Feedback on the March 2023 Notes, Negatives & Positives
Firstly, I’d like to state that this is the first patch notes that has encouraged me to write one of these feedback posts. I believe it is very important to state an opinion here, more so than ever. Please do keep in mind that this is my opinion. I hope we can all respect each other's opinions.
That being said, I am going to start with the negative notes and then proceed down to the positives - as I believe the negatives are far more important.
The Negatives:
The Healing Change
This feels incredibly unbalanced. Solo Queue Survivors just got buffed to make their playing experience less miserable. If this healing change is to go ahead, Solo Queue could become worse than what it was before. This change encourages hit and run tactics from the killer. This incentivises forcing a 3 gen from the start of the game. Furthermore, with this change makes healing a slow process, which could easily be broken by Sloppy Butcher, or addons which leave survivors mangled or hemorrhaging. 24 seconds of healing time is excessive. If you add other perks on top of this, like stated above, Sloppy Butcher, and Coulrophobia and then Thanataphobia, and let's say the killer is a Legion, this could make these matches incredibly drawn out, and in some cases purely unwinnable for Solo Queue survivors.
This being said, I do agree that some Medkits do need a Nerf. When I say some Medkits, I refer to the Emergency Medkit. The other Medkits were, nowhere near as much of an issue as the Emergency Medkit. I am glad that is going to be addressed.
Perk: Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance Nerf, Dead Hard Nerf, & Boon: Circle of Healing Nerf
This Perk was pretty balanced. It might have been sometimes annoying when people who know Pain resonance is in the game and Dead Man's switch is in the game refused to let go of the generator, however, like Pop Goes the Weasel previously was, it was pretty well balanced. In fact, it is possible to argue it is the most balanced regression/slowdown perk. So giving it tokens and nerfing this perk to the ground seems very out of touch with what's going on in the trials. Furthermore, nerfing this perk will encourage more camping and tunnelling and forcing of 3 gens because the slowdown you get from one of the better slowdown perks is so incredibly limited, that there is very little point in running it, and the alternatives are rather bleak.
If Dead Hard needed a nerf, this wasn't it. Personally when playing Killer (Oni) I never really had any issue with Dead Hard. If I ate a Dead Hard, my response would usually be, "Okay, cool, now I know". For the most part I was able to wait it out, or trick the survivor into using it early. There were, I admit, some situations where you would eat a Pallet or eat a Dead Hard - these situations did slow things down and made things very frustrating. However, certain perks could counter Dead Hard, such as Save the Best for Last, or certian killer powers outright nullified it. Furthermore, it feels like it would be difficult against good killers to hit a solid Dead Hard.
Also, reiterating what many others have said about this Nerf - it incentivieses tunnelling. The first hooked person will not have an active Dead Hard. Therefore you can just wait out their basekit BT and tunnel them out the game. This is even more punishing for Solo Queue players - at least in a SWF others may be able to successfully bodyblock and buy time.
In addition to this, Nerfing Dead Hard like this shadow nerfs the following perks to some extent: For the People, No Mither, Breakout, Mettle of Man and perhaps Unbreakable (as sometimes you have to get up and instantly Dead Hard to avoid being bled out). One final note is Dead Hard sometimes was the only counterplay to a Blight, and one of the best ways to counter a Nurse - two of the strongest killers in the game. Neither got nerf notes to match the Dead Hard nerf.
Lastly, Circle of Healing in these notes is no longer really viable to use. Not use in any meta, just use in general. I understand it was commonly used, however, since its previous nerf, I saw it far less frequently than before. Nerfing it so that there is absolutely no point in bringing the perk is not what a nerf is, that is an obliteration. The main issue with this nerf is it removes the whole point of the perk - to heal. If this perk needed a considerable nerf, it could be put on cooldown. For example: after someone is healed within the circle of healing without a medkit Circle of Healing goes on cooldown for 60 seconds. During these 60 seconds you cannot heal yourself without a medkit in Circle of Healing -- Just for example.
Killers: The Hillbilly Nerf & the Hag Buff
Alright, no one asked for Billy to get Nerfed. No one. In fact, quite the opposite. Players wanted Billy to get Buffed. Billy's Overheat mechanic has caused many issues for Billy players in the past, and yet they are still some of the sweetest, and kindest players out there. From my experiences, they play DBD for fun, for the Challenge of seeing if they can Curve this tile or that tile, or do a full lap of the map before hitting a survivor. And these Addons are getting Nerfed? The engravings have caused no problems and need no nerf. The Drift addons need no nerf. In fact, the patch notes give the impression that Billy should solely be played as an M1 Killer with no ability. Why on Earth would this killer need a Nerf? They are rare enough as is. Do not Nerf Billy. Buff him.
The Hag buff is somewhat interesting. I like the fact there is a new way to wipe away traps. That's great. However, a new problem arises with the removal of flashlight's power. Let me riddle you this, how is one meant to rescue from the basement vs a Hag who has placed all 10 traps around there, or any hook really without a Flashlight or multiple survivors? Answer: You probably aren't. The Flashlight was one of the strongest counterplays to the Hag and sometimes it was the sole counterplay. Removing the Flashlight ability to remove Hag traps improves the Hag's success at camping a Hook or a 3 gen. Therefore, this buff should be altered to reflect this.
The Lightburn Changes:
I swear Nurse just got nerfed - she is still an incredibly strong killer and removing the Lightburn ability just makes her even stronger. Removing Dead Hard's ability to counter her unless they player has unhooked just increases her ability further.
The Wraith Lightborn change sadly just increases their camping capability.
While adding changes to Lightburn is a good idea, I don't think these are the right ones. I am not sure what the right ones would be, and I think it would take a lot of thinking to come up with.
The Positives:
QoL: The Bloodweb changes & The Visual Terror Radius Update
I think these changes are fantastic. The feedback seems to have been considered in regards to the increase in bloodpoints players have been receiving and how difficult it has been to spend them quickly. I hope this feature is developed upon in order to assist players throughout their prestiging and levelling up. I am hopeful that this will also allow a certain about of bloodpoints to be banked in the future. Overall I think this is great for the game.
Overall, again I think this is great for the game. It opens up a greater level of accessibility to players who may have difficulty hearing the terror radius. Accessibility is very important in the game. This also makes me hopeful that other difficulties in terms of accessibility will be addressed in the future.
Perk: The Overzealous Buff, Call of Brine & Overcharge Nerfs
Overzealous is a perk I enjoy using. The buff is very much appreciated. It has felt underloved for a while, at least in my opinion. That being said, I think in regards to the increased nerf on the killer slowdown perks, it may be worthwhile considering re-buffing Pop Goes the Weasel, or Hex: Ruin. Especially Hex: Ruin, as it feels like Overzealous and Ruin are almost polar opposites of one another in a way.
The Call of Brine Nerf sounds great. As it previously stacked with Eruption and Overcharge it was a force to be reckoned with. With the introduction of the Knight and the Skull Merchant who have strong 3 gen from the start of the game potential, Call of Brine made games incredibly drawn out, especially when combined with Overcharge. I think the Nerf amount seems just right for now. In this section I have also included Overcharge, as I feel like these two perks often came hand in hand. I am not too sure about the decreased penality for Overcharge, however, I am glad something is being done about its presence . Of course the PTB will truly tell if that is the case.
The Killer Buffs: The Pig, The Oni, Freddy, Pyramid Head, & The Clown
Pig has always seemed to struggle (at least from my experiences) to travel across larger maps, so any kind of buff to her movement speed is helpful. Pig can be great as a jumpscare killer, and therefore I welcome this buff, even if it is due to an addon. This may also disincentivize Pig players from camping hooks, as they now have the chance to traverse the map a little better if they are using this addon.
I am going to state this now, I am an Oni player. I have a fair amount of experience starting to mount up as an Oni player. Therefore, this buff doesn't really have any sort of influence on how I play him. That being said, I think the addon buff is welcome for newer Oni players, as collecting blood is very important to gaining ability. However, I think it may be better to buff the passive charge rate addons instead of these addons, as for newer Oni players gaining ability can be tricky. Therefore, giving them a better passive ability change may help them learn to use their ability, as they will get it faster.
Freddy has been near the bottom of the Killer barrel from my experiences for a while. He fell from grace after his large nerf. It is nice to see him get a buff through his addons again. Blindness is certainly impactful on indoor maps, and can lead to panic as a survivor is hooked and being unable to find them. I would also like to mention that Freddy's reach is still a little bit questionable at times. I hope that the hitbox for his reach is addressed.
At long last, Pyramid Head's addons are getting a buff. Well addon. I'm going to be straight forward and blunt here. His only reallly good addons are the extension ones. Therefore it is nice to see one of his addons get a buff. I hope other addons belonging to him are up for a buff too, as, like I stated above, his general addons aren't that great right now and feel very outdated. Extending the killer instinct to double what it was, hopefully, will free up some information perks for him, as well as encourage more power-usage in comparison to M1s.
Personally, I rarely see Clown players, and even less running the Pinky Finger addon. I think, as it does take some practice to get the hit on the survivor, unless at close range, I think it is an interesting change. I think having it function like Irridescent Head on Huntress feels like a fair change. However, I think the PTB will show more.
The unincluded things
The things I haven't included because I am currently unsure about them: The Gearhead Change (I would rather this be based on downs than hits for similar reasons listed before, however it is nice to see it get some love), and the 2 map changes (I'd have to see these in order to make a call).
Thank you for your time if you made it to the bottom of this (I apologise for spelling mistakes etc). I don't think I forgot anything, but i might have.
Comments
I have to ask, and I'm being genuine- how on earth does removing Lightburn help Wraith in camping scenarios?
Ah, sorry I should have explained. If a Wraith is camping a hook in cloak you can Lightburn them to stun them, and get the unhook. I hope that clarifies. It doesn't help if they are uncloaked. A lot of my own experiences of Wraiths who have camped have been in cloak.
This is particularly effective in a Basement scenario.
I assume, because they cannot be burned they have a free insidious.... I guess?