There Won't Be a "Meta Shakeup" Because of Perk Changes.
It's bizarre how much emphasis is put on the perks in this game, The Meta has been similar if not the same for the entire span of the time I have played this game. The actual core gameplay is stale, changing perk stats doesn't fix that.
Flatlining multiple useable perks into unusable ones doesn't "Shake Up" a Meta it just makes people angry.
If BHVR actually wants to shake up the game they need to put out a real content update that changes the actual gameplay in a way that makes people reconsider what kinds of builds they want to bring.
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There won't be a meta shakeup because the meta killers are untouched, the meta killer perks are untouched, and the meta killer strategies are, if anything, buffed by even more anti-tunnel perks being eviscerated.
This is part of it, but it's kind of included in what I mean… DBD totally lacks any real content switchups and then people act like changing the perk stats is going to fix the "Meta" when the Meta is enforced by the actual mainstay content / gameplay loop. Tunneling/Proxy Camping has been the most common and unchanged killer playstyle since I started playing 6 years ago, and survivor's "meta" has only changed in the way of making the game feel entirely worse to play, nothing new has been given to them just the next perks while old ones get nerfed one by one into being unusable, no content shakeup or change… literally just Fog Vials which are horrible. no core gameplay change, no other thing to do that actually benefits the match… nothing… so no matter how much the devs change perk stats, the favored perks aren't going to change because the alternatives are niche perks that don't have good value consistency. "balance" has just been making viable options unviable and keeping unviable options unviable also.
The same is true for killer… the game favors a boring playstyle that doesn't change, it's better to tunnel someone and defend hooks by proxy camping in 95% of games if I want a 4k… I don't want to play that way. I want the game to be engaging and interactive with Survivors, but the survivors gameplay has been so unchanged that people have just found better and better ways to avoid the killer and do gens with little interaction.
If they really wanted a "meta shakeup" then corrupt, pain res, and bbq should have all been on the chopping block. Those are all the most used killer perks, right? But they're just nerfing survivor meta which is incredibly frustrating for someone who only plays this game because of his duo.
Of course it won't change.
Tunneling and gen-regression have been buffed once again while on the other side they keep nerfing the few things that are actually useful for countering them.
They’ve even gone so far as to criticise the way survivors have to loop, punishing them for their optimal choice (check out the dev notes for the 200% buffed Knock-Out, lmao).
All the anti-tunnelling-camping-slugging measures have been torn to shreds because of all the tears, and we’re always back to square one; nothing will ever change.
Yeah one of the killers I do play more often than not is Bubba, never with an optimal build, I prefer having fun and chasing everyone personally rather than making the game hell for everyone, myself included.
However, Bamboozle and Knockout are both in that build… I use Knockout because the counterplay for the pallet shredder killers on the extremely unsafe pallets is… pre drop and run… but if you think at all as the killer player… you just don't shred the pallet and go straight for the survivor instead… this leads to very easy and consistent insta downs with chainsaw on Bubba with the current knockout… the buff is a 400% buff on the hindered by the way (from 5% to 20%), if someone runs from the pallet they're absolutely getting instadowned now… and if they try to stay and play the pallet they're also getting instadowned… it's just a lose - lose for survivors and punishing a gameplay element that BHVR themselves created by adding a ton of filler pallets.
Again, this is why the Meta will not change without an actual content change. I am pretty annoyed that they specifically put the blame for the knockout changes on the survivors… weird choice.
Overbrine didn't take over the game in the first week of 6.1 so let's just give things time to settle.
It's always wait and see when it's going to benefit killers, but when survivors get anything? Kill it in the womb. Salt the earth. We cannot even let it reach the second day of PTB.
The 6.1.0 patch actually was a major meta shake up because they nuked the meta at the time on both sides. Not just perks but with basekit changes to the game we've all been enjoying for 4 years on now. Looking at the list of changes they made in 6.1.0 is insane now. What a game changer it was.
10.2.0 is just a bunch of tweaks to mostly mid-range perks and the meta is practically untouched. The most used meta survivor perk, Lithe, got indirectly buffed now that Windows of Opportunity and Spine Chill both will buff vault speed.
It's not a matter of waiting for things to settle though, is it? Things are going to stay the same, if anything the state of the game is going to get worse… a great many of the survivor perks which are being nerfed + the recent -5s of BT just make the established meta even more obvious for killer. Likewise if I can't be altruistic in any cool ways besides just directly healing a teammate, I am going to start genrushing, Tunneling is best countered by sitting on gens after all.
I'll restate it: The horrible and long standing meta of DBD will not change because BHVR has given zero reason for either side to change their playstyle, in order to get people to consider other perks and build ideas more consistently the game itself has to change to encourage that, not perk stats.
I get what you're saying but overall the game hasn't changed. there's been QOL stuff for sure, and I am not trying to pretend like BHVR does nothing at all, I remember a lot of fixes that moved the game in the right direction from accessibility changes to important gameplay changes BUT the actual core game design is unchanged, entirely so. 8 generators, 12 hook states. nothing new to interact with, pallets/lockers/vaults/chests. no new meaningful objective for either side or game twists. it will take something like that to shift the meta.
If anything it's actually changed for the worse in a lot of ways regarding the overall state of gameplay. DBD has totally lost its horror game feel in favor of a pure game of cat and mouse, the few characters left that do provide a sense of horror do so through gimmicks like scratched mirror Myers (which people have just started to abuse for free mid MMR Solo Queue wins TBH) or the ever rare and once beloved Insidious Bubba.
People have learned what's most efficient to win in the current state of the game, changing perks won't change the practice.
I am not sure how to reply to this. We're not disagreeing.
it was more of a continuation than a counter point, sorry if it was worded badly.
The point was kind of "yeah I get what you mean, here's more" I guess "but overall" does sound like I was making a counter point in hindsight
what I'm saying is, none of yall know how things will actually play out on live servers. you guys are assuming how things will be without considering the human element.
Its so weird basically the devs telling the survivors how to play mean while one side gets free range. It's…..Really annoying. Let people play how they want within the games logic.
The totem meta is gone now. Infact its easier to delete totems faster than ever.
they arent telling you how to play. that makes absolutely no sense to say whatsoever. there is a single perk out of hundreds that has a consequence for a particular form of action/behavior.
You might find it interesting to know that is the case for many perks on both roles. that pretty much every action in the game has either a positive boost to it or a negative buff applied to it.
DS isnt telling killers they arent allowed to tunnel. if you werent allowed to do it, you just couldnt do it. DS is causing there to be a potential consequence for tunneling. which only applies to you if someone decides to bring it. youll only get punished for leaving a pallet if someone brings this perk.
your free to leave loops whenever you want, there just in some matches be a risk to it. luckily, there are pallets and vaults within range of most loops that shouldnt be too difficult to get to since the killer has to go around the loop every single time while you can make vertical distance depending on positioning and most loops you should be able to get 6 seconds out of. and if its a filler pallet, well those arent supposed to be that safe anyways.
it's not. TOTH is still a problem, maybe a worse problem for certain killers, very bizarre rework.
It can block totems, but survivors can now break totems from like 10%-100% faster while also avoiding being able to scream. Thoth will now entirely depend on how often you can hook. Rather than protecting the totems manually like jason or judgement. So theres ways to keep people away from totems but once they touch them they get deleted in seconds.
For examples 'better than new' makes survivors break totems 50% faster, calm spirit 10% faster while immune to scream, 'flow state' 15% per stack up to 5 (75%). And small game now just shows totems through walls
What made totems hard to break was constant interuption while the totems took so long to break. Now you have a very short window to stop them by catching and hooking someone.
this entirely depends on perks survivors bring. no perk should be able to control a game because someone didn't bring something. there's no reasonable communication or way to see what allies bring in pre-game lobby. load into a game against a Jason or Judgement with a Hex defense build but you don't have anti Hex perks? game over.
The entirety of the Hex system needs fixing, Its another example of why BHVR continues to miss the mark by not actually fixing core gameplay problems and instead just rebalancing perks.
Yeah this isn't going to change anything for me as killer. I'll still be playing my same A tiers, I'll still be using the same methods, and my perk builds will be untouched while I reap the rewards of survivor nerfs. On survivor, I'm just angry and my matches played will drop. The role is half my play time and it's losing it's appeal more and more with each new patch. I guess that's a shake up for me but maybe not the one they intended.
Are we playing the same game?
Devs are trying to force a certain meta. They nerfed stealth perks, they nerfed perks that are used to prioritize yourself (Selfish perks as they called it) So yes they are telling survivors how to play the game.
Which is fine if they want to force a certain meta of play. But when its heavily on one side compared to the other it makes people question why they are doing this.
You people will never be happy.
It can block totems, but survivors can now break totems from like 10%-100% fasterThey already could with Counterforce. This isn't Chaos Shuffle. The fact that there are more perks that do the same thing doesn't actually make it anymore likely survivors take them.
its not. now killers have to put in effort for the effect. aka a reward for doing your objective and if survivors know its in play they can cleanse totems when the killer is in chase wich is shown on the HUD
Yeah, this won't shake up anything.
The most impact that they've done is nerfing Windows.
I don't think that's all that true, personally.
The devs haven't nerfed "stealth perks", as a category, they've nerfed two specific ones - Distortion and, on this PTB, Self Preservation. They have yet to nerf other similar stealth perks, and other forms of stealth perks like the chase-breaking deception perks in the vein of Dance With Me and Quick & Quiet most recently got buffs.
Stealth as a mechanic is absolutely allowed and even encouraged in some forms by the devs, based on their actions, it's just also subject to balance changes like everything else.
The devs don't, to me, seem like they're trying to push people away from any playstyle, they tend to favour weakening playstyles they think are too strong or obnoxious. Even when that isn't appropriate, like with tunneling.
they didnt touch lightfooted, lightweight, lucky break, deception, iron will just to name a few stealth perks that are quite useful.
The dbd community has a really big issue with exaggerating what the devs or human behavior within the game are doing
you can't even reasonably categorize these the same way as the perks he's talking about. these are all examples of perks used within chases to confuse or disorient a killer, that's not stealth as in "avoiding the killers notice" its Evasion amidst chase.
if you're invested in a setting and you see it getting worse, you tend to be vocal. Voicing problems that have been extremely obvious for a very long time, and our annoyance at the Developers for seemingly not listening to player feedback is what forums are for.
I didn't make this thread just to complain either, I did it to point out a very real and persistent problem which is causing a consistently stale and uninteresting state of DBD regardless of what new killer comes out which is that the core gameplay is rarely ever changed, and arguably never has been changed in a meaningful way.
The Meta will not change because changing perk stats is not how you regulate a meta in a game like this. if you want certain things to be less valid you need to change the game to benefit other things equally as much as the current things. I am not going to pretend like these perk changes are doing or will do anything good for the game, reading them invokes more of a sense of "why even do that" rather than even finding the changes good. BT change is indefensible, it's like zero thought was put into it at all, and I will be harsh about that because I care about the game and I know BHVR can do better because they have done better in the past.
Survivor doesn't get the benefit of something new coming out with the next content release, it's just another killer with more problems to overcome. the only things survivor has gotten that are new in years are horrible: Fog Vials and Invocations. It's just another reskin of a null character with three perks which tend to release in an either unusable state or a state deemed "too strong" and nerfed almost immediately never to be the same again.
TOTH change makes my point even more clear, the perk is a problem perk because whether in its former state or new state it literally requires survivors to bring antihex builds in a game with zero pre game communication for regular players and no way to know there will be a hex in game or not, and on the flipside if they have an antihex build and there's no hexes in the game they're not only wasting their own perk slots and time looking for them, but also wasting their teams time by doing something not benefitting the final outcome of the game.
People are forgetting all of this changes also come up with the player intention system.
I was able to pre leave a Wesker and coordinate gens, saves and heals. SoloQ experience will be much better with the intent system.
so…your foot steps being silent doesnt help you evade killers outside of chase? Having much shorter scratchmarks doesnt help you evade the killer outside of chase? iron will doesnt help you evade killers outside of chase? I am a little confused on how those could be in a different category. deception and lucky break i can agree
urban evasion and the perk i cant remember the name of that lets you walk 20% quicker are also highly useful stealth perks.
there isnt a lot of aura hiding perks ill concede that part.
The primary use of those perks is to help you while in chase, not to evade chase from beginning. there are many perks that fall into usefulness in more than one situation, that doesn't mean they weren't designed for something else.
Urban Evasion is also a chase perk. people use it to hide, but it in no way prevents you from being detected by the killer. it's much better suited to evading ranged killers or killers with strange attack hitboxes while in chase (Hillbilly Chainsaw/Blight Rush).
Fixated / Self Aware is designed to be used with exhaustion perks, and almost all viable builds that include the perk are in that category.
definitely didn't forget, Just like I remember DBD before the UI on the sidescreen that shows you what teammates are doing.
This is not a gameplay update, it's an extremely long overdue basic form of communication, a good thing for the game for sure but I'm not coming back super excited to use a text wheel. that's not a content update or change that influences actual core gameplay, it's just a bypass of VC.