Persistent serious bugs

All to true below. Thanks MadS. You saved me from making another tedious pointing out the User Errors post. :wink:

  1. Agreed 100% Especially if behind half cover with a Heavy, who practically needs total unobstructed LOS to a target, in order to hit it. :open_mouth:
  2. Defensive Melee Attacks are something I’d like to see added as a Proximity Triggered Event in game. This could be added as a Free Attack Perk, giving the character a chance to Bash an enemy that runs next to your soldier. Like rifle-butt-stroking maybe?
  3. Can Phoenix Point stand improvemnet? What game ever released, could not stand Improvements, in the eyes of the End User?

Ahh, this one is easy to explain. Return Fire does not work, if you are in Over Watch mode. :open_mouth:

Over Watch Cones are a thing with me as well. But not why they don’t activate. My issue with it, is Why is that activation zone so darn short? Especially for HMG’s, and Sniper Rifles? In a Real Life sense, I find it curiously refreshing to see a game have characters shooting in OW, but hitting obstacles in the path of the target. Frustrating? Sure it can be. But you learn from your mistakes, or just wade through the mire and repeat them again, and again, etc.

1 Like

Depends also on perception (but full and not half like RF) and so also if it is a night mission. Strongman gives OW a very short range because of its -20 perception. Farsight (+10 perception) helps a bit but not that much especially for snipers with Strongman.

Don’t skill Strongman on Snipers if you like to use long range overwatch with them :wink:

1 Like

Perhaps cover icon should be replaced with stance icon to properly communicate what it is. The game doesn’t have a “cover” per se, neither it should pretend to have one and confuse players. Show it as what it is - stance of soldier when next to it.

2 Likes

Perhaps it should simply not display anything and also not automatically crouch down when the soldiers stop moving next to low cover. Instead, introduce that you can and must choose it by yourself: standing, crouching and additionally lying down.
Then also take out the automatic sidestep from high cover so that you have to do it yourself and the education for self-guided movement management is done.

Do not take this too serious, but sometimes I wish they would copy more from old and IMO not that bad game mechanics. :wink:

3 Likes

Nah, some things need to evolve. This one is clear for me: if they do this, you won’t have overwatch from a corner anymore (assuming it did always work…). I know you were kinda joking though.

1 Like

Just a little, actually it would be interesting how it would play then. Sure, OW from high cover would then no longer go, but only in the direct direction of cover. I once took pictures*** of it (high rock as high cover), your line of fire goes up to around 45 °, up then you have a full field of fire, depending on what kind of cover there is in front of you (a tree offers smaller angles, a wall rather higher to shoot). On the other hand, such a high coverage in PP is also a high protection in the opposite direction with the same angles, straight ahead to 100% (apart from the fact that something shoots through the cover) and not just an accuracy reduction in the chance of hit (as in FXCom).
So, if you stand behind high cover like the big rocks, trees or walls, then you can already overwatch anything in diagonal direction to a certain degree. If the enemy wants to hit you, he has to go in your overwatch.

Edit***:
I found my post where I took some screenshots from the view of a potential enemy that aims at one behind a big rock as high cover:

The evolution I see here is a mechanic to enable a soldier to peek/shoot through a corner, or a window, etc. Firaxcoms enabled that while using the percentage to hit mechanic, so there was that.

PP uses a more realistic approach and thus higher cover could really mean better protection, which is better in my opinion. Also as you can control the overwatch cone, angle, etc, it also has it’s own trade-off: do you overwatch in a 90 degree angle where, let’s suppose, the enemy is behind cover too, or you set the cone in an angle that’ll only trigger if the enemy leaves cover? I think it’s a really good system. The only part that’s not good is that the cover mechanic doesn’t always work.

Sure, it is not bad, but maybe it can improve? Leaning mechanics/animations would be for sure better than this, in my opinion, stupid step one tile to the side, shot and step back. This is also a reason why OW and return fire are so devastating when you shot from high cover.

PS: I found the thread with my pics about cover in PP, see my edit in the previous post.

Make sense to me. But the missions, whether in Day or Night, have the same Cone Range Distance in the play I’m doing. :open_mouth: I’ll have to count out the tiles tonight to be sure.

If you use the night vision module (“Multi-vision Sensor Module” i guess [I play in German language :wink: ], a Synedrion helmet module) then it is the same whether day or night, but if not then it should be half the distance.
Also the Echo Head bionic augmentations provides night vision.

1 Like

Yes yes, the los bug that some structures and small covers create is the problem, and leaning mechanics are a possible solution.

I took the time to read your post on the other topic and all the replies below it. Reading from an outside (of the argument there) perspective, I think I understood the guy’s grievance. What he wanted were those leaning mechanics, and I agree that it would be a great addition to PP. I also found it very nice of you to take the time for the screenshots, I would never do that :joy:

1 Like

Honestly, I also understood him, but these “there is no cover system in PP” and “low cover is better than high cover” has driven me mad :wink:

1 Like

I seem to remember that for purposes of the RF perception check, the stealth stat of the shooter/target was also taken into account (just as with Overwatch) which should make it harder to RF against (most) Tritons.

1 Like

Thanks, but I know all of these things about RF. I’m taking about when an assault with good perception with a totally clear shot fails to return fire at an arthron just tiles away. I have this happen with annoying regularity, but then I intentionally use RF as a weapon, so I probably encounter it more.

The LOS problem from behind linear cover, I believe, is due to the fact that LOS is determined from the center of the tile. If they’d use the least obstructed tile corner instead, things would work much better.

Tbh, I don’t rely on RF to do anything, so that’s why perhaps I have noticed this. Does this happen in any situation, or is there some sort of pattern to it?

AFAIK the LOS is determined from the shooting position of the currently equipped weapon. So you get one LOS with a pistol and another with a rifle. (and a very different one with a heavy weapon)

You mean if they leaned to change the position of the weapon?

1 Like

I’ve been unable to determine the pattern of RF failure, which is what makes it so frustrating. I never know when it’s going to go off or not.

Are you sure about LOS? For example, all forward LOS is blocked when you’re behind one of those useless trapezoidal pole bases, regardless of weapon. I’m not sure that the lateral position of the weapon is accounted for. Perhaps it’s just vertical position relative to the center of the tile, when it should be relative to a tile corner.

Yeah, that’s the worst… Well, see if you can spot a common thread, I will pay attention to see if I come across this too. You should also F12 it, because I’m not sure that the devs have this on their radar atmo.

I’m sure that LOS is different for each weapon - you can often see when moving that you have LOS to an enemy from a tile with one weapon, but not another, and I’m pretty sure that’s because weapons when shooting are positioned differently.

This can actually be a big deal. You can see it with Destiny III when mounted on a raider heavy armor. Due to a bug, it appears mounted on a foot, and that changes completely how it works vs the proper position over the head.

What happens with the trapezoidal pole bases (former lamp posts, I guess) is that the base is too high, so although they are low cover, for shooting from them they should behave like high cover… There are a couple of annoying assets like that in the game.

Another issue, maybe connected with this one, is the hitboxes, and that unfortunately seems to be a technical limitation - to maintain performance some item hitboxes are slightly bigger than the item itself.

Not only items - some cover/obstacles can be “seen” through at the edges. I mean if you try to aim at an enemy who’s behind something and the reticle still recognizes the enemy’ll be hit and shows how much damage the shot’ll do. I can’t remember a cover example but I do remember this with a destroyed aspida. I could target some enemy parts even though it was completely behind the aspida carcass. Also, the shot didn’t lose any power so it in fact didn’t hit the aspida carcass.

That’s a really minor issue because it’s not really bad, it’s mostly near the object’s edges. I’m just pointing out that not all hitboxes are perfect as Voland said.

I’ve also seen the different los from different weapons multiple times. I’m not sure it’s because los is positioned on the weapon end and that’s what causes the difference though. If the calculation was made with soldiers pointing the gun ahead, there would be no problem with the trapezoidal lamp post for example. I think it may be something related to the weapon’s accuracy… like in with more/less accuracy what’s right in front of you ends up getting its hitbox detected or not.

It’s really no much use trying to guess, besides making this a guessing game :stuck_out_tongue:. Devs know how it goes and could probably fix this easily if it got in their radar.

1 Like

It is because these lamp post are low cover and so the soldier crouches behind it (Edit: i.e. his gun is pretty low). If he would stand than it would be probably no problem.

1 Like

The aiming origin is an interesting question. Like I said, if it were anything other than vertical position along an axis through the tile center, a rifle or pistol should be able to aim past the pole base. Instead, they all point straight along the centerline. The only time this doesn’t appear to happen is when you’re in a position where you can step out.