Comments

• While the developers have missed the mark sometimes - it's a massive company with leaders, passionate artists, and talented engineers making this "half-lucid asymmetrical horror dream" experience work so amazingly.

  Personally, I can't agree with the idea that giving every killer "base kit pain res" is a solution to any kind of problem, and there isn't a lot of evidence to suggest that the developers prefer one side over the other. At the end of the day, the developers are just people - they're doing their best with what they got.

  Directly or indirectly, we have a relationship with the developers through their work; Sometimes their best is amazing, sometimes it just isn't good enough. That's how relationships work. It's best for us to give grace and help fix their mistakes instead of putting them down.

  As for the "pain res base kit" - I can't imagine what that would solve.

  If the problem is pressure or match time, there are far more eloquent ways to increase Killer pressure and/or make Trials a pinch longer to relieve scrutiny on the Killer. The solution is seldom to take a meta item and tape it to the base game.

  in We should give better benefits to murderers who don't dig tunnels. Comment by Valik October 25, 2025

• Honestly, I don't like giving profound in-game benefits for hooking different survivors out of perks.
  If anything, trying to give tasty rewards in a game designed like this would be ruinous. Killers should feel plenty powerful basekit and have the ability to pour on pressure, antagonize survivors, and effectuate hits reliably.

  It's true that not all kits have been designed in a way we can all take pride in as a community, but heaping massive benefits such as regression and haste onto "non tunneling" behavior will either overtune the 96% of Killer mains that play their characters properly, or developers may have to actively NERF Killer kit to balance out the "rewards" for normal, healthy gameplay.

  It's not like giving all of your employees a small raise or quarterly bonus - whenever you empower one side of this asymmetrical game, the other side is the one who has to pay.

  Trying to keep the game as-is and "bandaid" a solution with some numerical benefits will not work; bad Killers will not feel enough of a benefit, normal Killers will be generally buffed, and great Killers will feel unstoppable. You can't make the buff too high or it breaks the game, you can't make it too low or it will fail as incentive; and regardless, bad faith actors are going to keep being mean no matter what carrot you dangle over their heads. (Which is why the devs chose to add a little 'stick' to the anti-tunnel patch last time… a bit much but we get their train of thought.)

  What REALLY needs to happen is less of a focus on the Killer gameplay and a much broader focus on the Trial's pacing itself.

  Why do lots of Killer players (not the mean-spirited ones that tunnel to be vexatious) feel that they are pressured into getting a Kill earlier than natural? Why do Killer players keep bringing powerful regression perks and lament about how OP survivors are? Why are content creators always complaining about mechanics that avoid hits and give objective bonuses to survivors? What is the number one complaint of new Killers that start to climb in MMR ? Why do Killers often feel so helpless?
  On the flip side…
  What do survivors feel when someone gets hooked early? Why do survivors disconnect at the first sign of trouble? Why is it so common to see survivors sacrifice themselves for a friend in need when there's only one generator left - but that same survivor will easily let friends perish at 5? Why do survivors often feel so helpless?
  
  The root cause for many of this game's negative experiences don't just stem from balance and power dynamics - it stems from the fact that Survivors have too much power in the early game and virtually none later on. Generators fly by in a blink, and it's often difficult for even the best players to stop a survivor team that's glued to the gens and well coordinated.
  On the flip side, what happens when the Killer gets a couple of downs before a generator or two are done? The match can be salvaged perhaps, but that's the key sentiment: "**Salvaged**" - it's easy for survivors to lose hope because if they don't get the first couple of generators done before the Killer gains momentum, the match is basically over. There are plenty of second-chance perks that rebound health states, give advantages in chase, and can come in clutch in rare circumstances; but there honestly are not a lot of opportunities for survivors to bounce back and turn "3 hooks at 5 gens" into a 3 man out.

  What needs to happen?
  The early generator progress needs to be slower and Survivors need ample opportunities to power through generators as the match drags on.

  It should not be EXPECTED that the first survivor hook is going to be punctuated by 1 or 2, sometimes 3 generators popping.

  It should not be EXPECTED that if the Killer gets three hooks with 4 gens remaining that the match is basically over.

  Having an idea of what this healthier, more robust system might look like - I believe anti-tunneling would fit in here somewhere.

  A quality anti-tunnel system isn't going to be adding numbers to Killer basekit, it will be interacting with a new system designed to encourage health and engagement across the board. In a system where the Killer is given more lenience and survivors are allowed more opportunities to make a comeback, an anti-tunnel system would maintain lenience early and starve survivors of opportunities later - with those who tunnel foregoing particular lenience early on and allowing survivors to escape more easily.

  Thanks for reading this stranger's weird take <3

  in We should give better benefits to murderers who don't dig tunnels. Comment by Valik October 25, 2025

• Have him holding a bunch of traps (like 8) and have more traps out there (like 8??) but have all the traps spawn open.
  For ease, give him Iridescent Stone - where the traps auto-open one by one every 20s. He'd be much more engaging for both sides then.

  in Proposing a minor Trapper buff for 2v8 Comment by Valik September 4, 2025

• I loathe these changes because they artificially complicate and "get in the way" without explicitly IMPROVING anything. The incentives are designed in such a way to increase annoying "snowball" circumstances that harm newer players on both sides MUCH MORE than experienced ones. The design is so unabashedly horrible that not only has Behavior given survivors the ability to outright REMOVE IT FROM THE GAME in private lobbies, but they also had to curtail its effect specific to particular Killers - because the design is so poor and lacks eloquence that exceptions and rules have to be added to the exceptions and rules.

  Taking a look at things piece by piece:

  • When a Survivor is hooked, their hook status is hidden from the Killer. When they’re unhooked, there is no notification and their hook status isn’t revealed immediately.
    
    This is such an awful idea I cannot even imagine what the developers were thinking. I understand the kneejerk reaction of wondering a reality where Killers would not be rushing back to hook instantly, but this would be better relegated to a new perk (Personally, reworking Off The Record to give an 8s delay to the Killer's HUD and noise notif would be the play). Making the game less accurate, less trustworthy, less precise, and MORE clunky in the pursuit of trying to "punish everyone just in case they might be a little bad". Not only will this likely backfire and promote NEGATIVE Killer gameplay, but making a valuable information resource LESS reliable and instilling paranoia, distrust, and confusion in Killer gameplay for the very fringe hypothetical that 30s of invulnerability isn't enough to protect survivors overall. This One change is a declaration from the staff, in my opinion, that they neither trust nor respect Killer players enough to give them the most minor benefit of the doubt. In all transparency, I generally feel that the game is balanced and that the developers are - overall - not favoring of one side over another - but this is absolutely ridiculous. It's on par with an idea of "Lets make it so that the Killer cannot see survivor portraits or how many generators are left. When generators are completed or the exit gates are open the Killer does not know until 10s later! We must do this because informed Killers are more oppressive and more mean to play against!" - removing a line of basic, valuable, normal information that has existed in the game since launch in hopes that it MAY improve interactions with FRINGE cases against a MINORITY of players is beyond overkill and distrust - it is deleterious to reputations and experiences.

  • Unhooked Survivors gain the following effects for 30s:
    • Haste, Endurance, and Elusive (see below) status effects.
    • No collision with other players (both Killer and Survivor).
    • Immunity to Killer Instinct and sees the Killer’s aura nearby.
    • These effects are lost when the affected Survivor perform a Conspicuous Action.
      
      30s is way, way, way too long and this is, beyond the shadow of a doubt, fundamentally too strong. Survivors who are unhooked are ALLOWED to make mistakes and misplay into an early grave. It's part of playing the game - it's part of playing ANY game. Basekit Borrowed Time is very nice and it has stopped the Killer from tunneling directly off the hook in the overwhelming majority of cases, the anti-grab and anti-camp mechanics have eloquently removed the bulk of camping. Giving strange special permission to override the "Guaranteed Information" in Killer's kits, giving profound and unrivalled stealth and mobility that rivals 4.4m/s killers for such an extended period of time gives increased benefit SO SEVERE that it legitimately trivializes Off The Record, Babysitter, Borrowed Time, and many other perks by virtue of existing. 12s of 8% Haste, Endurance, No Collision, Hidden Aura, and no scratch marks was NOT ENOUGH - that is so incredibly concerning. Instead of starting with more conservative additions that, frankly, would work incredibly well at any rate, more than DOUBLING the efficacy of these perks and granting profound information. The ability for players on both sides to experience emergent gameplay surrounding hooks is quashed and - overall - the objective of "preventing tunneling" is not much more dissuaded from the actual changes from the original. This change is not going to make the experience worse for the 0.1% of tunnelers, it will not make the game more fun or enjoyable for survivors, but it certainly will make matches more predictable and uninteresting for Killers.
      
  • Added a unique effect to the Killer hook state UI that indicates the last Survivor they hooked.
    
    Actually a wonderful change. I don't mind this at all. Special scoring events to punish/reward good gameplay surrounding this and maybe perks interacting with it should make the game more interesting and promote nuanced gameplay.

  • After completing a “unique hook” (the same Survivor is not hooked consecutively), Killers get the following benefits:
    • Bonus damage for the next generator kick.
    • Temporary Haste status effect.
    • Temporarily reveals Survivors (think basekit BBQ & Chili) that have less or equal hook states to the hooked Survivor.
    • These effects are slightly lessened for The Blight, The Dark Lord, The Ghoul, The Hillbilly, and The Nurse.
    • These effects are disabled once all generators are completed.
      
      What. The. Heck.
      I play Killer more than survivor - I like the gameplay more. I hate these changes more than words can permit. Basekit Pop? Matches are going to be more snowball heavy - Killers with momentum are going to destroy matches and survivors are going to feel more helpless - while Killers that struggle to get hooks are going to feel even more ashamed because future balance will be around this. 20% on average is going to add ~80s of gameplay to each match if this feature is used effectively. 10% Haste for 15s is going to be worthless to low mobility, ranged, and information based killers but profoundly boost higher mobility and teleportation enabled killers. 10% is 2 stacks of Bloodlust - Survivors are not going to feel like they have a chance if they enter chase within this time frame. It's just unfun. Reworking BBQ and Chilli to do this instead would have been worthwhile but BASEKIT? Seeing all non-hooked survivors for FREE on a hook is such garbage design. Stealth has been marginalized, but turning NORMAL DbD into 2v8 matches is NOT the play. They are two completely different styles of gameplay and what Behavior may soon realize is that increasing the 'momentum' is likely going to punish newer survivors and turn many matches into predictable slogs rather than interesting mindgames.
      Overall these things are so chopped and silly that they're outright halved for the top performing Killers in the roster. This isn't a W for Behavior - this is a point-and-laugh scenario.
      
  • Added new effects that disincentivize tunneling:
    • If a Survivor dies before 6 total hook states, all remaining Survivors gain a repair speed bonus for the rest of the Trial.
      
      This is basically a bad joke. Not only is the "DBD is like Hockey" situation rearing its head again, but this is plainly silly. Just about every person who plays the game normally can attest that 6 hooks is NOT usually tunneling and, overall, is not how the game is played. In truth, the game is about bookended momentum and we DO want to see the Killer applying lots of pressure at the end game, but we do NOT want to see a survivor not being able to play the game and dying when there are 4 generators left. Having this be based on hook states regardless of generator progress is a telltale sign that this was a choice made in ignorance, not in good faith. 4 hooks would be more reasonable, but it doesn't change the fact that this is an ARTIFICIAL THROTTLE on the game. Using buffs and debuffs players should FEEL incentivized to do the correct thing. Trying to reach through the monitor and smack a player for "tunneling" when the criteria is not designed around tunneling gameplay is poor design, embarrassingly uninformed, and rooted in avarice rather than nurturing.
      
    • If the Survivor that was last hooked is Sacrificed or Killed, generators cannot be regressed or blocked.
      
      This is a meme. It's like those jokes where people make up a perk "Hex Call Mom: if the Killer tunnels you your mom drives through the wall of the trial in a 2008 Ford Focus/2016 Toyota Corola/2024 Lincoln Nautilus, running over the Killer and saving everyone." or like that one meme where someone took the perk Dead Hard and changed the title and description to say "Dead: Press the E key while injured and running to instantly die. You do not recover from death.". It is such an unreasonable, unfounded, out-of-nowhere, uninformed, and frankly strange idea to be put in the game. In essence, and entire aspect of the game that has been part of it since creation: Generator Regression - which has been expanded upon and has its own aspects of gameplay used to BALANCE the game between the two asymmetrical parties - will be REMOVED FROM THE GAME at the expense of the "OFFENDER" if they do not play the game "Correctly". People play this game and get hooked twice in a row all the time and it isn't all bad. Yes, sometimes it's because the Killer is a mean, rude person trying to ruin everyone's fun. Most of the time, it's poor luck - I do something silly or stupid - I try to be brave and do a big play - it's the last generator and I sacrifice my life for the good of the team - etc. Putting a MAJOR lose-lose situation with America's Nuclear Launch Codes into the game to nuke an entire team's chances by REMOVING GAMEPLAY is such a massive and unreasonable choice. It's as if in Call Of Duty, to prevent spawn camping, they come out with a patch saying "If we detect that someone dies in an active spawn zone, the enemy team cannot use Killstreaks or use grenades" with the reasoning "This will punish very bad players and, honestly, if you guys are killing people in their spawns you dont need the Killstreaks". With absolute respect this is such a clear and undeniable fumble I believe it's worse, much much worse than the Boon release.
      

  Overall, if they added mechanics like - Totems increase repair by 8% until damaged, Every time a survivor is hooked all other survivors gain a stacking 1.6% repair speed until hooked, when a survivor has been left in the Dying state for longer than 20 seconds all other survivors gain a stacking 12% repair bonus. And just add, like, 4 seconds of repair time to each generator or some early game slowdown to balance it - and you'd accomplish the same ultimate goal of encouraging spread pressure, discouraging slugging, and increasing the emergent gameplay of Dead By Daylight while reducing pressure on both sides to perform and improving overall enjoyment…

  Adding all of these really weird 2v8 rules to the base game to try and turn it into the same Loony Tunes show each and every time is so strange I'll never understand the reasoning behind it. Hopefully it feels good to play but if it isn't I may just have to put the experience on the shelf for awhile.

  in Is the recently proposed anti-tunneling mechanic too much, too little, just right, or not necessary? Comment by Valik September 4, 2025

• I find a lot of the lore to be written excruciatingly poorly - as if composed and edited by middle schoolers.
  That being said, I don't get to dig in and find more because the glut of interesting interactions are hidden in horrendously organized tomes with little short stories and animations buried underneath sub menues.

  I feel that unlocking tomes and such should unlock content that is viewable at the character menu.

  I wanna look at David and see "This character has 8 paragraphs and 2 videos to unlock in the tomes" to encourage me to do the work, then come back and view it. Then the content would be centralized and experienced organically.

  in How do you feel about Dead By Daylight's lore? Comment by Valik September 4, 2025

• @LiquicatteKomi said:

  There's some good in here and there's certainly some real bad in here but I'd like to ask at this point since hook states are going to be stupid important now is can killer please have a hook count per survivor? Sometimes it certainly hard to remember exactly which identical Meg I need to hook to avoid the steep consequences.

  It looks like they will have a HUD element that will make it obvious which one of the identical Megs to avoid :)

  in Developer Update | August 2025 Comment by Valik September 1, 2025

• @AtlasShark said:

  Honestly, bit flabbergasted by these proposed changes. It doesn't feel like you guys have a great idea for how players typically play your game at all. As is, these changes feel more like they outright disable these strategies rather than discouraging them, which would be the healthiest way to go about it. Not gonna talk about the specific killer balance changes as they seem fine. Here's what I like about the game-wide changes:
  
  - Elusive. Great status effect, and a big help to discouraging tunneling without punishing killers. I am worried that the "for a limited time" will be longer than the current duration of haste and endurance though, as I think it should be the same length (if not then maybe let elusive last like 5 seconds longer than the basekit haste and endurance effects. Nothing too crazy).
  
  - No collision with other players when unhooked. This probably should've been in the game ages ago so glad it's here.
  
  - Can see the killer's aura. This is good as it helps the survivor navigate away and really is only gonna help newer survivors as experienced ones will have enough gamesense to generally know where the killer is coming from already. Solid change. Don't give them the immunity to killer instinct though because that's largely killer specific and would only serve to nerf them specifically.
  
  - Improved repair speeds if a survivor dies while under X hook states completed. You guys set it at 6 but personally it should probably be 4. Sometimes survivors are intent on stealthing and you can only consistently find 1-2 people. 4 hook states means you have to spread hooks evenly between 2 survivors to avoid the repair speed punishment and feels like a much more fair requirement. It's much harder to argue that a survivor was tunneled out if the killer kept oscillating between 2 different players.
  
  - Unique hook bonuses. This is a good idea, and especially the part about it affecting different killers to different degrees. But, there's a better solution I'll give below everything else.
  
  Here's what I think should be immediately trashed:
  
  - All the slugging changes. Slugging only really derives the value it does because someone else has to come and pick the slug up while the killer presumably chases someone else. As it is here, the survivors can just keep sitting on gens the entire time because their teammate is going to get back up in 90s. It's a team game and I think that the killer being able to force teamplay is a boon to how the game plays. Given the current wording, it seems like it will be infinite use too after that 90s period has elapsed. I feel that these changes are too extreme given survivors have a solid collection of powerful perks to mitigate slugging already. Unbreakable, Exponential, and Conviction are all solid choices that survivors can choose to alleviate the pressure slugging generates. If we're really dead-set on giving basekit Unbreakable we should limit the usage to once per match and increase the required slug time. I'm completely fine with the general intent of these changes. Attempting to curb the behavior of the very small minority of killers who slug just to bleed people out is a noble goal but these changes are going to impact killers just genuinely playing the game. And the basekit Tenacity should just be gone like c'mon this doesn't need to be here at all.
  
  - Hiding hook status from killer. I think it's fair to delay the loud noise notification, forcing killers to keep an eye on their HUD to know when someone's been unhooked but sometimes the unhook is the only source of information the killer has. This not only feels like an anti-tunnel change that's just going to result in more proxy camping, but it's a change that protects the unhooker who should be a prime target under any normal circumstance. It just feels really convoluted and silly without necessarily accomplishing the intended goal.
  
  - Removing the ability to block or regress gens if a survivor is double-hooked to death. This seems like overkill in the best scenario and outright exploitable in the worse. Let's say the killer double-hooks a survivor and they either kill themselves on hook or their team allows them to die. Does this mean that survivors can benefit by letting one of their teammates go even when the killer wasn't intending to tunnel them out of the game entirely? If so, that's pretty absurd and kinda goes against the team nature of the game outright.
  
  With all that in mind, here's what I propose. The best way to deal with tunneling and slugging isn't to disincentivize it so heavily they're basically phased out, it's to encourage spreading hooks and picking up.

  
  - Broadly buff hook-related perks on the killer side, but make it so they don't function on a double-hook. For instance, take Pop Goes the Weasel. Add some extra regression but now the killer has to hook different players to get the reward. For something like Friends Til the End make the aura reveal significantly longer so it's easier to actually get the expose down. Scourge Hook: Gift of Pain/Weeping Wounds? Tweak the numbers a bit. If you also adjust Scourge Hook RNG you can probably further incentivize hooking. This approach simultaneously encourages hooking instead of slugging and not outright tunneling players. The exception would be Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance which should probably disable itself when a survivor dies. Because it effectively already has the limitation of unique hooks and is arguable the most powerful regression perk in the game this feels fair.
  
  - Massive blood point bonuses for spreading hooks. I know a lot of players aren't going to care about this sorta thing but there are some that will. This is a change free of any balance complications that might further help so why not right?
  
  I know this is a massive chunk of text that most people aren't going to take the time to read but I genuinely think that if you take the aspects from the first section and combine them with the last section you could effectively curb slugging and tunneling for the majority of killers without going so far as to basically remove these strategies for normal players. I'm extremely worried that you guys will implement all the changes here. Like, with very little exaggeration this will kneecap almost every killer except for those with the highest mobility. This patch has a high potential of causing a real killer exodus and putting the game into the same death spiral that VHS found itself in if not course corrected.

  I actually really appreciate the passion and how well this was composed!
  
  I have to throw my weight behind you in mentioning bloodpoint incentives.

  Giving MASSIVE bonus bloodpoints for spreading hooks and severely punishing repeated hooks would absolutely change gameplay, in my honest opinion.

  Hooking a survivor for the first time: 400bp

  Hooking a different survivor than the last one unhooked: 200bp

  Hooking the last survivor unhooked: 100bp

  Sacrifice after 6 hook states: 200bp bonus

  No survivors sacrificed at 8 hook states: 8,000bp bonus.

  Maybe give Killers a permanent Haste/break/vault/lunge buff if they get to the coveted 8 hooks no sacrifice everyone DOH state. Call it "Entity Elated" or something. It would be a much more seamless, positive, and worthwhile condition to the game.

  If that's too much, you could always do something very sneaky and simple for the "Entity Elated" reward like - making vaults be blocked by the entity after 2 uses instead of 3 and removing the Great Skill Check zones from all survivors. Something small that rewards Killers for keeping everyone alive to the end but doesn't frustrate Survivor players too much.

  Idk, I'm rambling at this point - but honestly, giving players lots more bloodpoints for playing properly and very little for playing scummy would have an effect on players. Honestly it would be a much more sensible first step than using an orbital strike to nuke regression if a survivor perishes too quickly.

  in Developer Update | August 2025 Comment by Valik August 31, 2025

• While generally skeptical - it's very disappointing to see all these things hitting the game at once.

  When you change the recipe to something you love, you experiment with one new thing at a time - if you throw a bunch of changes at your working system at once it is almost impossible to tell WHICH change is causing problems when things go awry.

  Each individual aspect introduced in the anti-slug/camp system I personally disagree with in regards to direction, but am optimistically skeptical about when it comes to gameplay. Dead By Daylight doesn't belong to me and isn't mine to direct, but I'm hoping matches get healthier overall because of it.

  Overall - when all the changes are taken into account at once - it fills me with a sense of dread and negativity.

  Not because of "oh no, muh tunneling!" or "My Slugging! I can't PLAY without my SLUGGING!" meme.jpg
  It's because we've seen these things attempted and failed countless times in the past: Objective Based Matchmaking, strict design, etc.

  Yes, in a game like Call Of Duty - it's very annoying when 1 guy on the enemy team is super good and wiping the floor with everyone, heck, it's less fun when that person is on YOUR team and you don't get to engage with the gameplay because one or two people on your team are "having all the fun" - but making it so that better performance causes players to perish faster and deal less damage to sneakily MAKE matches feel more "engaging" is a betrayal to the liberty and equal playing field offered by such experiences.

  This, in many respects, mirrors that very bad philosophy while also being self exclusive at the same time.

  When I read these notes, what I'm understanding is that the designers - understandably so - have an "ideal match" in mind and are aiming to steer players towards that… not by subversive little nudges or passive effects, but by massive overt mechanics that REMOVE GAMEPLAY from Dead By Daylight.

  To unbox it a bit more deliberately, let's look at the points one by one.

  • Removing Gameplay - Survivors being in the Dying State is part of Dead By Daylight. Trying to prevent a Killer from focusing on one survivor is part of Dead By Daylight. There are perks, playstyles, legitimate strategies, and in-game decisions made because of this. Survivors can bring Made For This and We're Gonna Live Forever to pick up their buddies and make a massive comeback. From a Killer's perspective - when these plays are made - it doesn't make me feel bad because they composed themselves in a smart way and made a comeback, tanking a hit and leaving me empty handed when I tried to gamble a slug play. From a survivor's perspective, crafting a For The People, Made For This build to sweep in and save the day doesn't always pay off - but when it does it feels great. Gunning for those niche plays and comebacks adds a charm and versatility to gameplay. When a survivor unhooks their friend, there was a bit of a proper etiquette to it - where the unhooker takes the hit and chase, or is a very bad teammate and leaves their friend in the wind. Sometimes there's sheer bad luck and survivors healing one another break in a panic and the most recent unhook gets pinned in a chase. Survivors have to band together and stop a Killer from tunneling - a Killer pays for tunneling with powerful perks like Babysitter and Borrowed time. While it's not part of EVERY match, the truth is that these are parts of the game that are emergent and aspects that are considered from before a match to after it ends. From now on, moving forward, when survivors look at all the perks in their inventory, are they going to be thinking - "I can bring Tenacity and Unbreakable to be super sneaky and make a comeback if slugged?" No. Are they going to be thinking "I will bring We're Gonna Live Forever to make a rapid comeback if the killer slugs one of my buddies?" No. Because the punishment for slugging is so incredibly severe and not ever worthwhile that it will become too rare to consider, and too worthless to counter. Why bother bringing "Anti-Slug" perks when most killers will be too terrified to leave slugs now, and teammates can make a comeback on their own without help? As a matter of fact, why think about it at all? In call with friends and a rando is slugged "Should we pick him up?" "Nah, it's been a bit, they can pick themselves up." - The answer to Slugging now is "dont worry about it.", which is wonderful because it removes those nightmarishly bad "Only Slug and Bleed-Out Nurse" games you encounter every once in awhile, the sacrifice for this benefit is NEVER CONSIDERING it in ALMOST ANY match going forward. From a Killer's perspective - thinking about bringing Deerstalker to track slugs or Coulrophobia to counter rapid healing saves? Thinking about bringing a very strong momentum based killer gameplay with slugging in mind for snowballing (Oni with Forced Hesitation and Infectious Fright, Meyers with Play With Your Food and Rapid Brutality) or even using a killer that is designed around momentum that often NEEDS to slug in their base gameplay kit (Singularity / Twins/ Long range Huntress) - are just going to be punished overall for keeping their gameplay strong and interesting, so why bother? Being FORCED to hook survivors without emergent juggling or splitting pressure may be a nice break for noob survivors aiming not to get stomped, but it will turn every single match with good players into a boring slog; "I can't chase that survivor that's running away from the objective, because even if I down them I will HAVE to hook them and the additional 8-12 seconds to get that done just isn't worth surrendering the pressure I have on the objective" will be the thought. Most folks will look at interesting, quality chases or bully squads and feel "it's just not worth it." - second chance slugging perks and savior plays are going to feel similar with newer players having less opportunity to jump in and be the hero, and more often then not being encouraged just to let players slug it out if that ever happens. When it comes to NOT TUNNELING this is less so, but still a matter of the game. Gracefully preventing tunneling by unhooking safely, distracting the killer, taking protection hits when need be, making yourself an easier target to bait the killer away from your vulnerable allies - this is a part of being a SURVIVOR, but soon it absolutely will not be. Why worry about unhooking your friend in front of the killer and running to safety instantly? The Killer's NOT ALLOWED to hurt them by the game mechanics and is actively punished - severely so! Why sacrifice a health state to keep the Killer from downing the unhooked buddy? It's more valuable to keep your health state than it is to prevent the hook overall - the potential time and repair buff boost and the lack of Killer Buffs means that the Killer will either be wasting valuable time or having to ignore the recently unhooked survivor to chase you. Why bring Babysitter or Borrowed Time or any interesting perks at all? Why bother bringing Off The Record if you cannot bodyblock and if the Killer cannot reasonably expect to win if they harm you? From the pre-game screen to the in game considerations, Killers are just going to resign away from even being in the same zip code as unhooked survivors, and Survivors are going to not care about the safety of people they unhook. The complexity of the gameplay with these things considered will rapidly and undeniably be removed. Slugging sometimes ruined a few matches. Tunneling sometimes ruined a few matches. Now, they will not even be a bother to consider, and that makes the game less complex, less interesting, and - ironically - less fun. I appreciate giving incentives to play well with minor rewards for doing the right thing and minor punishments for doing the scummy thing - but this isn't keeping the gameplay with conditions, this is destroying the gameplay altogether for better AND worse.

  • No Subtlety - The best gameplay nudges cannot even be noticed. A little clutter placed around Midwitch to make it harder to see Exit Gate lights to increase Survival rates? Very smart and effective. Decrease stun and break time by a fraction of a second each to subtlety increase killer lethality in chases and threat levels in Noob lobbies? Wonderful! Looking at this though, Giving survivors basekit Off The Record and Babysitter and Tenacity and Unbreakable - then giving Killers basekit Pop Goes The Weasel and 2v8 Aura Read - then making it so the Killer auto-throws the game if a survivor dies at the halfway hook quantity - and that survivors insta-win the game if the Killer hooks the same survivor twice - are NOT subtle things to consider or balance. These are massive IN YOUR FACE things to consider. Now, something subtle would be increasing the repair time of the first generators by 12% or so and giving survivors small Repair buffs when killers fail to spread their hooks out or start slugging - this would give some soft incentives and balance. Killers would have a bit more breathing room and survivors can overcome that if the Killer does not spread pressure out and play fair. Stamping a "You will now lose the match because you hooked the same person twice and they are dead and you have only 5 hooks." is NOT what i would consider a civil, polite, or mature way of solving the problem. It's almost like those memes where players will make up a perk like "Boon: TNT Boom - If the Killer hooks you twice in a row a Creeper from Minecraft™ walks up to them and explodes, killing them instantly and causing their Dead By Daylight account to be banned forever" or something silly. In my opinion, as someone who has played this game religiously for 6 years, the proper and correct way to implement these systems would be to make it as though they were never there to begin with. Similar to solutions for prior issues Behavior has addressed gracefully, players shouldn't even be thinking about it or worrying about this new system - when it's implemented correctly, it carefully guides and corrects players over time to accomplish a desired change in behavior (pun unintended) but when overt systems like this come out, folks are going to misbehave, get frustrated with it, and it's going to negatively impact well meaning and quality players just as much as the silly one's we're all hoping to correct.

  • The "Ideal Match" - The entire "Play the game how we want you to or stop playing altogether" feeling is part of gaming history. We've seen it all over the industry. I don't think this is precisely what is happening here, but it certainly is giving similar feelings. In FPS shooters forever players are asked to stand in specific places and perform particular things or else they see the game over screen - it is designed for "optimal fun". Walking Simulators stranglehold player freedom to tell a story, poor examples of the "assassination" game genre give players a lot of freedom but punish heavily for not doing things the "right" way, branching storyline games (such as The Casting Of Frank Stone) often mince up the story and punish players with shorter storylines and confusing narratives if they do not make the "correct" choices. We've seen all across the medium designers limiting opportunities and options and cranking up the heat in the frying pan below to say "You will play this game how WE intend, or suffer the consequences." and have often felt the bite of pushback. Dead By Daylight isn't any of these games and, let's be honest, seeing more survivors enjoy their experience into the Late Game of a trial, finding more "Everyone is dead on hook" scenarios, and Killers feeling less pressure to perform perfectly are all things we WANT very badly as a community, and Behavior is listening - these changes are aimed to bring us closer to that vision! After countless matches and experiences from both sides of the game, playing thousands of hours of Survivor and thousands of Killer, the "ideal Match" is fleeting not due to lack of mechanics, but due to the asymmetrical nature of the game and the complexities of player interactions. A survivor can make a few mistakes and land themselves on the hook, hanging out for much of the match, Killers can UNINTENTIONALLY slug 3 survivors that are trying to greedily slam a 99% gen in their face, a confident looper can gamble a 360 and lose, a botched flashy save can turn an assured 4e into a tragic 4k, one survivor perk can save their lives, a missed Redeemer shot can choose the fate of the match, one generator getting hit with 2 Surge procs can be the difference between Claudette being killed or Dweight being killed, Ruin getting cleansed early can determine if everyone lives or nobody does, a survivor can wiggle free because someone got stuck, bad hook RNG can strand a survivor in no-man's land where there are no viable hook options, a great Hook Sabo can save two lives in the end game and sacrifice another ; Survivors can breeze through a match without difficulty getting an easy 4E, they can also blunder and all get put into the Dying state in the first 80 seconds of the match. Killers can undermine and outsmart survivors and get two kills before 2 generators are finished, they can also miss a few critical hits and waste their time with misinformation and hardly encounter a single survivor at all. While there are unpleasant aspects, the variability of these matches makes loading into them particularly interesting and unique. How many times do you lose a game in 80 seconds in Call Of Duty or League Of Legends? How often can you Win a game in the last minute with one or two massive plays? Dead By Daylight has so much interesting variability and lots of intricate interactions that trying to use a little carrot and a lot of stick to FORCE a particular outcome is just going to make these systems moot for a lot of the boring normal matches, and also extremely disruptive and annoying in the more interesting ones. How many times do you play and see "8 Hooks, everyone on death hook" end game scenario where the last generator is hotly contested? Not very often. You may see that a little more often now, but every match that you experience outside of this will likely be more strained, painful, drawn out, and tragically predictable.

  • No Baseline - If you design a weapon that deals 32 damage per body shot and 2x damage critical - you can design a game where a target with 100hp goes down with 4 shots to the body, 2 critical shots, or 3 shots where one is critical. It is predictable and rewards skill. What happens if we start buffing and debuffing the damage and hp states? We may see that silly casual players don't particularly notice when it starts taking 5-8 shots to defeat an enemy, or when underperforming makes the targets easier to kill with reliable 2 shot victories - but the truth is that having a baseline predictable nature to these elements allows for emergent gameplay to happen. Players that can confidently rely on the experience to understand where and when their damage values change can develop a subconscious rapport with the interaction. Maybe damage is doubled while diving, and halved while crouched or prone to reward players for jumping about and discourage camping - but this would make every match turn into a predictable slosh of folks dipping and dodging without any stationary clarity; a better system would be to have an item, zone, or obvious trigger that cannot and will never be triggered accidentally: a special beacon makes all shots criticals, a particular gas halves damage - a power up increases HP by 28 points, a visible oil slick that can be avoided lowers it by 12 for a few seconds. These aspects are healthy because they do not disrupt traditional gameplay behavior, and are only triggered by intentional offenders - which not only punishes bad faith actors, but rewards skilled and confident players with the opportunity to gambling particular gameplay to their advantage. What use is knowing how much progress a generator has when it can be regressed anywhere between 12% + 1c/s or 0% no regression based on who was hooked last. Will the Killer know where you are at this very moment? Sometimes. Is the Killer 4.4/4.6 or faster? Do they have Haste? Can you tell? Does that person who's on the ground need help can the killer find them?
    
    TL;DR on this one - If Killers and survivors get a ton of buffs and nerfs from being hooked or slugged or hooking or slugging or whatever, the baseline of the game gets muddled.

  • Betrayal - You hook someone who is looping by a nearly completed generator, this is their second hook - they will be on Death Hook after. All the other survivors have only been hooked once. You step away from the hook and hear a noise notification, so you go back. The person who was last unhooked ran to the adjacent generator that is at 88% and is dedicated. You hit them. There are 3 generators to go, this one is almost done - and you are pretty sure that others are being worked on to. There are still faint scratch marks of the Savior leading to one of the gens you think is being worked on.
    What do you do?
    Normally, you're not worried about DS or anything, so you hook this person again. They die instantly - it is their punishment for not playing smarter. Even though you lost the scratch marks of the Savior, you have increased pressure and head towards the other generators. You are unlucky and don't find survivors, but do find a Generator 4/5ths of the way done - you kick it and get it regressing. One generator pops. You go and start chase with the survivor that completed this generator - you eventually win, but that original generator that was regressing gets popped right as you hook this survivor. You hook the survivor and get to the final generator that you left - it's almost completed, that earlier regression you made on the 4/5ths one gave you the seconds needed to be here. The two survivors sacrifice their health states and team up to complete the generator. They're skilled in chase and use a couple of opportunities to get away. You dedicate on one, by the time you get them down - a survivor is saved from hook, and they are both healed. You venture to patrol the exit gates, it opens. One is chased out, but the other snuck by for an unhook. The healthy survivor takes a hit while the other finds the hatch while you patrol gates. GGs. WP GL HF Next. 3e/1k
    ALTERNATIVELY - The second you hit that survivor that was just unhooked at the start of these events, you decide not to kill them. You follow the scratch marks and see that a survivor was nearby, waiting to steal the generator. Because they were caught by surprise you manage to get them down quickly. You go to hook them. The two other survivors that were repairing leave their generators to perform an emergency rescue operation. You fake out returning to the slugged death-hook survivor and double back to catch an altruistic would-be savior and start chasing them. This scramble to save friends turns into a daisy chain of slugging, hooking, health exchanges, and chasing where survivors manage to just barely scrape by. It takes a lot of back and fourth and the Killer has to break away to kick generators and keep them regressing because they are so close to completion. Survivors keep dipping by and stopping the regression which turns things into a cat and mouse. The regressing generator with 80% is finished, the 4/5ths one is contested but is also finished, and they eventually get the final one. 2 survivors are sacrificed to the entity during this and that original survivor that was on death hook barely makes an escape with their friend. GGs. WP GL HF Next. 2e/2k
    NOW - this is a lose lose situation. If you pick up the survivor and hook them, all of the generators stop regressing and cannot be kicked. Mess around and find that 4/5 generator - cannot kick it and it doesn't regress. The gen over there pops. Mid chase the original generator which stopped regressing because of your sacrifice pops. The 4/5ths generator pops too BEFORE you end the chase. Frustrated and annoyed that you couldn't kick the generators because of the hook. You camp the survivor through the end game and the other ones leave while frustrated. Snore. Get Gud. 2e/2k.
    IF you chose to SLUG the survivor and leave them - it's no gamble anymore. They crawl away and auto recover very quickly and are either picked up in a safe location or are left on the ground while everyone else does their thing. Maybe if you go find the other survivor with the scratch marks that hook can potentially give you the information and regression needed to pull through - but why would you gamble? MAYBE it's worth it, MAYBE that potential 2k can turn into a 4k because of all the buffs you might get - but no matter what… at the end you're not going to remember the feeling you had chaining downs together or pressuring survivors or the fact you had this Laurie Strode dead on hook and at your feet - but she made it out. No. You're going to remember that gut realization that Dead By Daylight is a video game and you are in a a lose-lose situation. If you leave the Laurie on the ground, you are punished. If you hook her again, you are punished. You are not a bad person and did not make a critical game breaking mistake or choose to play in a mean or disruptive manner, but you are screwed - because the Laurie instantly went to the generator and dedicated, and now you have to pay for their mistakes.
    Humans are very interesting machines - particular emotions resonate deeper with them than others. Joy and desire are stronger than grief and pain, fear and disgust override peace and contentedness, rapport conquers distrust, and betrayal reigns strongest of all…
    When people feel betrayed by a friend, by a brand, by a product, by an idea they often don't forget that emotional response, even at the cost of other emotions and reasons.
    Players are going to remember that feeling staring down at a dying survivor more than anything else. No matter how much content, skins, laughs, and engagement that is provided - that subconscious kneejerk frustration they will feel when they must choose between 'tunneling' or 'slugging' will likely prove to be disastrous for the game's health at large.
    Players are not going to remember when this system saves them nearly as well as they will remember when it betrays them.

  The anti-slug system and the anti-tunnel system counteract one another and have a VERY VERY VERY high chance of disrupting normal, honest, good natured matches.

  The anti-regression system was already a bit tough. It certainly accomplished its goal of culling the sheer volume of overlapping regression events in the game to prevent Killer players from adding minutes of in-game time to the match (instead of balancing regression perks properly) but the amount of good natured and well meaning players that the system disrupts is notably low. While I do see regression blockers kick in during normal games from time to time, the overwhelming majority of the time it is not a massive issue, perhaps a minor annoyance. It is sad, understandably, that 1-2% of the time in my normal matches the mechanic gets in the way and disrupts a match.

  I have a very, very, very bad feeling that these systems are too blatant, too intentional, and too pervasive to be ignored in common non-toxic matches. The direction of taking Dead By Daylight into an "Objective Based Balance" to try and make every match "The Ideal Match" is something that hurts my heart and makes me fear that the game will become increasingly drab, dull, and predictable as time goes on.
  
  I'm hopefully optimistic and am looking forward to how these changes will effect gameplay. If we see a lot less malicious killer gameplay and don't feel the effects harm the authenticity and flow of normal games, it will be a wonderful addition to the game.

  I still feel, in my gut, that this may be a very critical change in direction that may take something that's important to my heart into a place I could never follow it into.

  in Developer Update | August 2025 Comment by Valik August 31, 2025

• @ddg_r said:

  https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3984630#Comment_3984630

  Do you mean that when you move the camera in the game, you start experiencing incredible lag, but when you don’t move it and just walk around, everything is fine? I get something similar after every update.

  What happened was if I moved it too far to the left the cursor would just exit the game and my character would stand there.
  
  This was solved, ironically enough, by a WINDOWS UPDATE - meaning it was a system error and not a fault of Behavior's

  Technology is fun!

  in Have you been experiencing performance issues with the game lately, especially after updates? Comment by Valik August 30, 2025

• @HuskyDogLover said:

  https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3985747#Comment_3985747

  Ideally, the killer could simply kick them out of the game at any point and let a bot take over. So if you want to participate in the fun little game mode, you can, but if you try sabotaging the killer you'd just get kicked into spectator mode.
  

  Sounds like an awfully lot of effort to create a robust admin controlled lobby kick system as a safety net for an obviously flawed and fatally unbalanced idea in the first place.

  in 🔪 Poll: What If Survivors Could Kill Each Other? Comment by Valik August 22, 2025

• @THE_Crazy_Hyena said:

  https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3984723#Comment_3984723

  Don't forget there are TWO variants of RPD, East Wing and West Wing. Which should make the chance 2/72 or 1/36 to be exact

  THANK YOU

  That actually is a massive help. I didn't even consider that.

  This actually started ticking me off after reading it - so I went back and HAND COUNTED the maps, disregarding maps that the wiki considered "variants" (Not counting Badham 4 times for different seeds etc.)
  It's actually 40
  So the formula would be 1/20 and NOT 1/72 - which is a big difference.
  
  I really appreciate you telling me so I can make the adjustment. I feel bad for talking so confidently while a little wrong made me VERY wrong!

  in Map Offering Rarity & Achievements Comment by Valik August 19, 2025

• @AcesSpeedo said:

  https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3984718#Comment_3984718

  and its boring. NEXT!

  Dropping two comments and not even reading it all ? I'm spoiled today.

  in Ok guys, how fast would this idea end poorly? Comment by Valik August 19, 2025

• @Dilusionz said:

  https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3984796#Comment_3984796

  Played pretty much all day, got RPD like twice and didn't escape either, had swf all keep popping RPD emblems 🤐

  Nearly halfway done but the end isn't in sight 😑

  Stay strong, brother. Having that 100% is like Mr Krabs getting his millionth dollar. Just a few hundred more to go

  in Map Offering Rarity & Achievements Comment by Valik August 19, 2025

• @GeneralV said:

  https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3984699#Comment_3984699

  To be fair, the killer you choose really does not matter if you're playing against a cheater.

  Skull Merchant's current state is weak, unacceptable, and genuinely an insult to everyone who is dedicated to this killer, yes. But even an extremely strong character wouldn't be able to catch someone who is hacking.

  Poe's Law in effect - I was meaning this in a strictly comedic way. I think we all know the bad deal she got because of her release and how folks are STILL dodging her in spite of all the reworks. A shame what happened to her with the devs ostensibly dumpstering her entire kit until they can iron out a proper mechanic for her to use.
  
  Again, I was hoping it would get a snicker, with how the forums are I should have been a bit more forthcoming.

  in Grinding killer perks has made me hate survivor. Comment by Valik August 19, 2025

• @Dilusionz said:

  Just popped 10 RPD offerings, got it on the 10th (1 in 10 is crazy) and got to 1 gen, died. I need 12 more escapes with exit gate, so it'll take me at minimum 120 more RPD offerings and at 25% chance we get exit gates and escape, that's now 480 RPD emblems minimum to finish the achievement. What is the point of the offerings? Meanwhile one sacrificial ward every 10 games and my chances are 10x lower.

  Yeah, it's really really busted. Hoping they change it. These new offerings are doodoo.
  
  Glad you're about halfway done with the progress, it will make it a lot easier.

  in Map Offering Rarity & Achievements Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• If anything it needs a buff and to only be activatable once.

  It's very, very strong in a highly specific and exceedingly rare set of circumstances.

  Otz isn't wrong, if you bring in one of the most unused and ostensibly worthless perks into a match, have your entire loadout dedicated to it, and then have all of your friends in on the build to ensure it works… you can make ANY perk seem broken.

  Conviction IS powerful but will not see value 99% of the time. If you dedicate all 4 perks slots, your playstyle, your time, and your energy - and your FRIEND'S energy - you will get some Conviction value, but you won't get those generators done any faster or secure an out any more than you would have if you put this much effort into literally any other perk too.

  in Do you think Conviction is going to get nerfed (Otz video warning!!!)? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• @DarkStrife said:

  The devs should be playing their own game as part of a work assignment with a minimum threshold of hours per week like some other game companies do. This isn't the first time the dev team or anyone in behavior has been embarrassed on stream and it hurts to see thats needed to make changes. Shall I remind them of the insta blinds? Now we have a celebrity now.

  This is truly unexeptable and they should have a minimum threshold to have a certain amount of hours per week to be out in on playing with the community. Maybe a minimum 15-20 hours a week? This is more is more than enough time to catch any issues. Also they must have also looked into player bug reports and try to recreate it in game during the play time.

  Also this would 100% make the community feel a lot better with devs and developer progress and connections. Warframes devs do it all the time and just take a look at the player/developer relationship. They are extremely close because the devs actually play the game. Infact they also stream it which boosts player confidence heavily and is why the warframe fanbase is so loyal. Perhaps behavior should take note there.

  What do you all think?

  I've put 3000 hours into the game and am still learning new things. While some folks in the company may benefit from exposure (namely asset creation artists, level designers, balance team folks, etc.) The bulk of folks at the company would not see an increase in job efficiency or even respect from playing this video game even for a THOUSAND hours.

  The other thing is that this is why it is important for the administration NOT to start tormenting their employees with mandatory brain rot, but rather LISTEN TO THOSE WHO ACTIVLEY PLAY IT.

  I'm no fog whisperer, I do love the game very much and like working with Behavior any chance I get - but asking for software engineers and musicians to play a video game to appease our sensibilities sounds a little silly. Maybe if they had a work event where everyone sat down in a lounge and played customs it could be funny - but expecting employees to have intimate knowledge of players who put thousands of hours into the game like us is unrealistic and demeaning to what they actually contribute.

  This is a wonderful community center, and the moderators do a good job. I don't expect any one of the employees here in the community to play 3,000 hours or more of the game to rival me in some arbitrary "game insight" way. Their job isn't to pull a CJ Tech to save me at a pallet, their job is to keep this community as toxin free and well informed as possible. They don't need to know what a "blendette" is by firsthand experience.

  There is a reason why companies have QA departments with playtesters and bug reports internally - because why have people who don't need to play the game spend company time doing it when you could also get silly guys like us to do it full time instead.

  I'm glad it works for the Warframe folks, but just because something works for others doesn't mean it will work for everyone else - just look at diets.

  in Dbd devs should have a minimum threshold of hours playing their own game and heres why. Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Make them identical to the Fog Crystals from the haloween event in opacity, etc. Maybe a little less severe to make addons bring it to that level.

  Give the vial 8 charges. Slow survivors as they use the vial. Every second the vial is HELD this way, increase the charges expended when activated - activates when use key is released.

  For each charge (second) used, the expansion rate, opacity, duration, and size is increased.

  Survivors can use it for 8 quick little "tufts" of wafting gas that last 2 seconds or so, hiding an activity or juking the killer. They can also hold it for 8 seconds and release to make a massive 16s cloud that obscures everything. Everything in between.

  Uses charge system like other items, can be used once - several times - modular.

  in Should fog vials have infinite charges and pre-nerfed opacity, but be weaker in other ways? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• @Coffee2Go said:

  Well, i think i hit my OWN skill ceiling as in with using my fun perk build, im sitting at 78% WR with myers and yep... every match is OTR, Dead Hard, medkit hit.

  Then straight loop to shack and repeat until they finish gens (which i avoid looping there only when 2 survs left or 3).

  Uhh idk anymore its not viable and its unplayable for me just feels not right or fair againts michael even if i ran tomb build his tier 3 wont puncture the DH, OTR.

  I despise tomb build either way since its not fun for me either.

  I also refuse playing m2 killers just because i dont want to go off of my myers, been thinking of doing ghostface and do meme build for a while until myers gets gameplay changes.

  Im stopping there because whats the point for me it goes on 2 loss streak then 2 win streak and it hits the cap where they are just in call have comms and then cycle OTR, DH.

  Im tired and drained, had one match today where they knew i play for win and for some fun jumpscares so they decided one will die one will escape so i let them go for hatch and that made me happier.

  (FYI, i dont got much hours on michael, and i play on ps5 60 fps with high input lag due to my tv, they seem to have 2k hours on avg when i inspect the profile of these lads)

  Well, you're playing one of the worst, most outdated Killers in the game.

  You're going to get bullied very, very hard as an M1 killer. I understand how charismatic Meyers is. He's a favorite of many for good reason. The best thing you can do is put Bamboozle on him, tbh - Shack just eats him up. Being 4.6 M1 is rough but I'm going to tell you a secret.

  Meyers is not a chase killer.

  Don't chase with him - like - ever.

  He has a tiny terror radius and works best in ambushes. If you can't get a survivor down quickly, kick a pallet and stalk them and then break away to stalk another. You will apply more pressure to objectives, catch more people out and in unfavorable circumstances, and find that he's a lot more fluid than you initially think.

  Tombstone is lame anyhow, dont worry about it.

  Now when it comes to perks wise with DS and OTR - these are chump perks. You'll learn as the seasons grow on you that you'll see these perks less and less as you learn to play Killer more effectively. Both are disabled by conspicuous action, so if someone goes to a heal party or touches a gen, they're open season.

  Meyers is a funny Killer because he has a very, very slow early game and struggles to seize the momentum from survivors in the same way higher momentum, A-S rank killers do. What he gains in exchange is exposure and some minor buffs in T3, but also stealth throughout his kit.

  I recommend not playing Meyers like a 4.6 M1 "Machete Man" build (similar to Trapper) but more like Wraith. Pretend you are invisible to survivors. It will be much more fun when you catch them by surprise and get hits.

  If you have to go for another Killer, I HIGHLY HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend going Huntress or Nurse.

  I suggest this not because they are oh so precious or oh so powerful, but because they will teach MASSIVE lessons that make playing Michael Meyers easier.

  Huntress is all about sightlines and getting hits from afar, you will learn where in chase survivors favor cover and when to break off. You will be rewarded for splitting your pressure, learning peek holes, and pulling away from a chase to "reload".

  Nurse is the opposite of Shape - She teleports to survivors and messes them up instantly without need to power up or gain momentum. Survivors play very differently against her and spread out to objectives a little differently too. It will teach you a bit about pressure, momentum, and dividing attention.

  When you return to Shape after learning from these killers - you will conceal yourself better, sneak up on survivors better, learn best when to cut chase and reacquire prey, when a survivor is going to cook you in a loop, when to pop T3 best, etc.

  As a bonus, you will feel much much faster with your M1 build as a 4.6 and have a new perspective to appreciate everyone's favorite strong and quiet type.

  in I hope michael gets a viable change to be more playable at high mmr players (unplayable at high mmr) Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• EDIT!!!
  Another user proved the below math wrong because the ACTUAL odds of getting RPD randomly are closer to 1 in 20 (about 5%) which is MUCH higher than the initial 1.4% I originally considered!

  ~~~~
  
  I did the math earlier.
  Boiled down, there are 72 maps. Your chances of getting RPD is 1/72

  (There is an average and maximum to create a range of expectations. If you roll a 6 sided die until you get the 6, your odds are 1/6. You may get lucky and get it first try! You may get it sooner. You may get UNLUCKY and have to roll the die several more times than 6 to get it! For this reason, we're going to simplify things and go with the maximum average. We're going to say instead of getting lucky and seeing 6 first, or having to roll it 12 times to see a 6, we assume that we will see a 6 on the 6th roll.)

  We will come back to this.

  Then let's look at your escape rate. You're arguing 40% - I disagree.

  I got this achievement awhile back, but I can tell you with confidence that being the ONE TO OPEN THE EXIT is much more difficult than not. It often happens that you are killed, tunneled out, Killer DCs, allies open the gates, killer opens the gates, EGC forces you through the hatch, killer gives mercy and drops you AT hatch, ally opens the gate and then unhooks you for the escape, etc. Let me tell you, there is nothing more agonizing than getting a bit into this achievement and seeing No Way Out pop in front of you. I believe you might find that the success rate towards the achievement is closer to 16% even when your escape rate is much higher.

  For simplicity we will say that the success rate is 25%.

  With a 25% success rate, you will need to play on RPD about 80 times to get the achievement.

  With the OLD map system, I burned through about 120 of my own RPD badges (because other offerings were used to bring us elsewhere half the time)

  Less than 200 matches though, it wasn't too bad.

  But let's look at doing this vanilla.

  Coming back to the 1/72 die roll.

  You have a 1/72 chance of getting RPD.

  You will have to play 72 matches WITHOUT any offerings to see RPD ONCE.

  You need to play on it 4 times or so to ASSURE yourself a point.

  You will need to play 288 matches of Dead By Daylight survivor to ASSURE yourself a point on this achievement.

  You will need to do this 20 times.

  Which means, to ASSURE yourself of the achievement, you will have to play !!! 5,760 !!! matches of Dead By Daylight survivor.

  Ok. Lets use the map offerings.

  The new map offerings no longer increase the odds of the realm being employed by 999.

  Well the current map offerings work by lowering that 1/72 roll to 1/58 or so.

  (It's fuzzy and inconsistent from my own gameplay.)

  So if we use RPD badge offerings EVERY match, we change the formula outcome.

  1/52 chance, play on it 4 times for a point, for 20 points.

  Congrats, due to the map offerings, now you only need to play !! 4,160 !! matches of Dead By Daylight survivor to secure the achievement!

  Now there's a lot of play in the joints. As I said, you can get lucky with a few of your matches, you can see RPD frequently some times and less often other times.

  Map offerings will reduce the limit of CONFIDENCE by 1,600 matches. But then again, if you get lucky, you may be able to secure it in only 2,000 matches or so. More than 10x the amount of grind than what I had to go through back when Skull Merchant got released.

  Sorry buddy. Good luck!

  in Map Offering Rarity & Achievements Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• It helps to remember that your win condition has nothing to do with generators, but everything to do with momentum.

  Think about it like a candle burning down the wick.

  If your goal is to snuff out the flame.

  The fire is brightest when all survivors are on generators. 100% efficiency.

  When two survivors are off of generators the candle burns away at 50% efficiency.

  When only 1 survivor is on a generator the little flame is winnowing.

  When no survivors are repairing anymore, the wick is a smoking ember.

  I understand your frustration - but for a 90s generator to be completed so quickly, several survivors would have to be on it and using resources (perks and items)

  You may be concerned that there's "Not enough wick" to extinguish the fire in time, but that's where the funny thing about the game is - it's not linear like most. Most games when an enemy gets a good item, or has a higher score - it may become implausible to win (League Of Legends, Call Of Duty, Left 4 Dead, etc.) in Dead By Daylight the survivors can do all the generators and open the exit gates and still lose to you. It's a tug of war.

  Generators fly very quickly, but even here in your example - it seems like all of them are on generators and repairing them.

  Bringing REGRESSION perks only adds more to the wick - and when a bright and raging flame sticks to a candle, adding more wick does little to slow it.

  The most important thing is GETTING SURVIVORS OFF OF GENERATORS and DOING LITERALLY ANYTHING ELSE.

  Making survivors go to unhook or pick up their friends, restore each other to healthy, cleanse Hexes, hide in fear, or waste time being chased are all valuable tools in your arsenal.

  Perks? Items? They are only important if they help these things. If an item or a perk increases your ability to DISRUPT survivors and REMOVE THEM FROM GENERATORS then you're golden. But if you're constantly throwing wood on a raging bonfire and wondering why it's burning up so fast, reach for the extinguisher instead.

  in These Gen speeds are ridiculous and I am tired. Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• I don't care for it at all and it goes against the Dead By Daylight formula for me.

  Organic, quiet communication between players has always been the funniest and most disarming aspect of the match.

  There's a coup de Grace, but we won't get into that just yet.

  Survivors crouch spamming, nodding and pointing. Killers shaking their heads and meleeing a generator sort of thing. That's part of what makes DbD magical.

  Survivors in a tight little congo line or dancing or bobbing heads is very cute and disarming to Killers in a certain way, and there is an anonymity to it all. It's refreshing to come in from the slur-filled audio chats of Call Of Duty and Halo into something so blatantly silent and devoid of noise. As a survivor, audio is a massive component of the game - hearing heartbeat, lullabies, killer audio cues, skill check warnings, even hearing an injured friend nearby to heal them. Having folks yap over it all would become a problem, it would mess up a lot of what makes DbD special, and it would likely NOT add to the experience in the long run.

  At very, very low levels communication may be helpful, but the amount of toxicity in the playerbase would only grow in how problematic it is. I know we'd like to think that the non PC player in your lobby would be so polite and demure if only they knew you were in that locker - but prepare for the whiplash of reality when some guy has his mic on and you hear his breathing and parents washing dishes in the background alerting the killer to your shared location.

  Get ready for players to start feeling less secure because speaking up is going to make strangers creep on them because they sound effeminate.

  Prepare yourselves for toxic memers blasting THE VENGABUS IS COMING at 9000% volume

  But here's the coup de grace

  Remember when players weaponized flashlight clicking to cause seizures in sensitive rivals and annoy the rest?

  I bet you all the money in the world they'd do the same thing with the audio system and, if anything, just spam slurs to annoy others.

  One of the best things about Dead By Daylight is the externalization of the vocal community with the advent of Discord.

  People can be safe and warm up to strangers and eventually chat with them as friends on their console platform, Steam, or even a third party app like Discord in the long run.

  Overall, survivor gameplay is extremely - I mean EXTREMELY simple.

  1. You repair generator.
  2. If bad guy chase, engage chase.
  3. If need, unhook.
  4. If can, heal.
  5. Bad guy near no see, hide.
  6. If flashy save yes then do.
  7. Glowy Skull is cleanse.
  8. Toolbox if panic.
  9. Tee bag at exit

  It's a very, very, very simple formula. Seeing who's on generators, healing, and in chase takes care of almost all the needed communication at any point.

  I can see survivors being able to use VC to talk before and after matches - but for WITHIN matches, it does not add any mechanical or logistical benefit, will cause massive amounts of problems, and behavior has enough problems trying to track down abusers even without an entire sensory format of communication being open. There's just so little to gain and a lot to hate.

  in Ok guys, how fast would this idea end poorly? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• @IWantCandys said:

  I'm actually not sure what I'm hoping to achieve with this post. I probably just want to vent a moment of frustration that's been slowly building up over time. Sometimes talking helps.

  You're probably thinking this is going to be a rant about killers being OP and everything being so terribly unfair, but that's not it. I'm frustrated with myself. I've played the game for almost exactly 1200 hours now, and I just can't get any better at chases. The usual tips like watching good survivor players and YouTube videos don't help; as soon as I'm in a chase, I panic and forget everything I've seen others do. Learning how to run tiles (e.g., from the aforementioned videos) doesn't work either; I can't get it into my head, no matter how hard I try.

  Some people with 50-100 hours last longer in chases than I do. I usually can't even last 15 seconds.At this point, I'm downright ashamed and doubt my own intelligence. Am I stupid? Why can't my brain memorize how to run tiles? Is it because I probably have ADHD? I was diagnosed with it as a child, but I don't know if it goes away in adulthood.

  Actually, I can't be stupid; I passed my medical exam with an A. But as soon as I play DBD, I doubt my own IQ. At this point, I don't even know if I ever want to play the game again. Today I got to the point where I actually disconnected (forgive me) because I was so ashamed that I almost instantly get downed by every killer. It was like that back in 2021 and it is like that today, No improvement.

  I like the game, but I'm not having fun with it anymore because I just can't manage to keep chases going. When I spectate my teammates, I feel even stupider. It seems like every single DBD player can loop better than me.

  Sorry guys for the whining, but I felt like I just had to let it out somewhere. Feel free to ignore me. :)

  People are blessed in different ways.

  I'm not going to hype you up or dress you down. You can certainly get better at the game - although I don't think it's going to be from an intellectual stand point, but more of a place of deeper inner peace.

  I have a friend, she's an INCREDBILE person. She's funny, intellectual, she has this amazing writing prose and admiration for poetry. She's a gorgeous mother of two with a great husband, a great life. She works very hard for her family and has two part time jobs she pours her life into - but she still finds time to socialize with friends. She is an anchor to all, a bedrock of support, and stalwart in the face of adversity. This woman stands up for what she believes in, isn't afraid to speak, to care, to love, and to hold a hand out for others. She plays many games and could yap to you about Final Fantasy 14 for hours - she is a master and could run circles around my head about that game any day. She has seen darkness, and has the fiery light of life deep in her bones. She is a great friend, a powerful wife, a loving mother, a strong pillar of her communities, softly spoken, strong in her defense, and wonderful in every way I could summon words to describe to you.

  She also cannot last 12 seconds in chase and screams like a little girl when she is being chased by the killer. She isn't new. This is as good as she is going to get at the game for a LONG time.

  There is absolutely NO judgement towards her. She also tries her best and is often lost or confused - or I'll say "You go left I go right" and after she says "Got it" the second the killer rounds the corner she goes right and we both are horribly murdered. We're both laughing to the point of tears and yelling in levity as she cries out "I GOT SCARED IM SORRRYYY"

  You're absolutely not stupid, dumb, or intellectually challenged. What you're facing isn't even an intellectual thing. It's a primal fragment that comes up and overrides your ability to be rational, and it's the same thing that turns my bedrock-of-society, mother-of-two best friend into a murmuring puddle of humanity sloshing from side to side in a confused, screaming panic as a hag walks up to her casually.

  And while I use her as an example (With my massive, throbbing, high IQ of 98 brain) I've been a very competitive Killer for many years. Without tooting my own horn, I want to say that I'm fairly confident in my abilities as a killer and feel that I am competent in my matches. I also often feel like a liability as a Survivor even still to this day. With almost 3,000 hours I'm still sweltering and making swiss-cheese headed gaffs that cost my friends their lives in many cases. Even within the game, I know every perk and element of the game backwards and forwards (If I only applied that same level of enthusiasm to medical school like you did) and can reliably secure 4k matches on just about any killer even with meme builds. But how confident do I feel in a survivor match ? Not nearly at all.

  Everyone has different gifts and areas they are great in. Being smart doesn't mean you're supposed to be amazing at everything, and it certainly doesn't mean you can't have parts of your own mind and humanity that act OUTSIDE of intellect. There is nothing to be ashamed or guilty of - because being a little goofy in the margins is what makes people interesting and worthwhile.

  in I feel stupid when I play DBD Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• The important thing to remember is that the only thing that matters in the match are 2 things:

  Objective Efficiency.

  Exit Gates.

  Firstly, If survivors do all the generators but perish in a heap - the feeling is moot. It's tempting to even say "The only generator that matters is the last one" to reflect the racecar idiom "The only lap that matters is the last one" - but it's not even true. If Dead By Daylight was a race, it would be one where you can stall to 0mph on the last lap and the opponent can cut across the field and instantly win. If survivors throw all of their eggs into getting the generators done as fast as possible but their buddies are still on the ground or hanging, they may not live long enough to escape. There is no free lunch - and if survivors are keen on completing the last generator when you only have 4 hook notches on your ring, that's not the end.

  Secondly, most important, Objective Efficiency is what wins Survivors the game. Nothing else.

  How many survivors are on generators at any given time. Nothing else matters.

  Think of the trial less as a battle over generators and chase. Think of it more like a candle that is burning down a wick.

  Your job is not to do anything but prevent that candle from burning all the way down to the base.

  at 100% Efficiency all survivors are on generators doing repairs. The candle is burning as fast as it can

  You chase one, that's 75%.

  Chase two off of a generator, that's 50%. The candle burns at half strength.

  Someone is on the hook, one person is going for the save while you chase another, that is 25%. The candle is a flicker.

  One's on the ground, one's on the hook, and two are healing for the save play, that's 0%. It is a plume of smoke that might reignite.

  The killer's primary objective is NOT to keep generators from completing, it is to reduce the Generator Efficiency to 0%.

  Regression perks add more wick to the proverbial candle, but if survivors have high efficiency at 50-100%, they're going to burn through the regression and stalling perks. Saying "I have to add more wick, the candle is burning out too fast!" makes sense at first, but if you know how to snuff out the candle with a couple of licked fingers, the sentiment shifts under the weight of scrutiny.

  If you chase one survivor for a ton of time, you let the candle burn down at 75% efficiency. Your job isn't to win chases or kick generators, it is to stop the fire from reaching the base. Every survivor that is not actively repairing reduces that flame by a factor until it is a smoldering ember.

  Worrying about generators and 'comeback perks' and 'basekit generator elements' and what not is like stressing about the wick. Your job is not to address the wick - it is to kill the flame. 40% of the objectives done with no hooks is no reflection on you or your abilities; it does not define what your victory or defeat may look like. The primary issue with having a full regression perk is that you've placed all of your effort into playing DEFENSIVLEY - trying to add more wick or have a greater distance between the flame and the base.

  But unless you are lowering OBJECTIVE EFFICIENCY by disrupting survivors - chaining chases together, pressuring hooks, proxying generators, forcing heals and health trades, you're going to be burned up in a flash. Survivors can bring things that can raise their efficiency above 100%, and you can bring things to lower it too - but the most important thing is to KEEP THEM OFF AND AWAY FROM THE GENERATORS.

  My prescription for you is to play with no perks - or maybe 1 mild QOL perk like Brutal Strength or BBQ. You're going to feel very vulnerable and week for a few matches, but you will get into the flow of things and learn where to place your blades and when to twist it to make Survivors scatter.

  Because you're trying to stop GENERATOR EFFICIENCY with REGRESSION - trying to kill a fire by adding more logs on it to burn. If you accept the challenge I propose and take a step back, you will learn how to nurture a candle's flame into smoke, and that is how you win and have fun instead of losing and stressing about it.

  in Gen stall perks feel necessary to avoid games lasting 5 minutes Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Just make Head On highlight your locker in Yellow for other survivors to see while active.

  Otherwise, just as you said, it will only be used to get mad at folks for being rats. Funnily enough you can tell when they're being rats when they are not doing an objective for a few seconds!

  in Locker Icon on Survivor HUD... Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• @TheSingleQuentinMain said:

  Give trapper a shotgun.

  You only get 2 shots per a trial. Hold control, for 2 seconds to switch from Trap mode to shotgun mode. Shotgun mode lowers movement speed to 4.2 m/s. Aiming the shotgun takes 2.2 seconds, cannot move while aiming, and your max turning speed is 20 degrees per a second. Anything within 6 meters, and a cone of 45 degrees is considered hit when you shoot. Cannot go through walls, unless you stick the the gun real close to a wall, such that the barrel is on the other side. If you manage to get the barrel onto the other side of the wall, an audio que will go off, with a deep voice saying, "Peakaboo!" This way survivors understand the shotgun has made it to the other side of the wall, and so does the Trapper.

  Shotgun blast will put healthy and injured survivors in the dying state. There's not even an animation for them going down, they just instantly get on the floor, like they tripped.

  More importantly, it can break pallets, even ones that aren't dropped. You can also shoot windows/vault locations. Doing so will make your vault speed on those spots 30% faster, and survivors will vault 30% slower.

  To prevent slugging/camping, a stamina feature is introduced. Holding the shotgun for 6 or more seconds causes trapper to enter a fatigue state for 4 seconds, where he can't move or attack.

  Requires tweak.

  2.2 aim time 6m range with no movement. Survivors move at 4m/s. They will be 8.4 meters away by the time the gun blasts. Decrease Trapper movement speed to 2.8m/s and lower charge time to 2s flat with an 8m range and a 24 degree cone. To ensure the upmost balance, I would consider increasing the fatigue time to 8s and damage to survivors causing their computers to erupt into flames in real life. Then I would call it balanced.

  in Unbalanced but fun Trapper Idea Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• @Destaice said:

  I finished getting P3 on every survivor except paid DLC and was working towards a P100 when I realized it probably made more sense to P3 the killers.

  And immediately realized just how often my teammates were cheating. Like yeah no wonder that Jane or Steve or Ace looped for 4 gens they had hacks on. Making me feel like a trash survivor in comparison.

  I'll play 1 game where the Lara is playing perfectly. She knows where to path. She knows the loops. She's hitting fast vaults. Checking the check spots. Winning the mind games. She still goes down. Resources dwindle and bloodlust stacks eventually get me my down. Well played by Lara.

  Then the next game I'll be bloodlust 2 chasing a Taurie who is hindered getting drone scanned with an active claw trap who has no movespeed bonus perks, there's no boon up, nobody else had a speed bonus perk, and I cannot close the distance. She's always making distance.

  So so many survivors are just suddenly running faster than they're supposed to.

  First mistake is playing Skull Merchant. I'm sorry.

  in Grinding killer perks has made me hate survivor. Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Humans are ever interesting things, aren't they.

  What it boils down to are EXPECTATIONS, BETRAYAL, ENTITLEMENT, and THE ILLUSION OF CONTROL.

  People expect experiences to go a certain way, and that often isn't the case.

  When their expectations come crumbling down on them, it takes a mature and seasoned mind (I wish that I had one of those) to recognize that there is no intrinsic FAULT for that betrayal but their own; folks often look for a shadow to cast their negativity onto instead of accepting that they may be wrong.

  Folks are often entitled too. We are all like that before we find our manners, grabbing toys and shouting "mine" at our parents. It's natural, human nature.

  So when a human plays this game expecting a result and doesn't get it, there are the "others" to cast blame onto: the other side (Killers/Survivors) and the developers themselves. We can always villainize the enemy and shirk the responsibility of being WRONG off of our own shoulders while we do so! It's what allows us to continue our entitled ways and step into each trial grumbling about expectations before the first generator pops.
  It's easy to see why some folks get into a match and quit when they are downed in a first few seconds, see a survivor use a perk they do not personally believe is fair, or experience a gameplay element that is at odds with their personal ideations of what a 'fair' match should look like. They have an idea in the back of their minds of what a match SHOULD be or WHY things should happen, and are constantly butting heads with reality when the facts stare them straight in the eye.
  
  Finally, the bare truth about all peoples across the planet, is that we humans struggle with the ILLUSION OF CONTROL.

  It seeps into the lives of everyone throughout everything. Silly people think they can dictate what is right and wrong about politics on the other side of the globe, they think they can influence the minds and efforts of their own family, they feel responsible for the actions of a stranger, they fear the burden of events in a work environment that do not concern them, they invest a painful amount of time and emotional effort on social connections in a blind conviction that they are somehow responsible for the actions of other people.
  

  Pulling that element into an asymmetrical, high pressure, horror themed deathmatch tends to make people cry little rivers of tears because, deep down inside, they have not relinquished their fictional control and ownership of the game to its natural resting place. Every defeat turns into an indictment of their personal worth, their skills and value are called into question during a misplay, they feel the weight of responsibility for their teammates and guilt for what others experience, they feel anger and defensiveness when another player is rude to them, they experience levity and inappropriate elation in humiliating those they consider inferior. It is because Dead By Daylight, in the ancient reptilian brain, is not a shared experience that is a gift.
  
  Humans are very silly. They are often immature, scornful little crybabies. But when they learn to find their footing and stand upright, those same people - you'll find - can be extremely insightful, funny, and wise company to have.
  
  We'll always have crybabies in the community. But we'll also have our good friends in the fog to count on until they grow up.

  in Why is majority of dbd fan base such crybabys? Checkmate boys Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• I've been having lots of fun playing the game myself and have not been encountering this nearly as much as you have.

  The odd toxic meta player, yeah - we have those.

  Clowns are all over and it's bad, as you say.

  Honestly, though, this is nothing new. Every patch that comes out with this game some content creators make some videos like 'CLOWN IS BROKEN LMAOOO" and "SWF GETS OWNED. TOKYO GHOUL FTW!" level brainrot, then players copy the builds and try to emulate what they watched on YT.

  For example, this past week I have run into a TON i mean a LOT of BASEMENT BUILDS!

  Iron Grasp, Agitation, Mad Grit, etc. Why? Why is this artist/Onryo/Ghostface/Trapper (okay the last one makes a little sense) walking across the entire map to put me in the shack and camp me when I've been playing this game for 6 years and haven't seen this since basement bubba?

  Because some TikTok content creator made a meme and folks are easily influenced. It will go away.

  You're not wrong - toxic killer builds are everywhere and folks are abusing the changes. But this isn't new. I remember when boon totems released broken and everyone was bringing those healing perks to meme on folks.

  I remember when Call Of Brine Eruption combo became a big deal even though the perks were generally mid until someone started saber rattling about it.

  I got smacked down by the Hubris-Fury build several times a few weeks back and haven't seen it since! It was an odd pocket.

  Folks get influenced and play the game all the time. It's annoying. They find "broken" stuff and then go into matches trying to abuse it - it's annoying. You're right.

  What's the point of playing survivor anymore? Because it's survivor and we like playing it. Shoe's on the survivor's foot for scummy meme builds this patch, but it's always like this and always will be. Next patch some survivors will get some busted update and Killers will complain about meme builds abusing it.

  Remember when the Boil Over change had everyone bring Erie of Crows and going up to that corner on the top floor with flip flop? I do. That was horrible - but the counterplay, hilariously enough, was to just leave em to bleed out and get their teammates.

  Wild, lame, annoying, toxic players will always be in this videogame experience and community because, well, they exist in real life! Humans are funny things! If you're asking what the point is to all of this, I'm not a pastor or a spirit guide, but I've been playing this game through many many busted up patches and I still like it - I still owe the game a lot - if the kitchen is getting a bit hot then sit the patch out until things are smooth again (I did that with the boon patch, that healing bugged me)

  It's a silly game that's not worth stressing about, and if meta builds, trolls, and easily influenced memers out to ruin your day are wrecking your enjoyment, there's no shame in putting things down to do something more enjoyable until all this gets sorted out :)

  in Does anyone else just feel like Survivor is utterly pointless now Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• As wild an idea as this is, I agree.

  I fidgeted with an idea awhile back called the Groggy status effect.

  The idea would got that Survivors would start the match with Groggy 2 - Repair speed is reduced by 24%

  When a survivor enters chase with the Killer, survivors lose a stack and have Groggy 1 - Repair speed is reduced by 12%

  When a survivor takes damage by any means, all survivors lose the Groggy status effect completely.

  What does this do?

  It will be slightly annoying for survivors, yes, and culls quite a bit of their initial momentum. But let's consider it.

  Top tier killers such as Nurse, Blight, Kaneki, and even Hillbilly to an extent will enter chase rather quickly - and oftentimes get hits within a few seconds of a match starting, making this "basekit" moot and staggering survivors by only a handful of seconds worth of progress.

  Bottom tier killers that require time for setup such as Trapper, Shape, and even Hag would see massive benefit, with survivors suffering from Groggy for several seconds before the Killer enters chase and starts damaging players.

  In this way, lower tier killers would see a massive bump and be able to make matches much more tense, close, and play more confidently while high momentum killers will find no true benefit from it.

  As a tertiary benefit, survivors will learn to grumble less when a health state is lost.
  When the Yui gets into chase in the first 5 seconds and takes a hit shortly after - the team's thought isn't going to be "Well, might as well pack it in folks, this match is over, where's the DC button" and would be elated to see their progress bar lose the red hue while saying "Finally, lets use the toolbox now."
  
  While 24/12% sound like a lot in theory, the duration of the debuff and severity of the repair hinderance would do relativley little overall to destroy a team's ability to escape and would promote much more healthy behaviors in the long run.

  4 survivors spread out on generators and it takes a Blight 12 seconds to get into chase, 20 to land the first hit: Instead of gaining 72 total generator charges - they'd gain 60, and the debuff would be gone for the rest of the match.
  Vanilla - 3 generators at 22%, 1 at 13%.
  Groggy - 3 generators at 16%, 1 at 10%

  Same situation but it's a Trapper that takes 40 seconds to get into chase, 60 to trick a survivor into stepping into a trap: instead of gaining 220 charges of generator repair, they gain 175
  Vanilla - 3 generators at 68%, 1 at 45%
  Groggy - 3 generators at 52%, 1 at 33%

  So in a top tier killer match it might bump the initial survivor momentum down by 3-6% of repair, but for very low momentum killers that are at the bottom of the tier lists, it will bump initial survivor momentum down by 12-16%

  It's not usually going to be game changing. Those spare 5-10 seconds aren't going to be what makes or breaks a survivor's game, but it will organically promote healthy gameplay behavior, give lower tier killers more breathing room, and won't do much for aggressive higher tier killers in the short or long run.

  I also liked that it can fit in the lore, as survivors fall asleep at the fire and awake in the trial - so them being Groggy and needing something exciting to shock them awake is nice.

  No Mither removing the effect for the whole team is a hidden bonus.

  ~~~~
  Edit:
  Percentages can easily be changed to be more mild. 24/12% is the maximum I'd suggest - which would have the most radical and definitive effect on gameplay, but can be changed.
  A silly rule of thumb is to consider that every 4% that a Groggy stack contributes puts 5 seconds of game time in the pocket of Trapper and Shape, and puts 1.5 seconds of time in the pocket of a Blight, Nurse, or Kaneki.
  12% giving Blight players ~5s and Trapper players 15 seconds is a bit strong, but I personally think it's worth investigating.
  Lowering it from 12 to 10, 8, 5, or even 4 are also viable options. While I favor 12% as the maximum yield, it would be a gameplay element that can be tweaked to augment early trial behavior.

  in Possible basekit idea Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Performative anxiety is very normal. There is a lot of pressure on playing Killer no matter how new or seasoned you are!

  I just posted a similar thing on a different thread:

  • It's not a competition.

  • It's not worth being stressed.

  • Enjoy the chase.

  • Let go.

  The most important thing to keep in mind is that both winning and losing do NOT reflect on your value as a player, a person, your skills, your value, or your potential. Matches can be easy or hard or punitive and it's best not to go in with expectations. If you start cringing and feeling anxious or bad in the game, just disconnect; go do something else, no videogame is worth human suffering or stress. Have fun in your little chases, feel joy when a survivor narrowly evades you or trips you up, enjoy the game of cat and mouse and you will eventually conquer it. Truly, above all else, surrender the illusion of control. This game is not yours to win or lose. You are not responsible for the outcome of a match or how other people feel within it. You are a guest and this match is a GIFT. What other people say about your experience has no bearing. So long as you did your best and had fun, that's all that will really matter. :)

  in Killer Anxiety Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• 4 words of advice, my brother in the fog, from least to most important:

  • It's not a competition
  • It's not worth being stressed
  • Enjoy the chase
  • Let go.

  Iron: It's not a competition, it's sparring. Like fencing or playing basketball, you can go against folks that keep score and make it a point to put you down to build themselves up, but they don't get it. If you like fencing or playing basketball, the fun part is engaging with the game, not proving yourself against foes. You can lose a basketball game, but enjoy the challenge. You can hold your own and eventually lose to a competent or even superior sparring partner in a fencing duel, but it's worth it if you like fencing.

  Bronze: If you're getting stressed, remember that it isn't worth your time. Your mental health and joy are FAR FAR more important than any silly game. If you find yourself getting wound up or put down by a videogame, it's flat not worth it my friend. Trust me. Take a little break and maybe try again another time, but if it keeps happening then stay away. If the lotion starts to burn, it's not for you. Thats okay.

  Silver: Enjoy the suck. I mean it. They have that military term "Embrace the suck", but you will find a lot more pleasure in your killer journey if the road is what feeds you happiness than the destination. If you go into matches looking for a 4k or to inflict misery on survivors that cower in your presence, you're setting yourself up for eventual failure. If you boot up the game because you enjoy the chases, like pulling off silly hits, play around with meme builds, and have funny interactions with strangers - you will have a LOT more fun and start to find those 4ks and dominating matches come around more frequently. You have to train your brain not to break away from a fun chase so that you can win the game with camping and objective control - and switch it to a version that is happy to have 8 pallets dropped on you, flashlight stuns, and being chased for 5 gens if it means you got to pull out all the mind games and spar with a worthy survivor that put you down. Enjoy the chase. Enjoy the hunt. You will turn 600 hours into 2,600 hours happily if you do

  Gold: Let go. Surrender the illusion of control. Remember that you are NOT responsible for the match and the survivors are NOT testing your sovereignty. Release that part deep inside of you that is tempted to think that you are the authority in the interaction. Remember that the other players are your brothers and sisters, and this is a designed language of code being run by a machine. We get most frustrated when we feel responsible for a loss, when we feel that our will is being tested, that our abilities are being circumvented. Let it go. Let it all go. You can only do your best, and doing your best is its own reward. Those people that talk bad about you are enjoying their time in the sun, but their hour will come - and they will envy the peace you feel now. Let go. You are not in control, you are all guests. This match isn't yours to win or lose, it is a gift and a blessing.

  
  
  These are the steps I took to being relaxed in my games. Hope it helps you too!

  in How do i stop getting so stressed at the killer role? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• My personal build is for memes only:

  • Lethal Pursuer
  • Nowhere To Hide
  • Save The Best For Last
  • Hex: Plaything

  Nemesis has big stompy stomps, so Plaything isn't the BEST. Nemesis also struggles early but conquers late, so it's generally BETTER to have a strong opening - which is why Lethal Pursuer is a good perk to start out with, it can get you into Tier 2 in a matter of seconds.

  Nowhere To Hide is super de duper good due to lethal Pursuer buffing the duration, but it comes in handy to find lurkers and sneaky folks near gens.

  Plaything is always comedy gold - even seasoned players gaff with no terror radius. I think it's potent on Nemesis because Zombies can alert you to survivors nearby and across the map that can't hear you coming.

  Save The Best For Last - this is mostly a meme. You will generally not be using M1 with Nemi, but that's sort of the glory of it. Survivors almost always expect you to pull out the tentacle. And there's a certain sad face you get when you dont get to infect or get evolution points from survivors from the whip. STBFL is sorta like safety insurance that incentivizes your playstyle to use M1 in conjunction with whips. For me, it makes me feel a little more relieved than robbed when I use an M1 - and this often trips up survivors because I'm not gunning for the whip on every chase or loop, and catching a survivor off guard with an M1 is a lot easier than feeling the need to whip them point blank. As an added bonus, if you get high stacks, being able to follow up with a slick whip after an M1 is pure serotonin to the brain stem.

  in What are some builds to run on Nemesis? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Huntress!
  
  Nothing more satisfying than back to back cross-map hatchets.
  From playing with my friends, they also tell me that it is the most terrifying - which is nice. It's what DbD is all about! Terror, fear, adrenaline, and laughs!

  in Killer Mains. Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• In the first clip it sounded like a flashlight save. There was a click to the righthand side and two survivors on the generator. Due to the HUD element, it would seem that the Dweight was out of frame and got a cheeky 45 degree flashy save at a distance. With a focused lens, the range can be far enough that you don't see the little halo coming from the light.

  Without reading the other comments, this is my guess.

  The second one is just the killer dropping you. This was a tactical thing on her part.

  If you have above 80% wiggle and the killer drops you, you are freed instead of being dropped. This is why they pick you up and drop you 4 times and the 5th one causes you to be freed from their grasp when each drop gives you 20% wiggle progress the next time you are picked up.

  The reason the killer did this at that moment is because they were either memeing or did not think they were going to make it to a hook. Dropping a survivor off a ledge intentionally is tactically better than dropping them anywhere else, because survivors are momentarily slowed when they drop - allowing a killer to regain chase much more easily than not.

  TL;DR

  You were flashlight saved in the first clip and the killer dropped you in the second.

  in how ? i don't have Decisive Strike Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Survivors being allowed to heal themselves is strong, but it adds a level of strategy. "You heal yourself, take my medkit, I'm going XYZ", "This is a risky unhook and heal, should I use my medkit charges to save my friend, or keep it for myself?", "I missed a skillcheck! now I'm going to need a friend to top me off!", "I'm going to the place where my friend died on hook to use their medkit and heal myself so I can run to the exit gate before End Game Collapse gets me!"

  I've seen lots of crazy plays and team choices emerge due to self healing as an item based option.

  Toolboxes. Not at all. What do they even do? Make the first gen you're on finish a few seconds faster? That's it? That's not engaging or nuanced at all. The biggest brain play any survivor can have bringing a toolbox is saving a BNP until the last generator - and that's not strategy at all, really.

  Medkits add a layer of nuance, consideration, strategy, and triumph to the game.

  Toolboxes do not.

  in One stays one goes, medkit or toolbox Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• As a big GoW fan, I don't see the aesthetic and themes of Sera melding well with that of the Entity.

  If the franchise leaned more towards its original direction as an action horror game, perhaps - but the books have been cooked on that for some time and since 2008 the franchise is synonymous with hyper-masculine, brainless action blockbuster games similar to Transformers and Halo.

  (I have a Marcus Phoenix wallpaper on my PC right now, lol)

  I think Gears Of War would fit a lot better in a Helldivers 2 crossover than Dead By Daylight, which is - in itself - the condemnation.

  in Would yall be down for a gears of war chapter? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• They're mildly annoying, but that's just it.

  That's the best and worst aspect of them.

  It's like the Chemical Trap item - it's not even GOOD it's just a giant "lmao you stink" at the Killer.

  Sometimes Fog Vials trip me up, sometimes they dont, but there's the kicker that makes it kinda worthless and also infuriating.

  Medkits, Toolboxes, flashlights, keys, maps, flashbangs - they all have a binary mechanical benefit that is given to a survivor in a particular field. Health, objective speed, blind the killer and save a friend, see vaults and important landmarks, open the hatch, etc. You know what the value of the items are and how they are used.

  Fog Vials though?

  Drop it and maybe the killer might not see where you are or arent perhaps ? Escape a chase ? Confuse the killer ? Buy yourself 2-4 seconds of distance ? It's not absolute.

  I don't mind them. They're kinda fun and not overpowered. I do get a general sense that folks that use them are less interested in winning the game than they are trying to bully me. Unlike with flashlights there is no skill expression and it's all kind of pathetic in my eyes. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't - just like a blast mine or chemical trap; more times than not they don't really add to the survivor's escape, but they certainly do mess with me a little, and that's the only reason they ever bring them. I just don't particularly care if they mess with me so long as we have a good chase.

  in Fog Vial thoughts from killer mains Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• It annoys me less because of the mechanics than the sportsmanship.

  I get nobody wants to sit there for an extra minute or so and wait to be killed - but I do have a personal edict to stick out what one signed up for.

  in Killers, is it annoying when survivors disconnect? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• It should be reworked.

  Make survivors drop items and when they pick it up they get hit with some debuff. (Hindered, aura reading, etc.)

  I get people want it to drain charges for the obvious reasons, but I do think that making survivors venture back into tiles for their belongings often wastes enough time itself and a debuff stacked on top would be worth it.

  Reverting back would still be good, but they'd need to destroy the Map/Fog Jar items to make it work across the board.

  in Should Franklin's Demise be reverted to its pre-9.1.0 version? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Its a very tricky perk to balance, because if the conditions are right - it is BROKEN.

  But also if conditions backfire it is WORTHLESS.

  Stuck chasing your obsession, or they are a bully and take hits for their friends - useless perk.
  Spread your attention well and manage to keep everyone on the ropes - very mild power.
  80% of matches where you hit some folks then get in chase with your obsession - hey, it's nice!
  Never see your obsession but only others - BROKEN BEYOND BELIEF

  in Was STBFL nerf needed? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Matches are much better and teamwork is greatly improved. This simple change has reduced the amount of "time to kill myself" players in matches by, like, 80% or something. I'd much rather hash out the match with a bot than a worthless 3v1 we COULD HAVE won if there was an extra pair of hands to save Claudette #2

  in Does anybody like the new Hook without being able to get off it yourself after no one helps you? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Hatchet go brrr

  in Who is your favorite killer out of these 7 killers and why? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Behavior wants to be Fortnite very bad so I'm betting they are gunning for it.

  The problem is - what do ?

  And how get?

  How do you convince 2K that the chapter will do good by their reputation and also that the content is going to reflect well on the IP?

  It's hard, and 2K is known for being absolutely greedy. We'll just have to see how things work out between the CFO suits before we can fuss about what the talented artists and devs get to work with :)

  in Do you think that Bioshock will eventually come to Dead by Daylight? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• When your teammates are more competent and do their job better, they will invariably let you hang and may risk a second hook phase. They may take protection hits for you, but if they're doing their job right they will be in another zip code while you're in chase.

  It's true that when bad survivors refuse to help their friends or choose to protect themselves over an ally it can be frustrating, but the price they typically pay for in these matches is with their own lives. Survivors that are not coordinated and are scared of being injured do not perform well in matches. Giving the option to heap on punishment when your allies are already scattered and disorganized would be a coup de grace that would smother a potential comeback.

  You're not wrong that seeing bad teammates get their comeuppance would be satisfying - but this would also open the door for bad faith actors and even those same selfish souls to ruin a good comeback, throw away their own win, or obliterate their own MMR by punishing survivors that are playing smart instead of "how that player wants". Worsley, it would impact newcomers to the franchise the most.
  
  I can see many times this would get my friends to giggle and scream over Discord and laugh for a few matches, but I can also see many, many more ways this could destroy an already frail balancing act in both the game's meta and this wonderful community.

  in 🔪 Poll: What If Survivors Could Kill Each Other? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• My teammates already kill me in the game enough, I don't want to deal with griefers.

  This also adds increased complexity and inter-community avarice without explicitly ADDING to the game's overall experience.

  "If something bad happens to you, you get to ruin the enjoyment of your 3 teammates by creating an imbalance in the game"
  Not for DbD.
  
  It would make for an interesting game - I'd like to see it done, but it cannot fit in Dead By Daylight's current design philosophy of hope, hunt, suffering, and sacrifice.

  in 🔪 Poll: What If Survivors Could Kill Each Other? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Im a simple man.
  I see Skull Merchant in this poll - I disconnect.

  in Most annoying scream? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• After the last update my cursor is no longer locked to the client and slides out of the game, making it virtually unplayable

  in Have you been experiencing performance issues with the game lately, especially after updates? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• Removing perks and elements does not make the game better, it makes it less dynamic.

  Having a competitive mode where certain "chance" based elements (Such as luck and perks like Dramaturgy) are removed might make sense, but stripping buffs/debuffs such as the games entire mobility system, information system, or other reward systems would severely disrupt gameplay balance while also making the overall experience much less interesting.

  in Would you play a game mode where there is no haste, hinder or aura reading of others plays for both Comment by Valik August 17, 2025

• There will be a TL;DR at the end…

  ~~~

  Using a map offering should reliably allow the realm to be summoned.

  I understand that it is often abused by bad faith actors - the primary ache of this stems from poor map design.

  If maps were designed well and didn't innately favor one side to another - these would never be a problem.

  My biggest grip is that certain achievements become much, much, much harder without reliably summoning a map.

  Outbreak Breakout and all of the "repair the main generator and escape" challenges are ostensibly impossible now. There are 75 maps in DbD and the odds of getting any which one is less than 1.4%

  That means if it takes you two attempts at the map before achieving victory on a third one - the odds of getting the same exact map 3 times to allow for the challenge may take !!! 214 matches !!!

  As an example, I've been playing Survivor almost every day since TWD chapter to get my last remaining achievement on the new map. I have played about 28 matches and have encountered it once - each map bringing an offering to get into the realm that contains that map.

  If this stroke of luck continues - I can look forward to trying it again in another 3.7 hours of nonstop survivor gameplay with the map. If I need another attempt after that, Perhaps an additional 11-12 hours GRINDING survivor WITH the map addons JUST to play on this ONE MAP more than TWICE will be enough. Without the map offering, it could be double that.

  I do not think asking players to grind 28 matches over 4 hours or so with map offerings for a CHANCE at an achievement is reasonable.

  Outbreak Breakout - opening the exit yourself to get out - has a success rate of 16% or so per match (after grinding it myself). I'd get an escape this way every 6-7 matches or so, and I'm a good survivor.
  That's just shy of an HOUR AND A HALF of straight survivor gameplay on RPD to grind 5% of the achievement.

  Even when brining the offering, there were times I didn't get the map with the old system - and it took about !!! 180 MATCHES !!! to squeeze out the achievement! Loved ones had to come in and help me secure it, but I had spent over 40 hours of constant gameplay grinding the achievement. 180 matches with RPD map items from me and my family trying to get this achievement. It is NOT reasonable.

  Now imagine trying to get that achievement with the CURRENT map system, where maps only suggest a bias towards the map that accounts for only halving the strain at best.

  With a success rate of about 16%, a player would need to play on RPD 80-100 times to be confident in getting the achievement.

  Let's be conservative and say that they open the exit gates and leave once every 4 times they play on the map, and need to play on it 80 times for the achievement.

  With the current basic map logic, a player would have to blindly engage in !!!! 5,714 !!!!! matches.

  (That is 72 maps evenly considered, for RPD to randomly show up 80 times, a player would need to engage with this content)

  With the OLD map offering system, I needed about 180 offerings to get the achievement. That's a savings of 5,534 additional matches I didn't have to grind! Yay!

  With the NEW map offering system, I would reduce that number to !!!! 2,285 !!!!

  That's just unacceptable to me.

  If you wanted to complete a map challenge, you'd have to burn 4-8 offerings.

  Now you will have to burn over 100 offerings or play 252 matches randomly.

  It's not fair and needlessly punitive.

  This is because there are 72 maps, you may need 4-6 tries to succeed on a challenge, and other people bring contesting map offerings sometimes. There are outliers where Killers snowball and 4k, other players give up, you get tunneled, the killer DCs, your friends betray you - etc. There are plenty of reasons why burning the offering to get into a match does not guarantee that you get the challenge.

  ~~~~~

  TL;DR

  If you want to get Outbreak Breakout without map offerings you will have to play ~5,714 matches.

  With the OLD system you could use map offerings to get Ourbreak Breakout over 180 matches instead.

  With the NEW system you will have to use map offerings over ~2,285 matches to have a chance at Outbreak Breakout.

  If you want an achievement, you will have to spend 13x more time investment to get little challenges due to this change. Players will now have to grind for dozens, hundreds, and in rare cases THOUSANDS of matches for achievements due to this change.

  Balance the maps. Let people play where they want. Don't make them use items over HUNDREDS of matches to do challenges.

  in do you like the changes done to map offerings in the recent update? Comment by Valik August 17, 2025