Phoenix Point is a solid game, but there are definitely a few things that are either underpowered, overpowered, imbalanced, or in need of bug fixes. Here’s a list of things I’ve come up with and some suggestions on how to change them. I’m sure a few of them have already been noted by the devs, but I’ll still be listing them.
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The Ancient Weapons are extremely strong and satisfying to use, don’t get me wrong, but they’re honestly too much. While I don’t think nerfing their damage, range or other parameters is necessary, I do think they should not have unlimited ammo. Changing the weapons to require exotic ammo would help curb them a bit by removing one of their key advantages: the fact that they save on backpack space. Make it so the ammo costs Antediluvian materials to create (not too much, but something like the Rebuke should need Mutane gas to forge its ammo) and it’ll keep them from being 100% beat-all when compared to the weapons made by the other factions.
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Rapid Clearance is definitely in need of a rework. It feels like cheating when you have an Assault/Heavy equipped with a Mattock, the Synedrion Mech Torso and Anu Agile Legs, and send them into a cluster of enemies, oneshotting them and getting 2 AP for the 1 AP you spent attacking them. I’ve had such a soldier sweep through over 10 kills in a single turn when attacking a Pandoran Nest; it’s kinda insane. Even if it takes a while to get a soldier who can do this, it still feels broken. To address this, Rapid Clearance should refund the amount of AP used in a killing blow, not refund 2 AP on every kill regardless of attack type used. This would definitely nerf the Assault/Heavy melee build and some explosives builds, but it would be a buff for heavy weapons and sniper rifles. Either that or Rapid Clearance needs a cap on how many times it can refund AP per usage (i.e. up to 5 times per turn).
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The Infiltrator’s Sneak Attack perk should have its effect reduced for explosive weapons. I’ve been using an Infiltrator/Heavy combo with a Rebuke, augmented with the Synedrion Head and Anu Shadow Legs for improvements to Stealth. This build lets me bombard enemies from long range and do insane amounts of damage, while using Vanish if my artillery soldiers are spotted. It’s kinda insane how much damage they can do. Reducing the effectiveness of Sneak Attack on explosive weapons could help rein in such terrifying power.
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The New Jericho Archangel RL-1 rocket launcher is an oddball, likely due to improperly-coded stats. It presently deals Blast damage, but without a blast radius, and has a 168 effective range. I’m guessing it was meant to have a blast radius of 1 and an effective range of 68, but someone goofed it up. I know this one has been cited before, but the devs haven’t gotten around to fixing it. Sure, having a sniper-like rocket launcher is kinda nifty, but I doubt that was the intent.
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EMP Grenades, even when used against the Pure, are pretty weak. 60 damage alone is bad, and it doesn’t even deal limb damage. Add on that it only works against mechanical enemies, and there’s no real reason to make EMP Grenades.
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Speaking of The Pure, the mission “The Bionic Fortress” is very underwhelming. The map is very easy to beat by mid-game, with the only threat being those pesky Spider Drones, but the fact that you don’t even fight Subject 24 and the fact that the facility doesn’t even look like much of a “fortress” makes the showdown with The Pure really anticlimactic. I would love to see the devs remake the mission, maybe taking notes from XCOM: Enemy Within and the assault on EXALT’s headquarters in that game.
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Repair Kits are just too expensive. They cost almost as much as an augmentation itself, even if they can restore its functionality mid-fight. I personally just use a Technician with Field Medic and repair the augment after the mission rather than use Repair Kits. If Repair Kits were cheaper, I think they’d be a lot more worthwhile.
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Scyllas need to be more resistant to psionic attacks, viral damage, and other forms of disables. It’s really easy to disable one if you have a soldier with Biochemist and a rapid-fire weapon to drain its WP after you shred its armor. I’d change them so that they have a passive that lets them resist effects that drain their WP as long as their head is not crippled. If you cripple their head, however, you can then use stuff like Induce Panic, Neural Disruption, Mind Control, and so forth. This would make it so those options aren’t completely taken away, but the player has to put in more effort to get them to work.
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The Adrenaline Rush ability doesn’t state in its tooltip that it imposes a severe accuracy penalty while active. I found this out the hard way while trying a Sniper/Berserker combo with Strongman. Adding that bit to the tooltip would be a nice quality-of-life fix.
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The Anu Perceptor Head, while neat, needs to do more than just provide stats. Perception isn’t that hard to build on a character, and you sadly can’t pair the Perceptor Head with things like the Motion Sensor or Mist Repeller accessories. It’d be nice if the Perceptor Head had a special feature to it, rather than just being a stat-stick.
I’ll add more if I think of it, but this is a good start.