Focus on perk dynamics instead of targeted perk nerf/buffs
Since the beginning of Dead by Daylight the main problem relating to the game's balance is the combined strength of a survivor team using the same perk. Wich lead to the dev-team implementing perks that sound like fun but aren't that usefull.
Let's take Any Means Necessery as an example:
Being able to reset dropped pallets sounds incredibly fun to a survivor and horrifing to a killer, so there has to be a limit wich is allright!
So if every survivor runs the perk the maximum should be one pallet every 30 seconds, sounds allright aswell!
Except for the fact that a game lasts for about 15 Minutes and if your the only survivor runing AMN you have a 2 minute cooldown if you even menage to find a dropped pallet to set the timer off.
There are a TON of Perks that were WAY to good when stacked in a SWF or at random if they're the META.
We lost Saboteur for over 3 years and it's barely back.
MoM got nerfed to the ground after being an absolute beast.
Self-care as well as DS were the reasons some gameplay mechanics had to be reworked a number of times!
Borrowed Time was just way to OP and I'd argue that it still is if every survivor runs it.
BHVR got better at creating not so overpowered perks but at the cost of the fun the perks could provide.
Please implement a System that checks if the other survivors are running the same perk and decrese/increse a perks limit/duration/timer around that.
1 Person with AMN? 30 sec cooldown!
2 Persons? 60 sec ...
I know implementing a system like that is easier said than done but I believe this is achievable and will prove to be worthwhile!
Not every Perk needs to be dynamic but there are certain perks that just HAVE to be.
Thanks for reading :)
Comments
While not universally the case. The issue with perk stacking isn't that the perk is somehow only overpowered when several are in play, but rather that while it's more impactful than a perk should be, it's not so much more impactful than everything else to be gamebreaking. However, when all 4 Survivors run the perk, they also get 4x the power boost over the norm, which IS enough to be gamebreaking.
However, the fact that the 4 Survivors are running the SAME overpowered perk has nothing to do with it.
1 Survivor running current DS
1 Survivor running old MoM
1 Survivor running old DS
and
1 Survivor running old Sprint Burst
would be comparable in strength to all 4 Survivors running DS right now. Yes it wouldn't be quite the same, but it would have the gamebreaking effect you are hoping to solve with the dynamic system you are implementing.
This is because the perks effects, while they do stack, do not synergize with each other. A Survivor having DS does not make a different Survivor's DS perk more effective. Instead, having several of them crosses a threshhold, a threshhold which can be crossed by using several different perks with a similar function instead if needed, but it's not about there being 4 identical perks in play.
BT isn't somehow less powerful if you are the only Survivor running it. DS isn't less powerful if you are the only Survivor running it and neither is perks like Dead hard and unbreakable.
In fact, Unbreakable had diminishing returns from multiple Survivors running it. Since a single Survivor running it can simply pop the perk and pick up the other Survivors, meaning the other Survivors don't need to also run the perk to get picked up.
Same applies to Deliverance.
The only relevant perks I can think of that DO have a self synergy of some kind are Self Care and Adrenaline. And both for the same minor reason.
Adrenaline supports prioritizing rushing the gens over healing when you only have a few gens left. If everyone has adrenaline then everyone can ignore healing and focus on the last gen thus getting it done faster, while if only some people had adrenaline then the ones that don't still need to heal slowing down the gen rush.
Self Care meanwhile supports healing alone since you won't have to find others. If someone without self care runs up to someone with self care to get healed then the travel time is lost anyways.
In fact, any means necessary is another perk with diminishing returns, since the more pallets you pick up the less pallets are available to be picked up. Meaning if everyone has the perk you will be bottle-necked by available dropped pallets
About any means necessary: it should just have no cooldown and not be a green perk. The time required to pick up pallets instead decreases every tier.
imo, pallets used a second time should be inherently weaker, but I doubt the devs are going to do that any time soon.