Skull Merchant Good Actually
Controversial opinion I know, but I just wanted to offer feedback for the latest changes she got now that they've been out for a bit and I've been able to play them.
I personally enjoyed SM even before all the changes when she was at her "worst" state in the original PTB. I know she's not particularly strong and in a lot of ways her drones were kind of an afterthought, but I used to main Legion before Frenzy could down so I'm used to having a "utility" power that only works well once in a while. I never used CoB/Overcharge, or even Pain Resonance, and I still don't. My build for her is just bargain bin chase perks and one minor slowdown. Brutal, Fearmonger, Sloppy, and her perk Game Afoot. All this to say that I haven't been using her at her "most effective" in the least.
And yet I still win most of my games and have a good time doing so. A large part of what makes her fun, in my opinion, are her add-ons that change how you interact with her drones. Some games you have add-ons that make you want to step into your own radius for a speed boost or momentary stealth. (It's very funny to chase a survivor who avoids my active zone when I'm running these. Don't worry, it's not there for you. :) ) Others you use them to cause minor speed debuffs or get aura reading. These are good game-changing (though not necessarily winning) add-ons that actually give you a different flavor each time you play, the way that most add-ons should be. Again, I mained Legion before and most Legion add-ons are basic number tweaks that hardly alter how you play at all, excluding the iridescents of course.
The new buff of speed when survivors mess with your drones is very nice and I think actually was the final push she really needed to be a dynamic and fun killer (for my tastes, at least). It gives you information on where everyone is, even without using your radar, and gives you a boost to the current chase you're in so you can close it out faster, and the fact that the speed boost is always in flux actually messes with survivors way more than you'd think. All of it together means that I never feel overwhelmed in chase, always know where to go next, can control survivor pathing (both by setting up drones to scare them away from an area, or lure them to one that I actually don't care about), and there's always some new situation to figure out and plan for.
Against very good survivors she will obviously still struggle as much as any M1 based killer, but with my anti-exhaustion perks and add-ons, even those survivors have never really given me all that much trouble. I know that would still bother some people, but y'know, if you pick a less oppressive killer you've got to just accept that you're going to be less oppressive. Even on the games I get zero kills, I do still end up with many hooks and a lot of fun, tricky chases, more so than I used to have on Legion when I was outmatched. With Legion, everything is front-loaded into that first chase hit and general map-wide harassment, but if the survivors are really good, you simply never get to use your power. At least with SM, good survivors must still engage with your power, which means you always have a chance to do something more than just brute force chase someone down.
Hopefully with the nerfs to the 3Gen enabling perks, SM will be less annoying for survivors to run into, and killer players can start to learn her more fun elements and we can see her more often. :)
Oh also just to say this here because everyone memes on it: Brazil has the largest population of Japanese people outside of Japan. So the Brazilian Manga her father wrote actually makes perfect sense and isn't just some weird BS BHVR made up. The more you know. :)
Comments
I like playing SM as well.