Competitive Potential
There are many competitive games in the world and it would be interesting to have an asymmetrical game like DbD become one. Unfortunately, it does not meet the standard that viewers and skilled challengers expect or deserve. And the reason is that, once players are experienced enough, the game turns on it's head. I'm surprised they don't have Wile E. Coyote as a killer since high level play makes terrifying monsters look like cartoons.
Now, before you rev yourselves up to combat the typical "x is OP, y needs buffs" arguments I've seen in the videos and threads I've gone through, let me stop you. Notice the word potential in the title. This is a very interesting game with a fantastic theme and it could be great. People love horror movies and this game could tap into that. The gameplay, however, is utterly degenerate and lacking in competitive opportunity. What's worse, a game that features classic horror film villains stalking and sacrificing victims plays out at the highest levels as "Punking Serial Killers: The Game". I've watched "tournament" (yeah, I put it in quotations) level play and the way you win is: Which team's killer can stop the most points. It's quite disappointing and not even remotely entertaining (unless you enjoy bullying, then maybe DbD is just a good vacuum to suck the degeneracy and toxicity out of other communities and I'm okay with that).
The great news is that there could be a solution to allow DbD to climb into the spotlight and become a featured competitive and exciting game: Competitive Solo Queue.
"Dude, that's already been suggested." Of course it has, because the honest members of this community recognize that 3rd party voice chat completely obliterates the entire framework of the game. People want to play with their friends and playing as a team can be extremely fun in most games. In DbD, however, the fun is had by clowning on Killers who are utterly neutered by the fact that their 4 opponents have telepathy (in game mechanics terms). It's not intended for people to have as much information as comms provide and it allows them to vanquish the game's odds. Perks intended to alleviate the pressure Killers have as part of the game are ignored because methods outside the game render them nearly or completely worthless.
The solution is simple: Create a solo queue that doesn't display player names (to avoid the almost certain creation of Discord server names), doesn't allow you to queue with others and doesn't reveal players to each other in lobby with a chat. All this game needs is to eliminate 3rd party voice chat and it will have a chance and THEN survivors can really begin to show their skill. Did the killer just reveal a perk to you? Well, the other 3 will have to find that out themselves. Did you just use up a couple pallets near the shack? Well, the other 3 will have to find that out themselves.
There are other things like 99% exhaustion exploits and generator considerations that would make the game more intense and enjoyable too but, before anything inside the game is dealt with, it seems utterly necessary that the developers need to keep things outside the game from disabling it.
Comments
Also, as a competitive gaming fan I realize that people could just attempt to snipe into each others games but, that could be adjusted for server side. And if they can get the community to grow, it will become less and less feasible to have players survivor snipe into teams. More could be done from there as well. The comms-free solo queue model would be used for pro games as well (no gaming pros play DbD that I've seen but, it could develop). Isolating players from their teammates would bring back the suspense and thrill that this genre (both movie and game) should feature.
This game will never be competitive because it's simply too random. The layout of a map can make it a walk in the park for survivors, or they'll lose within 5 minutes because there were no pallets and everywhere you look there is a dead zone. And this also wouldn't work because these survivors would be going all-out sweat with DS, Unbreakable, borrowed time and SB/DH. Unless you're a good Nurse, or a Spirit or Billy with the best add-ons you're not winning against these 4 survivors, period.
This. Yes comms make the survivors stronger but even if the killers were buffed to match that or the comms were somehow banned it wouldn’t matter. This game is RNG on top of RNG on top of RNG that’s never gonna make for a competitive game.
Maps in general.
specific layouts of loops, pallets and windows.
heck even the ridiculous 4% self escape can swing the tide of a game
rng, major unbalance, crappy bugs and undedicated servers
nuff said