Yes, it was FTS on the Panda side. It makes the game unfair.
Both: the bomb chiron and the skill BOOM BLAST (2 indirect shots with extreme range) are clearly OP.
I personally think that it’s great. Hard is good. If one continuously go around butchering the enemy then there’s no challenge. Then the DDA kicks in. I watched the video and noticed the player seemed a bit overwhelmed with the game. So perhaps he should have been playing on an easier level, not on Hero?
A artillery unit that lobs grenades all over the map at you before you can even spot it will make a lot of people rage quit. There is a reason why Firaxis never does such kind of enemies.
I must say I have a lot of issues with Chirons.
Now, I do like how they force players to seek cover in the buildings - which usually I would not do. However, an acid or explosive Chiron can pretty much wipe a party with a lucky shot before player has a chance to react. I don’t think that’s good, or fair or fun. I am also not 100% clear as to when they can see me and when they can’t. I hear it’s all about spotters, but sometimes Pandas are in my LoS and Chirons are not firing. And sometimes on Panda runs into view, and all hell breaks loose from Chirons all over the map
I had two thoughts going on regarding how to address it:
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Do not allow Chirons to aim and fire on the same turn - let’s make it like Archon’s Blazing Pinions from FiraXCOM2 - Archon sets an area on which he fires, but fires at the start of their following turn - they can set up another barrage later on the same turn. That way it pushes players to move (or not care if its worm Chiron), but doesn’t wipe the team without a warning. Player has a choice between standing his ground or moving out.
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Lets have Chirons act first on enemy turn - if it’s all about spotters, then it’s frustrating to have someone pop up and then get wiped by Chirons. The idea would be, so Chirons would make a move first on enemy turn - if there is no panda in your sight when you end turn, Chirons won’t be able to rain death upon you. However, if you leave panda standing with knowledge of where you are, you are a fair game.
The goal of both ideas would be to allow players to react before coming under fire from the other side of the map.
Edit: Posted those suggestions on canny:
https://phoenixpoint.canny.io/feedback/p/less-infuriating-chirons
I suppose you mean “Don’t let…”
I’m more for option 1, as setting predefined order on enemy isn’t quite fair, as we as a player would act differently - we can spot with one soldier and rain death with another in the same turn.
But still even more than your option 1 I would prefer to nerf Chirons:
- remove bug which multiplies damage done with explosive/acid attacks (because now even if you should be able to survive such attack, bug makes it impossible
- a) lower damage per projectile OR b) lower number of projectiles OR c) make projectiles area of effect not overlap with each other for example by lowering blast radius. Where I prefer option b). Overall idea is to prevent multiple strong hits at the same human sized target (because it works similarly to the bug mentioned in first bullet point).
This is an excellent video, thx for posting it.
The player does exactly all the wrong things. This is not an FTS by the Pandas, and there is nothing unfair about what happens to the player, IMHO.
First, he starts out in an open space in the bottom center of the map. That doesn’t seem to bother him at all. Good spot as any, right?
Second, it’s a night mission. Night mission means perception is halved - it’s harder to spot enemies, and harder to be spotted by them. What’s the point of running about with a unit with low stealth and low perception? He is not going to spot anything that ain’t going to spot him first, which is exactly what happens.
Third, once he spots the Chiron, his reaction is, “oh frag! Well, let’s see what it does to me”. Of course, he doesn’t check what this particular Chiron does. Does it have stability stance? Why not find out on its turn! It doesn’t even occur to him to look for cover, or at least to spread his squad around. Instead, let’s take a potshot with the sniper at an Arthron because… why not? So for the dubious advantage of shooting off the arm of an Arthron that doesn’t pose any immediate danger, he reveals the position of his squad (yes, his squad, because this particular Frederick Zoller is standing in the middle it).
What happens on the Pandoran turn is entirely predictable, given that the player decided not only that an open space in range of a Chiron is a perfect spot to camp, but also to reveal its position to said Chiron by shooting an unsilenced weapon.
Right, Chirons are not fun, let’s nerf them. Let’s make it so that no matter how absurd the decisions of the player, the AI can’t stand a chance against him.
Lol I had to click the link, because I posted even without checking video.
- Guy sends squad tired to the battle. That is first mistake.
- He spots that Chiron with his first soldier. And he decides to stay in the open with the rest of the team when he clearly could go and hide in the buidling in front of him. That was his doom.
That wasn’t really the problem because Arthrons still haven’t spot him after that shot (He plays with mod showing if soldiers are revealed). But eventually one of those Arthrons and Triton would spot him there even without that shot.
I suppose player was tired. But if not then I would not want to watch such “streamer”, because he doesn’t know how to play.
I wonder what would have happened if it didn’t hit a squad of dudes in sniper gear, the impact of the first volly is actually quite marginal, a few crippled arms but the damage is manageable…nor was a surprised he got hit out there in the open.
the second volly that kills the sniper hiding around the building corner I have to agree with a few of his comments, notably the very awkward angle the shots would have to take to get there. and I do think that a rocket or grenade would have smacked into the building rather then lob over it.
the vision system comments are something that I disagree with based on my understanding of it…but I could be wrong. to my knowledge, if you are spotted at the beginning or during of your turn, the enemy will know your position until the start of your next turn…even if you break LOS during your turn.
Lol, I didn’t even notice because I watched the video on cellphone…
The Arthrons don’t spot him, but the sound made by the weapon is a valid target for Chiron’s indirect fire.
It can go like that. Blast radius got that sniper.
It is even longer. If they spot you then they see you at least for 2 turns. I think that third turn is the one which resets your “reveal” status.
Damn, you are right. 
But still Arthron and Triton spot his soldiers in their turn.
How can a Chiron with 2 disabled legs go into a stability stance? I had one that did just that and launched a 5 salvo of bombs on target.
I think it needs a setup phase. Those kind of abilities are actually much better designed in Firaxcom.
Also, the bug where projectiles vanish at the edge of the map needs to be fixed. 
The guy makes a lot of mistakes that could have avoided this.
Bomb and acid chirons are still an incredibly dumb enemy.
The end.
There’s also the usual arguments here that because there are certain things the player can do/avoid to beat the chiron, it therefore makes it a fun or satisfying gameplay experience to do so.
Not true.
This. I think I figured out how to effectively deal with them, but I just don’t find them any fun to fight against.
Last campaign, Derleth, I didn’t find a single Acid Chiron, RNG? Idk
Danforth, mid game, the same
That is the stability stance - it can’t move, enter stability stance and shoot on the same turn. A setup phase like in Firaxis Xcom would just mean you would have another turn to take out the Chiron before it could do anything.
I strongly disagree. What happened in Firaxcom is that getting caught by the enemy artillery was so destructive that the player was supposed to disable it first. This is not necessarily the case in Phoenix Point.
For example, in the video, had the soldiers being wearing heavy, or just medium armor, it’s unlikely that they would have been crippled. Also, the Chirons have very limited ammo - 12 projectiles. That’s 2 salvos with stability stance. And, unlike in Firaxcom, they are not guaranteed to hit their targets.
To all those players who find Chirons OP, I recommend MCing them at some opportunity to see how limited they actually are (MCing them is easy - disable the unarmored head and they are reduced to 10WPs).
I think that’s pretty hard to fix, actually. Maybe have the AI correct the aiming for targets at the edge of the map? Probably not easy either.
The stability stance is optional and gives a bonus to projectiles. It still can shoot on every turn.
What I meant is the setup phase with an indicator for where a potentially game ending ability would strike. I do not propose how exactly something like that is implemented. It simply cannot be that your game can end on turn one before you even see the enemy. Simply nerfing chiron projectiles is clearly not the way, we do like dangerous abilities.
How exactly would that be hard to fix ? Projectiles just need to not vanish. Do you know any limiting factor about the engine that we don’t ? If that is so, then projectiles could still explode when hitting the “force field”.
It seems everything in this game is hard to fix, the camera tracking, ironman, soldier customisation being saved, acid damage values…