Together....But Not. My (hopefully) Different Take on the 2v8 Concept
You guys all know about the exit gate bug where survivors technically escape, but still die by EGC. Well that was my inspiration for this idea. The TL/DR version is that survivors escape and run from the exit gate of one killer's map into the exit gate of another's. The detailed version is below. This idea is in its infancy, so everything I suggest is open to edits. There are a lot of balance issues that I probably haven't considered yet.
Ok so the game loads up with all players. Let's say 4 red-team survivors vs the Wraith at Haddonfield in the same session as 4 green-team survivors vs the Hag at Mother's Dwelling. SWFs would start on the same map together. The 2 killers could also be friends.
The game progresses as a typical match, but all the generators will have a colored glow around them. (i.e. on the Haddonfield example, they'll all glow red so that the red-team can repair them.) I might recommend reducing generator time from 80 seconds to 60. Beyond this, everything is the same including EGC.
Any survivor that escapes maintains control of the character outside the exit, but the entity will block their return to the map. (This essentially turns that "bug" into a "feature"). Anyone who escapes by hatch will crawl out of an exit hatch outside the exit gate. When any survivor DC's, escapes, or dies, their icon is removed from the bottom of the screen.
Upon leaving the exit gate, they can see another gate off in the distance and run toward it. Perhaps they even get to run by the campfire and switch out perks and/or equipment if they want. Could be useful if only a single survivor remains and needs a new, more solo-appropriate loadout. Maybe limit them to changing 1 or 2 perks. Regardless, there should be a timer to prevent stalling. Perhaps an ominous thumping sound that intensifies to signal that the Entity smells them and will eat them directly if they don't hurry.
When they run to the new map, they enter through one of the exit gates which will have a smaller, survivor-sized one-way door to pass through (if the gates weren't opened by the other team yet). Each time a new survivor enters the map, all players get an audio notification and the survivor icon is added to the bottom of the screen. When this happens, 3 random generators will switch color as the first survivor enters, and 2 more switch for each survivor that follows. Running generators that switch color cease running, but this does not affect the count of repaired gens for the team that started on the map. Still, this could be bad for the slower team as un-repaired gens could also switch color. While there will always be at least enough generators to finish the objective, this could limit their options and force them to focus on one single remaining gen.
When they enter the new map, the survivors receive complete invulnerability (including not triggering any traps) and a 200% speed boost with no scratch marks for up to a minute. This expires upon their first interaction or at the end of the minute. This insures that killers don't camp the gates and injure survivors as they enter. The survivors can get to a safe starting location to begin the match. 3 generators are required to open the gates on the 2nd map. (keep in mind that there SHOULD now be fewer survivors. This is how the killers help each other.)
Other Notes:
- EGC begins on the 2nd maps if you are the last survivor of you team AND there are no remaining survivors of the original team on the map.
- Injuries, sacrifice progression, item usage, and destroyed totems do not change. They remain in their current state upon entering the 2nd map.
- Red team cannot interact with green gens, and vice versa. This is the only limitation between teams. If red and green members are on the same map, they can still heal each other, exchange items, and receive area-effect perk benefits like Prove Thyself.
- Survivors from different teams may exchange items and heal each other while between gates, but they'd best not linger there.
- If a killer eliminates all survivors from his starting team, then the other killer will be taken to the match results screen with the option to spectate once his map is empty. (It might be a good idea to have killers pool their blood points so that this doesn't hurt the killer who only had a chance at the initial 4 survivors. This is off the top of my head, but this will likely warrant further discussion.)
- Killers like the Hag can use their time waiting for new survivors to set traps around the map. This is another reason for survivors to not linger between the gates.
- If a killer sacrifices all 4 survivors, and only 1 survivor escapes the other map, then EGC begins after the 1 minutes invulnerability expires.
- If you start against red-team, and green-team member joins your map later on, EGC will still apply to the red team but does not affect the green team. It should either be invisible to the green team, or the glowing lines that appear on the ground should be either red or green to indicate who is affected.
Comments
A couple other things I should mention in this idea.
I like it, although there may be a few kinks in it. Overall not a bad idea, with some tweaks and testing of course. However I doubt this or any kind of 2v8 mode will ever make it into the game because of how it would have to rework a lot of perks, powers, maps, and all new coding.
That's what I had been thinking all along and why I feel like this idea is more viable than many other 2v8 suggestions. The biggest consideration is that 2 killers in the same map is ridiculously powerful.
From a programming standpoint with this idea, there doesn't need to be much rework since it is essentially just 2 separate matches that link up and are continuations of each other. Some perks, like Corrupt Intervention would need to be edited to have effect against both groups of survivors, but this shouldn't be too difficult. The simple solution would be to just make certain perks unavailable in this game mode.
I also think all players in general would have more fun as the matches will last significantly longer than they do now.
Although I imagine lag would be a big issue. The game would have to have two maps fully loaded at the same time as well as supporting 10 players.
Probably a long load-up time, but that's understandable. This idea will certainly have to wait until dedicated servers are in place and have the kinks worked out.
Well if we don't end up getting a 2v8 game mode, I do think it would be essential for the games health to add a new game mode, because the standard play we have now is getting stale, and adding new characters every 3 months isn't gonna help it out that much.
I agree. I would love to see new game modes, in particular an unranked mode. However, due to the "2 Killer" glitch we saw a while back, we know that its already possible in the programming, so a 2v8 mode shouldn't be too hard to bring into existence.
Nonetheless, with 2 killers on the same map, I see extreme massacre potential, which is why I like this "separate maps" idea.
No, this means that if one Killer gets Gen rushed then the other Killer has 8 Survivors and that's not fair since those Survivors also get a temp immunity, more unbalanced than the average 2v8 idea.