Why is the obsession such a useless mechanic?
When I started playing I thought the icon of the obsession meant there was something special about them? But 9/10 times (maybe even 10/10) the obsession is a liability when the killer brings an obsession perk and can even doom the entire team.
From horror movie tropes, I'd consider the obsession very closely related to the final girl trope. I understand that everyone dies and she usually survives, but this doesn't feel to be the reality of the game atm. And survivors who equip obsession perks usually get very underwhelming effects.
Survivor Obsession perks being:
Blood Pact
Decisive Strike
Mettle of Man
Object of Obsession
Sole Survivor
For the People
Blood Pact can be downright useless if you don' t end up as the obsession. Object of Obsession has a chance to also be less useful if you are not the obsession. I assume I would bring this if I wanted to keep track of the killer. If you don't end up as the obsession and the killer doesn't run aura reading it's a wasted perkslot.
Decisive Strike has been talked about extensively, so I don't have anything new to add.
Mettle of Man is insanely hard to trigger.
Sole survivor fits the final girl trope sort of, but it usually means that the survivor who has it equipped plays in a very selfish way.
For the People sounds strong in theory but can be hard to use well in solo.
Just fills like killers have much better perks involving the obsession than survivors. Survivors obsession perks are pretty niche at this point in time, and I expected the Obsession to have more relevance on a basekit level (as in no one having any obsession-related perks). The Obsession feels very under-utilized as an idea.
Comments
The obsession mechanic was brought specifically by Myers' & Laurie's perks, and there only was an obsession during games with those perks. This lead to killers tunneling in games where there wasn't an obsession because they knew no one had DS so there is now an obsession in every game, although it doesn't matter most of the time (which is fine in my opinion).
Doesn't it matter when killer brings STBFL?
Yes it does, as I said it doesn't matter most of the time, exception to that being when players bring obsession related perks.
Yes. Obsession perks on killer's side are very influential. And it's not just STBFL (current meta), but also niche stuff - like rancor (especially paired with game afoot or at least nemesis), play with your food (for some killers absolutely bonkers strong, on others meh one). There are also those worse perks, that still have something to offer - like dark devotion (has potential for a few interesting builds), remember me (end game build after next patch), maybe even grim embrace (but devs should buff this one first).
Well the obsession used to matter in every game because if there were no obsession perks in play then there was no obsession.
However, because DS is an obsession perk and every other obsession perk was unpopular (even STBFL) this meant DS was really the only obsession perk that saw use. This meant if there was an obsession in the game, there was a DS and you couldn't tunnel, but if there was no obsession you could just tunnel and win.
Some obsession perks are very relevant to the obsession though. STBFL is the most common I'd say. If the killer has STBFL a smart player being the obsession can make a huge difference in the outcome of the match. If the obsession tries to force basic attacks in chases they can really put the killer in a difficult spot.
Killers like Demo though can run STBFL and the obsession cannot do anything about it because he'll use his power vs the obsession. I dunno if there's any other killer who can make use of STBFL as well as Demo. It's just that this is ok because of how rare Demo is.
You can still force a demo to m1, whether its by taking hits during carry, you can run around an object thats too small for him to use his power until he m1s you, or you can play a tile where you can crouch tech his power like shack
Billy, leatherface, Myers with tombstone, pyramid head, nemesis, wesker