Developer Update | August 2025
The 9.2.0 Update arrives next week, so let’s check out the notable gameplay changes you can expect from this Public Test Build. Plus, stay tuned for next week's PTB Patch Notes where we’ll share the precise values that are changing for each of the topics below!
Read on for all the details:
NEW FEATURES
- If a Survivor is left in the Dying State for a total of 90 seconds during a match, they gain the ability to pick themselves up after fully recovering.
- Added the option to enable or disable this mechanic in Custom Games.
- Note: Perks that enable you to recover from the Dying State - like Boon: Exponential - will continue to function as before, without needing to meet this requirement.
- Gradually increases crawling speed for Survivors who are left in the Dying State.
- Added the ability for Survivors to recover while crawling. Recovery now occurs passively with no need to hold a button.
- Updated several Survivor and Killer perks to account for these changes.
Passive recovery while crawling
Pick yourself up if you’ve been in the Dying State for 90 seconds
DEV NOTE: When it comes to slugging, we know it can be frustrating if you're on the receiving end of it too often or for too long, but we also know that sometimes it's the smart move. This updated system acknowledges this, allowing the Killer to slug occasionally when they feel like it's the right call, but will eventually kick in and swing in the Survivor's favour if slugging is used excessively.
A big part of this is also about making the experience of being slugged more pleasant (as much as being slugged can be, at least). The recovery changes and crawling speed will give you a bit more agency when downed so you aren't just holding a button and waiting for someone to come save you.
- When a Survivor is hooked, their hook status is hidden from the Killer. When they’re unhooked, there is no notification and their hook status isn’t revealed immediately.
- This is disabled once all generators are completed.
- Unhooked Survivors gain the following effects for a limited time:
- Haste, Endurance, and Elusive (see below) status effects.
- No collision with other players (both Killer and Survivor).
- Immunity to Killer Instinct and sees the Killer’s aura nearby.
- These effects are lost when the affected Survivor perform a Conspicuous Action.
- All these effects (except Haste and Endurance) are disabled once all generators are completed.
- Added a unique effect to the Killer hook state UI that indicates the last Survivor they hooked.
- After completing a “unique hook” (the same Survivor is not hooked consecutively), Killers get the following benefits:
- Bonus damage for the next generator kick.
- Temporary Haste status effect.
- Temporarily reveals Survivors (think basekit BBQ & Chili) that have less or equal hook states to the hooked Survivor.
- These effects are slightly lessened for The Blight, The Dark Lord, The Ghoul, The Hillbilly, and The Nurse.
- These effects are disabled once all generators are completed.
- Added new effects that disincentivize tunneling:
- If a Survivor dies before 6 total hook states, all remaining Survivors gain a repair speed bonus for the rest of the Trial.
- If the Survivor that was last hooked is Sacrificed or Killed, generators cannot be regressed or blocked.
- Added the option to enable or disable these new mechanics in Custom Games.
- Updated several Survivor and Killer perks to account for these changes.
DEV NOTE: It’s no secret that tunneling can be seen as an efficient way to play for Killers. While this can be true, it’s also true that the results of this can be frustrating for Survivors, leading to Trials ending too quickly for some, while leaving others to fend for themselves in a match that is now much more difficult.
The intention here is for both roles to feel the benefits and incentives that come from spreading hook states. On the one end, Survivors have better opportunities to evade and reset after unhooks, while also limiting those tough situations where losing a Survivor too quickly causes things to go south quickly and snowball. On the other end, Killers are able to apply more map pressure to push back against efficient teams, covering ground post-hook and strengthening gen regression.
- Added a new status effect that silences grunts of pain and suppresses Survivor aura, pools of blood, and scratch marks.
DEV NOTE: To start, we’ll be using this new status effect as part of the tunnelling reduction update, but plan to integrate this into relevant existing perks down the road to make their descriptions more streamlined. Arguably the easiest way to look at this is a Survivor version of Undetectable, in that when it’s active, you know you’re in stealth mode.
- Updated “The Tomes” menu to feature new Tomes and accompanying lore alongside each Chapter release.
- New lore is unlocked each week within the active Tome.
DEV NOTE: Ever since we reworked the Tome, we’ve seen how much you’ve yearned for more lore. We’re happy to share that beginning with 9.2.0, lore is back! While previously, lore was tied to challenges, we want all players to have a chance to immerse themselves in these stories, so we’ve shifted to a weekly unlock, not linked to any quest completion.
KILLER UPDATES
- Replaced “Evil Within” with two modes that can be toggled with a button press:
- Stalker Mode: 4.2m/s movement speed, Undetectable, and can stalk Survivors.
- Pursuer Mode: 4.6m/s movement speed, 24m Terror Radius, increased vault speed, bonuses to lunge range, break speed, and stun recovery, and cannot stalk Survivors.
- Once the stalk meter is full, Evil Incarnate mode can be triggered at will, granting the following effects for a limited time (note: Survivors no longer become Exposed):
- 4.6m/s movement speed, 40m Terror Radius and an increased vault speed.
- Unlocks Slaughtering Strike ability:
- Hold the power button to charge this ability, reducing movement speed.
- Press the attack button while charging to quickly lunge forward, adjusting your angle as you move. The length of the lunge depends on charge time.
- If a Survivor enters the Killer’s attack range while lunging, they are knocked into the Dying State.
- This ability can also be used to destroy pallets.
- Unlocks the ability to grab and kill or perform a regular Mori on Survivors who would die the next time they are hooked.
- Adjusted some of the mechanics of stalking:
- Removed the limited pool of stalk points per Survivor.
- Reduced stalk range to 32m and removed distance modifier.
- Moving while stalking has increased movement speed but incurs a reduced stalk rate.
- Reworked his add-ons.
Slaughtering Strike in action
DEV NOTE: By moving away from linear “Evil Within” tiers, we wanted to give players more tools they can use to adapt to each Trial’s unique situations, while keeping the core of what makes him “The Shape”.
Slaughtering Strike makes for a high-threat offensive attack, offering up an insta-down opportunity with an extended lunge that's particularly effective in loops and for ripping through pallets quickly.
Understanding his kit has changed quite a lot, we’ve done a pass on nearly all his add-ons, reworking many of them to offer more unique effects. In particular for those who prefer his old playstyle, Fragrant Tuft of Hair will change Evil Incarnate to function like old Myers, offering an Exposed effect and no Slaughtering Strike. Stay tuned for patch notes for the full details on these changes!
- Increased activation time of the Afterpiece Antidote.
- Increased how long the Afterpiece Tonic’s Hindered effect lingers after leaving smoke.
DEV NOTE: We’ve heard your feedback that The Clown’s easier-to-activate Haste can make instigating and maintaining chases less interactive for Survivors. That, coupled with nerfs to his purple bottles has pushed players towards this frustrating tactic. To make both bottles feel like viable options without being too oppressive, we’ve adjusted the values of their most impactful qualities to strike a balance between pre-9.1.0 values and Live values.
- Increased the additional time added to Weakened when injured by a UVX projectile.
- Increased movement speed recovery after teleporting.
- Increased camera vertical range.
- Adjusted several add-ons.
Increased vertical camera range in action
DEV NOTE: The Unknown is largely considered to be fun to play as and against, and we want to preserve that while adapting to the current state of gameplay. We’ve buffed the UVX slightly, while also taking what we learned from The Animatronic to allow for orbitals, improving UVX aiming and making for even more fun gameplay.
It’s also likely no surprise that Blurry Photo is the most used add-on for the Unknown, given the importance of speed recovery. To help create an opportunity for more add-on experimentation, we’ve converted a portion of this add-on into a basekit buff, while also doing a pass on other add-ons that are due for some adjustments.
- Vampire Form:
- Slightly reduced Hellfire cooldown.
- Increased total Hellfire pillars by 1.
- Reduced Hellfire charge movement speed.
- Slightly increased slowdown time after casting Hellfire.
- Wolf Form:
- Increased Pounce Attack charge time.
- Increased Scent Orb spawn time.
- Bat Form:
- Increased movement friction to make flying easier to control.
- Adjusted his add-ons.
DEV NOTE: Vampire Form is slightly less oppressive in short loops where movement slowdown had less of an impact, and toning down Wolf Form’s mobility, which has been outclassing some dash Killers. On the flip side, you’ll find Bat Form easier to control in tighter spaces and can use Hellfire slightly more frequently and reach further with it.
- When grabbing a Survivor on the other side of a vault with Kagune Leap, the Survivor is released at the start of The Ghoul’s vault instead of at the end.
DEV NOTE: It’s no secret that it’s been a common pain point for Survivors to be locked in place when hit with a Kagune Leap Grab-Attack across a vault. Survivors shouldn’t have to wait for The Ghoul to finish their vault before being able to move again, so we’ve removed this tech.
- Hooking a Survivor now spawns more blood orbs.
DEV NOTE: We understand that with the changes we’re making to address slugging, this will impact The Oni slightly, so we want to mitigate this. By turning hooked Survivors into a greater source of power gauge build-up, The Oni is rewarded with more quickly snowballing power by hooking.
- Updated various perks.
DEV NOTE: In addition to the general perk balance updates you can expect each release, we've also made a number of adjustments to account for the new systems coming to DbD this update, specifically relating to slugging and tunneling.
Stay tuned on Wednesday, September 3 for the PTB Live Balance preview on Discord, where we'll dig into the details of these perk changes, and then follow that up with patch notes, where you can find the nitty-gritty numbers.
Until next time...
The Dead by Daylight Team
Comments
I mean ive gotten a condemned kill at 0 hooks before because of poor survivors plays....
it appears to be to prevent body blocking
Just for the tiny chance that a developer reads this despite how cluttered this comment section is becoming, I would like to point out four things to keep in mind while making these changes.
Overall I personally believe that these changes are a little overtuned but will not judge until we see the actual numbers in the PTB. However, I applaud the attempt at making big changes, just please do a lot of testing, this is not something that can be rushed!
Like I said, I could see it maybe being a problem, but it strikes me as a problem you'll see once in a blue moon and not something that really negatively affects the killer in every other match, y'know?
Sadako does still hook, even when spreading Condemned.
Of course, it's also worth mentioning that Sadako really needs a proper update anyways, so maybe that's planned later down the line or something.
Do you guys ever think about how things are going to be used in an actual game? Do you ever do any internal testing with people who actually play the game?
You do understand that with these changes in place, if there's a survivor on death hook before 6 hooks are up, they're going to body block aggressively because they'll know that they won't suffer any penalty for it. Did you down them? Well that probably cost you your chase and they know that they can just pick themselves up for free because you aren't going to hook them and risk incurring the penalty.
What about matches where the survivors all use the same cosmetic? That's not super uncommon and now you won't know who to chase or hook unless you're keeping a really careful eye on the player list, and even then, killers don't have a way of keeping track how many hooks are on each person so if you lose track, you can get ######### through no fault of your own.
Seriously, do you guys ever actually think about the mechanics you want to implement before wasting man hours building them?
It's not even about the "buffs" killers are getting, because they aren't even buffs when it's only a lack of nerf with a system that didn't even exist before, it's about the philosophy that anti camp/tunnel is a necessity in early-midgame but not endgame and that killers should just get free kills
You do know this is just gonna help survivors who are toxic and sweat for no reason right? Why are killers so hated, ik tunneling & slugging was a problem, but sometimes you HAVE to tunnel & slug when people are being toxic & sweaty, thus basically just gives THOSE players a handicap that allows them to get away with it more
It's not a "free" out for the survivor, the survs got all the gens done, they earned it. Meanwhile what does the killer have to do for their actually free kill? Get a single hook and camp :/. Anti camp and tunnel being enabled in endgame is definitely the more reasonable option, survivors earned their 4 out plenty more than the killer earned a kill
All of this makes playing killer miserable and honestly not even worth it anymore.
I really appreciate you guys working to tackle such complex and challenging issues like these. Honestly I haven’t touched the game since the nerfing of fog vials because I was just feeling so disillusioned and reading these updates made me excited to play again. I love that buffs and rewards were given to killers to encourage not tunneling/slugging, along with the consequences of doing so.
I get that a lot of people are probably upset right now, but I believe it’s because the game has always been a certain way and that these updates are changing things that have been around for a very, very long time. Though the one honest, so has the criticisms about these issues too. It’s not as if these changes haven’t been asked about for years.
Excited to see the changes get tested and adjusted, and how these changes will impact the game not only for survivors but for killers as well, as no longer having tunneling as a reliable way to get kills could shine a light on killers that struggle more without relying on it, and could lead to them receive more base-kit changes and buffs. Thank you for tackling this!
Please add chucky sounds when myers is dashing 😅🤣😂😂
feedback for some listed changes
Antislug meter: should slow down when there are nearby survivors (similar to anticamp) as this is the typical situation a killer has the opportunity to slug aggressively and they deserve to benefit heavily from it. otherwise this is fine as a combatant to slugging. (positive: recovery without needing to hold a button is an amazing change, so many games are lost because a stubborn survivor will refuse to recover)
Obscuring hook status: this only really serves to take away important macro-information from weaker killers and those who intentionally choose to not tunnel already. a tunnelling or high strength killer has easy access to consistently check back on the hook and a tunnelling one will often proxy camp the hook regardless, meaning they can visibly see the unhook occuring. if committing to the idea then the hook should stay obscured with a black bubble surrounding it but i think a better idea is to only apply it if a killer is within 24m of the hook or so (so a faraway killer still gets information they need to play)
Losing collision after unhook: a great and perfect change, though i think it should go further. instead of unhooks removing collision from the killer, all endurance effects should remove collision while theyre active. that becomes a more intuitive method of understanding when its in play and takes away certain problematic offensive bodyblocking while not losing any of the defensive value of endurance effects.
Basekit BBQ: Make it a white aura or killer instinct or both, no other notes.
Tunnelling punishment/hook state UI: give survivors the same info of who was last hooked (glowing hook tally?), and make one half of the killers hoor counterr a different color/pattern etc to showcase that there are unique effects when someone dies before 6.
Tunnelling: consider reducing or removing the effects at certain stages of the game. if a survivor is consecutively hooked/killed at 2 or especially 1 gen remaining, survivors dont need additional help in repair speed. a consecutive hook kill also isnt so problematic if multiple survivors are already on death hook, so the gen regression/block removal after someone dies should only occur before 6 hook stages.
Myers: why limit the range he can stalk survivors? limiting his range takes away an important aspect of his skill expression and stalking very faraway wasnt problematic when survivors are paying attention as they should
otherwise i love these changes and im super excited to see how they reshape the games meta as a whole and how its played, considering the many possibilites to combat tunnelling especially it seems the devs have taken an extremely well thought out and fair method of preventing it ❤️
edit: as someone above me mentioned a death hook survivor can intentionally bodyblock for other survivors at low hook counts and potentially largely buff their team. its possible the way this is designed that wouldnt negatively affect the game and could net benefit the killer, but a simple solution to that problem if it exists would be to make a death hook survivor have no collision with the killer
What happens if the most recently hooked survivor decides to aggressively bodyblock the killer after the elusive status wears off?
Because that sounds like survivors weaponizing the anti-tunnel feature.
You guys killed the game for us killers with this anti-slug and anti-tunnel, congratulations! I'm going to play other games if this go live.
Can't you think of any other adjustments besides narrowing the killer's strategies?
They should give even hanging some merit.
Why always narrow the range of strategies?
Good changes overall. Would like to see more adjustments for Ghoul, generally around his power inflicting deep wounds without even being in melee range of the survivor. Myers is interesting.
To the people complaining about anti slug - 90 seconds is a lot of time, if you can't make something happen in that timespan, thats entirely on you.
A lot of people just commenting and exposing themselves as blatant tunnelers/sluggers who don't want the game to go in a healthy direction.
Overall pretty W update IMO. Looking forward to the PTB.
YEAH!
That's what I've been waiting for! Addressing tunnel without the reason of why killers do it.
You're now forced to 6 hooks before killing a surv.
Slow the damn gens and make unable for gen related perks to stack or work with each other like Hyperfocus+Stakeout.
GOD DAMN IT!
Also I'm sure you tweaked Dracula's number by A LOT for nerfs and almost nothing for buffs and what did you do with Kaneki? Removed the kidnap tech and that's it.
NICE!
To begin with, I found this Myers update disgusting, It's so out of character that I don't even know what to say. It looks like Chucky/Oni with extra steps.
Now, since you're significantly reducing the pressure that killers can apply, why don't you nerf some of the pressure that survs can apply?
The main thing that should be added is the passive healing regression. It shouldn't be possible for a surv to use resilience and leave the healing at 99 to get the full benefits of the perk. It's frustrating when a surv spends a long time injured with a gen repair bonus, then when you enter a chase, they still have the valt speed bonus, and then when you finally catch up, they heal and tank a hit and still have the perk benefits. Being injured should be a bad thing for them, not a game-changing feature.
The devs addressed survivor frustration.
They forgot to address killer frustration.
I am so glad I didn't waste an additional year of my life playing this slop. Dead game.
the reason killers tunnel:
gens are too quick (addressed by basekit pop)
they cannot find another survivor (addressed by basekit bbq)
it is generally the most efficient strategy (its now massively inefficient if done too early in the game)
they absolutely addressed tunnelling at its core and they have BIG compensatory buffs for spreading hooks now, especially the information youll get from bbq is massive for all killers
Basekit Pop is nothing and it's a well know fact that if you 8 hook before killing any surv you already lost the match.
Also survs will keep using 2nd chance perks and weaponize them against the killer.
No, it's a well known fact that if you 8 hook before killing anyone and still get a 3 or 4 k, you played a fair match where everyone had equal opportunities and left with good points.
This is all overkill too. You wont even add any indicator for the killer whether its a basekit feature or a perk allowing them to just stand up from the ground. "Elusive" aswell, like what? My guy, you cant ever hear the survivors when injured anyway. Have you ever played a match of your own game? Jokers, all of you. Embarrassing.
There's a difference between fair match and letting survs win.
I don't like when anyone let me win, so I respect my foes the same by not letting them.
I never turbo tunnel (3 hooks and a surv is dead) unless survs really screw up, but 6 hook is almost 8. This is ridiculous.
I was wondering how this will this interact with perks like Devour Hope that grant tokens or Jagged Compass/Floods that make noise notifications and have a visible cooldown on the perk icons? Will those count as notifications and be removed/delayed?
as someone who played the ptb the first time they did essentially this same anti-slugging change, they took away one unhealthy interaction and added in a new one, these changes are horrid for the game and that's only talking about the slugging change. Not even going into what makes the tunneling changes bad (SPOILER: they won't only punish tunneling).
if you 8 hook then you already outplayed every survivor in a chase twice for up to 16 health states, at that point who cares if you "won" in the games terms when you've proven you're better anyway? 8 hooking would again be far better than it is now with constant information on survivor positions and stronger gen regression BOTH without using any perks. if those changes came without touching tunnelling survivors would be complaining just as hard as killers are right now about how "killer is op and being handheld" or whatever
They turned Myers into a dash killer
I don't want to prove anything.
If I deserve I want to win, not only a proof of it.
I can only say a single word....
Interesting.
The only thing I object to is Myers.
He was fine before. Skully mains, I know how you feel now.
they said theyre making tuft of hair revert him to how he worked before, so he at least wont be irreversibly butchered like skerchant was
@ThatRyanB
Two questions:
You said that killers will get a basekit-like BBQ which reveals the survivors with not many hooks, is this like an aura reading effect that can be avoided with going into a locker or having Distortion or OTR? Or is it a complete new and unavoidable effect?
How much is the gen speed get when a survivor dies before 6 hook states? Is it just a little like 5% or is it more?
Let's hope this all dies in PTB, please 🙏
The anti-camp and anti-slug is wayy too OP, basically giving survs like 5 perks as a base kit. I am for some anti-camp/slug features, that's for sure but this is wayy too much.
Yeah killers are getting some buffs too but it's wayy less than survs.
Survs are already in a good position, plus tunneling usually happens for 2 reasons: either killer is a new player or the tunneled person decided to be a pain in the ass (clicking flashlight, spamming vaults and other various kinds of unsportsmanlike behavior.)
Also Mayers rework is just ???
Survivor makes mistakes or plays poorly = survivor gets rewarded
Killer plays well = killer gets punished.
seems fair…
I would just get rid of the recovering while moving and when the survivor unhooks a survivor the survivor that unhooked there aura should be revealed for 7 seconds
myers changes look absolutely silly. just completely out of character and ruins the gameplay that felt unique to him. his power felt different to most other killers in the game and linked to him as a character. anyone saying "oh well he had longer lunge" can't seem to comprehend the difference between a subtle boost like that and turning him into an olympic sprinter. no way to treat one of the most iconic characters in horror.
being someone who plays survivor more than killer, i want to like the anti-slugging/tunnelling changes, because it can be frustrating to deal with that in a match, however some of it sounds like overkill (especially the regression thing). i think these changes are just going to gut the killer experience and reward bad gameplay from survivors.
Have you considered bringing up the hook denial issues outside of topics about anti-tunnel/slug/camp?
So you just made the game incredibly survivor sided and made it damn near impossible for the killer to effectively deal with bully squads? Good job BHVR good job you continue to release updates that make me question my own sanity. Slugging and tunneling are part of the game just how flashlights, bagging and SWFs are as killer you just deal with it but if your a poor poor survivor you shouldn't have to deal with the pesky killer winning oh no you have to have every possible advantage to win don't worry your sweet head about it the devs will make sure the killer can't even get a kill if you swarm him with flashlights and meta builds.
Please give whoever suggested the unique hook buffs a raise:
10/10 genius (specifically for the unique hook incentives). Thank the people who came up with unique hook buffs for me.
Are the downvotes SURVs who don't understand that hook incentives mean Killers have more freedom to mess around in matches? Do you want to see more Low Tiers like Ghostie/Pig/Trapper and mid tiers like Xeno/Demo, or do you want to play against only Nurses and Blights because they can actually make it across the map?
For my fellow players for The Blight, The Dark Lord, The Ghoul, The Hillbilly, and The Nurse, you are STILL GETTING haste/bqq/gen regression bonuses for Unique Hooks. You're still getting haste, just enough that suits your Killer's need. A flat buff that applies to everyone the same way would fail. For the haste to be noticeable on weak killers, it would have to be decently high which would be OP on high mobility Killers, hence why it would get nerfed quickly. Instead, you get your flat percent buff while we get ours and the two never shall meet. Let's stop putting sports cars into the biking lane, please.
But dude, you have no argument on WHY they should stop disabling them at the end. Our argument is the fact that it'd make it even harder for killers to get a kill at the end if they've already had a terrible game. What is the killer supposed to do during End Game if they got no kills? Just give up and walk away and let the rest of the survivors simply free the hooked person and leave because the anti-camp feature will free them anyway? They need at least a chance to get a kill, and disabling the features gives them a slightly better one.
Are you expecting the killer to get a pen and paper and track who they hooked, how many times and for how long? Because that sounds miserable. This is a casual game, and that is taking it to a level of effort I'm not willing to put in. I just want to sit down and play a game, not get punished for not taking notes during the match. I'll just stop playing if this goes live. DbD isn't the only game in my library. The minute it feels like work I'm done.
One of the features being added is an indicator of who was hooked last.
Is this back to back hooks? Hypothetically, if you tried chasing other survivors for 2 minutes lost chases and came back to the same person and hooked again, does this count? Is there a time counter to make sure it’s tunneling and not someone who is coming back to a survivor who has unhooked and healed after like 2 minutes?
Why do people keep asking me this? What would you do in endgame if you couldn't camp? Literally there's your answer, it's so simple. And no they do not need a chance to get a kill, you don't deserve a kill for hooking 1 person and camping them, get a kill before then, and if you can't for some reason other than skill issue then that's a general killer/survivor perk balance issue, not one which is solved by giving killers free kills just because they feel bad
I respect the attempt at a huge swing, but it's already obvious some stuff will need to be tweaked. So far I have 2 major complaints.
The anti-tunneling is not just anti-hard tunneling, this also punishes accidental tunneling and survivors running into the killer off the hook, intentionally or not. More specifically, the 6 hook kill and off-the-hook kill punishment should be removed. Killer should not have to be forced to ignore a survivor because they present themselves as too easy of a pray.
And the other thing is Myers' new "lunge". His current lunge is indeed an increased lunge. This is a charged sprint, which may sound similar, but feel wise is a completely different thing. It's why everyone is calling this "dashslop", and why he wasn't previously called that.
I don’t particularly hate this. I just hope they’ve taken flashlight/locker savers into account and self pickup won’t punish killers for searching the area before pickups. The basekit killer buffs will be so nice! I can’t believe no one is talking about basekit bbq, haste, and the fact that high tiers won’t get as much use out of it. It’s so major the person who came up with it should get a raise!
Reddit seems to be taking it well:
https://tinyurl.com/rrggeherhwer
Also, without Floods of Rage or proxy camping, healing under hook seems like it will be free real estate.
Then they die. They wouldn't have any protection left.