Stats 6.1.0 In Review - comments
Peanits just posted a nice article summarizing their broad overview of how various stats have changed since the big rework.
@Peanits said:
This past July, we released quite possibly our largest balance update yet when we changed 40 perks including the existing meta. At the same time, we briefly introduced and later re-debuted Matchmaking Incentives, which reward players for switching to whichever role is needed at the time.
With so many changes at once, the dust still has not quite settled, but we’re starting to get a picture of how the game will look moving forward. It’s been a little over a month since the update went live, so we want to shed some light on the impact that the 6.1.0 Update had on the game.
Before we dive in, we want to remind you that these numbers are still changing each day. The numbers we share in this post will likely be obsolete within a few months. This also means that any recent changes may not be reflected in these stats.
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In Dead by Daylight, the Killer should strike fear into the Survivors. Part of this comes from being a big, scary looking person or monster, while another part of this comes from their ability to kill you. Before the 6.1.0 Update, we found Killers to be a little lacking. As a result, we introduced several changes to improve Killer quality of life & make them more deadly. Beyond that, we made significant changes to many of the most & least used Killer perks.
The result of these changes: The average kill rate (percentage of all Survivors killed) rose by about 8%. This leaves Killers- on average- within a range that we’re comfortable with, making them deadly, but not oppressive.
More significantly, the variety of perks being used saw huge improvements. The previously most used perk, Barbecue & Chilli, went from being used in 40% of all Killer loadouts to only 17%. Jolt, meanwhile, climbed from 13% usage to 19%. Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance dropped slightly, going from 20% usage to 17%, just barely beating Barbecue and Chilli for the number 2 spot.
Other top 10 most used Killer perks include: Sloppy Butcher, Save the Best for Last, Overcharge, Thanatophobia, Call of Brine, Hex: No One Escapes Death, and Corrupt Intervention.
Overall, the disparity between the highest and lowest usage rates is significantly smaller than before. We intend to continue monitoring and fine-tuning perks as needed going forward, but already we’re seeing far more variety than in the old meta.
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Survivors saw similar results following the 6.1.0 Update. The previously most used perk, Dead Hard, fell from 42% usage to 19%, making it the second most used perk. Meanwhile, Self-Care remained a popular choice in some regions but not others, securing it the first-place spot at 21% usage. A new contender entered the fray with Windows of Opportunity shooting up to 18% usage.
Other top 10 Survivor perks include Lithe, Prove Thyself, Sprint Burst, Boon: Circle of Healing, Borrowed Time, Adrenaline, Spine Chill.
Much like Killers, the gap between the most and least used perks is much smaller than before, leading to a wider variety of perks used each match.
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All these changes have also impacted queue times. The distribution of players playing each role seems to be a lot healthier than before, causing the average queue time to drop to 59 seconds from 91 seconds.
Unfortunately, we don’t have a ton of data on Matchmaking Incentives just yet since they only returned alongside the Resident Evil: PROJECT W Chapter. However, we have some data to share on how impactful they can be.
When a new Chapter launches, we typically see more people trying to play the new Killer than the new Survivor(s). Naturally, this causes Killer queue times to skyrocket as there simply is not enough Survivors to go around. This most recent Chapter was no exception.
Once Matchmaking Incentives were activated, queue times dropped significantly. In the most extreme cases, the time taken to find a match decreased by up to 4 minutes for Killers and up to 40 seconds for Survivors.
We’ll be watching closely over the coming weeks to see how Matchmaking Incentives affect matchmaking, but early signs suggest that they are very effective when they are needed most.
We hope you enjoyed this peek behind the scenes as we reflect on our first meta shakeup. As a reminder, the numbers you see here are still changing every day. We’ll keep monitoring and fine tuning over the next few months as everything settles.
Until next time…
The Dead by Daylight team
Just some off the cuff thoughts
- Peanits, if you do a follow-up I personally really liked the charts you guys put together in the June and July updates that showed perk usage by MMR bracket as line graphs. 🙂 If you get a chance to rerun those charts I think it would be cool to compare them side by side with the ones from June prior to the rework. Just my personal request though.
- The numbers he posted above are more or less in line with the numbers from the aggregate site I follow. That site has about a 7% increase in kill rate since the rework compared to 8% in Peanits’ summary. And the top perks and percentages are roughly on par with the top perks and percentages I’m seeing on that site as well (e.g. Dead Hard around 20% usage give or take). It’s nice to see the site I follow is lining up pretty well with the actual official numbers. (One minor difference is the average kill rate on the site is about 5% lower both pre- and post-rework which I think is due to the site’s games being uploaded mainly by above average players and I suspect kill rates are slightly higher among newer players than veterans.)
- It’s good to see the average queue times almost cut by about 1/3. 👍
Comments
Also, Self Care seems to be an outlier, on the aggregate site it’s at 9% usage which is still popular but not in the top 10. I think maybe Peanits ran numbers over the last week and there just happens to be a survivor challenge to run Self Care which could be skewing his stat.
It's possible the people more likely to use an aggregate site aren't the ones who use self-care.
I'm admittedly surprised by the usage of Prove Thyself. I was sure it would be in the top 3. I now see at least one Prove Thyself in every match. It's died down a tiny bit since 6.2.0 though as more people are replacing it with Hyperfocus it seems.
My god do survivors love their self-care.
The stats come from a 30 day period, with a small buffer after the 6.1.0 update while everything settled a bit. It's not doubt at least partially influenced by the Tome challenge.Self-Care is actually still meta in some parts of the world, though, so while you might not be seeing it much in your matches, enough people are using it elsewhere to secure the #1 spot.
If the site you're referring to is the same one I'm thinking of, it may be due to that site's userbase primarily being from English speaking countries where Self-Care is far less popular.
Wish the incentives had done anything for me, but I'm literally giving up on grading up Killer this month because I don't want to wait ten minutes on average for matches. They need to be doubled or tripled.
One thing that is for certain is that I have seen more variety. DH and BBQ going from 40% to under 20% is insane. And the wild thing is, I LOVE Dead Hard and BBQ still.
I enjoy both Survivor and killer more after this update, that is for sure. Really wish certain perks like Pharmacy and calm Spirit weren't ruined, though.
I’m in the same boat as you. Waiting to queue up as killer has been miserable.
That’s an excellent point on the English speaking user base maybe having a different meta when it comes to Self Care. Thanks for pointing that out!
Like I said, most things seem to line up between those numbers and your summary though so I think that lends weight to both being pretty valid.
@Peanits I actually had a question. Is there a concern that aiming for a ~60% kill rate might end up being an impossible goal? I'm not familiar enough with the numbers, but I would think that, with MMR being kills/escapes based, that this number would self-adjust itself to 50% all the time. Then the kill rate gets too low, killers get a buff, and the kill rates temporarily go up until the MMRs adjust again.
Again, I'm not sure about how this works in practice, but is there any data about the distribution of players for certain MMRs? I'd imagine if the game was imbalanced towards survivor, you'd see more survivors at a higher MMR and killers would struggle more to get there. If the opposite, you'd see more killers at high MMR and survivors struggling to get there.
But, if the aimed for kill rate is ~60%, wouldn't that indicate that killers should, on average, increase in MMR or remain even while survivors should go down in MMR/remain even?
(Full disclosure: I'm the developer of the site I believe we're all thinking of.)
As with any occasion official stats are released, it’s fascinating to explore the similarities and differences to the data NightLight has gathered. People have been quick to point out the rather large difference that currently exists but I’m glad we now know the period the official stats are from. I was doubtful they included the last couple of weeks at the very least. If you look at the historical stats on NL, the perk usage is a lot closer to what we’ve been shown (as one would hopefully expect). The rankings/usage rates shown on NightLight are based on the last 14 days for perks and 30 days for kill rates (by default) as is stated on the site. In any case, there are still differences between the data, and I wanted to share some of my thoughts as to why that might be.
- Regional representation (as has been mentioned here). NightLight has users from around the globe but there’s naturally going to be bias towards English speaking countries.
- Perk availability. The selection of perks newer/more casual players have available is going to be rather restricted. I think this might be playing a large part in the discrepancy with Self-care in particular.
- Game knowledge/experience. Again, newer and more casual players are going to be considerably less informed in their perk choices – for better or worse - and the level of gameplay is obviously going to differ as well.
Unfortunately, the last two points cover the demographics least likely to use NightLight. It's a problem many point out and is something I can't do a whole lot (about as I rely on people finding the site and wanting to track their own stats). This is also another limitation - my sample size is a tiny percentage of the matches that are played. At the very least, I wish I had some way to use MMR data (or something close to it) so I could at least offer some context into who the data represents. I am looking to incorporate an "hours played" metric into the site as one way of potentially helping with this but that's obviously far from ideal.
As a side note - (unless I’m mistaken as to which site we’re referring to, in which case please disregard this message), it’s nice to see a somewhat official somewhat acknowledgement of my work. If anyone from Behaviour would like to discuss NightLight or stats in any way, I’d be more than happy to chat. I'm really trying to provide a positive and interesting resource to the community and the last thing I want to do is present data that shines an unfair light into the fog.
Those no doubt play a role in which perks are most popular- and yes, we are indeed talking about the same site. 😁
Huge props for putting it together. I'm a big fan of stats myself, so having community sourced constantly updating stats is super exciting. It's very interesting to see how they line up with the complete data, so I can kinda piece together where the blindspots may be depending on where they differ.
Highly used =/= meta
In some parts of the world can they afford to buy all the DLCs and have all the perks available?
There are many reasons why Self Care is popular, that doesn't mean it's strong or meta.
This is why changing perks solely based on usage data is a mistake.
Even with Self Care being nerfed, it's still a better and more available choice for healing oneself than Renewal, Resurgence, Pharmacy, Solidarity. It's more a reflection of how bad those perks are rather than how good Self Care is.
If you want to heal yourself without a teammate or a med kit, you only have 3 good choices. Circle of Healing, Inner Healing or Self Care. Only one of these choices is always available and on demand, no wonder it is the most popular despite being weak.
"More variety"
I've seen nothing but Pain Resonance and Dead Man's ever since they walked back the nerf over a niche scenario that could've been avoided if they just tweaked Merciless Storm.
If it isn't that, it's some combo of Call of brine, Overcharge, Eruption, Floods of Rage, Sloppy Butcher, Pentimento + all hexes, Jolt, No Way Out and NOED.
Can't forget crutches like No Way Out and NOED. And as if the basekit changed weren't crutches enough, Brutal and Save the Best.
What did we get for survivor?
DS is completely worthless, Iron Will is trash, Calm Spirit of all perks got nerfed, they nerfed Blast Mine for no reason, and Mettle of Man was made decent before going back to being a worthless meme perk again.
Solo queue is even more of a nightmare, and even in a SWF we escape through the gates maybe once or twice in 10 games because killer is so oppressive now.
And don't even get me started on the uncounterable builds killers bring all the time now, like Plagues 110 seconds of object infection time build, Iri Legion Pin/Julie's Mix Tape, or the big one, Omega Blink Nurse in 2022.
The Survivor experience is at its lowest point, meanwhile killer is so easy even with the sweat squads that I get matched with I've managed Onryos, Dredges and Wesker adepts first try.
BHVR as usual patting themselves on the back for another killer sided update.
Youre genuinely delusional if you think the game is still survivor sided (which it hasn't been in years) lol
I'm not wanting to hijack this thread but that is genuinely awesome and a bit surreal to hear. As unlikely as I know it would be, If you ever fancy sharing any insight into those blindspots my details are on the About page of the site...
Another survivor main ######### post