Tunneling isn't real.
Greetings, everyone. Some of you may know me, in which case, hello. Most of you may not, as it's been a long, long time since I've engaged with the DBD community out of game. I think since mid-2018, to be honest.
I'm here today with a (maybe not so)unique opinion.
Tunneling isn't a real thing
To elaborate on this, it all boils down to the killer victory cube. I've played a lot of killer in the last year. I even joined the "Killer Alliance", or as it's known now, the "Masochists Alliance", which is a very apt name for the group. I'm currently a rank 3 with my bae the Wraith, which any killer main will tell you is a world of pain to do as Wraith.
Now, look at the killer victory cube - you are rewarded for the destruction of the survivors in the quickest and most efficient manner possible. You are punished for long chases, longer length of the game, the more generators that get repaired etc. To clarify, this doesn't mean you should camp, because killers are punished for that was well. The victory cube, on the other hand, SCREAMS at killers to hook someone, find someone else, but as soon as that person is unhooked to haul ass back to the hook and get that person back on the hook because they will A) be easier to down due to being injured, and B) they closer to death than anyone else. Though, this mostly applies to weaker killers, like Wraith, Clown, ESPECIALLY Freddy; Nurse, Billy, and even Huntress to an extent don't have this problem because of map mobility. Spirit, I swear, is MADE to double back to the hook from longer distances; and it makes sense. As well, tunneling can be a bad strategy at times - for example if you simply run into a survivor who is a god tier runner (which is seldom, to be honest, even at red ranks) and it's not worth the time to chase them.
This all lines up with the survivor victory cube as well - they are rewarded for all the things killers are punished for, and again that makes sense.
Now, is being "tunneled" fun? Depends on who you are. Some survivor mains thrive on it. Usually, though, no it's not; but let's be honest, in general losing isn't fun for the most part. To be even more honest, being tunneled as a survivor is just about as fun as being run through the infinite at Crotus Penn Asylum, or the killer shack, or anywhere in Haddonfield/Springwood as a killer; but at the end of the day, "infinites" are the most effective way to lose a killer. Just like tunneling is the most effective way to win as a killer (again, there are exceptions, like Nurse, Billy etc). Survivors will do what they have to do, killers will do the same.
TL;DR: Basically, "I was tunneled and that's why I died" is an excuse. Don't blame killers for it, blame the devs for...not necessarily revolving the killer cube around tunneling, but more inadvertently making tunneling the most effective thing you can do to actually win; AND before you say "you can 4k without tunneling", while that is true, you can also 4k and still not win. Or at least, by game definition because everyone has their own definition of victory in DBD; and it gets progressively harder to get that game-defined victory pip the higher you go in ranks, because the requirements are far more strict.
Comments
@CaptainCastle how so?
Also @CaptainCastle you need to @ me
Only if i wanted a response. I didn't, i just enjoyed your humble brag.
@CaptainCastle oh ok. I came across as a bit braggish.
You're just so good bro
What I thought was weird was when I got accused of tunnelling when Survivor A rescued Survivor B very close to me, and then promptly disappeared leaving me only one target, Survivor A. But then they did it again.
I mean, what am I supposed to do? Let the injured person go so I can hunt for someone who just vanished?
I know strictly speaking this is the definition of tunnelling, but Survivor A's behavior didn't leave me a lot of strategically intelligent options. :)
I hear you, but that hasn't been my personal experience. Bad killers tunnel. Good killers know when to break off and wreck your team that isn't as good at the chase. You can't get gens done if there is just one of you left.
What confounds me is all the survivors that send hate mail. If I didn't have you out there to possibly kill me then I wouldn't have a game to play. Like I said, I get pissed when I get face camped but I won't DC or send salt. I need you lmao
to me, tunneling is more of a behaviour pattern than an incident or two and it requires intent, specifically to chase someone off hook
in the scenario you're describing the person at fault is the rescuer ghosting after they unhook and i say this when i'm the person getting unhooked. part of altruism is taking the aggro for an injured person who has just been unhooked, not just yoinking someone off the hook to get your points. teammates are vital
when i'm on killer i usually just slug the person who's just been unhooked so that i'm not giving up pressure but am not punishing the unhooked person for their teammate's bad play. i certainly don't expect other killers to play like this though. running past a healthy person specifically to go for the injured person is another story
It's probably easier now than it's ever been to get away from a killer chasing you strait off the hook but it's still going to be hard to carry out your objective if they really want your head. If everyone that complained about tunneling did their part to take the heat off of their teammates by baiting the killer in whatever way possible it wouldn't be much of an issue anymore.
When you're in a race against time you're going to go after your only visible option so you shouldn't be too mad about it happening when you're staying out of sight and not giving the killer any incentive to hunt elsewhere. Most of my frustration is directed toward my teammates when I get tunneled because they aren't doing anything to help besides safely waiting for the hook save points. I never get that mad about it though because it was my playing that got me caught in the first place, well beside the rare sandbag, but I know you can't always rely on your team. Really most of the things people complain about post game are things that I know could have been countered because I've seen it done enough times with people playing against me in the same exact situations.
This works amazingly well, because you're punishing the person unhooking (no safe save points) and the unhooked person will probably get picked up while you hook the unfortunate soul who decided hook farming a teammate midchase/by leading you to the hook with scratch marks was a good idea. I tend to do this a lot. It does help with pressure, isn't really tunneling and is a better strategy overall to me.
I mean even when I mess up as a survivor and I am mid-unhook animation as the killer TR returns I do my absolute best to protect them and try to get the killer into a chase if they do manage to phase through me and attack them. It's mostly just accepting responsibility for bad plays, it's not that hard. Also trying to get BT on all survivors for when these moments happen.
I had this one game where as wraith:
1: I hooked an ash for the second time (I had already ate his MoM)
2: I immediately cloak so I can go and find someone else
3: Before I can even turn around a Claudette with a flashlight unhooks him
4: I uncloak to chase them
5: The Claudette BODYBLOCKS the ash preventing him from getting to a window (and then using it herself right next to a safe loop that will take me far too long to chase)
6: I down and rehook the ash for a Kill
End of the game
Claudette: "Stop being such a ** you tunneling wraith"
Not even the other survivors bought it.
You worded it it with a lot more care and respect than most. As someone who plays both sides I can't really argue. But some of us do try if its even a tiny consolation.
You guys are totally missing the real issue here.
It's not whether tunneling or gen rushing exists or not, because they do: Killers do in fact focus on one survivor until they are dead and removed from the game and Survivors do focus on nothing but completing generators as fast as possible.
It's whether or not these things are healthy for the game.
I would argue they are not.
Tunneling is unhealthy from both a competitive sense and a casual sense. From a casual sense, it's obvious: someone who just wants to have some fun and maybe a few scares alongside it now doesn't get to play the game. What fun is there in that? When this happens to you for multiple games, it ruins your experience. The competitive side requires looking at it form a different angle, but it exposes the imbalance of viability between Killers.
Take a look at which Killers tunnel the most often. You may notice they are mostly Killers noted to be lower on the ladder. You won't see as many Nurses, Spirits, Billys or Hags tunneling (or camping for that matter) because they are built in such a manner that they can succeed with out it, and look where they are on the Killer Totem Pole. This shows that in terms of competitive balance, Killers with weaker Kits require tunneling as well as other unhealthy methods due to a lack of base effectiveness in their kit.
Gen rushing is also unhealthy from both a competitive sense and casual sense. Once again, casual sense is obvious: if you are a Killer who doesn't care about getting a 4K and just wants to have fun and enjoy the thrill of being a murderous psychopath, suddenly the gates are powered and you barely touched anyone at all. It makes games too short and ruins the experience. From a competitive sense it has the same issue with games being too fast, but the issue is once again from another angle: nothing else matters. If it's not a generator, it's not as important. Chests, healing, looping, sabotaging, taking hits, blinding or stunning the Killer, even unhooking...none of these are as important as getting a generator done. This means the entire playstyle of both the Survivors and the Killer revolves around a single objective. Does a new Survivor Perk make it so you can do gens faster or for longer or help your allies do them faster or for longer, either directly or indirectly? Does a new Killer Power or Perk stop them from doing gens, directly or indirectly?
If so, how effective it is determines how often it will be used.
If not, it gets tossed into the pile of Perks deemed to be useless or the Killer will not be as viable competitively.
Funnily enough, it seems to me that the people who play competitively on both ends seem to accept both sides using these tactics. It doesn't bother them because they too are trying to be competitive and rank high on the ladder. Who it negatively affects are the casual players who just want to have a good time who are suffering by people trying to rank up when seasons reset or after losing hard and de-ranking.
The solution I offer? Making two separate modes and matchmaking for Casual and Competitive. This way competitive players can weed out some of the hate they get as well as consistently getting more engaging matches and casuals can face less players trying to win so hard and enjoy the game more.
Of course this doesn't solve the problem that the game focuses too hard on a single objective and thus has balancing issues because of it, but that is for a thread for another time.
Being a killer main, I do my part to not intentionally “tunnel” anyone. But, if the person I hook comes across my path on my way to the next Gen, I’m going to chase you...it’s my job as the killer. Don’t get butt hurt because I saw you. I don’t get upset when your team Gen rushes. I’m there to hunt, you just so happened to get in my way...again. (Knife) but I will say this, if you are the type of survivor who likes to T-bag the killer and taunt us, you bet your a** I’ll come for you, and I don’t want to hear it.