Why do they never address why killers actually tunnel ?
The devs keep bringing up that tunneling, camping and slugging are unhealthy parts of the game, but never why they accure. A big component as to why these situations happen is because the killer role just doesn´t have enough tools to combat things like fast gen speeds, rapid healing speeds or just purely unbalanced maps.
When are tool boxes going to be addressed ?
I think the biggest reason for tunneling is gens speeds and that the average killer mathematically can not keep up with a commodious tool box and addons like Socket swivels, Wire spool and Brand new part. If you´ve ever played on EU servers then you probably know the dread of seeing a tool box or two in your lobby as killer and going against multiple brand new parts leaving you with no option but to tunnel. Not to mention that even if a survivor doesn´t have a tool box they are going to spawn next to a generator and can instantly start working on it (that is if you don´t have corrupt intervention or mobility), which puts the killer at a severe disadvantage.
When are healing speeds going to be addressed ?
In the recent developer stream they have mentioned that they are going to look at addons like syringes and styptics, but that still doesn´t change the fact that a lot of healing perks this year got massively buffed making strategies like hit&run way less impactful. While antiheal perks like sloppy butcher and franklins got heavely nerfed. Which leads killers to do the next best thing, which is tunneling and camping.
Are there any options even left ?
If the antitunnel, camp and slugging changes go through I don´t think the killer has any option but to, well play like a bot. Just instakick the freshly added 20 pallets to every map and go after the first survivor you see. Which at that point why not impelement killer bots into normal matches because to be frank, I doubt anyone is going to play a role with no agency and no choices to choose from. An opinion which is already being echoed by content creators taking breaks from playing killer.
Comments
I'm just going to point out briefly, because I think it's relevant, that the idea of this being a team game is a bit up for debate.
There's always been a big discussion around this game being 1v4 or 1v1v1v1v1. As far as "scoring" goes, there are blood point incentives for altruism.
But as far as MMR goes this is mostly individual Although if I'm not mistaken there is still a team component, so for example if I die and my 3 teammates escape I believe I do lose MMR, but far less than a 4k, and my teammates gain MMR, but less than if we had all 4 escaped.
And just as I have no say on anything the killer does, I also have no say in how my teammates play (even if I'm in a swf). And, to reinforce the point about team vs individual, the build left behind, sole survivor, clairvoyance, and low profile is considered a valid way to play the game.
One other brief point: there is a notable lack of subtlety and nuance in this community in general, but there's a massive difference between telling killers "you can't play this way", which is what I see many people claim, and "BHVR, the meta gameplay you've created is flawed and should be fixed" which is what I see most people actually saying.
People here seem to intentionally take it the first way, but I almost never see people say that. Mainly, people do not want things to change, which is understandable, and (some) people will try to spin it personally for various reasons.
Unfortunately, sometimes that spin also has a direct impact on game balance (the most recent examples being "haste changes" and "anti tunnel ptb" that were pulled almost completely).
people do start new to the game at some point so yes a baby killer v baby survivor would be evenly matched but 1 could still do nothing and win off the back of the team.
why be a good player when i can be a smart player? i could master the art of looping and become untouchable or i could play stealthy….personally i have fun being stealthy. maybe this is the issue people have? they want to play "good" whatever that means amd neglecting their brains.
with the ghost face solution my way means the shack guy gets a heads up to run while i finish my gen…. your way you stop what your doing to let the guy know. switch it to pig or myers, same situation but you cant knock him out of power what would you do? how would you intervene without comms?
i have played killer and know the 2 v 1 situation very well and trust me when you ignore the injured one to look for the healthy one, the injured one will get on gens eventually because they dont want to be stuck in a match being ignored by the killer. most of the time they will throw themselves at the killer to go next. i would be careful what you say regarding "picking them up so they cant die". especially if they do try to do gens and your repeatedly downing them stopping them from dying. that is promoting unsportsmanlike gameplay and can be warned or banned for admitting something like that. i know from experience regarding that exact same thing. same with offering hatch to the survivor that helps you find the other player…. just saying careful what you say in the forums lol.
people are frowning on this because it is whats happening in dbd 2025, has been for years
I don't know why you think hiding is smart. It's neither smart nor stupid, it just is. Good macro is smart. Seeing the match as a whole, like you're looking down at it from above, is smart. What hiding isn't is beneficial to a team as a whole if everyone else is on death hook and you have no hooks.
I'm not downing anyone repeatedly and tormenting them with repeated slugging. I'm not in here preaching empathy and then being a total jerk. That's about as out-of-character of a thing as I could say. I let people be or give them second chances if I see their teammate isn't being active—and that same teammate is one who has been consistently absent all match—because I dispise that behavior. The hiding locations are usually pretty predictable (main, edgemap, basement, shack) so I'll find them eventually. If there's three or four gens left the other can go ahead and do one or two. It's not going to change the outcome, and it lets me keep track of where they are. I also didn't say they help me (though that would be unsportsmanlike on their part. "Working with the killer" is the phrasing on the report.) I just choose my targets. If anyone gets a chance for the hatch, it'll be the active teammate. If anyone gets out, I want it to be the person I think deserves it most, and that's the person who stayed on gens and didn't hide even when they knew it was hopeless.
Sneak away? Killers move at 4.6m/s on average. In the time it's taken to communicate that the killer is going to shack, they're already between 4.6m - 13.8m away depending on how long it takes to relay that information.
If you hide in a locker, you are almost certainly getting caught. A gen that has significant progress, but no scratch marks is a good indicator that a survivor is nearby.
Comms are only effective when you can relay precise information. Outside information you would've learned anyway, they're largely ineffective without a coordinated callout system.
This is true.
Some people just tunnel by default, and the justification moves to the next strong thing every time.
If you nerf everything that is quote unquote "strong", survivors move the the next best thing and so will the complaints.
Well, you made one mistake with that.
I'm certainly not a Survivor.
In actuality…
Killer: "I don't like how survivors play, change it!"
BHVR: "Okay."
Killer: "There's a new thing I don't like, fix it!"
BHVR: "Okay."
Survivors: "You know, there's this thing killers do that we don't like…"
Killer: "Oh, what, are we supposed to change things because you don't like them?"
Killer: "There's a new thing I don't like, fix it!"
BHVR: "Okay."
Yeah it only took them 6 years to change DH, 2 years to change CoH and 6 months to change MFT. Meanwhile a new killer releases and gets nerfed within a week.
BHVR isn´t playing favorite with either side. They want to make money and tip the scale to the side which is leaving most.
Before the big 6.1.0 Update the quques as Survivor were pretty long, because no one was playing Killer even after all the nerfs the OG Survivors recived. (no insta heal, no brand new part)
Time went on and BHVR gave Killer Players more Toys to play with.
Now we have the same thing on the other side. Killer is to strong and BHVR is doing everything to rebuff Survivors. (New Pallets, Strong Perks like Finesse, Conviction and Vigil. New Anti Tunnel and Anti Slug.) And maybe it is just me but my Survivor quques aren´t instant anymore like they used to.
I agree that killer pressure is hindering or completely stopping survivors from doing their objective → Doing gens and then opening the gates to escape.
Yeah, survivors are under pressure when one of them is hooked but this is something that will happen if go for every single survivor or swap between two or three of them. The thing is: as soon as someone is under risk of taken out of the match - or is taken out of the match for real - the game turns in favor of the killer because killer is stronger - not invencible - in the 1v3 scenario. If no one is under the threat of taken out, survivor can play very greedy
Just taking people out of gens is not enough to win a match, downs and hooks are. If just being present in the map were enough, killers like Sadako or Dredge would be in the top of every tierlist, since they can harass survivors easily, but they lack tools to down them.
As much as some people hate this, tunneling, camping and slugging are the basic tools that every killer have to stop survivors from doing gens. And a good part of killer experience is knowing who to chase and WHEN to chase them.
TL;DR : Managing hook IS the killer macro at is core, since playing optimally revolves around taking someone out of the game as early as possible. Which doesn't mean hard tunneling, since its one of the worst killers strategies.
Okay, and?
That's still an infinitely better timescale than their tackling of tunnelling, considering that's 9 years and counting.
Sorry, but the discussion if this game is a "1v4 or 1v1v1v1v1v1" was never a relevant one, at least as far i know. What is discussed is how much a more selfish playstile for survivors is valid in 1v4 game, which i personally think its very counterproductive, because it relies on your teammates playing altruistic while the selfish just play for themselves.
This game was always portrayed as "assymetrical horror", which means its 1 player versus 4 players. The game balance is around that, since you would need to have means to do many things by yourself if you shouldn't rely on other teammates, like unhooking or healing your own, or even picking yourself from the ground if left slugged.
Thus, although everyone is free to play way they want - they've bought the game - survivor was designed with coordination and teamplay as core mechanics - and thus, balanced this way. Otherwise leaving the trials would be impossible since killers are stronger - or should be - in 1v1 scenarios.
Fog Vials got dumpstered in a week.
Fog Vials were more annoying than strong - aside when used with the Iri Addon. It was one of the dumbest decisions dev made recently, and thats it. They changed Fog Vials faster than they changed pallets density, what is absurd.
Fog vials changes were uncommon, since usually it takes months or even years to change things.
Its not like they are nerfing survivor stuff asap. Its the contrary. Fog Vials were an exception.
Medkits were the strangest items in this game for years. Toolboxes still exist and Hyperfocus + Stake Out combo still exist and don't requires too much skill to get great value. Vigil counters every status condition in the game and renders some killers power's almost useless.
The survivor meta is far more diverse than killer meta, still locked into antigens.
I don't want survivor experience to be miserable as i play a lot of survivor too but its very annoying to read some many people diminishing the many pain points and issues in the current killer experience as if killer were in a fine situation.
They nerfed the anti-tunnel changes so fast they never even got a full PTB.
It was a test, LOL. And good chunck of it will be TESTED on the next PTB, with almost no real incentives for killers.
They also didn't implemented Mori Finisher after the PTB; Trickster was heavily nerfed after the PTB in which he was tuned up to 4.6; Alien was nerfed within days after release, even if his counter was already in the game (the fire turrets).
Trying to force the "BHvr is completely killer biased" is quite a non sense.
Not trying to force it.
Merely pointing out that they've been especially quick on the draw lately.
hiding is smart for the player thats going for the win…hide and do gens. sod the team…. we have already covered the game win requirements is individual so whats good for the team is irrelevant.
in this hypothetical scenario, you as killer have not seen me all match even though i have done 4/5 gens, healed survivors that approach me while my team has not made any effort to do gens at all. they try doing flashlight saves, always running around getting chases and hooked by you. 2 survivors are dead, its just me with 0 hooks full health and a survivor with 2 hook states and injured. there is 1 gen left to do. It sounds to me like you would ignore that injured survivor to hunt me down because you havnt seen me all match assuming i have done nothing for the team. You dont know if im inactive or not. But you have said you would likely give that injured survivor a chance. would you hunt me down no matter how long it takes while the injured survivor does the gen? or would you go for the injured survivor? Bare in mind you are not allowed to repeatedly down someone and you are not allowed to encourage survivors to work with the killer….what would you do?
I use this example because this is how i play, i use stealth WHILE doing gens, healing team mates, using my scratch marks to distract the killer. i dont simply hide in the corner all match which is what you seem to think. You say there are only so many hiding spots and they are predictable which is true, and someone who is bad at stealth will get caught. but someone who knows how to play stealth wont stay in 1 spot, they will move around, doing a little bit of a gen, moving on, doing a little bit of another gen, move to a totem, watch the killer search in areas then move to to the area they have just searched. Your describing a rookie hiding player that avoids the objective. thats not what i do. unless the killer has full aura build which most dont because they use slow down perks, im rarely discovered when its 2 v 1.
there isnt much i can say if you truly believe giving a stealth killer a terror radius via comms isnt giving an advantage. i have played in SWF before so i know how helpful it can be. one match, i was in a duo v scratch mirror myers on hawkins. i was on the gen upstairs in the little dead end bit. my due team mate saw myers heading to the stairway and told me. i was able to get off the gen and run before myers could hit me. if i was soloq i would have been hit or worse grabbed off the gen.
did my due team mate give precise call outs like what side of the stairway myers was? no. did they say the exact distance from stairs? no. it was still enough time for me to run which delayed getting hit. in a game where time is everything, that hit being avoided made a huge difference.
as soloq when i see TR kicking in and im on a gen in the shack or somewhere that has low visibility i am able to walk away and make sure killer doesnt see me leaving no scratch marks. they often waste time searching lockers and find nothing. a heads up from a team mate is clearly an advantage v stealth killers and if you honestly think otherwise then i dont know what more i can say other than your just flat out wrong.
This convo has gone on way too long and diverted too much from the topic but I will say I can easily pressure a 3gen with 2 people left and find both. There are indicators of what people are doing and how they're moving around. You're asking the wrong person this hypothetical. This type of playing is my biggest grievance in the game. I hyperfocus on combating it and I can't recall a single instance of failure. Maybe when I was new and didn't feel this way, but not anymore.
you didnt answer the question. what would you do? spend 30min trying to find me like you said you would while the other survivor does the last gen? enlighten me on how you would handle that situation.
Not what I said, but I'll bite.
Take an outdoor map, and you have several variables and three possible approaches to account for. Knowing the killer is going toward shack isn't very helpful unless you jump off the gen at the first hint of a terror radius. Which is what new players do.
Even applying the idea of "giving stealth killers a terror radius" only works when everyone knows where the killer is at all times via coordinated callouts.
It's not that comms aren't advantageous; it's that inefficient communication makes that advantage insignificant.
Killers tunnel because it's easy, takes very little skill, and is extremely rewarding. They tunnel because they can. And the proposed changes to tackle tunneling on the upcoming PTB are a joke and won't do enough.
i have been playing stealth for a long time, i can do gens and remain hidden by pre running and walking slowly away at the first sign of terror radius when i cant see the killer…. its worked for me for years. they waste time searching lockers and looking but i had time to walk away without a trace, using the map to keep no line of sight. while the killer is looking for me near the gen, others are doing gens without trouble. Thats how i play and how i win.
i have already pointed out the benefit of a heads up from comms regarding stealth killers and an enclosed space with low visibility. you can say it provides no benefit but i was in that match, i had the comms, it gave me benefit which was significant, which is my point. there was just me and my duo friend, not everyone knew where the killer was, just my team mate that saw from the hallway and it still gave me the benefit of knowing the killer was heading to me. if your not getting value from comms unless used hyper efficiently i would say thats on you because i can get a lot of value from the simplest of forms of comms such as "killer heading your way" or even "killer is the hag".
i had a match earlier where i had no idea who the killer was, turned out to be hag. if i had comms in that match and just 1 person saw the killer and said "its hag" i would instantly know to keep an eye out for markings and to predict what that killer might do. with out comms i was oblivious to who the killer was so i didnt know what to expect, i was looking out to see if it was myers or ghostface or any number of killers it could be. yet another advantage comms can provide.
its not really even opinion based, its a straight up fact i had info due to comms i wouldnt have in solo. Also a fact, that info gave me time to move away in the hawkins match.