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Calm Spirit and Balanced Landing Buff Proposal

UndeddJester UndeddJester
in Feedback and Suggestions

Following on from UW post, I accept that tackling Ultimate Weapon is a complex thing that can easily kill the perk.

@UndeddJester said:

So as many people know, I'm quite vocal about this perk, but the advantage of discussing in this forum is your opinions get challenged and you're forced to reassess and sometimes even change your opinion.

So to get on with it, Ultimate Weapon is a big talking point, with some players maintaining its OP, some saying it's only OP on certain killers, and some saying its strong but fair, and some saying its mediocre. After talking about this perk so many times, I conclude that all are true depending on the context, and the difference is the skill gap... mostly...

Ultimate Weapon's key strength is that you can use it any time you like to almost guarantee finding survivors when you need it. It's main weakness is that survivors are warned about this and can pre-run from you to loops.

The reason for all these different opinions is the skill levels involved in the discussion

  1. At low levels, looping is tougher for survivors, and not something they do very efficiently. Ultimate Weapon prevents a sneaky playstyle and forces survivors to have to loop, whether its tunneling, proxy camping or general gen defence. It also take away WoO, punishing weak loopers even more.
  2. At high levels, looping is the most effective means of consuming time from the killer. Being found for survivors isn't really a big deal, as they get a head start and can run to loops early. As they are good loopers, this makes UW kinda mediocre, as the killer will struggle to actually get their down.

So on the face it seems purely a skill issue right?

Well not so fast. Killers that are strong in Map Traversal (Oni, Wesker, Blight, Nurse) are strong with this perk, and those with Anti-Loop (Blight and Nurse) are exceptionally strong with this perk. By finding survivors so consistently, these killers also force you to loop them, which is a problem because you don't typically want to loop against these Killers that have a strong advantage in loops.

What makes Blight and Nurse OP to many is they have this anti loop strength, and can fundamentally counter the most effective time consuming method survivors have. It's not as simple as "nerf Blight and Nurse", because their power is fragile and robbing these killers of that power can easily kill the killer. UW forces you to play vs. this power however, as the Nurse/Blight can always find you.

TLDR/Conclusion:

The main point I'm driving it, is that UW forces players to have to loop the killer, and thus gains much more value on the killers that:

  • have good map traversal to get to into chase quickly.
  • have a strong power that can force downs quickly at loops.

Ultimate Weapon removes 1 of the few remaining tools survivors have to counter these types of Killers... stealth... and there isn’t really any way to prevent that without gutting the perk.

Is the perk overtuned and unfair? The honest answer is... it depends, and I'm not convinced its possible to balance it in all cases.


This makes it a tough nut to crack... and my only thought for making UW consistently fair is to modify Calm Spirit.. and most people cite remove the Calm Spirit weakness...

However, 1 less obvious reason I can see why Calm Spirit has its downside, is the lack of a scream is one of the few traits Balanced Landing has when dropping off heights. While not the strongest perk, the silent drop makes it somewhat desirable, and Calm Spirit essentially removes that niche.


So with that in mind, I want to suggest this change to Calm Spirit and while I'm at it, a small buff to Balanced Landing.

Comments

  • UndeddJester UndeddJester

    Calm Spirit

    Animals seem to trust you as they often stay calm in your presence.

    • Prevents Crows from being alerted by your proximity and flying off, unless they are being stepped on.
    • Suppresses the urge to scream from any cause at all times.
    • Suppresses all noises related to unlocking Chests and cleansing or blessing Totems.
    • For 30s after supressing a scream, reduces Chest and Totem Interaction speed by 40/35/30 %.

    Balanced Landing

    Your agility and cat-like relexes are incomparable.

    When falling from great heights, you benefit from the following effects:

    • Suppresses Grunts of Exertion and Screams from falling.

    When not Exhausted you get the the following effects:

    • Reduces the Stagger duration by 75 %.
    • Upon landing, break into a sprint at 150 % of your normal Running Movement speed for 3 seconds.
    • Exhausted Status Effect for 60/50/40 seconds.

    "I have jumped from higher places." — Nea Karlsson

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