What are the unwritten rules for Survivors?
I'd like to hear what everyone has to say about unwritten rules and honour codes that exist in DBD, just because I think it's an interesting topic to explore.
Killers - are there any unwritten rules around sportsmanship or a type of honour code that you expect survivors to follow, or that you consider toxic behaviour (for example, no bodyblocking, no flashlight blinding, no teabagging at the gates, etc.)? Do you follow the same rules when (if) you play survivor?
Survivors - similarly, are there any rules of sportsmanship that you impose on yourself while playing (such as no teabagging) or that you expect other survivors to follow (for example, don't leave teammates behind on the hook)? Is there any survivor behaviour that you would consider 'toxic'?
Full disclosure: I'm a design student, and I've decided to centre my Honours project around the DBD community. Insights gained from this discussion may be used to inform my practice (although I won't include any identifying information, like usernames, if that does end up happening).
Comments
You hate to see it
Back in 2018 I use to play to just double hook everyone, then let everyone escape. Going easy on bad survivors does more harm then good, as it boosts them to a rank where they don't belong. Therefore they'll continue to be into put to matches where they are out of their depth, which will have a negative affect on their enjoyment. As well as impacting the enjoyment of their fellow survivors.
Code of Honour as a Survivor:
I do not BM (T -bagging, spamming my flashlight, pointing etc) unless the killer camps, tunnels, brings a mori, or has NOED. Although I'll sometimes chain blind if I make a flash light save.
I avoid looping infinities
I never use a key.
Despite being a Jake main, I do not participate in Sabbo builds.
I never bring a Haddonfield or a Ormund offering.
I always say good game after the game.
Code of Honour as a killer:
From the start of the game I'll try and play as fair as possible I don't camp or tunnel.
I do not bring a Mori unless the survivors as a key or I see a survivor who I know to be toxic post game.
Unless I'm playing Leatherface I don't use the perk NOED
Although if I go against a toxic SWF group or a sabbo squad, I'll finish the game by letting them bleed out. Giving them a chance to think about their behaviour/actions.
Have a picture of dan avidan from the musical group ninja sex party open on a separate monitor at all times.
First of all, thank you for all the comments - it's been a huge help. I've finally had time to go through them all, and I have some clarifying questions for some people. Some of these may sound rather pedantic, but I'm genuinely just trying to understand your ideas better.
Which second chance perks specifically do you avoid as survivor? Why do you assume that Nancys and Bills in particular are likely to be a detriment to the team?
You say that you like to do totems as survivor if the gens are going too fast. Is that a tactical move in case of NOED (since if gens are getting done fast, it's likely no one else has bothered with totems), or a kindness to the killer, or a combination of both?
You teabag killers who camped and tunnelled, but don't want survivors to teabag you if you had a bad game. What if a killer camped and/or tunnelled because they were struggling? Do you consider it acceptable as a killer for a survivor to teabag you if you camped or tunnelled them? (I'm not attacking or judging you, just trying to understand your point of view.)
Can you elaborate on what you mean about being toxic with perks? Are there particular perks that you will never use, or that you will only use in specific scenarios?
What would you define as "abusing" DS?
Do you ever use killers that have an insta-down built into their power? If so, do you use that power?
By "farmers", do you mean survivors who rescue teammates near you, or survivors who are trying to farm for bloodpoints?
If you don't use the Tombstone Piece, does that mean you also won't use Judith's Tombstone, or is that an exception for some reason?
What do you consider "accepting" a boop? Do you let the survivor escape, or do you only let them live until you see them again?
Do your survivor rules apply only to yourself as a survivor, or are those expectations that you have of the survivors when you play killer as well?
Do your survivor rules apply equally to other survivors, or are they purely self-imposed?
Do you avoid Haddonfield and Ormond offerings out of respect for the killer, or because you personally just don't like playing on those maps?
DS is the big one. If you use it properly then fine, but jumping into a locker or forcing the killer too grab you because you intentionally made a mistake is toxic IMO. Another one is a Sabo + No Mither team, It's completely unfair for the killer since he has no counterplay other then going too the basement every hook, which may not be possible. Object of Obsession in SWF is toxic IMO because you only need 1 person too have it too completely ruin your killer game. Mindgaming is impossible with one so you end up just tunneling that one person while the rest do gens, so you loose either way.
Hope this will clarify what I meant, sorry for the confusion.
No worries at all, thank you for taking the time to clarify 😊
I can't read
Without my reading classes 😎
My Survivor rules are largely self-imposed since I don't have any way to communicate them to others. It would be nice if other Survivors followed them, and the game would probably be in a better place community-wise, but I don't get my hopes up for it.
Hope this answers the question, since I know my explanations often make things even more confusing.
By farmers, I mean teammates that 'farm' you. You know, pull you off the hook right in front of the killer and/or immediately stealth/SB away. Bonus points if the killer chases them there or if I literally just got hooked. If I go down, that is 100% my teammates fault. Don't care if they had BT, if the killer commits to me that's still on my teammate. That includes me getting facecamped pre-endgame: don't reward facecampers. Do gens. You are creating positive reinforcement for that playstyle. That's a terrible, terrible thing to do.
Judith's Tombstone is a massive debuff. The stalk amount alone is enormous, not including the speed debuff. Tombstone Piece, however, is a reusable ivory mori. You just pop T3 (it doesn't take that long, and you can shorten it with other add-ons), kill someone, and now it's a 3v1 against a 16 (let's be honest here, 8) meter terror radius m1 killer. AND YOU CAN DO IT AGAIN. I don't like that add-on.
If survivor boops me, I chill. At least they have a sense of humour. I might let them go, I might let everyone go, maybe I'll meme, maybe I'll give them this 1 free outs and come back later. It's so rare these days, people just want to rush gens and leave (which is fair, don't get me wrong, that's literally the aim of the game). I just don't really want to go full sweat against someone that boops.
And generally speaking, if survivors don't stick to those rules (keys, DS abuse, immortality combo (DS/Unbreakable), ultra non-meming BM) I don't stick to mine. I see a key, I'm sorry if it's green. I see OoO, I'm sorry if you were solo. I get an undeserved DS... I'm not sorry. I don't Mori key holders or anything like that, but I also don't play nice with people playing dirty. Better to ask forgiveness from decent people than give arseholes an even easier game. I've been on the recieving end of a killer scared of OoO, keys, or a team full of Immortality Combo. I get it. I really do. It is not fair playing nice with underhanded people. And the best part is the sheer number of dirty players (killer and survivor) that complain about the filth the other side sling at them after they themselves cast the first... Well, heaping pile of filthy, dirty plays.
TLDR: Farming is unhooking in the killers face, Tombstone Piece requires the same effort as an ivory mori, Boop Transaction is complicated but generally I just like memer's, and if someone does me a dirty they cannot complain when I return the favour.
Survivor Perks I regard as "second chance" would be Sprint Burst, Dead Hard, Adrenaline, Decisive Strike, and Unbreakable. To a certain extent, I also include Head On in this list, but I actually enjoy using that Perk, so I can't help but throw it on every once in a while.
As for the Bill/Nancy thing, it's simply because I've never seen a smart Bill or Nancy, either as Survivor or Killer. Bills are the kind of person to last for less than twenty seconds in a chase and still somehow manage to burn a third of the pallets on the map, and Nancies are too greedy with their pallets and REALLY love to overuse Fixated thinking they're the most immersed gamers alive.
Very much so, thank you!
What do I define as abusing DS? Well, I tend to stick with the common consensus of it as in doing REALLY stupid actions in a killer's face because you have DS active. This includes unhooking in my face, blatantly working on a generator or even something more subtle like teabagging at me when I found you healing someone.
Basically acting like you have immunity to the killer because of a mildly inconvenient 5 second stun. Most killer's DON'T run Obsession perks, and half of them are negative to you.
On both sides my unsaid rules evolve from the thought of it’s a Game that five individuals are playing to entertain each other and themselves. With this said:
as killer: same as prior. I don’t tunnel or camp. Also I do not particularly get frustrated with any perk. High rank killer might be more of a frustration but up to lvl five it’s relatively easy to get bp and rank up. May get heat for it but killing everyone as quick as possible, making it entertaining and promoting team work as well as getting as much bp as possible is what the game requires of the killer. Tunneling and camping is for individuals that have the four kills equals win equals fun critters.
for survivor- I only teabag to say hi or thank you to other survivors.
Don’t hide all match. Expect a turn on the killer. If everyone is trying and not potatoing and three players are double hooked and you haven’t been chased really...######### you need to step up. It’s your turn. It makes it a team effort and you’ve enjoyed your teammates run the killer six times while you do gens carefree. Its your turn.
Survivors that I know are good enough to know better that bring killer to gens or to players healing. I’ve only noticed much more recently since I now use aftercare with most builds..and then some b line it to me knowing they’ll lose the killer.
Looping around the hooked individual. You could be the best looper and wanna show off but gtfo and so it somewhere else.
If you don’t want to be healed under hook. Don’t run to where you want to be healed...it just delays the inevitable due to the scratch makes but we could have started healing 6 seconds ago. Walk #########, walk
Any survivor going into second phase On first hook without being severely camped is just as much your fault as it is the other two teammates. If this happens that player will be enraged honestly and should be.
Over all I don’t run DS, so I find BBQ and chili is the most toxic perk in the game and it is run by 90 percent of killers. It is too strong to have the bp component attached...the bp component is every killers excuse for using it. You may find that comment more survivor main’ish. No perk had such an effect on survivor gameplay as that perk.
Thanks for the response! Are those all rules that you would expect other survivors to follow, or just ones that you follow yourself?
There are more. From your original question you can see where my philosophy on game play arises. All five players are supposed to have fun. If you as killer are being over oppressive 3 survivors will leave the game with less than 8k points and salt to be a selfish survivor next round. I like to leave as killer with opposing survivors getting roughly at least 15k. It gives less experienced players time to learn, and more experienced players to to interact and have fun trying to help each other.
survivor side other than stated prior it’s not about just completing gens or escaping only. Any behavior that does not promote cooperative play to escape with as many of your survivors as possible. Farming a player or unhooking close to killer with minimal chance of healing and with no intention of keeping asking a protection hit is not conducive with you trying to escape with your fellow survivor. You’re getting unhook points, and leaving the player to be easily downed thereby less likely to be chased yourself. So the farming aspect in that regard is selfish. You can unhook quickly but have a build to do so. Bt, MoM or we’re gunna make it...or inner strength to heal easily after taking a protection hit.
Using pallets can be tricky. It takes awhile to become accustomed to not using certain pallets. I’d say a few month before the “oh crap the killers in me” , so I don’t follow the “you used a particular pallet” so imma sabotage my team. Have any of these survivors stated to one of these other survivors to not use god pallets early? If so it was probably in a derogatory way.
If you know “NOED” is not on the board. Make a play for the save regardless of skill level. You gotta try. You’ll feel better for it. If the team gen rushed and NOED is in play with a player hooked an no one looking for it...it’s probably the only bye gurl bye scenario.
oh. If someone is creep walking...don’t just run by them if you’re not in chase and have no where to go immediately. People have different play styles and creep style is ok but not if you lead the killer with track marks right to them Mwahaa
To answer your question, those are the rules I feel apply to the average player to keep the game ongoing. Once you have too many games with more non team player survivors and tunneling/camping killers it turns you off from the game. I really enjoy dbd....so I Utilize my own personal gameplay rules that perpetuate other players in having a positive experience. Thereby doing my part to maintain a healthy player population. Apologies for long posts
I have my personal code of conduct that I don't expect others to follow but I couldn't play the game without.
-I try not to leave a man behind unless it is impossible to find NOED or a Billy, Bubba, and now a spamming Doc is face-camping. I run a totem finding build most of the time so it isn't a problem.
-I don't teabag or taunt killers. I think it is childish and unnecessary. I have however, tbagged at the gate twice in this game (nearly a year ago), but that is after a killer was being very toxic, I usually just let toxic behavior go.
-I'm opening the gate. Other people 99ing the gate and leaving it, has gotten be killed more than bloodwarden.
-Doing a gen. I prioritize gens over healing unless there are 3 of us and it could be done quickly or I have a healing build. Also, if I know you are on death hook.
-I deliberately get the attention of the killer if my teammates are on death hook and I am not.
-I don't run the killer toward hooked survivors and if the killer spots me when going for a save, unless you are close to struggle state, I won't try and save you. BT is not part of my normal build.
-If I get taken to the basement once the gates are open against a camping killer, I'm giving up on hook. Better to take the L than the whole team down with me.
-Never insta-save, except against a Demo who left a b*tthole. Instantly saving someone can get them killed. 1.) Killer has not had time to leave properly unless it is Billy, Demo, Freddy or Spirit. 2.) You could have gotten 15 more seconds or so out of a gen before running across the map. Even if I'm close, I'll wait a bit until killer has put distance between the hook. Unfortunately, with solo queue teammates, even at red ranks, they dive bomb the hook.
How did Sprint Burst make the list and not Lithe or Balanced Landing?
Because Sprint Burst can be used whenever you’d like, and as such, most Survivors use it as a brain dead panic button whenever the Killer has rightfully closed the distance on them. Lithe and BL can definitely be used as a second chance, but in order to be used effectively it takes a good deal more decent pathing and forethought than SB or DH.
As a survivor, don't be a dick to the killer. I sometimes give myself as a sacrifice to a killer who was obviously matched with people well outside their skill level, just so they get at least one kill. I also berate survivors who're toxic to killers in the chat.
I wouldn't say a kindness as much as it is a means of slowing the game down a little. I don't like rushing out the gates. Though I don't imagine the killer likes it much either. I don't worry about NoED too much unless the killer's playing a certain way. Some killers, you just know probably have NoED from the way they play.
If a Killer's really struggling, and camping and tunneling hasn't been their gameplan all along, then I don't teabag. (I always run Kindred, so I usually know a Killer's habits when it comes to hooks. Its saved my life a number of times) Personally, I don't camp most of the time. And I try my best not to tunnel. I don't find it necessary to get ONE kill every game. If I get a kill, fine. If I don't, also fine. Survivors might've just been better than me. If I do camp and/or tunnel you, then feel free to teabag me. You've earned it.