About so-called "anti-x" perks
It seems weird to me that "anti-tunnel" perks like DS and "anti-camping" perks like BT don't actually prevent what people purport they prevent. Rather, they punish killers for doing those actions, but it won't actually stop tunneling and camping. Stabbing your pursuer won't make them not tunnel you and getting an extra health state after you get unhooked won't help you get unhooked. These are after-the-fact perks that hand out retribution in the form of a big, giant middle finger for playing scummy, but don't work to preemptively to prevent camping and tunneling
So, is this intentional, or should "anti-x" perks actually prevent what they are ostensibly counters to?
Comments
You can't really stop another player from tunneling or camping without getting to a point where you create situations of where survivors are actually invulnerable which isn't fair.
Anti-Tunneling/Camping perks work by making it take longer for your opponent to succeed.
BT prevents a camping killer from instantly downing you and giving you time to reach safety.
DS gives you another chance at leading the killer on a chase giving your teammates more time to do gens.
Right, but my point is that most of these hope that the punishment for action x, y, and z will be so great that it discourages those actions after the fact, but they aren't great enough to prevent said actions.
I struggle to see perks that actively stop a killer from doing a certain thing because it's usually the killer who decides the flow of a match (Not saying they have complete control, but rather survivors respond to what the killer does)
Think about it, in order for DS to be considered an 'anti-tunnel' perk, you need to actually be tunnelled right? When does that happen? Usually after you've been caught and hooked once already, which is where the perk comes in. It's a safety net in case you get tunnelled.
I'm curious, what form would an actual 'anti-tunnel' perk be by your definition? A perk that punishes killers for consistantly chasing the same survivor all game? I can't really see it but maybe you have ideas I'm not aware of
If a killer wants to keep chasing you after you got unhooked, no amount of perks or teammates body blocking is going to stop him. This isn't a perk issue.
DS is fine. Killers who want you out of the game will do so regardless.
Something like off the record (conceptually, I'm not saying OTR is good) is somewhat like where I'm getting at. It prevents the killer from being able to tunnel you (for like 5 seconds). If you get tunneled straight out of a facecamp, giving DS a much, much longer stun or having it proc multiple times can make the punishment so aggressive that it'll literally destroy the killer (as in gauge an eye out or break a rib), especially now that they narrowed down the activation requirements.
That's not what I'm talking about. All I'm saying that is DS and BT don't actively prevent a tunnel or a camp, only give a small slap on the wrist for them.
It's hard to strike a balance for sure, because you could make just one small tweak and it would completely shift things
Imagine if unhooked survivors had something like a two second grace period after being unhooked, similar to the small invincibility shield survivors get after being revived in HSHS if you've ever seen it. That seems like such a small change but it would hurt killer so much
Because you can't prevent another player from making the choice to camp or tunnel you.
DS and BT do their jobs well and give the survivor a 2nd chance to escape a tunneling or camping killer.
There's nothing more that can be done besides offering the 2nd chance.
Well there's always going to be nuance to things. If they can stuff that much text into DS, I don't think it'll hurt to tailor an "anti-x y and z" perk (assuming it won't be basekit, anyways).
Personally i like the idea of making it partially impossible for the killer to tunnel through the ds stun. Like for 10 seconds after the stun you leave nothing (grunts of pain,blood trail,scratch marks). So once the killer takes it that survivors gone. Prevents true tunnelers and doesn't effect the people who just tank ds to prevent it at the endgame.
Sure you can. It goes:
DS, as elaborated above, is a one-time slap for tunneling. Tunneling isn't a one-time occasion. BT, as elaborated above, requires you to be unhooked. Camping actively makes it difficult to unhook. They don't actually address the questionable playstyles.
You can't outright prevent camping, tunnelling or slugging, because at certain times they can be valid tactics, and anything that outright prevents it could easily be abused by survivors.
All "anti-x" perks are meant to dissuade that tactic and encourage another one.
Killer perks do a better job at this than survivor perks ever will. Like BBQ and Devour Hope. They need to make more strong killer perks that make it more beneficial to the killer to not do these things.
Survivor perks as you rightly say punish the killer. They're a stick instead of a carrot. The problem with a stick is that the threat of it is more powerful than actually using it. Once DS is spent, that threat is gone. So things like DS need to have multiple charges to be effective.
Run Lucky Break.
I agree, but with the precedent set by DS' new description (and probably deathbound), I think the devs have abandoned brevity in favor of specificity. They probably could get away with making a very specific perk, although those really situational perks that serve to counter one possible gameplay style might as well be incorporated into the basekit in some form.
Well you can't ever fully stop something like that.
For example, anti-air defense missiles don't always hit their target do they? It simply mitigates whatever "x" may be.
So a perk such as BT, an anti-camping perk, is designed to mitigate camping, not fully stop it.
BT doesn't even do a good job at mitigating camping; it just makes it so that if you are unhooked, which is the hard part when it comes to camping, you get an extra health state for a few seconds. It just adds insult to injury, but doesn't help you get that injury in the first place.
Buff 90% isnt going through. And again its for 10 seconds you can still run lucky break/ironwill for a longer more consistent effect not relying on stunning the killer with dstrike.
Nothing should fully stop killer from doing anything he wants
Oh yeah, like that time a killer got banned for exploiting and stealing personal information. Totally unjustified.
We are not talking about exploits. If killer wants to camp or tunnel perks should just make it harder, not stop it completely
Their purpose is not to prevent, it's to heavily punish if they do.
I feel a lot of the time the flow of the match is up to survivors and how quickly they can do gens.
Not sure how you could prevent a person from making a choice to do something.
If killers were bots, sure, you equip something and it turns off that chunk of code. But people aren't bots. These perks are referred to as "anti-x" perks, but that's just a nickname, it means that they affect an opponent who does "x."
A perk that is "anti-tunneling" will help protect a survivor when a killer tunnels, giving them a chance to escape. The perk can't completely save them, it can't do all the work for that player, it just gives them an opportunity to save themselves. A killer tunnels off the hook, the survivor has no opportunity to get to a safer location because they just came off the hook, so they get to stab the killer and then run to a loop or try to break line of sight. The perk has given them a chance they didn't previously have.
I mean, theoretically, things like what you're asking for just comes from one thing: not getting downed in the first place.
After all, you can't determine whether a killer is going to camp or tunnel you until you're hooked, unless you're the madlad who did the 1 for 1, or it's something like a basement Hag/Trapper/Demo. Imho, perks like BT and DS are there to help deter killers who might be tempted to camp or tunnel someone out of the game for an easier game, by causing the threat of a longer chase. Two M1's on a Survivor+the speed boost from a hit+ whatever exhaustion perk they might have+DS can lead to another decent chase (or great chase) if the Survivor is good, which can make the game end with the Killer getting a 1k- especially if the team is at least coordinated enough to realise 'that guy getting tunneled means I should slam gens asap and don't waste time, because we can't afford to'.) Creating a threat of these things being in play makes tunneling/camping much less appealing, especially if the Killer is going for kills, and gens are flying due to their chases going on for too long/bad map/pressure issues. (Because man, I've seen a lot of killers who camp/tunnel struggle with one of these things, and they're normally correlated in some ways. For example, only chasing one person and spending too long in chase lowers your map pressure.)
But at the same time, we can't deny that camping and tunneling is a valid strat that shouldn't always be crapped on. After all, I don't think it's right to crap on a killer for camping/tunneling in EGC/End Game when they're just trying to secure another Kill- especially when both gates are already 99'd/open, and they have no where else to be. No real incentive to leave. And of course if you're playing against a hardcore team, you always want to beat out the weakest link first, because anyone can do gens- but not everyone can be a god looper. Though, that doesn't make these strats fun to face, normally nets you very few points as the Survivor (and even the Killer to a degree), and, at least in the case of the hardcore teams, generally not necessary in your average games.
Idk, camping and tunneling is a part of the things in the game that they can't really change, because there are some good reasons to do it, so it's not like there's any one magic solution to it. Especially since, if a Killer wants to camp or tunnel you, they're going to. Doesn't matter your perks or add-ons, or what your team is doing. If they want you dead, they want you dead. Just like how if a Survivor wants a flashlight save or pallet save, they will do whatever they can to get it- even if means being a detriment to the team.
Then maybe a change of name is in order? Plus, the looming threat of heavy punishment is sort of a preventative in itself.
Well it's a simulative game so you have an arsenal of tools. If you want to take the nuanced route then you could take inspiration from off the record, or how Pyramid Head's cages work (constantly relocating in the event of camping).
The invincibility shield is more than two seconds for me, considering my aim in that game.
A name change isn't needed as "Anti" does not imply it makes them impossible. Anti simply means opposed to.
They're already literal S tier meta perks even in their current state, they do not need to be better. If they are not properly preventing you from getting tunneled/camped then this is a skill issue, not a perk issue.
Here's a little history lesson;
Decisive Strike used to be the most bullshit perk in the game, having it meant that the first time the killer picked you up you'd free yourself by doing a skillcheck. The only counter to this was not getting the obsession and getting someone else (But if they got a certain wiggle progress the perk would activate), or drop juggling, which is counterproductive because it grants wiggle bonus.
They nerfed it into an anti tunnel perk, or at least that's what the hope was, however it instead granted 60 seconds of invulnerability after being unhooked. It was never a good tunnel perk, just a really abusable, long lasting invuln-frame.
It being an anti tunnel perk was a byproduct, I think that's why it was so bad at its one job. It was an afterthought.
You are right that these perks don't stop camping and tunneling. They are there to help survivors in a tight situation and thats it. A killer that wants to camp/tunnel will do so and no perk can stop them.
Buffing anti-x perks is also not the solution. The reason DS was nerfed because survivors were abusing it. Same goes for BT. I often see survivors openly running for unsafe hooks. Of course I go after them... I'm not going to pretend I didn't see them. When they get the unhook I try to hit that person but of course the unhooked will block with BT. I don't camp or tunnel yet I was being hit with these perks because survivors were playing with them offensivly and didn't give a damn if I saw them running for the unhook. Since the DS nerf I haven't been it with it. It was a good change.
If anything is to change there needs to be more reasons for killers to leave hooks and alternate hooking survivors. Devour, Make Your Choice, Pop, BBQ, these are all good perks to encourage the killer to leave the hook area. I would love to see more perks that encourage the killer to not tunnel or camp (that are not tied to hex).
Right, it needs a complete overhaul but the devs are too sentimental.
(or you could make some anti-tunnel stuff basekit but hey)
I don't think that's true. If the devs wanted they could prevent camping by making it a poor strategy.
Something like the hook timer not progressigm when the killer is close to the survivor and not currently in a chase would do it
You're right these perks provide little relief and are super easy to circumvent, so even when they do provide utility it really only is a chase extender imo. And in the case of DS is limited to one-time use. They are never going to make perks that definitively protect against these things, it would be too strong. However, the game fails to discourage the behavior. Currently, tunneling, slugging, and camping can be powerful and effective so it is common.
I remember watching a development insight vlog of another major game I play and they provided an internal perspective of dealing with highly effective behavior from one role that is frustrating to players of another role and it might apply to DbD. Basically, the issue they were faced with was a large percentage of players in certain roles would engage in specific behaviors that were too difficult to balance, easy to do, and highly effective at winning against other roles in the game. They tried adding new mechanics for the other roles and they helped but players felt it was unfair, boring, and frustrating that they always needed to always do the same tactics, use specific roles and classes just to have a chance at winning. So the devs implemented what they called "soft-punishments" to tell players that "what you're doing is less than optimal and you should stop bc the game will set you back if you continue doing this." The idea was to allow it but introduce a high cost that forced players to choose. And as a result, a significant dip in the behavior as the in-game punishments that occurred in real-time during the match would increment and be too costly.
I'm not sure what that would look like in DbD but perhaps this is the approach Bhvr should explore.
Well, slowing it down to a snail's pace, maybe. Stopping it entirely might open the door for holding the game hostage.
How woukd it be held hostage like that?
It prevents the game from ever ending if the killer intentionally camps.
....but the other survivors would finish gens
And what happens if the survivors are staying near the hook? The hooked survivor wouldn't die.
If the survivors are near the hook and the killer is chasing them then the hook timer will go down.
If the other three survivors are working with the killer the hooked survivor would always have the option to stop struggling if they want ti die
As I'm sure others have said nothing will ever completely stop people from doing what they want to do in the game unless it is made completely impossible, which if it were to happen for camping and tunneling I don't see how they could implement a change that wouldn't be abusable to high hell.
I mean look at the current breakdown bug, certain people smelled blood in the water and are abusing the it like crazy.
They literally did exactly this.
Survivors used it to hold the game hostage by goading the killer around the hook indefinitely, so the hooked survivor was never sacrificed.
"But I said not in a chase."
Yes I know, and you don't need to be in a chase to get the killers attention and get them close to the hook.
Cab you explain this to me I've never played as a killer where I'm chasing someone and it doesn't trigger a chase? Especially if the survivor is running around in a small area around (ie near the hook)
Unless the hook is in the middle of a massive deadzone, then there will be walls etc... which survivors can hide behind. That would allow them to be close enough to the hooked survivor to disable the timer, but as they aren't in the killers line of sight, then they wouldn't trigger a chase.
I'm not seeing how the survivor being there impacts things. The hook timer stops if the nearest survivor is next to the hook or across the map ot makes no difference. If the killer is there the progress stops period unless in a chase. So what difference does it make if there arenwalls or not.? If the survivor holes up behind a wall and the killer ignores them and stays near the hook the timer stays stored. If the killer chases them and they lead the killer away from the hook the timer starts. If the killer chases and the survivor Loops next to the hook the timer all starts. So what's the exploit the survivors can do?
Other than force the killer to leave which is the whole pount
Ok. Here is a possible and probable scenario where that would be an issue. Let's say you have hooked a survivor during the end game collapse. You can see that the gates are 99'd, and there are 3 survivors approaching the hook from different angles, i.e. in the open and behind walls. Your suggestion would prevent the killer from securing that kill, as he is left with the following 2 choices:
1. Leave the hook to chase off a survivor. Results in the survivor getting safely unhooked, and allows the usual BT, and DS shenanigans.
2. Stay around the hook to prevent the rescue. As the timer will not decrease anymore, due to the killers proximity to the hook, this basically creates a stalemate. As the survivors do not need to attempt a rescue until the killer leaves the area, this virtually guarantees a safe unhook, unless the survivor on hook gives up.
This would create a really unhealthy endgame.
Do you see the issue now?
That's the funny narcissistic point of view that I see in most killer mains and some survivor mains.
How is it a invulnerability perk?
Because (before the recent nerf) it wouldn't deactivate if you performed an action, so survivors would use it as an invuln frame.
It isn't actually one, it was just how it was used.