the terrains that they experienced at tours. especially for winter weather. I would probably remove their counter to heavy infantry, reduce their base stats to be slightly less than heavy infantry, give them terrain bonuses in drylands, deserts, and maybe floodplains. Forests and other terrain associated with climates of Gaul and further north, plus a winter penalty.
This sounds counter productive at this point since every DLC likes to introduce one of those. Every region and culture group is going to have the 'overpowered MaA' in it unless you also feel like removing Longbows, Cataphracts, Asawira, Elephants, and half the things Vikings and Nomads get.
Well, how many Mali Empire DLCs have we had so far?
This is a hot take, I suppose, but: yes, I think they should rethink the cultural Overpowered MaA standard that the DLC have set, and some of the MaAs should be removed. This will probably require them reworking warfare/military strategy as a whole, but that was on the roadmap from a few years back.
I don't think this is a hot take at all. Its quite reasonable, its just that its an all or nothing proposition. Whether you buff levies and normal MaAs or nerf cultural MaAs, or both, you gotta do something more comprehensive.
