Please explain how Mortar Chiron work

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OK, just finished a lair with a mortar Chiron.
First of all, it shot me as I hadn’t even had a chance to see it. So, great, one of my snipers is down at 10 HP with a bleed and no head. But …

The Chiron was far, the only enemy in the vicinity was a Siren and it had spotted my Berserker (since it is the only one to not be stealthy with only 0%, the rest being at least 25%). And he wasn’t even the target for the bombs.
I checked on my turn, all my infiltrators were still in stealth mode (so nobody saw them, and since they didn’t get a chance to move, nobody eared them either).

And I’m not finished yet. After killing the Siren and an other Arthron that came by (after the bombing), there is nobody around me for at least 20 tiles. I move my team and still nobody around (and I know that because nobody showed in further turns). Chiron bombs one of my infiltrators (still in stealth and nobody at least 20 tiles around).

And the next turn the same happens again.

Come on !!! Such precision is not luck, there is cheat going on.
So please explain how this is possible. The corpses of other Pandorans can ear my soldiers, just like they prevent Marksman from triggering ?

It cost me only medkits for this time, but it’s really annoying that there is no escape.
And Zzzz, being behind a wall didn’t prevent one of my infiltrators from getting bombed.

Really going to sleep p…d tonight. Usually, managing to get through a hard mission with no loss is exhilarating. There I’m absolutely not. Granted it’s “legendary”, but this is not what I call difficult ; it’s plainly unfair …

… unless you provide a damn good explanation on how it could know where my troopers were.

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Pretty sure once they start firing they don’t stop (unless you scare/bother them in melee), regardless of vision. As long as an enemy sees you at any point during their turn, they’ll at least know where you are roughly for their next turn. Whenever it fires at you, I’m assuming it reveals you (at least in a red sound beacon sort of way). So it always know where you are on the following turn every single time, even once losing LOS. Don’t know if this is exactly how it functions, but so far it seems to play it out this way.

I think Line of Sight triggers it. While it can’t reveal you at a large distance, if anything else does and it sees you, it’ll start firing and won’t stop until you disable/kill it.

Just remember there is always at least one Chiron in a lair and to be extremely wary of encountering it in a bad situation. The best bet against the explosive variation is standing near ledges or hiding in those pits at the end of your turn (a surprising amount miss, even with stability stance - but getting unlucky is always possible too I guess - learned this by a Siren trying to take cover from my Scarab/Grenadier).

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I’ve noticed the same thing. Once the mortar Chiron is alerted, it always knows where every soldier is regardless of stealth or LOS. It’s total BS, and one of the few things that makes me genuinely angry.

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Infiltrator’s stealth equipment produces a very fine emission. It is not visible by human eye, but all Chirons on the map are oversensitive to it and try to shutdown the source at whatever it costs them! :roll_eyes: :ghost:

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There could be Triton with double perception spotting you and hiding in the corner of the map. But that is just my guess. Chiron could shoot at that single spotted soldier but due to inaccuracy he hit many of your soldiers. :slightly_smiling_face:

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The only triton I had on this lair didn’t have double perception, and was even farther than the Chiron without a line of sight…
The only spotted unit (berserker) was at least 10 tiles away for the second and third shots.

So basically, the Chiron saw my units moving, although there was noone around.

The soldier shot in the second round had fired twice to kill an Arthron and then dashed so nobody knows where he is now … well, think again…

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There’s some exceptions I noticed:

  • With bombard chiron doing damages not worms or gelee, and you have a cover that is a top cover or an obstacle high enough that can protect, and no soldier/turret/building/civil to shoot at, it stops. In lairs there’s close to no cover allowing it.
  • Panicking give one turn break.
  • Not move make invisible the turn after and not bombard, but I think you also need no los and out of range of vision but this is often true with Chiron. Moreover it works well for some soldiers, I don’t think it works for the full team. Turret are a counter case, and even seem be favored targets.
  • They can flee the battle even if not injured, this is probably only some Chiron and when there’s close to no enemy left.
  • They have a clip so when it is empty they stop bombard.
  • Buildings to defend can be their priority target.

About covers against Chirons with damages or gelee:

  • High wall or structure blocking the trajectory are cover. But in lairs breakable obstacles (there’s ton) don’t work.
  • Roof protect but not hole in roof which break the trajectory rule.
  • Roof borders work despite hole in roof don’t.
  • Glass roof won’t work and they’ll be broken at first shot.
  • Go at border of the map, it’s lame but it work if you have a small obstacle.
  • Caution a splash damage is considered. If the trajectory allow it and you are at a door with roof on top to cover, the chiron can shoot right in front of open door.
  • If Chiron manage roof glasses and can ignore them, they don’t for windows or arcades if glass isn’t broken already.

Caution cover top design is very nasty with many traps. This doesn’t work for worm Chirons.

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Turret is in this case, not invisible soldier, don’t move and your soldier is ignored, move and he makes sounds then Chiron know where he is, invisibility doesn’t help.

But invisible can also broke los so a soldier in Chiron los but invisible and not moving will be ignored, shooting doesn’t matter with Chirons.

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War Cry also gives a one turn break. They can’t shoot with less than 3 AP.
I think 3 shots with Athena also stop the shooting, but I’d rather double-check that.

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Yeah it’s very possible that paralyze can be faster than killing or disabling the part throwing stuff.

For going that close, I’ll add, caution once I had half team with broken weapons because going too close to a Chiron with Earthquake skill, but yeah this skill probably requires 3AP too.

This lead to another point, some Chiron without real close range attack and move close to them, alas it’s only in first parts when I wasn’t mastering enough Chirons to consider that option, later it won’t be an option.

EDIT: Now I wonder, for a Chiron just fleeing the map not injured, it was perhaps a tank (without turrets thanks to a Triton sniper) going closer but not that close yet.

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Chiron was at least 30 tiles away. I seriously doubt that he could ear me moving since his perception is 20 and it would seem that earing is half-perception (or something - having game mechanics that are not explained is annoying).

I can understand the first shot since when the Siren came she triggered overwatch and it probably made some sound blips that the Chiron targeted. But the following turns there was no one to detect my soldiers.

It seems that once they have the sound blip, they keep it even if there is noone in earing range.

If I didn’t have a familly, I’d decompile and take time to find out and explain the inner workings, but I really don’t have the time.
It’s a bloody strategy game. How do you play strategy without knowing all the rules ???

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Don’t search the sounds logic, I tested it too much to not be sure (as much than it’s possible for sure), instead of not believe, try.

Not know the rules, it’s learning curve, test and try and conclude, like in any good tactical or strategy game. It’s not Chess.

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I can understand a learning curve, but when on the same map, a triton gets alerted when I’m at half his perception and an other one I can get closer, I can’t define a logic…

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Quickly looking at the code, it seems that when checking for hearing range, it doesn’t check if the actor is dead. So if you are in hearing range of a dead Panda, you are “located”.

If you are “mounted” (jet jump ?) or “cloaked” (vanish, pain chameleon ?) they can’t hear you.

Then it checks (in 3D) against the hearing range which seems hardcoded to 5.

So I guess that’s a bug, method “private bool ReUpdateHearingImpl(TacticalActorBase fromActor, TacticalActorBase targetActor, bool notifyChange = true)” is not checking if “fromActor” is dead.

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I didn’t get it was about the alert so the start of bombard, on that I don’t have a real explanation. Sorry for the confusion.

But one point is if you don’t move you won’t be detected, except that obviously not all team can not move lol.

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Interesting theory actually.

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So this is unsused code or there are bugs with infiltrator because clearly sneaking doesn’t stop bombard.

100% sure other aliens aren’t the trigger to alert a Chiron, so many case it didn’t along many combats turns.

Im’ less sure about controlling an enemy, I had a feeling it was a strong Chiron alarm, but not 100%.

There’s two points, Chiron alert, and Chiron bombard target.

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In fact, the “actor” status is shared among a “faction”. So if one Panda has “located” you, all have.

  • “cloaked” might be a flag triggered by an ability such as “vanish” or “pain chameleon” during the animation (which explains why you don’t hear the Triton during his movement)
    • I haven’t found where it comes from, must be called by an other DLL
  • “mount” seems to mean that you are inside a vehicule.

This method is called by the “OnActorMoved(TacticalActorBase movedActor)” method, so I’m pretty sure it is used.

The method is called just after “private bool ReUpdateVisibilityTowardsActorImpl(TacticalActorBase fromActor, TacticalActorBase targetActor, bool notifyChange = true)” which checks if the actor is dead.

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No you hear Triton move when they use their Vanish.

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Conditions to alert a Pandoran:

  • shoot at him (even if you miss)
  • target of attack is within “alert radius”
    • unless you are using a “silent” weapon
    • the radius gets bigger each turn
  • if you move in hearing range
  • if you move in line of sight and perception range
  • if they see an ally die
  • at the start of their turn, if they have an alerted ally in the “alert radius”
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