The LEGION: a problem analysis and ALTERNATIVE solution.
WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE LEGION?
In Dead By Daylight we like to keep things iconic; easy to understand. Many of the ideas around DBD, such as Lockers for hiding, Pallets for throwing, etc. make so much sense to us as they are easy to understand.
The developers decided to do something similar with the Health System: Healthy > Injured > Dying state. Easy, right?
Although it works great conceptually, it's very limiting in the rate at which a killer should be able to attack someone because every killer kills in 2 hits (or at best 1).
With a 0-100 Hit Point system where every killer would do 50 damage, the devs would have a lot more variety and room for variation; changing it so that you start bleeding at a certain HP range (say 80) and you start bleeding more frequently depending on how much damage you have exactly.
But what IF we want to be able to have a killer that hits people more frequently, without being overpowered? Well, this is where we corner ourselves; because of our lack of having a more dynamic health system, we create a new health system (similar to what is mentioned above) and have that run at the same time as the traditional DBD health system!
Then we'll artificially create some amount of interplay between the 2, and voila.
Our desires for the dynamic HP system leads us here: Some suggest that when in the injured state, DW should start at 50%, effectively being exactly what I mentioned, but the DW playing as a more dynamic HP bar allowing for 75% and 25% Hp hits, etc. In short we really try to make it work... but hell does it feel unnatural having this intermediate health-system compensate.
Even worse is the Current Health system, where the interplay between the 2 separate health-system stop working together once someone entered the Injured state.
When we look at this killer we see weirdness. Why is there no difference between hitting a hurt or healthy survivor? Why can I not see scratchmarks when in Frenzy?
Well, the answer is, we've gotten too technical by trying to build on a fundementally flawed killer.
When searching for "Legion" in the searches, I see most debates stabilising and agreeing on building on top of these flawed mechanics.
But I think I have an Alternative:
WE ALREADY HAVE A GREAT KILLER HERE!
You read that right. Conceptually, this killer is great! When I found out that they made a mechanic that allows you to effectively deal with grouped survivors I got excited and was impressed by the Devs.
Uncounciously we already know who the Legion really is:
-He stabs frequently
-He is good at moving over various obstacles
-He's a shredder of groups
Let's turn this killer in something great.
My suggestion will feel weird as it's very non-conforming to the current direction of the Legion debate.
My suggestion is only loyal to the concept of the killer and will do everything to avoid building on top of flawed mechanics and conceptually dull technicalities.
AN ALTERNATIVE.
How he'll play:
The (new) Legion is a killer that is good at shredding groups. He benefits from survivors who like to stick together. He jumps from target to target and the more he hits, the stronger he gets. When he finds a survivor alone, he generally will be able to catch them, but after inflicting damage, he'll most likely have lost them.
Definitions
-Deep Wounds:
Deep wounds is an effect applied to a survivor that triggers a timer. This timer can be stopped by mending for 16 seconds. (8 seconds with a teammate). The timer always ticks. whether in a chase or not, except when you're mending.
-Quick Cuts:
Quick cuts is a delayed hit of any nature. It works like a status effect applied to a survivor, like exhaustion. While this status effect is active on a survivor, a killer (through whatever ability) can then trigger Quick Cuts, removing it and applying the hit with whatever intensity. Note here that the effect of Quick Cuts is not always the same, in as far is it signals it will be able to trigger a delayed hit of any nature on you.
-Frenzy-Stun
The Frenzy stun is a stun the Legion can receive (Typically after depleting the frenzy bar or hitting a survivor for the 2nd time while in frenzy). During this stun, the Legion stares at the ground while looking at his hands, completely losing vision of the environment for X amount of seconds. During this duration and 5 seconds after, he's unable to see scratchmarks and blood. (The scratchmarks and blood are not deleted. Their alpha is reduces, similar to the spirit until they start to fade back in.)
-First Hit
The first hit refers to the first hit against a unique survivor during this instance of frenzy. Meaning that at best, you could get 4 first hits off if you hit every survivor once, until you are forced to go for a second hit. That it is called the first hit doesn't mean that it's the first hit in the game, or against that survivor ever. It's exclusively defined by this instance of activating Frenzy until it is depleted.
-Second Hit
See first hit. The second hit refers to the second time you hit the same survivor during the same instance of activating Frenzy. Theoretically you could get 4 second hits off if you already hit all 4 survivors once with your first hit.
-Sudden Death
Sudden Death is a status effect that allows a killer to mori that player.
-Red Frenzy Glow
This is the glow survivors will gain after they've been hit for the first time. It is important to do it this way around so that other survivors who might be hiding aren't unfairly exposed.
-Red Frenzy Indicator
This is the red symbol you see during frenzy, that show you the location of the survivors.
His power:
His power is revolving around the Frenzy bar. When frenzy is active, he can vault pallets and windows fast, see scratchmarks as ever before and he can hit a survivor, what is defined as "a first time' and "a second time".
Whenever the Legion hits a target for the First Time, he refills his frenzy bar completely, Moves up 1 tier (up to 5) and applies "Quick Cuts".
As the second hit is "the combo closer", the second hit will trigger the effect of quick cuts on all the survivors except the survivor receiving the second hit.
Depending on what tier you were it, the effects of your second hit and Quick Cuts are increased.
The Legion wants to hit as many survivors before going for his second hit. The higher his tier, the more people he will have Quick Cuts applied to and the stronger the effect of quick cut gets.
Because your first and second hit gets stronger the higher your tier is, you want to hit as many survivors before ending your streak by attack a survivor twice.
If you manage to hit all 4 survivors, you will be in tier 5, which will turn you into a machine-gun as later defined.
The exact details:
Tier 1:
-The Frenzy-bar timer is relatively short
First Hit: Apply quick cut to the target hit.
Second Hit: (impossible to get as you jump to tier 2 after your first hit)
Tier 2:
-The Frenzy-bar timer is significantly increased from tier 1.
First Hit: Apply quick cut to the target hit.
Second Hit:
If Healthy: Injures a survivor.
If Injured: Brings a survivor to the Dying State.
-You receive the Legion-Stun for 7 seconds.
Tier 3:
-The Frenzy-bar timer is slightly increased from tier 2.
First Hit: Apply quick cut to the target hit.
Second Hit:
If Healthy: Injures a survivor and applies a Traditional Borrow Time effect for 25 seconds.
If Injured: Brings a survivor to the Dying State.
-You receive the Legion-Stun for 5 seconds.
-Triggers Quick Cuts: The Survivor affected by quick cuts gain Deep Wounds.
Tier 4:
-The Frenzy-bar timer is slightly increased from tier 2.
First Hit: Apply quick cut to the target hit.
Second Hit:
If Healthy: Instantly downs a survivor.
If Injured: Downs a survivor.
-You receive the Legion-Stun for 3 seconds.
-Triggers Quick Cuts: The Survivor affected by quick cuts get Injured + receive Deep Wounds. If they were already injured, they are brought down to the Dying State.
Tier 5:
-The Frenzy-bar timer is slightly increased from tier 2.
First Hit: Applies "Sudden Death" to the target hit.
Second Hit:
If Healthy: Brings a survivor to the Dying State.
If Injured: Brings a survivor to the Dying State.
-You no longer receive the Legion-Stun after stabbing a survivor for the 2nd time during this instance of frenzy.
-The lack of Legion-Stun allows you to apply the "Second Hit' to all remaining survivors if you have reach to them.
-The Second hit refills your frenzy bar.
-Triggers Quick Cuts: The Survivor affected by quick cuts get Injured + receive Deep Wounds + Mangled and Haemorrhage. If they were already injured, they are brought down to the Dying State.
Other details:
-The Red Frenzy Indicator is an indicator shown every so now and then intervals. They are only shown when a survivor is moving.
-Upon Depleting your Frenzy timer, you receive a Legion-Stun lasting 3 seconds.
-The Legion can see scratchmarks during Frenzy.
-When the Legion applies a second hit, he applies broken to that survivor for the same duration he is stunned. (This is to avoid heal abuse with the giant stun times.)
-Quick cuts only lasts for the duration of that instance of Frenzy. After is is finished, Quick cuts is completely removed from each survivor. If the effects were already triggered, they will of course continue.
-When the Legion is in frenzy and he attacks right in front of a locker, he will open the locker and grab the survivor. This counts as a second hit, ending the frenzy.
-His frenzy stabs do not proc NOED, Make Your Choice, etc.
EXAMPLES
Without knowing every detail, here is how it mainly plays out:
Here you see a Legion having stabbed 3 unique survivors. As shown, he attacks the 3rd survivor twice, thus ending his Frenzy.
The other 2 survivors will now trigger the Quick Wound (as indicated by the skull icon).
Had the first stabbed the 4th survivor, then the 3rd would've also have the Quick Cut effect and the punishment for that effect would've been increased as decided by tier.
BALANCE
So what are his strengths and what are his weaknesses?
His strength is obviously being able to get over obstacles fast and being able to quickly inflict wounds to a lot of people in a close area.
His weakness, more then in the original version, is that he is terrible at "tunneling" or focussing down someone if he doesn't have reach to multiple people.
His stun is deliberately awful, as to make it extremely consistent for survivors to disappear.
This is what is so beautiful about this solution:
He is a killer that is very good at hitting people, like the nurse, but can not tunnel these people as he loses them after applying a low-tier second hit.
This means that, unlike the frustration caused by the nurses ability to ignore most of the game, the Legion will lower that frustration by not being able to tunnel these survivors like the nurse could.
This forces him to cause havoc across the board against anyone who he can find, hoping he has enough map pressure and manages to stumble on a hit, hiding survivor, or hopes to find 2 or 3 survivors together, at which point he can slowly start machine gunning them down, not requiring him to find them again (by the fault of survivors themselves).
Now we have a strong killer that unlike the nurse manages to lower frustration, as he spreads his/her strength across the map, instead of against 1 survivor.
A killer that is fun AND strong.
A killer that is easy to understand:
A machine gun against groups; requiring you to sit still while he stabs at your team, in the hope you are hidden..
and if he catches you alone; strong at hitting, but bad at tracking you from Healthy To Downed.
I hope by that, you see a solution other then the building on previous clunky mechanics.
We have the chance to turn his/her beautiful concept into a killer we all can enjoy.
Along the variables like: Legion Stun Time, Frenzy timer across tears, the increased movementspeed, etc. we have all we need to turn him from UP to OP, being able to settle at a perfect balance with healthy mechanics that feel intuitive and make sense.
No more staring at the ground to avoid triggering a chase while chasing a DWed survivor!
Nope! Just intuitive mechanics, conceptually sound technicalities and a lot of stabbing.
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