This should be a red flag to developers (Freddy OP!!!)
The fact that Freddy has a relatively low pick rate but a SIGNIFICANTLY higher kill rate should be a major red flag to BHVR that he is too strong.
IDC what you want to say about Nurse or Spirit, but Freddy is objectively one of if not the strongest killers in the game and there are multiple reasons for it.
I must preface this with...
- I was an old Freddy main at rank 1. I played him without Ruin or NOED and was still quite effective with him. However I would acknowledge that he was, at the time, the weakest killer in the game.
- I play new Freddy regularly at rank 1 and I find him to be hands down the most oppressive killer to play. Consistently. Like I win games regularly with 3 or more gens left, AND I rarely have to camp or tunnel.
So why is Freddy so strong?
First is his teleport. He has the best map pressure in the game because he can instantly go to the gen you are working on. No other killer can do this, save for Demo and Hag but they have to set up first which greatly reduces their pressure. Every single gen slowing or gen tracking perk is borderline God tier on Freddy. BBQ, DIscordance, Surveillance, Tinkerer, Thana, Ruin, Pop (especially Pop). Yes these are good perks for many killers, but on Freddy they become exponentially more powerful.
Second is his snares. He has an anti-chase that is very similar to Clown. Say what you want about Clown, but a good Clown will catch you CRAZY fast. Freddy is just a slightly weaker Clown in this aspect, as he can't plant a puddle in front of you during a chase. It is damn near impossible to run a good Freddy for very long around most loops just as it can be a good Clown. This is a minor issue however.
Third is Dream World, or rather the fact it automatically gets Oblivious. This means that he gets a free BT counter, or any perk requiring a terror radius. Sure this hurts him too, but the perks he can't use aren't that great anyway (Unnerving, Insidious??? LOL). Infectious is probably the only TR perk that is good, but guess what? IT STILL WORKS FOR HIM! Yep try it, Infectious will make dreaming survivors scream. Oblivious doesn't stop that for some reason but it negates a lot of good survivor perks.
Fourth is stealth. He has built in semi-stealth due to him being INVISIBLE to awake survivors outside his TR and even sometimes in his TR. This means he can get really close to you while awake without you having a reasonable way to react. He is basically a Wraith.
Finally, he is the ONLY killer in the game with add-ons that affect gen speeds. This is the big one. He has 3 add-ons that do this, and while they were nerfed that is not good enough. They shouldn't exist, period. Don't get me wrong, at first I loved them because my main tactic with old Freddy was to use range add-ons and tracking perks like Surveillance and Nurse's to permanently keep survivors asleep for that sweet 50% action penalty. It was a strong tactic, however since I had to put them to sleep myself it was fair since I had to be active to get that reward. But now you just fall asleep in 60 seconds OR when he hits you. You are going to be asleep more than 50% of the game easily, and usually without any action on the killer's part. Basically he just gets this stuff for free by equipping an add-on.
Let's summarize... Freddy is basically a combination of Hag, Wraith, and Clown with built in BT counter and passive slow down that no other killer has access too.
My entire point here is that Freddy just has WAY WAY too much in his base kit, and that is why he has such a significantly higher kill rate compared to other killers. You can say "don't draw conclusions from data alone" remember that I told you I play new Freddy at rank 1 and my experience is that he is oppressive. Furthermore, as survivor, a good Freddy with a strong slow down build is one of the most difficult killers to beat. Literally your only chance against a killer like this is to run in a 4 man SWF, which anyone who plays this game could tell you is already broken, but I digress.
So what is the solution? How do we fix this? I'm not just making this post to complain, I'm making it to offer a suggestion. Now I have been writing down my ideas for changes to Dead By Daylight I would like to see that I believe would improve the game. It's a lot, I will just copy and paste what I wrote for Freddy. Let's take a look...
NIGHTMARE
- Survivors no longer passively fall asleep at the start of the game and do not see the sleep clock until they are hit and put into the Dream State at least once.
- Dream Snare radius reduced by 20%.
- Oblivious removed from Dream World.
- Nightmare can be always seen by awake survivors within 32m.
- Remove stacking penalty on Snap Clap wake up action.
- Cat Block, Z Block, Pill Bottle, Paint Thinner, Outdoor Rope, Jump Rope, and Swing Chains reworked.
- Cat Block inflicts Haemorrhage on sleeping survivors. Healthy survivors that are asleep will bleed.
- Z Block inflicts Mangled on injured survivors that are asleep and blocks the aura of their dream clock outside of 32m.
- Pill Bottle makes the Nightmare; disappear intermittently to awake survivors; invisible to sleeping survivors outside of 32m.
- Paint Thinner reveals the survivor's aura for 4 seconds upon falling asleep.
- Outdoor Rope greatly increases interaction time for each successive Snap Clap.
- Jump Rope causes the survivor's dream clock to move to a new location every 30 seconds.
- Swing Chains causes Dream World to inflict the Oblivious status effect.
- Garden Rake and Prototype Claws Dream Tokens reduced to 8.
- Prototype Claws aura reading removed. Prototype Claws inflict Hindered for 10 seconds on survivors that interact with Dream Pallets.
- Kid's Drawing adds 5 Dream Tokens.
So let's unpack this.
The first line is actually a slight nerf and buff to Freddy, as one of his only drawbacks is that you KNOW it's a Freddy right when the game starts. This would give some leeway at the start of the game for survivors, and also give Freddy more element of surprise opportunities. Though of course once he hits someone they would see, but the point is he would have a bit more spook at the start. Once you hit them the clock appears and it functions as normal.
Making Dream Snares smaller means it would take better planning in their use. I feel like I can just spam them without care and they do more than what I need them to do. At least require me to use to skill here.
Next. we basically take away all the "fluff" from Freddy's base kit. The goal is to shift most of them to his add-ons. Pill Bottle is a bad add-on IMO, it does nothing for him. This new version would do something for him. Notice how for most of these things while I offer to take away something from his base kit and move it to an add-on, I'm actually buffing it in the process because it now requires an add-on and therefore can be a tad better.
This all opens up new builds for Freddy. I enjoy add-ons that change how a killer functions over straight up making something they do faster or stronger. It leads to more interesting emergent gameplay.
The dream pallet add-ons I feel are redundant. You don't need 3 of them, hell 1 is enough. So let's take Paint Thinner and do something else with it, what I suggest is reminiscent of old Freddy and I would enjoy this as both killer and survivor. I only kept 2 dream pallet add-ons because I honestly couldn't think of another thing for Claws to do.
All the slow down add-ons are gone and in it's place are add-ons that are still really good but not stupid to play against. Giving Oblivious in Dream World as an add-on is acceptable. Base kit it is not.
Finally we make his lame BP add-on a bit better. This is just to offset the fact his snares just got worse.
These are just my suggestions, obviously they won't be implemented but something like this would be a good change for Freddy. If you guys have suggestions you are free to put them here.
Be aware I'm not looking to argue with anyone about whether Freddy is too strong or not. He very much is and the chart above confirms it. We need to discuss ways to fix this.
Comments
Hag, demogorgon, nurse can all teleport to objectives
Sooo basically he is a good killer and a good choice for killer mains?? Why should killers be weak so survivors will be satisfied?
I never even lost the game to a Freddy main. Moreover, I didn't see them getting more than 2k in any rank. Hell, I don't even sweat while playing against him, Pig makes me more nervous.
They are accurate.