And then if we ever get to castle, I would say Malians look best there with the archer Sofa combo. But if we get to Imperial, it's always that Janissary threat.

In castle age, Malians look very competitive. Janissaries are frightening but not that frightening yet, especially if you start having mass toxin archers against you.

Eating a lot of those cattle is a nice bonus that the Malians have, but it's not really something you want to actively do, especially in the feudal age. They cost a lot of gold and you'd rather deposit them. But when you're contained and it's risky to move out on external food against a unit like the Sipahi, it might be necessary.

Sipahi is just by far the strongest horsemen unit in the game. And you want to have units like that when you're up against the Malians. Armored units can easily be countered by the Musofadi warriors from the Malians. So having a very strong horseman type unit that can even take good trades against a Sofa is going to be essential for the Ottomans when facing off against them.

Sipahi planning on moving across the map, burning down houses and pit mines that the Malians rely on so much.