In Response to WACEK; The Trickster REWORK
Let's start off by saying, I absolutely love what the Developers have done when it comes to Trickster. Not only have they added a lot of depth; they have also created a Trickster that is genuinely fun and fair to play against, as well as creating a killer that can be a monster when properly mastered.
That is why, in refining the last parts of the Trickster I too wish to build on top of the current rework and finish up with the last parts until this Killer is perfect forever, which thanks to this rework has become possible.
With there highly still being some refinements from the Devs, I wish to respond to the current adjustments proposed by Wacek (A comp known for Trickster)
For anyone interesting in his proposed changes, you can read them here;
Trickster rework - Google Docs
For those of you who are interested what I currently think are the last miles the Trickster needs, you can find that here as well;
⸻How I'd BUFF the Trickster (A Healthy Buff On Top of the current REWORK) — BHVR
Now let's dive into the proposed changes proposed by Wacek;
Change 1CHANGE 1: Each blade hit on surv should give extra second or two before your current rank will be gone
Not something that I would've thought of, but a great micro buff in general, which also has my support
CHANGE 2: Trickster should have Ripper Brace basekit (as a 4.4 killer)
For those of you that don't know, Ripper Brace let's you vault, kick gens, break walls 'n pallets 6% faster for each style rank.
This is also an overall great change and also makes the rank system feel even more valuable, and synergizes well with his previous proposed change
CHANGE 3: Ammo needs to be buffed up to 44 blades
Now, this is where I HIGHLY, very highly disagree. We should absolutely NOT buff up the max capacity away from being 36. One of the reasons is that right now, the main counterplay against the Trickster is literally only the ability to gain distance (Trickster being 4.4), as well as Trickster being able to run out of knives (36 max capacity)
One of the motives Wacek proposes is that at 44 blades, killers like him would then have enough knives to go for 3 kills, instead of just 2.
Now I don't disagree with the spirit of what Wacek is trying to achieve here, but I want to convince you that doing so through buffing max capacity would be wrong.
Let me introduce you the healthier way of doing it;
For each time you trigger the last laceration on a survivor, gain 6 knives back when picking up that survivor (Can't exceed 36). This would mean that if you had a 100% accuracy with 12 knives, you would get all 12 back. This would allow you to sustain yourself on knives forever, creating the following effect:
OLD SYSTEM:
(Formula: knives to kill, aka 12 / total knives * 100)
1 kill = 33.4% minimum accuracy + no laceration decay
2 kills = 66.7% accuracy + no laceration decay
3 kills = 100% accuracy + no laceration decay
4 kills = impossible
NEW SYSTEM:
(Formula: ((x + 1) * knives to kill) / (36 + x * knives to kill) * 100 where x is the amount of survivors picked up and where knives to kill is 12)
1 kill = 33.4% minimum accuracy + no laceration decay
2 kills = 50% minimum accuracy + no laceration decay
3 kills = 60% minimum accuracy + no laceration decay
4 kills = 66.6% minimum accuracy + no laceration decay
5 kills = 71.4% minimum accuracy + no laceration decay
6 kills = 75% minimum accuracy + no laceration decay
… and so on (indefinitely)
This way, survivors who are playing well against the Trickster will be rewarded for being able to make the killer run out of their 36 knives, which is a lot more realistic at 36 than at 44, however, great Tricksters will be able to sustain themselves (theoretically) forever, making them less map dependant where Lockers might be in bad spots, speeding up the gameplay and game-flow of the Trickster, which pairs well with his Style Rank decay
CHANGE 4: Make Trickster 4.6 while in S Rank
I really hope the Developers don't add this. I know that there is a lot of complaining about 4.6 and max capacity. And the reason is incredibly simple for it; people are complaining about it because THAT is how they are getting counterplayed. That is in fact the only thing that is preventing from the Trickster turning into a Ranged-Legion again and becoming massively hated among the survivor community (aka 80% of the playerbase). The beautiful thing about the 4.4 and 36 max capacity is; it's not a real problem. Skillful Trickster players are not held back by it in their ability to kill. People simply fail to realize that Trickster is like Nurse. A high skill ceiling killer and therefore also very unique. In fact, I'd argue that the maximum skill cap of Trickster is even Higher than that of Nurse, by a long shot. Not one Trickster player in the world has reached close to Trickster's max potential.
Aside from that, I don't have much to comment on his add-on changes. I think they're all decent and don't have much of an opinion about them
My Proposed ChangesWith Wacek's feedback, I'd like to reformulate what my belief is for creating the perfect and most satisfying version of Trickster to play with, one that would end the need for further changes and cements him as an amazing high skill-ceiling killer:
⸻ CHANGE 1: Each hit on a survivor should increase how long it takes to decay your rank by 1-2 seconds (As Wacek proposed)
⸻ CHANGE 2: Ripper Brace basekit; For the nice synergy it has with his style system (As proposed by Wacek)
⸻ CHANGE 3: Trickster receives 6 knives back for each time he triggered the final laceration on that survivor whenever picking up that survivor. (Grabbing survivors from a locker also gives 6 knives back without resetting the buff). (Cannot exceed max capacity of 36, even with addons)
⸻ CHANGE 4: Whenever triggering the final laceration on a survivor, increase Trickster's movement speed by: 0.3%, 0.6%, 1%, 1.5%, 2%, 2.5%, 3%, 4%, 5% at a max of 5% in that order. When he reloads at a locker, reset this buff back to 0.
⸻ CHANGE 5: Trickster gets basekit Ricochet, but they don't deal laceration damage after a bounce, unless it's the last needed hit. After a bounce, they still pause laceration decay and give style points (similar to long ranged shots and shots through narrow holes)
⸻ CHANGE 6: Trickster can cause an abandoned generator to start regressing by throwing a knife at it. This speeds up his gameplay, less chasing scratchmarks, and works with his style points. (These regression actions count towards the regression cap)
⸻ CHANGE 7: Trickster can throw a knife against a locker to trigger Killer Instinct on it if a survivor is in it; adds to the theme of Trickster being able to do anything with knives and making him more unique and scary in his own way
⸻CHANGE 8: Laceration decay starts at 12 seconds again (not 16), but scales based on distance the knife traveled. Starting at shots from 12 meter. (This means any shot within 12 meters will have a 12 second decay time, but as the distance increases so does the decay time. So a really long ranged shot might have a laceration decay time of 30 seconds max, based on distance). This allows survivors a genuine opportunity to punish Tricksters that screw up from closer range while also making long ranged shots from the Trickster feel more valuable. (This also creates interesting gameplay as ricochet shots inherently travel more distance as well). (Decay time scales linearly from 12 meter to max distance of 64 meters between 12 seconds and 30 seconds)
⸻CHANGE 9: Remove anti-camp for triggering his main event. It too often creates weird situations where you can't proc it when you aren't even trying to tunnel. For Vecna 2 it was a great idea, because he has to literally want to shoot there for it to trigger anti-camp. For Trickster however, this idea doesn't work as intended. I therefore would just remove it, and perhaps speed up how quickly his main event ends based on how close to the hook he is (or slow down how fast he throws based on how close he is to the hook), if he's within 16 ish meters, so it avoids these arbitrary blocks that in the moment feel like a bug/lagspike whenever it fails to trigger main event
If all of these changes were to be added to the Trickster, not only would his rework be perfected, he would stand as one of the highest skill-ceiling killers with incredible opportunities for power plays, fast paced gameplay and uber cool tricks, making him the most satisfying killer to play for anyone who wants to dabble into what would then be perhaps the most unique killer in the game~
Have any questions about the changes? Justifications? Adjustments of your own? Let me know in the comments below!
Comments
That opinion shows a complete lack of game design sense.
Because?…
I like that the devs listened to a respected Blight main to do his rework and clearly took Pixel Bush's recommendations for Skull Merchant's changes. I hope they continue to listen to respected and relatively unbiased "mains" with future balance changes.
If a killer main like Wacek makes suggestions I would love the devs to consider them seriously. Trickster is so much more enjoyable now, but I would still welcome a few more tweaks.
Hopefully the Sledgehammer approach to tweaking is a thing of the past.