jesterkind
jesterkind
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To be fair, ever since the most recent rework, it's not as though it's the developer's fault she's been a headache. That's squarely on the community, and I don't envy anyone in BHVR's position there.
Though, that doesn't excuse these absolutely horrific pitched changes lol
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@DigitalisObscura said:
It may be an unpopular opinion, but I think if something is not fun or engaging it should not be strong.
She should have never gotten the Haste or Hindered in the first place. I'm glad the Haste will be gone gone, and we'll see how the 5% Hindered feels when this hits PTB. I don't think she should get "compensation buffs" because they undid a mistake.
Not sure what the Drone changes are really doing but as long as the scan progress isn't reversible or removable it's probably still not enough to make people enjoy playing against her, honestly. If you lost some scan progress whenever you disabled a drone maybe it would feel more like a mini-game.
Genuine question, I'm asking this in good faith: If the skill expression of actively dodging drone beams isn't engaging, what exactly could be for her?
And if dodging drone beams isn't engaging, but dodging other killer powers is, what's the difference?
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@sizzlingmario4 said:
Yes, it is a pretty harsh nerf.
Considering she is the most obnoxious killer in the game and didn't have nearly enough counterplay, I think she completely deserved all of these changes.
Ideally, I'd like for her to get another rework but until that happens her power level needs to be brought down significantly.
Nothing here actually enhances her counterplay, though, it just makes countering her unnecessary because her power doesn't actually do anything of note.
If the issue is with her counterplay, they should be changing things to make that counterplay more obvious without wiki surfing. The only good change here is drones permanently being in active mode, because that gives survivors more information to start the counterplay with.
Skull Merchant has quite a bit of counterplay, in general, the problem with her is that you kind of have to go look up numbers to understand exactly how it works, and that could be changed with in-game QoL additions.
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@Skillfulstone said:
Well, rip Distortion I guess, for the vast majority of Survivors they will get 3 uses per match tops since all their chases will end on a hook. Complainers won.
Goodbye altruist-stealth build, hello yet another gen perk or Sprint Burst.
Good ol' perk variety getting lowered again...
Not that I'm agreeing or disagreeing with you here in general, but it feels odd to comment that on this post specifically lol
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These are definitely terrible changes, I'll be sure to check it out myself on the PTB so I can write a more detailed post in the PTB section once it's live but based just on this text… yeah, this is almost all awful.
It's like the devs think she IS too strong just sort of directionlessly, and not that her problems are a combination of unclear counterplay and general + unfair community bias.
The part that gets me is that they're pitching removing Haste from her power, and toning down the Hindered. Two of the only necessary parts of her kit. Why on Earth would survivors ever bother dodging drones - y'know, the interactive gameplay of her power - if they don't do anything now?
The only worthwhile thing is removing the stealth mode from drones, that's a nice way of making her counterplay more accessible and intuitive. That should've come with more changes like it and buffs, though, not this nuclear sledgehammer aimed squarely and exclusively at her not problematic areas.
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@Backmon said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3796366#Comment_3796366
Too much? Hindered works only when survivors infected and hes also need to hit them 2 more times.
There's still a number where that'd be too much, though, surely?
I'm also not saying it was, I'm saying it could've been. To just say they "nerfed his only good addon" would be deeply misleading even if it was his only good addon.
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They nerfed it because they buffed his basekit, though?
Well, fixed an issue with his basekit, but still. His basekit got stronger in a way that could've made the Licker Tongue too much if they didn't bring it down.
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@AmpersandUnderscore said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3793828#Comment_3793828
Adrenaline? That perk's still incredible, it still does the main thing you need.
Not if you're hooked when the gates are powered. Then your "once per game and only in the end game" perk does literally nothing.
Instead of playing most of the match with 3 perks, you end up playing the entire match with 3 perks.
Even with that caveat, Adrenaline is still an exceptional perk.
The free heal and speed boost are both very strong effects, the fact that you can't be guaranteed an escape with it by coming off the hook fully healed doesn't really change that. It was downgraded from "Exceptional perk with a truly broken use case" to "Exceptional perk in a fair way".
Not that Adrenaline being good or not really changes my overall point, it was just an example of top tier perks to support the rest of my post. I genuinely did not expect that to be controversial, lol.
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Pretty okay perks, overall, though I'd like to see at least two of them buffed.
Eyes of Belmont is the least in need of changes. I do personally wish it had just a few extra seconds on either number, but it's perfectly useful as it is- good effect on its own, and some strong synergies with other aura reading perks, quite nice.
Exultation is a neat gimmick perk that rewards more aggressive play, on top of being an item perk that's quite smartly designed to avoid buffing toolboxes specifically, which is nice. It has two problems, though. The first is that pallet stuns can be kind of hard to get on some killers, so I wish it worked on all stuns instead- that way you could pair it with, say, Head On, and have a better chance at activating it across the whole killer roster. The second is that it suffers from the "why wouldn't you just bring the item" problem that most chest-searching perks have too, and I honestly think the solution to that involves addressing chests before it involves Exultation.
Moment of Glory isn't quite as bad as people are making it out to be, its total time investment is honestly on par with most other healing tools. Medkits are 24 seconds, Inner Strength is 20 seconds, Strength in Shadows is 22-ish seconds, and Moment of Glory has a total of 20 seconds. The bigger problem with it is that your progress towards charging it resets on a down, that's something I'd really want to see changed- but once it is, the perk's a relatively versatile heal. You can use it in chase if you're confident, or you can just finish charging it and pump generators in peace while getting healed, on top of getting two items out of it. Perfectly good perk with one big glaring flaw.
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@ArthurVeloso said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3795255#Comment_3795255
Hey, friend! I totally understand your argumentation on BHVR’s tendency to overcompensate when balancing perks and mechanics, but I think it’s important to look at self-healing in a broader context and push for a more balanced approach rather than a complete shutdown of the mechanic.
You mention that self-care didn't need such a harsh nerf, and I fully agree that the drastic change felt over the top. However, this is exactly why advocating for a self-healing buff — whether it's through Self-Care or other means like Circle of Healing — is reasonable. The core of self-healing isn’t inherently broken; the issue lies in how it's balanced to fit the current meta. A well-tuned self-healing mechanic adds strategy without tipping the scales too far in favor of survivors.
Let’s look at the main concern here: healing pressure and efficiency. BHVR nerfed self-care because it was seen as too powerful, with survivors being able to heal repeatedly and negate killer pressure. While this was a valid concern, BHVR’s response — cutting self-care’s speed and effectiveness to the ground — has left a gap. Healing was once a reliable way for survivors to regain footing in a chase-heavy game, but now, survivors are forced into limited options, which makes the gameplay less dynamic. The over-nerfing has essentially funneled survivors into team-dependent strategies, reducing variety and taking away that "self-sufficiency" element that made healing perks enjoyable for a lot of players.
Now, when we talk about healing being "too efficient," we have to ask — compared to what? Sure, self-healing at its peak allowed survivors to heal themselves frequently, but it came at a cost: it was slow, required a perk slot, and left survivors vulnerable. Killers, meanwhile, have immense map control, stealth, and speed, and a properly buffed self-care wouldn’t break the balance in favor of survivors. In fact, a modest buff — say 40-45% healing efficiency — would make self-care usable again without reverting to the unbalanced meta it once was. It gives survivors an option to heal, but it's still slower and more dangerous than coordinating with teammates.
In a game where killers have incredible momentum with perks that snowball, like Gen regression perks, a slight self-healing buff provides a crucial counterbalance. The game needs to offer multiple viable strategies for survivors, and right now, with the nerfs to healing, we're seeing less diversity in perk builds and more dependency on cooperative strategies. That can be fun, but it also limits the ways players can approach the game.
Regarding Circle of Healing, adding a self-care option to it would fit within the current healing framework, especially since CoH has already been heavily nerfed. It would restore some value to the perk without making it overpowered. Survivors who choose CoH would still have to invest time to set up healing zones and be limited to specific areas, but it adds back an element of self-sufficiency that has been sorely missing. Self-healing gives survivors another layer of strategic flexibility without overpowering the overall gameplay.
I get the comparison to Billy, but there's a difference here: with Billy, the problem was in his high-mobility one-shot potential, which was too oppressive. In contrast, self-care never had that oppressive quality — it was a slow, methodical way for survivors to regain control. The nerf to self-care removed that option almost entirely, leaving survivors too vulnerable in many situations. BHVR did go too far, but this is exactly why we should be advocating for a reasonable buff to self-healing measures. It restores balance without going back to the old meta.
In summary, while BHVR's overcompensation with nerfs is a valid point, this doesn’t mean self-healing shouldn’t be buffed. A balanced, moderate buff to self-care and self-healing perks like Circle of Healing would enhance survivor gameplay without reverting to unbalanced metas of the past. In fact, there is really no point to even run different medkits since their overdone nerf.
I think you're focusing quite a lot on Self Care and Circle of Healing specifically here, when survivors have quite a few more tools for keeping themselves healed up without the need for a teammate available.
Is there some quality to those two options that you think elevates them above everything else, such that they should be the dominant sources of self healing? If so, would you be in favour of everything else getting nerfed to compensate, or do you just not think those tools are good to begin with?
I don't mean to sound accusatory, I'm just curious about your position here.
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@Firellius said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3794761#Comment_3794761
Considering you have to ferry back and forth, even if the tokens were 1:1, it'd still be notable slowdown in the killer's favour. The fact that you lose not just some, but -ALL- tokens when you lose a health-state by any means is just icing on the cake and dumps the perk squarely down in K(iller)-tier.
You're still looking at it in terms of speed here, though, when the point of Potential Energy isn't to make the game shorter. Yes, you spend a little extra time overall, but you get the value of finishing one specific generator quicker. In order for that to be worth your time, you have to pick your targets carefully.
Pump a safe gen the killer doesn't care about as much for tokens, then spend them on a generator that is easier for the killer to defend, or that's part of a 3-gen, or is just in a risky position for some other reason. It's the same concept as two survivors working on the same generator- not a good idea if you actually want to do all the gens quickly, but if the smartest play in the moment is to do that gen quickly, it's a good tactic.
It's only it losing all tokens when losing a health state that prevents Potential Energy from being a perfectly worthwhile perk.
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@Leachy_Jr said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3794798#Comment_3794798
That's exactly the issue. The speed of which they reset is simply not balanced, akin to something like old circle of healing. I don't want to leave that hook since I know they'll be healed in 2.4s instead of 28+s if I were to separate the unhooker and hit the unhooked into DW.
So either: Stay around hook, hit unhooked into DW to counter OTR and Res, chase unhooker to separate the Well make it. Guaranteed 28s heal assuming no other reset perks.
OR
Chase someone else further away. 2.4s heal.
Old COH did the exact same thing. Why spread pressure when everyone could heal in 20ish seconds? Why not tunnel when my health states mean nothing? Perks that directly punish the killer for leaving the hook need either a complete rework or a significant nerf.
Maybe if they had an activation requirement? Eg, resurgence would require 1 protection hit, WMI could require the killer to be within 24m of the hook while you're unhooking.
The difference being that old Circle of Healing did this everywhere, the whole game. We'll Make It and Resurgence only work after a hook. The problem with old COH was that injuries which didn't convert into hooks didn't matter, survivors could consistently heal themselves in six seconds. That is when it matters how fast a heal is.
When someone's just been unhooked, though, you already got the value of that injury. You should be expecting that whoever just got unhooked will probably be healthy again by the time you get to them next, since you're explicitly ignoring them for a little while. We'll Make It and Resurgence are good perks only partially because they allow for quick resets after a hook, they're honestly better for how much they can prevent you from being an easy tunnelling target— Resurgence also has the benefit of buffing some less useful tools like Self Care, and We'll Make It also has the potential for team resets, but both are only activated after the killer progressed their objective so they're balanced.
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@Leachy_Jr said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3794477#Comment_3794477
No, you are punished since if you're away from the hook, ur giving the unhooked a free 3s heal.
Proxying = no value from resurgence or WMI (unless they use it on someone else) if you return to hook in time or force hook trades.
Being far away = 3s heal.
I mean, sure, if you're not there and they're running We'll Make It, that's a quick heal. Eight seconds is nothing to sneeze at.
But in this scenario, you're already chasing someone else. That's gonna take longer than eight seconds, and it's probably also going to take longer than sixteen seconds, so… what exactly is the difference? The survivor's going to be healed and back on generators either way, and while an extra eight seconds isn't nothing, it's also not exactly game swinging.
If you're leaving them to reset, they're gonna reset. To a degree, it kinda doesn't matter how long it takes, and it certainly isn't punishing you if it's a little faster. The only way you're punished is if you're returning to the hook and trying to chase the unhooked survivor, since then you're dealing with an extra health state. If you're across the map then you're barely affected.
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@Firellius said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3794499#Comment_3794499
Potential Energy maxes out at -33% repair speed, and Weaving Spiders has an even worse return on investment. That's not 'high risk, high reward', that's 'massive risk, high punishment'. Both of these help killers more than survivors.
To be fair, the value pitch for Potential Energy is "This generator goes faster at the cost of that generator going slower", so it breaking out to lower repair speed is kind of the point. It's for completing specific risky generators faster, not for doing gens faster overall.
The problem with Potential Energy is that you lose all your tokens on hit, making it an even bigger risk than it's meant to be. If they changed that to only losing tokens on down or hook, the perk would be a lot more solid overall.
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I think the numbers actually work out in terms of investment. Discounting travel time, which will always be a factor for every source of healing and will always vary wildly, the time investment for Moment of Glory on its own is 20 seconds, the same as Inner Strength.
With Appraisal, the time investment is roughly 15 seconds, which is honestly really solid. With your proposed change, the time investment is just 10 seconds, which is really good, probably too good.
There are two bigger problems with Moment of Glory, in my opinion. The first is that I think 60 seconds is too long, but I think your suggestion for fixing that goes just a touch too far. 45 would be a more appropriate number, I think.
The second is that apparently, I've not tested this myself yet but I'm seeing a lot of people report it, if you open one chest and go down your progress is reset + you have to open two chests again. That's insane, and might be a bug? But either way it needs to change, it's absurd that it currently works that way.
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Old self healing was a big problem, but I do think we should acknowledge that "self healing" wasn't nerfed, specifically Circle of Healing and Medkits were nerfed.
What I mean by pointing that out is not just that only the two flat out overpowered tools got nerfed, but also that there's still plenty of good methods of self healing for survivors who want it. You allude to totems, so I presume you're already factoring in Inner Strength (which pairs nicely with a handful of other perks), but there's also a ton of reasonably strong pairs you could bring. For example…
- Strength in Shadows and Botany Knowledge allows you to heal faster than someone else healing you, with the only requirement being that you have to keep track of where the basement is. As a bonus, you get aura reading on top!
- Resurgence pairs well with any form of starting to heal yourself. Self Care, Strength in Shadows, and Medkits all make Resurgence shockingly quick.
- Medkits themselves are no slouch too, and have a few ways of making themselves more exciting. A single charge addon and the Anti-Haemorrhagic Syringe gives you two heals, one of which works while you're mid-chase, and the two stitches-themed addons that I forget the names of make your Great skill checks so good you'll heal speedily off those, too.
- A bit of an addendum to the last point but if you really want medkits to be good, you can do it. Botany Knowledge + Streetwise can make medkits a lot stronger just on their own.
- If I recall correctly, Desperate Measures works on self healing, so mix that in with any of the other tools around here. If it does, it wouldn't incur the medkit penalty like Botany Knowledge does.
- As a final note, Self Care and Botany Knowledge does still work. It's one of the slower options, but it's also very reliable, it's basically only susceptible to Mangled or other healing slowdowns. If the killer's not running those, you just have good reliable self healing.
I'd also like to point out that staying injured and going for risky plays can be pretty thrilling too. You don't have to play in an overly cautious way even if you have no source of self healing at all. In addition, there are perks that make it easier for your teammates to heal you, like new Circle of Healing or Leader.
Ultimately, I think healing in general falls into the same trap as a lot of perks and tools, which is that the average player doesn't seem to want to experiment. There are so many tools out there for these situations, but people don't want to dedicate chunks of their build to actually gaining strong effects, so they get overlooked.
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@Leachy_Jr said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3794406#Comment_3794406
Yes instahealing myself and punishing the killer for not tunnelling and camping is very good perk design yes yes.
Why do ppl defend we'll make it and resurgence to death when they're like 2 of the most unhealthy perks in the game by punishing the killer for NOT camping?
Wait, hang on- how are you being punished for not camping here? Surely the only way you'd be negatively affected by WMI and Resurgence is if you're sticking around the hook to try and tunnel someone, since in that case they're healed too quickly to do it.
If you're off chasing someone else, surely you'd expect that the saved survivor is gonna be healed the next time you chase them?
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The problem with that is that some killers - like Trapper and Hag - are forced into one specific playstyle at best, and are actively harmed at worst, with a basekit Corrupt Intervention.
I understand what the goal is, or at least I think I do: give killers a hand with early game pressure because sometimes that can be really difficult. I just think there are better ways of addressing that than forcing everyone into the playstyle that Corrupt supports.
For instance, if the game changed so that survivors were forced to all spawn together, or at least in groups of two, the average early game experience for the killer would skyrocket due to the worst outcome no longer being possible.
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What makes Wicked in need of a significant nerf/rework in your eyes? It seems like a pretty good and balanced perk to me.
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@Ohyakno said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3793976#Comment_3793976
Dunno what you call a survivor working on a high value gen and prerunning when you get near anything but t creating pressure. That you think pressure is the sole province of killer is........ ridiculous.
Okay, I definitely misspoke here, so let me try to clarify again.
When I say that survivors don't create pressure, killers do, I'm talking ONLY about hook pressure. It's not the survivors that give you pressure from hooks, it's you.
Survivors can absolutely pressure their objective, that's not what I'm talking about here. When you get a hook, it's not the hooked survivor giving you the killer your pressure. It's you going and occupying other survivors that creates your pressure.
Survivors are absolutely able to create pressure on their objective. They just aren't responsible for your pressure.
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It's easy to fall into the trap of assuming that the game must be unbalanced in favour of the opposing side, whichever side that happens to be, especially if you've had a rough string of matches.
In my opinion, though, this game isn't substantially weighted in either direction. That's not to say it's perfectly balanced, as outliers of strength exist on both sides and if you aren't prepared for them they'll seem impossible to beat, but it does mean that the fundamental mechanics and the majority of tools are generally equal across roles.
The most someone could say in favour of the game being killer sided is to point out tunnelling, which is an unbalanced element of the game, but honestly even with tunnelling in the state it's in I don't think the game is that killer sided. Not to say I don't think it should be changed, it absolutely should, but everything's prone to exaggeration when it's brought up in these contexts.
There's also an interesting phenomenon where some will bring up their experiences on both sides, saying "I win easily with Y role, but it's a struggle to get anything done as X role!", which I think is also a little misguided. To me, it just seems like those individuals are better at Y role than they are at X role- this is an asymmetrical game, after all, there's no reason to assume you'd be equally good at both roles. I'm not, I'm a better killer than I am survivor by a noticeable amount.
To explain "killer mains" as they're presented in this thread, though, I honestly think a lot of players have absolutely no perception of what the macro game looks like in this game or how to efficiently pressure their objective. This is true of both roles, but it's more obvious in conversation from the killer side.
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@Burniebotss said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3793968#Comment_3793968
survivor create a lot of pressure. Gens are the killers objective and there’s usually one being worked on at least at all times.
Gens are the survivor's objective. Survivors themselves are the killer's objective.
But, more to the point, I meant that survivors don't create the killer's pressure for them. The survivor dangling there isn't, themselves, providing pressure to the killer, the fact that you can occupy multiple survivors at once while they're there is what gives you pressure. Obviously survivors can create their own team's pressure, apologies if that wasn't clear.
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@Burniebotss said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/426201/idea-make-hook-states-last-indefinitely
there’s no reason to save then, you can do gens and not worry about them since they could sit there for all of eternity, and no I read the post, one survivor sitting there causes no pressure. It’s supposed to be an abandon all work and save them not whenever they wish. This will also make games forever is three are hooked and ones hiding.
You're right that one survivor sitting there causes no pressure, but that's because survivors don't create pressure at all, killers do.
Your hook pressure comes from going and occupying more survivors to keep damaging their generator efficiency. If they heavily delay the save, you're progressing your objective considerably faster than they are. If they refuse to save, you could and probably will just snowball a win.
Excessive hiding may be a more fair concern, though.
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Looking back, I do think that old Spine Chill was overtuned. It was way too good at revealing stealth killers, and the vault build shenanigans weren't really healthy for how little requirements they had.
That being said, I also think that Spine Chill isn't in a very good spot at the moment. An idea I had a little while ago for how to buff it would be to retool into the "finish an action in the killer's face" perk. So, have it boost unhook speed, healing, cleansing, and maybe exit gate opening OR hook sabotaging, shrink its range just a little, and then crank the numbers up to something way more noticeable.
That'd be healthier than old Spine Chill while still being useful. As long as it isn't ever allowed to keep repair speed as a boosted action, I don't foresee any troubles.
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There'd obviously be no dramatic downsides for the killer, but I would be slightly concerned about teammates being griefed by just being left there.
That obviously wouldn't be good for the team strategically, but people will go out of their way to be little demons to each other already, and I'd be wary about this being a new, particularly obnoxious avenue for it. Not sure how to fix it, or if it'd be a problem at all, but it's the one downside I can think of.
Otherwise, it would be an interesting thing to test.
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@Paternalpark said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3793788#Comment_3793788
I Haven't once considered using adren since it's rework. I'll never use lightfooted as it's only slightly helpful for fl saves, iron will is a better in every regard.
Adrenaline? That perk's still incredible, it still does the main thing you need.
On the topic of Light-Footed, it's not just for flashlight saves, it's also for being able to leave tall loops without the killer knowing and for being able to run around on multiple-story maps completely silently. It's slept on, I think it has some legit application but most players aren't really interested in it.
Nothing wrong with that, of course, it just doesn't make it a bad perk.
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I think there's a couple perks being undervalued here.
I agree with Finesse being in the highest spot filled here. I don't think any perks on this list are on the absolute top-tier list, they're not rivalling Adrenaline and Sprint Burst any time soon, but I do think some other perks are on the same level as Finesse.
Champion of Light, Strength in Shadows, Wicked, and Light-Footed are all easily as good as Finesse, if not better. I also think Chemical Trap is being underrated here, but it's also not on the same level as the others here.
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@Burniebotss said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/425777/possible-distortion-nerf
charges while in chase. That’s all we need to stop the abusers
You don't think my suggestion would be a healthy change? Any particular reason why?
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@UndeddJester said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/425777/possible-distortion-nerf
I think the not blocking scratch marks would be a good change actually. You blocked the aura, now you actually need skill in being stealthy to remain unseen rather than being given it for free.
It would also open up more thought to using something like Fixated or Urban Evasion in your build to get out of the way unseen.
I think the recharge in chase change is better, simply because Distortion let's you identify aura perks in play, so even if you have no tokens, you can still avoid the auras because you know they're in play... having it recharge in chase means you can get the advantage of blocking aura reads back by actually working for it, but even if you don't, the value of Distortion has already been attained.
However the need to actually build for stealth is also a good change rather than having it for basically free off a single perk.
Someone else also brought up the point about Distortion letting you avoid auras, but my question to that has always been "which perks are you referring to".
That's true of BBQ and NTH, but it's not reasonably true of most other aura perks. There's no reliable way of avoiding Gearhead unless you're cracked at skill checks, and there's no reliable way of avoiding Floods of Rage, I'm All Ears, or Bitter Murmur at all without basically throwing. Against some killers, there's no way of reliably avoiding A Nurse's Calling without extremely consistent info on where the killer is. Even some perks like Alien Instinct and Friends Til The End are hard to avoid because it's hard to ascertain if your aura is gonna be revealed.
Knowing what aura perks the killer has is still useful, because it adds a layer to your decisonmaking to know that you're being revealed, but I'd honestly say a clear majority of aura reading perks aren't something you can reliably dodge like BBQ or NTH. I don't think we have to be worried about survivors being able to dodge aura reading as a class of perks from one Distortion activation telling them which ones are in play.
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@Spare_Them_Mori_Me said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3792665#Comment_3792665
Or leave them be. They're both doing their purpose very well.
But since Distortion is getting changed, your change wouldn't be the end of the world. I'd stop playing survivor a bit and just stick to killer to see how things pan out. If Aura builds are viable against Distortion, it's a dead perk.
And I've been pairing the two. Its just no one has touched it because… why would they? I feel I am very justified in my reasoning as it's yet to be dismantled.
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3792669#Comment_3792669
Tit for tat is all I've been doing in this thread. No one ever addresses it.
Eh, they're somewhat similar but I don't think they're properly linked.
The equivalent to something like Distortion is probably Blindness on the killer's side, and Blindness that works passively, so… probably Fearmonger?
It's a bit of a moot point, though, Lightborn isn't on the roadmap so that's why I didn't factor it into my idea for how to address it healthily. I could see wanting those two to be changed in tandem, but it is a little bit aside the point to bring it up in this thread specifically.
As for them both doing their job very well, that's kind of the problem. Distortion - and Lightborn too but you see that one less so it's even lower priority - is really good at its job. Probably a little too good for how passive it is. That's probably why it's on the roadmap to begin with. Is it the most unbalanced thing ever? Nah. But I do understand why BHVR would want to change it.
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@reca said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3791563#Comment_3791563
"if you want stealth, you should be actively playing in a stealthy way, instead of just equipping perks and having it happen for you"
okay but if you wanna find a survivor maybe you should go looking for them and not have a perk do it for you? lol
You're acting like I'm mad at Distortion for existing or something, lol.
It's being nerfed and I'm pitching a healthy way of doing it, nothing more.
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@Spare_Them_Mori_Me said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3792646#Comment_3792646
I see. Rereading, your example change does keep the perk in tact. But I want to make sure I'm sturdy on my lil hill here.
Again, as it stands, I feel Distortion is one of the more balanced perks currently in game. This is mostly due to both sides having one perk that is pretty much God tier. Messing with Distortion will change that, so I'd ask how you would keep this balance between the two perks, Distortion and Lightborne. If one side has a total build shut down perk, I want both to have one.
Still, I dislike your changes but understand they would probably work. 6 seconds just doesn't wrk for me. 8 Would have to be the minimum, because just hopping in a locker as you said isn't as easy as 'just hopping in a locker.' I'd have to have Quick and Quiet, or slowly get into the locker and be spotted. If you get seen at ALL with Distortion, the perk failed. Half a glimpse is all the killer needs to get info, and thats what it's supposed to prevent. <3
Lightborn is kind of its own beast, but if we are branching out into bringing those two into parity with each other… well, just make Lightborn work like Distortion, right?
Token system, recharge tokens by chasing survivors. I think it's always kind of going to be stronger than Distortion by default, at least insofar as it having the stronger effect when it activates, but if you want the two to be considered pairs, you'd probably look to make Lightborn function like Distortion rather than the other way around.
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@Valimure said:
I'm still just flabbergasted that we're thinking of changing the symptom and not the cause.
The only reason Distortion is even seen as good is because of most killers' over reliance on aura reading to play the game for them. It's just like how I dislike survivors' over reliance on Windows of Opportunity as a crutch perk because they don't want to learn the map or pay attention to what pallets have and haven't been thrown in a match.
Like I dunno, maybe it's just me but when I play killer the only aura reading things I use are killer add-ons. I rely on map knowledge, audio cues, and a general awareness of how survivors think in order to find people.
I don't personally think that Distortion is a high priority for nerfing. I was careful to say that this is only something I'm thinking about because Distortion is on the roadmap.
Since it's happening either way I'd prefer it to be a healthy change, and I think there are healthy changes you could give Distortion. It is very effective, after all.
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@Spare_Them_Mori_Me said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3792202#Comment_3792202
Your reasoning is sound and I understand its implications. However, I do not wish to run into situations where lethal pushes other aura reading perks past Distortion's block time. This would make distortion 100% pointless, as the point is to block information from aura reading.
Not saying your suggestion is bad. Its not at all actually. I just am quite wary on touching that aspect.
Edit: Examples of this happening are BBQ & Chili, Alien Instinct, Darkness Revealed, Gearhead, etc. Actually makes a LOT of aura perks exceed your proposed limit.
That's what I just laid out, though.
Aura perk + Lethal exceeding Distortion's limit means one of two things.
1: You have two tokens available, it consumes them, your aura remains hidden. Distortion still works as intended.
2: You only have one token available, and it's consumed. You now have six seconds before your aura is shown, which also itself means two things:
- You have six seconds to find + hop in a locker, and your aura remains hidden. Slight downgrade but Distortion still works as intended.
- The killer probably isn't looking for you anyway because they're looking for survivors that were revealed at the start of their perk activating. Gearhead is the only exception here but it's also already the exception, Gearhead + Lethal chews through two stacks of Distortion because it lasts twelve seconds.
In both scenarios here, Distortion still does what it's supposed to do, it just becomes a little bit weaker and a lot less passive in some scenarios. That's a good thing, in my book, that's what a healthy nerf would look like.
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@Spare_Them_Mori_Me said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/425777/possible-distortion-nerf
Excellent post. Im glad its become a discussion still and not bickering, yet. :)
My thoughts have been a take to my friends, but I tie Distortion's power to Lightborne. Lightborne kills entire builds passively. Distortion kills entire builds passively, with a token caveat.
Every time something is nerfed/buffed on one side, cries follow to compensate the other side. For me, if Distortion goes, Lightbrone should follow suit.
They both fill the same role for both sides, except Lightborne is constant, 100% of the match. Distortion needs to keep tokens going to run it.
If we change Disortion, I'd like to simply remove the 'hide scratch marks' clause. Its not needed. As long as the aura hide duration doesn't drop below Lethal, I'm content.
My reasoning for the aura block timer going down is that it doesn't have to be longer than Lethal's effect to counter Lethal's effect.
When we're talking about Lethal Pursuer specifically, there's definitely no problem. Lethal just chews through two tokens at the start and your aura is still hidden. In general, though, in any scenario when you're on your last token, all that changes is that you've got a six second warning before your aura is revealed, and you can usually use that time to hop in a locker. Bare minimum, you can use it to make a lot of distance.
Worst case scenario is just that staying hidden requires active gameplay, which isn't exactly a bad thing.
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@Coffeecrashing said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3791853#Comment_3791853
No. The goal is to nerf the anti-teamwork players that are a burden to their teammates, AND to stop the scenarios where killers are having all their aura reading hard countered for the entire game by one perk.
And if we had to pick only one goal, it should be to nerf the anti-teamwork players that are a burden to their teammates. BHVR shouldn't be enabling anti-teamwork players with perks like Distortion, because it's unhealthy for the rest of the solo-q survivors.
So like, is that your position?
You've been swapping really wildly between that position and the argument we'd been having in the previous message about its effectiveness in countering killer perks. I'd just like to know which one you're going to commit to.
For the record, I think this argument is kind of overblown. I really don't think Distortion is the culprit for dumb solo queue teammates, I think they'd play like that either way. I didn't craft my suggestion around weakening anti-teamwork players because I truly don't believe Distortion has that big of an effect on their approach to the game.
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@Coffeecrashing said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3791839#Comment_3791839
No. It literally means that if I'm in a game where all my aura reading perks are being hard countered by Distortion, then it isn't helpful to list specific scenarios that are much better against Distortion.
For example, if at 9:03AM on 9/2/2024, I played a game with BBQ and NTH as my only aura perks, then all my aura perks are being hard countered by Distortion in that specific game. And listing specific scenarios that are much better against Distortion, doesn't help my game at 9:03AM on 9/2/2024, that was using BBQ and NTH as the only aura perks.
Gotcha.
So, three things to say to that.
One, the goal with weakening Distortion should obviously be to make sure it isn't a hard counter to aura reading as a class. Downgrading it from being very impactful against almost every aura perk in the game to being very impactful against just two of those perks is a huge improvement, obviously, that's why I listed the others. I'm obviously not concerned with only protecting BBQ and NTH, for some reason, I'm concerned with aura reading overall.
Two, your decision to run those two perks specifically should already factor in that survivors can, if they choose to and if they realise you're running those perks, counter them. They're the two aura perks that actually have a counter, Distortion just takes the guesswork out- if Distortion were removed from the game, those would still be the two aura perks that can meaningfully and reliably be countered. If you want uncounterable aura reading (at least insofar as being able to avoid the activation), bring different perks.
Three, and this is a more minor point, my suggested change would still allow you to make sure your proc of either perk eats two tokens if a survivor isn't able to avoid it in time, as long as it's paired with Lethal Pursuer, so. It's not as though my change doesn't help those two perks too, albeit slightly indirectly.
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@Coffeecrashing said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3791813#Comment_3791813
If I'm playing a game where all my aura reading perks are being hard countered by Distortion, then it isn't helpful to list specific scenarios that are much better against Distortion, because that's not what I'm playing.
I'm not sure I'm following, could you elaborate?
Do you mean that you only ever run BBQ and NTH as your aura perks?
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@Coffeecrashing said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3791800#Comment_3791800
We really shouldn't be aiming to keep Distortion's main function, because the main function is unhealthy for the game. The perk shouldn't allow for survivors to easily avoid most of the killer tracking perks for the entire game. Yes, that is a big deal. If Distortion announces to the survivor that the killer has a meta aura reading perk, then the survivor knows how to easily avoid the perk for the entire game, even if they run out of Distortion tokens.
None of your suggestions fixes this problem. It doesn't matter if Distortion tokens get burnt through faster, if Distortion already told the survivor which specific aura reading perks and addons they need to dodge.
I mean, how, though?
Sure, if it's something like BBQ or another hook-based perk, they can let go of the gen they're doing and get in a locker to fool it, that's something. If it's Nowhere To Hide, again, there's something you can do, though it's usually pretty inefficient overall to actually try.
What exactly are they gonna do if it's like, Gearhead, though? Never hit good skill checks? What if it's A Nurse's Calling run by a stealth killer, are they never gonna heal? If they know the killer has I'm All Ears, are they never gonna vault in chase? Bitter Murmur, never finish a generator? Floods of Rage, never unhook someone?
Most info perks aren't actually easily avoided. Knowing the killer has them adds a layer to decisionmaking, but it doesn't allow you to actually avoid them activating. This goes quadruple for aura addons, by the way.
Distortion would block those perks + addons when they do activate, though, and that could be considered a problem considering how little effort it takes to do so. That's why I suggest making it weaker at doing that part.
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@Coffeecrashing said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3791784#Comment_3791784
The unique part is problematic, and it's not important to keep unique parts. We learned this with Ultimate Weapon, which was unique because it was the only decent tracking perk that bypassed Distortion. But BHVR nerfed it into the ground anyway. And these are linked, because one of the major selling points of Ultimate Weapon is that it bypassed Distortion.
Distortion deserves a massive nerf. It encourages unhealthy behaviors in solo q games. The biggest gap between solo q and SWF is the fact that solo q is less likely to work together, and perks like Distortion help enable an anti-teamwork playstyle.
I'm not really interested in arguing about Ultimate Weapon right now.
As for the second part, you're really bouncing around a bunch of different arguments without committing to any of them here, but I don't think this one is as much of a problem as some people make it out to be either. Any stealth perk is going to enable survivors being rats and leaving their teammates to die, that doesn't mean they all warrant massive nerfs just inherently.
What we should be aiming to do is to keep Distortion's main function but make it less automatic. Sure, have it block aura reading and tell you it's activating, but also require survivors to actually have to take action if the killer's got a lot of aura reading punching through their tokens. That's a perfectly appropriate change, in my opinion, it allows Distortion to still be useful without being quite as autopilot as it currently is.
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@Coffeecrashing said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/425777/possible-distortion-nerf
Distortion should just block all aura reading for the first 80/100/120 seconds of the trial, then deactivate. That would greatly help the survivor avoid the first few chases, which should be good enough. One of the most problematic parts about the perk is that it announces to the survivor which aura perks the killer has, which means the survivor can just manually avoid most of the aura reading if they wanted to. And if the survivor is in a SWF, they can just announce the killer's aura perks and addons to the rest of the team.
Distortion should be nerfed with the same amount of energy that went into nerfing Ultimate Weapon, which was the only decent killer perk that countered Distortion. Asking for a light nerf for Distortion is super unfair, considering how many complaints Ultimate Weapon got over and over, until it was nerfed over and over, until it became an absolutely useless perk that I haven't seen since its latest nerf.
Eh, I don't think there's anything wrong with the token system it already has.
What you describe as the most problematic part is also the only unique part. I think that, if nothing else, should be kept- even if that becomes the ONLY thing it does, that should be kept, because otherwise it's not meaningfully distinct from other aura-block perks outside of being passive. It's important to keep unique parts of perks when thinking about changing them.
Not sure what the point of bringing up UW is. They're not actually linked, there's no reason they need the same approach.
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@Marc_123 said:
Distortion does not need a nerf. You already only have 3 tokens.
I could imagine they add the 2v8 effect that it shows when your aura is being revealed.
It's on the roadmap, my post is a response to it already being decided that Distortion's getting changed.
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@Valimure said:
Distortion isn't even in the top ten most used Survivor perks. Aura reading is already ridiculously strong on a lot of killers, we don't need its only major counter being nerfed.
Nerf aura reading on killers so it's not used as such a major crutch by so many people and then we can talk about nerfing Distortion.
That decision's been made, though. Distortion is being changed and I highly doubt it's a buff.
Since it's being nerfed, I'd prefer it to be a sensible one that reigns the perk in without removing its ability to counter aura perks.
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@Yoshirama said:
No, 10 seconds is fine, lethal pursuer last 8 seconds and distortion is the only counter, plus it adds 2 seconds to every aura perk and addon.
If they’re gonna short distortion duration, then they need to do it with all other aura perks
But you'd still be able to counter Lethal with Distortion, you'd just need to use the six seconds of block you have to hide. I don't think it's super unfair to suggest that if you want stealth, you should be actively playing in a stealthy way, instead of just equipping perks and having it happen for you.
Player agency still exists, here. A player running Distortion still gets the information that Lethal is in play, and still has the ability to do something about it. They aren't being rendered completely helpless, even if they get caught with the final few seconds of Lethal because there wasn't a locker in range or whatever. The killer's probably going for the person they could see immediately.
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Solo queue should be able to view their teammate's perks, but only after the lobby, for exactly the reason you're laying out - people would accuse others of "throw builds" and dodge lobbies.
Lobby dodging is bad and harms the matchmaking considerably. It should be heavily discouraged, not made more common.
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I think it's okay that the tutorial doesn't break down specific perk types like hexes and boons, that's probably outside the scope of teaching new players the absolute basics of gameplay.
That being said, I do think the tutorial could use some better explanations of chase dynamics on both sides. When it comes to Endurance, the only thing the tutorial should be impressing on new players is "don't try to chase recently unhooked survivors", but iirc it is missing that— or at least, it was when I did the tutorial myself a fair while ago.
I'm somewhat on the fence about it having tutorials for specific item interactions. I think showing it would prrooobably be a good idea? Just in the vein of, these are your options if you choose to bring in items, but you don't want to overwhelm a new player with a ton of information right at the start. Maybe break it up into Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced tutorial levels like some other games do?
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@Aven_Fallen said:
Dont really see any way why BHVR would do that. Maps are free in DBD, no player has to pay anything to play on a specific map. Therefore, BHVR would only pay a lot of money without getting anything back.
That's a fair point, I don't think it's super likely either. Maybe if they bundled it with some cosmetics, but it doesn't seem that likely even then.
I think it'd be a neat idea outside of the likelihood, though.
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I can't say I've noticed it all that much.
In my killer games there's been a few instances where I think "wow, they haven't gone for a save yet?" but I can't say if that's happening more than it used to. It's also not as though that's a bad thing for me, literally the opposite, so I'm not going to complain about it lol.
I think logically it probably will weaken proxy camping overall, because survivors have more time to reset and more time to punish it with gen repair. On the flip side, though, if they just stick on gens regardless of what the killer's doing, they're making themselves very vulnerable to a snowball, so it can't easily be abused.
Good change. Small, but good.
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Skull Merchant's Haste and Hindered are what make her power interactive, those and the fact that Claw Traps injure you are the only necessary functions of her kit. It's not even about her strength, it's about her design and what both sides are supposed to care about doing, mechanically.
I don't have any bets for what they're going to do to her, but my utmost hope is that these tweaks largely revolve around giving survivors information, since that's her biggest problem at the moment. Too much guesswork, too much having to go to a wiki and read the breakdown there if you want to understand anything beyond the broadest strokes of her power.
No predictions for the others, but I agree Billy's almost certainly copping a nerf. Hopefully a fairly minor one, he's not that bad, but he is overtuned. Ideally that'd come with revisiting some of his less useful addons, for a bit of give and take.
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Bloodlust, in all of its tiers including Bloodlust 1, exists to serve two important functions in my opinion. I can't claim that these are the intended purposes of Bloodlust, I'm not psychic, but by my estimation the two useful functions Bloodlust provides are as follows:
- Insurance against infinites. Map design is better now than it used to be and I'm pretty sure there aren't any infinite loops in the game even disregarding BL, but it exists as a nice safety net in case that happens again. However, that's the less convincing reason, to me.
- It's part of the suite of mechanics that ensure no chase lasts forever. The killer moves faster than survivors at base, windows block if they're vaulted three times, and the killer starts moving faster still if the chase drags on too long. It's bad for everyone if a single chase lasts the whole match- save for maybe the survivor being chased. The killer's having a miserable time, and the other three survivors are all stuck doing generators and nothing else. The game's designed for chases to end, Bloodlust is one of the mechanics that nudges that into happening without it actually being free value for the killer- if you reach BL3 you're still at a massive negative even after getting a down.
For those reasons, Bloodlust has every reason to exist. I think some people get caught up imagining Bloodlust as a killer buff, and not a base mechanic- it should be considered something to keep in mind just as much as a used pallet should be kept in mind. You have to know it's there and play accordingly, as well as accepting that if the killer sticks on you, you will be downed eventually. That's a basic part of the game, not a flaw.
As to the wiggle system, I don't think either of the two buffs the new system has had are all that impactful. Sure, a hypothetical extra second shaved off the wiggle bar could be useful… but it didn't really result to much in practice. What we have is fine, it's not substantially different in any meaningful way.