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Discussions Rules and Guidelines
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There are no political elements to consider. On a strategic level it's all about how you allocate your time to ensure that you have enough well equipped heroes to meet any threat you might encounter. On a tactical level (i.e. individual combat missions) Massive Chalice is similar to XCOM except that there are fewer enemy types, but all of them have more meaningful variation.
That being said, I do love game, but it's important to know what to expect.
However the turn-based battles in this game have 1/10th the depth of XCOM, and political systems + character management have 1/99899989794599949849th the depth of Crusader Kings.
Save your money OP.
Yet another Double Fine mini-game with the potential to be something worth while that got pissed away.
It is a turn based game which is all that it has in common with XCOM. This has about as much similarities to Crusader Kings 2 as Call of Duty. Nothing remotely in that category here.
Would have made a terrific game, even with the state of the game.
Instead it is.. worst of both world.
While the game has some merits, it was made sadly by listening to the wrong crowd.
Endgame, it just a product I have in my liberary and won´t ever play.
Not a big lost to me, but it seems they can´t make anything FUN anymore.
Instead they make everything .. well annoyingly boring.
Same here.
But of course they already have the money. They dont care. The best we can do is hopefully prevent others, like OP and ourselves, being mislead.
The game may still be fun for people moving forward from Angry Birds or Total War Battles and such. Too simplistic and shallow for anyone else.
While I definitely agree that Massive Chalice could use some more strategic depth, I do take issue with the complaint that it is simplistic and shallow compared to XCOM. The issue of balancing your research is sort of fascinating after the first required keep construction. Ditto for how you cultivate your bloodlines and balancing the placement of keeps on your border vs interior.
Border keeps can fall under attack and are more likely to be destroyed by corruption, but keep attacks let you level up your regents which normally isn't possible AND sometimes take the place of normal attacks. Plus border territories give additional bonuses. This produces a meaningful choice.
Most pieces of equipment aren't worth researching, and since special weapons can't become relics they're now a bit of a joke thanks to weapon training, but balancing your armor and weapon training research is fascinating. Ditto for how to fill your sagewright's guild and standards.
Depth doesn't come from having more choices. It comes from having more meaningful choices, and on that count Massive Chalice might actually beat out the new XCOM, and it certainly beats out the original that ended up with so few meaningful choices by the end that it became a joke.
Hahha somebody has high dreams. this game beating the new XCOM.
When the new XCOM has more sandbox features then any other TBS game.
You think one path is the way only for XCOM.
Problem isn´t choices it is freedom to make those choices.
That is why CK2 and XCOM are cult legends.
Cause the learning curve isn´t forced, it is up to players to find out.
Dreams? I put out one of the first XCOM mods when they released their demo. I played it enough to remember almost all of the maps before I got bored, and the game's basic build orders. While I adore XCOM the new XCOM the game lacks much strategic depth because your goal will always be to rush satellites early since satellite coverage wins the game.
The longwar expansion did change this, but I ended up finding it tedious and wasn't a fan of a dozen extra pointless guns and grenades dealing variable damage. Right now I have around 60 hours clock in Massive Chalice compared to 130 in XCOM, and I say with all honesty that on a tactical level XCOM wins out slightly (the expansion actually reduced the depth thanks to memetic skin), but on a strategic level Massive Chalice actual has more depth thanks to their training mechanisms which force a far more varied play style than XCOM's rush satellites and win.
My objection to Xenonauts is that like the original XCOM is largely tries to fake depth by having a massive number of options. The original XCOM had 10 conventional weapons, 3 laser weapons and 6 alien weapons. Of these there was only a point to using 6 human weapons, 1 laser weapon and 4 alien weapons. This list is cut down further by direct replacements which drops it to at most 6 weapon choices to make at a time. Having high explosives or an alien grenade is mandatory for all soldiers without a rocket launcher or blaster bomb so this falls to 5.
In most scenarios you're actually better off using a rocket or blaster tank. It should also be noted that the efficiency of rockets rapidly falls off after two launchers are present on the field. So an optimum configuration will always be 2 to 3 rockets plus additional weapons. Since it is possible to bring more than a dozen soldiers to the field this configuration need never change. So through the sheer number of options, a single choice optimum choice has emerged, and this will never change.
That's the problem with giving too many choices and decision points. Ultimately you end up with a single optimum configuration, and all hope for depth is lost.
Now lets compare the new XCOM. You don't pick weapons, you pick classes and since you have 4 classes with at most 6 slots that means you can pick one of each, but you are limited regarding depth. You run the risk of not being allowed to bring an asset on the field due to damage. So every time a mission launches in the new XCOM you are presented with a fascinating series of choices, and that's before we even get into the issue of how you want to distribute experience across your soldiers.
Massive Chalice one ups this since each of your soldiers has a finite life expectancy so now you can't rely on the same team ratios being available from mission to mission because your troops will die off naturally, and because of how breeding cycles work you may not have a certain class at all. You also have to cope with 9 class options with a limited about to select for class despite only having four slots per mission. So there is never a scenario where you can bring all of your options to bear at once.
That's why I say that Massive Chalice has more strategic depth than XCOM. On the tactical level the two are rather similar, but flanking and ranging in XCOM make it a bit more complex despite the fact that every unit in Massive Chalice has a special while in XCOM it's closer to the 50% mark.
That isn't to say that Massive Chalice doesn't have issues on both a tactical and strategic layer. The slot restrictions and research time restrictions ensure that a large number of items aren't worth pursuing for example.
As such everything except healing potions, wunderpants and one additional secondary item depending on your hero's traits can pretty much be ignored. Some of these are never worth it, like the vitaband which will lose in terms of hitpoints provided to healing potions almost every time doubly so because potions can grant heroes health when they level in combat.
I am sorry to say but those choices are optimum only for you, since you seem to prefer a limited way of playing, (no wonder you defend this game). I have played XCOM in every difficulty with every possible combination of soldiers and enjoyed all of them. Soldiers die and get injured in XCOM as well. Available traits, and soldier stats can be randomized. You find XCOM limited because you choose to make it so.
XCOM can be played in a natural and realistic way (provided its turn based) both in a strategic and tactical level. Massive Chalice however always feels gamey, like a bad board game, full of forced limitations and abstractions. XCOM is by no means the greatest turn based tactics game ever made, far from it. But its still 10 times better than Massive Chalice.