What changed?
A few years ago I started playing Dead By Daylight and I absolutely loved playing the game. Friends and I would get together and form a team of survivors to try and escape. We found the team work amazing and also the customization of perks to present a unique experience per trial. Even though at times, when I just wanted to make it easy, I'd pick the "recommended" perks. Solo queue was pretty simple too even against relatively experienced killers.
At some point, I switched over to playing the killer role and while it felt more challenging trying to juggle 4 survivors to hooks, it was still fun and engaging. I was able to get to rank 1 killer after a few weeks, which to me was more of an accomplishment than survivor. Then, I quit playing. Personal life reasons, work etc. etc.
I recently decided to return to playing again a few days ago. I mean come on.. Nick Cage was like sending a Batman signal into the sky. The survivor experience was still simple so I got bored with it after a few hours and was like "time to reclaim my rank 1 glory"!
Good..... lord.
After a multitude of rounds, I couldn't even get past Ash Rank 4. Therefore, my question is.. what changed? Survivors seem faster, always healed, more coordinated, and kind of more toxic. The toxic thing is a community subject and I'd rather not go down that road. I am trying to focus mainly on the game dynamics. There doesn't appear to be an "easy mode" anymore. Not that I want it "easy", but maybe some forgiveness when I miss a swing. Its like, I am 5 minutes into the round and looking at 1 gen left with only two hooks. I said to myself, keep playing and it will get better. But it hasn't. Why does the par for course feel like climbing Everest?
Is it time for me to just stick to survivor? And if so, when I get bored, am I forced to move on from a game I fell in love with years ago? I am very saddened by this experience. I cannot be the only one. Maybe I just don't got it anymore.
Anyways, I am going to try and play for a few more days to see if it improves. Just wanted to get some comments from the community on this subject.
I really want to be able to play the upcoming Alien content but now I am just not that certain I'll make it.
Much appreciated and much love to Dead By Daylight and the community.
Kirkyman.
Comments
SBMM (Skill Based Match Making) was the big change in that time. I'd keep playing for a few weeks and see how your games settle.
The Survivor population in general play towards ending matches fast now. I believe you will notice 5 gen chase videos are as less common now as compared to 2 years ago. This coupled with Survivors being more gen efficient would give you the feeling that your time limit is much more shorter as compared to before.
Sometime back, I swf-ed with a returning DBD player who last played in 2021. She basically spent the whole match finding and cleansing all 5 totems to prevent No One Escapes Death. We still lost the game. If she had ignored the totems and focused on doing gens the whole game, we would have gotten a 4 man out. In the past, Survivors could mess around and do side quests like cleanse totems, but that’s not the case anymore.
I would assume survivors have gotten better and you probably should not be playing killer the same way you did back then. You can't just turn off your brain for the most part and it makes sense for both sides. You can't just mindlessly chase a survivor for 5 mins and then expect to get 3k-4k (unless the survivors have been ######### around) and survivors can't escape to win if the killer has more hooks than they have gens finished.
People have optimized the hell out of this game like they do with any game over time.
Just like in the beginning of R6S defender barricaded themselves close to the objective room and attacker tried to crack the defense. Nowadays defender have stealth to roam the whole map, offensive tools, their own drones and so on and attackers also have defensive tool against lurker/roamer and multitude of other utility. This is one of the reasons why I won't go back to that game, despite having actively played it for the first 2-3 from release. I am just way to behind, have too many old habits that are counterproductive and there is too much new stuff and strategies to learn. (Also that game always sucked as solo after a certain point of rank/skill)
Games and the way they are played change drastically over their lifetime when player development more optimized gameplay. Of course that sucks out the fun for casual when the respective game doesn't have a working matchmaking and/or a separate ranked queue.
After a day of playing anther round of killer. I have decided to walk away from this role. It on longer feels rewarding and it simply isn't worth it. I'll play survivor for a few more days and then move on. The game doesn't feel balanced. I was able to jump right back into survivor with no issues. But killer is just too much of a learning and skill curve these days. I appreciate those of you who responded and all of your suggestions. I am simply not having fun. I am super glad that this is not the only asymmetrical game on the market. Take care and farewell.
This is merely my opinion based off of my experience and my experience just cannot agree with this statement. However, thank you for your input.
The MMR doesn't feel right. What I am really trying to say is, if you asked me to step back into the game to play at my peak from years ago, then no. That is impossible. I need to build up to that level of skill. It feels like I have been thrown back into a pool of skilled Rank 1s. I am getting queues with two or three 100 cap survivors and I JUST stepped back into the game. I cannot keep up and I feel like I am drowning. It isn't like I am a 7000 hour player who never quit playing like a streamer. I am simply a 600 hour player that came back casually. Sure, I am not "new" per se, but what IF someone was "new"? Is the recommendation for them to A) Just be miserable until they "get good". B) Stick to playing only survivor (making the game one dimensional) until they can play killer, C) Don't even try the role or move on. I feel really really bad for new players. There needs to be a skill scale. It doesn't feel that way AT ALL when I came back to survivor. It just felt natural like picking a bike back up.
Grades mean nothing about skill. There's no ranked mode anymore, it has been reworked a few years ago and now grades like Ash, Silver etc. are roughly representative of playtime.
Regarding the "difficulty" of the game, I'd say 2 things have changed: 1) Players have got better at the game and 2) The player count has decreased, so less casual players on average, and more sweaty players, on both sides.
It's true that killer is indeed the easiest it's ever been in terms of balance (at least based on public statistics), but matches feel tougher than 1-2 years ago, because of the factors above. Sadly there's not much to do about it except playing during event or early evening, when most casuals boot up the game.
Is it only the killer experience that sucks, or is your survivor experience much harder than before as well? The latter would be my expectation.
Yes unfortunately the SBMM has tarnished what used to be a much more "fun" experience... ESPECIALLY if you play Solo.....good lord I would NEVER recommend solo to anyone new to this game.. Get friends to play with or don't even install.. :/
The survivor experience feels way better than killer. It is more enjoyable. I feel like because I am part of a team I don't technically have to fight it alone. I don't need to have as much map pressure or I don't feel like I have to be everywhere at once. Survivor feels way more newbie friendly to me. But, that is just me.
Furthermore, a couple of examples I also noticed. I don't really need to run borrowed time anymore because now when I unhook people my chance of betting blood points are higher since they cannot be downed. That is base now. Super awesome. And then the boons for healing means everyone can be healed even if they cannot find a med kit. Right now, I am trying to get this perk called Made for this because that speed boost is tremendous. I don't really need to have the boon that speeds you up anymore. And don't even get me into Nick Cage perks. WoW. From my survivor perspective, it feels like Christmas morning all over again.
You might have missed an edit I made to the post later so just rewriting it now;
Grades like Ash, Silver etc. don't mean anything about your skill. There's no ranked mode anymore, it has been reworked a few years ago so don't make any assumption based on grades, they are basically just representative of playtime. (More precisely, they are based on emblems, but you'll always end up Iridescent each season if you play a lot)
It's very possible that you're already at top MMR even when the game displays you're Ash 4 (ie. you're facing the best survivors) and inversely, somebody can be Iri 1 and be at the lowest MMR (face baby players). The MMR and grade systems have nothing in common.
Lobby dodging is one reason why newer killers get the more experienced survivors. The veteran killers they're matched with dodge them, and the game eventually prioritises queue times over accuracy and other killers will be used as backfill. So baby killers will get veteran survivors, as some veteran killers shop for baby survivors.
Matchmaking needs an overhaul 100% as lobby shopping is absolutely not the sole reason this happens, but it certainly doesn't help. Many of us have said before that this game has become very new player unfriendly.
the game was easier for survivors back them but also it didnt had the horrible SBMM.
-maps were bigger
-loops were busted like REALLY BUSTED.
-many killers were weaker + survivor had broken item / addons back them.
-there was a reward by escaping which was keeping your item and addons basekit.
-because the game was more simple , back them there was more veterans playing than new players.}
-information HUDs wasnt a thing due to the amount of people already knowing the basics + even at rank 20 , u could find people really good at the game compared than now where low mmr is full of babies or SMURFs playing poorly.
now where SBMM just puts people that can be good but end up dying facecamped / tunneled / etc, with worst teammates the more they die , on modern DBD escaping is like a must have to avoid bad teammates /new players but also gives you more sweatier games due to increasing your mmr and eventually sweatier matches to play against. SBMM is just the worst thing that they ever added honestly , keeping a team of full new players just makes their experience worst due to all of them being unaware of how to play and because killer at low skil level its easier than survivors the killer end ups winning no matter what.
Unfortunately SBMM kind of introduced the worst of both worlds for both casual and competitive players.
Casual players feel that the game is too competitive now. Matchmaking is fairly loose even with SBMM in place, so players get placed in matches that feel too sweaty for them.
For competitive players, games often feel too easy on killer. And on solo survivor, teammate skill tends to vary way too much within the same trial. The matchmaker has a very hard time placing players at the top end in appropriate games.
(What is RS6?)
Rainbow six siege, tactical PvP Shooter.