What kind of Roon Remotes are you trying to control the Core with? Is Roon + RAATServer still added as exceptions to your OSX firewall and any application firewalls you may have (McAFee/Bullguard/Little Snitch/ect.)? You can use these instructions to check the Apple firewall.
Did anything change in between when Roon was able to see the Core vs now? Any updates to router software or such?
You mentioned you used Fing and you were able to see the iPhone, can you confirm if the iPhone had the same IP address subnet as the Core (all numbers were the same except the last 3)?
If you have any multicast options on the router, can you confirm they have been turned on?
Do you by any chance have another PC which you can try installing Roon on? When prompted on the “Choose your Core” screen, can you select the existing MacOS Core and connect properly to it? I wonder if this behavior only affects the iPhone, it will be a good data point to have.