Suggestions on how to make Boon Totems feel more enjoyable to play against and with.
Honestly, the whole concept of Boon Totems are not a bad idea. But the way they were implemented leaves a lot to desire, since they can be extremely frustrating to the opposite side, and the way they implement "Counter play" is completely not rewarded since thei're easy to place and rekindle. And i believe it's not a problem of the boons being necessarily OP. It's the fact that in conjunction with other items they become incredibly unfun to play, so here are some changes i've seen discussed by the community and some of my own that could make them more fun to play for both parties
- The healing stacks are capped by + 100%. Meaning a survivor is still able to take advantage of boons, but will not be able to abuse the insane levels of healing speed that right now plague high MMR games. Spook n' Jukes made a video that although filled with sarcasm and cinicism over the boon. Demonstrates how broken the stacked Circle of Healing and a Green Medkit can be. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAcL-VV2YaY&t). By capping the healing rate to 200%, you avoid frustration of the killer side, but still give a reason for someone to pick the perk and carry something else besides a med-kit to be able to be a all rounder, sacrificing a perk slot to have healing and a toolbox in the game.
- Boons Supress Hexes instead of completely overriding them. At the current state of the game, cleansing has no pratical use anymore, since there are items and perks that overshadow them in every single way. Why cleanse a totem and hide in a locker for one heal, when with circle of healing you can bless said totems an infinite amount and heal as much as you want? One way to incentivize cleansing instead of blessing hexes, would be a supression mechanic, meaning that once a Hex is Blessed, the game doesn't consider i to ble cleansed, but instead it becomes supressed. Meaning that it's effects are disabled whilst the totem is blessed. If the killeer snuffs the blessing, the hex effect will re awake and activate again. By making this simple change, it creates this new mechanic of back and forth between the survivor and killer, where the game can drastically change. If a survivor blessed a Tier 3 devour hope, in the mid game, the balance can chenge completely by the killer finding it and snuffing it again. Creating this high adrenaline feel between the killer who now at the end game has 3 stacks and is trying to defend his totem whilst also trying to kill the survivors, and the survivors having to corrdinate to get rid of the hex and escape the trial. It makes the match more instense and fun for both the killer and the survivors, who now have to deal witha secondary objective besides their main one. Not only that but with a change like this implemented, it gives the survivor incentive for more smart plays. "Do i bless this hex to supress ruin, but run the risk of in one of the times i go again to bless the snuffed hex, the killer might find me and begin a chase. Or do i risk cleansing it to become exposed with haunted grounds, or risk the killer having Pentimento and regressing the gen progression?" (And of course, if this change is implemented, blessing a totem shouldn't have the same effects that hexes might have on survivors that cleanse them, it's a choice between what kind of risk you'd rather choose to confront, instead of always blessing and never again having any incentive to cleanse a totem or hex)
I believe that adding these changes would make boons more anjoyable to use and to face against, turning them into a side-grade to cleansing. Instead of the definitive upgrade they are now.
Please, be free to agree or disagree below, just keep it civil
Thank you for taking your time to read this, and i hope you have a wonderfull day ahead.
<3
Comments
Problem is balancing this for one group ("high MMR") affects gameplay for the entire playerbase. For solo queue 100% cap is a bad idea.
Nope. Neither of those are adequate solutions and just make hexes the only real counter to boons which is unfair to killers that don't use hexes(me).
Let me break the totem. Add a token system for blessings. Reward me for spending precious time to find and snuff the thing. Something, anything.