Rob Zacny

Episode 314: Massive Chalice

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It's our Pi-eth episode! Rob is joined by game designer David V. Heron and OG panelist Tom Chick to discuss Massive Chalice. Doublefin's take on squad-based tactics has Tom all aflutter while David has a more reserved take. This Massive Chalice show has Massive Spoilers, so watch for the subtle cue.

 

Listen here.

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I love how Tom pronounces "alchemist" like he is in olden tymes and everyone is referred to by their profession:

 

"Joe Baker"

 

"Frank Miller"

 

"Al Chemist"

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What kind of spoilers are we talking about? Is there a big plot event near the end or something?

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What kind of spoilers are we talking about? Is there a big plot event near the end or something?

Well I can't exactly say (because it's a spoiler you see), but: yes.

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I'm surprised Rob had problems with this game. All hail Rob. I had a single walkthrough on Normal difficulty. Often I've felt I've screwed up - lost Alchemist class, didn't understand how territory bonuses worked, only got to the end with 2 relics - but the final battle was beatable on Iron Man.

 

It was interesting to play as an Iron Man challenge but I don't feel there's enough depth in this game for another walkthrough. I still plan to do XCOM for the third time (and perhaps more when Long War comes out of beta) but not Massive Chalice.

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What kind of spoilers are we talking about? Is there a big plot event near the end or something?

 It's a spoiler about the final battle, which is a really cool reveal about the gameplay mechanics.  I was delighted to discover it for myself, and I'd encourage anyone interested in the game to just let it unfold like it's supposed to.  

 

 

I'm surprised Rob had problems with this game. All hail Rob. I had a single walkthrough on Normal difficulty. Often I've felt I've screwed up - lost Alchemist class, didn't understand how territory bonuses worked, only got to the end with 2 relics - but the final battle was beatable on Iron Man.

 

It was interesting to play as an Iron Man challenge but I don't feel there's enough depth in this game for another walkthrough. I still plan to do XCOM for the third time (and perhaps more when Long War comes out of beta) but not Massive Chalice.

 

I wonder if Normal is really just for figuring out how the game works.  Once you know what you're doing, there's not much pushback on Normal.  It seems to me once you know how the game works -- the long-term implications of keeps, the character development system, the tech options, the final battle -- you're supposed to be playing on Hard.  That's where you're going to have to make harder choices, deal with occasional battle losses, and really sweat that final mission.  

 

By the way, 0% of the people who own this game on Steam have beaten it Iron Man at the hardest difficulty level.  Yikes.

 

   -Tom

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I'm fascinated by David's approach to strategy games, because it is so different from my own. He actively searches for the path of least resistance and follows it to its conclusion, even if it means leaving half the game lying in the dust behind him. I view strategy games as big toy boxes, and I want to take each toy out of the box so I can see what it does. So the all sniper XCOM army, or presumably the all ranger party in Massive Chalice, has no appeal to me, because I'm leaving so many toys in the box. I bet David completes a lot more games than I do, though.

 

I think some of this attitude came from my introduction to strategy- Dune 2 and Command & Conquer. Those games would dole out a new unit for each mission, and it was a big motivator to me. What cool thing am I going to get next? It's also a personality thing, since I like variety of experiences rather more than I like winning, at least when I'm playing against an AI.

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I'm fascinated by David's approach to strategy games, because it is so different from my own. He actively searches for the path of least resistance and follows it to its conclusion, even if it means leaving half the game lying in the dust behind him. I view strategy games as big toy boxes, and I want to take each toy out of the box so I can see what it does. So the all sniper XCOM army, or presumably the all ranger party in Massive Chalice, has no appeal to me, because I'm leaving so many toys in the box. I bet David completes a lot more games than I do, though.

 

I think some of this attitude came from my introduction to strategy- Dune 2 and Command & Conquer. Those games would dole out a new unit for each mission, and it was a big motivator to me. What cool thing am I going to get next? It's also a personality thing, since I like variety of experiences rather more than I like winning, at least when I'm playing against an AI.

 

I play similar to how you are describing David.  It just drives me nuts if I know of a efficient path and I don't take it, with exception being perhaps Civ games where I pick a victory condition I want to pursue, or drag on the late game just so I can see the empire blob more.

 

And it's not that I don't like variety, I just don't want variety to come in a form of sub-optimal by huge margin.

 

Oh and yooo same two games that got me into strategy games~!  When I saw Dune 2 I was blown away because it was like a game version of what I was doing with toys back then.

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I play similar to how you are describing David.  It just drives me nuts if I know of a efficient path and I don't take it, with exception being perhaps Civ games where I pick a victory condition I want to pursue, or drag on the late game just so I can see the empire blob more.

 

And it's not that I don't like variety, I just don't want variety to come in a form of sub-optimal by huge margin.

 

Oh and yooo same two games that got me into strategy games~!  When I saw Dune 2 I was blown away because it was like a game version of what I was doing with toys back then.

 

But how do you know you're on the most efficient path? For all David knows high level, well equipped Caberjacks are even better than Hunters. If I don't level all the classes how will I know what's good and what's bad? One clearly has to Try All The Things, with the added benefit of Playing With All The Toys.

 

Man, Dune 2 was so good and fresh and exciting that we put up with that interface.

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