jesterkind
jesterkind
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Because I like her power. Knowing there's a chance of people just giving up is the reason I don't play her as often as I would otherwise, and when I do choose to I'm rolling the dice on whether I'll actually get to play the game.
Her power's fun, both to play as and - in my limited experience - against. The way the beams work allows for a lot of interesting gameplay that revolves more around positioning and timing than it does pure mechanical input, and I'm someone who tends to prefer that kind of gameplay for either side.
In general, I also like the default M1 gameplay a fair amount, and Skull Merchant is a lot like one of my other mains, Clown, in that she enhances your ability to do that if you know how to use her power properly.
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@arcaneGospel said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3678042#Comment_3678042
I regret saying they deserve ground-up reworks, to be quite honest, it's just that I think their kits are so shallow altogether that fixing their issues might well wind up being that no matter how hard you try to avoid it. The general concepts of their kits should be preserved, I just think that what I'd change about Main Event, for an example, might as well be a whole new thing entirely.
I think it would be interesting if instead of just being a way to throw a lot of knives really fast, Main Event sort of forced survivors to stay in your lullaby radius, basically making a weird sort of spotlight-magic-wall. The ability would still be meant to make the Trickster more threatening for a very short time, but it would instead be focused on forcing survivors to stay and watch the Trickster, forcing them to give him attention, because I think that just fits his character.
Obviously that would need a lot of exceptions to prevent it from being used as the tunneling/camping ability, and it might not even necessarily be a great idea if you keep it from being used in those ways, but it's a better representation of his character and is more interesting, I think. It just has so little in common with what it is now, that it's not even really the same thing. Maybe I'm just not thinking about it right, admittedly.
I expected more SM hate than I've gotten so far, honestly. Could be worse.
I saw a fun idea once for Main Event that it'd be sort of a stance-change for different kinds of knives. Fanning them out horizontally or vertically was the example given, but I think you could drill down on that to hit Trickster's "flashy stage presence" vibe in a power that's a little more interesting than More Dakka.
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I think this is a little reductive when it comes to Trickster - there is skill expression in his kit from the killer side, aim and positioning are important to playing him well - but I would have a hard time arguing against the broad strokes of the topic for either killer.
In general I'm wary to invoke full on, ground-up reworks. I think that was a bad thing when it happened to Freddy and was only barely acceptable when it happened to Skull Merchant, I don't like the concept at all- but even with that in mind, Spirit especially really is kind of a nightmare.
I'm not sure how to fix the problem, but the problem definitely exists.
Also, my sincerest condolences on you having said the words "Skull Merchant" and thus guaranteeing half the responses are going to be blind incoherent rage.
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It's massively, massively underrated.
I'd honestly go so far as to call it one of the better info perks available right now. It has pretty consistent uptime, it gives no tell to the survivors it's in use, it gives you information that will always be relevant, it lasts long enough that you pretty frequently catch people as they're leaving generators and running away, it chews through Distortion stacks...
I've found it shines especially on stealth killers, or any build where you're using stealth in general, but honestly you can slap it on anyone and it'll do work.
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@Blueberry said:
If the kick limit was introduced to prevent 3 genning, why is it active at the start of the game, and not when there’s 3 gens left? Feel like that’s a big part of what’s making it overly hurt all the kick perks in the game.
If I had to guess, I'd assume it's an attempt at tackling the cause, not the symptom.
The problem that necessitated this system was 3-gen games that dragged on for almost an hour, but the cause of that problem was excessive gen stall. So, by tackling that root cause - excessive gen stall - you can safely avoid any weird loopholes or technicalities that allow the killer to stall a game out forever even if there isn't strictly a 3-gen just by going out of their way to kick the same gens over and over.
As an aside, anecdotally, I have not noticed this system harming kick perks. I run those perks relatively frequently, and at most I've seen the warning spikes appear, I've literally not once seen a gen actually get blocked.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3677188#Comment_3677188
Because I'm making arguments that I back up with evidence and explanations.
so did I... I told why it doesn't work, I even gave you an option how to fix your idea.
If my explanation doesn't work because you don't agree, then yours is not valid either...
While a survivor is shown on the Skull Merchant's radar, they are not able to remove any Lock On stacks by hacking drones
Change it to "survivors are not able to disarm the drones, while on radar". Otherwise survivor could just start disarm and wait, which sounds annoying.
That would also buff addons to keep survivors visible for longer, which is currenly trash.
Then I would be fine with it.
I've not had an issue with the actual arguments you're making (beyond thinking they're wrong, obviously), I am specifically talking about when you'd say things like "I'd like to see your gameplay", or "You aren't using Lock On correctly", or any other attempt at making the discussion personal and pointed. That is extremely different to making an argument in favour of your case, which we've both been doing.
I'm glad we could come to some kind of agreement, at least. The changes would be healthy ones, it seems, the question is whether there'd need to be a compensatory buff. I don't personally believe it would be necessary, but it wouldn't be harmful either, so if both happened at once we'd still get the part that matters. It'd be nice QoL in general, too.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3677180#Comment_3677180
It's not constructive, I'm politely asking you to stop.
You mean like "it will work if you are good enough"?
Most of what you said is highly map dependant and beam is not full circle, so it is kinda random if survivor will run into it or not and you can't influence this.
No, not like that all. Because I'm making arguments that I back up with evidence and explanations.
Sure, some of it's map dependant. I don't know off the top of my head if every map has those hidden drone spots, though I think every map does have the gaps in walls + structures that let you scan through them- think Trickster knives and Deathslinger harpoons, it's that kind of gap you need.
I think you would probably be able to spread stacks on every map, the map will just affect how easy it is.
Let me ask this. Assume everything else I want to do happens, but we add this buff: While a survivor is shown on the Skull Merchant's radar, they are not able to remove any Lock On stacks by hacking drones. That way you'd always have time to react to a survivor tripping a drone so you can recall it. Would that be more acceptable for you?
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3677141#Comment_3677141
Funny is you still expect survivors to run into it without thinking. Right now, they are not able to remove lock on and it's not normal to see survivors getting claw traps around the map. It would be even less likely to happen with your changes.
Trying to hide doesn't really work when they are easily visible and there is circle around them, unless you want to make them actually hidden and display properly what state is that drone.
As soon survivor starts disarming you can't recall the drone. So depends where survivor triggers you have like 2 +/- seconds to check your radar to even find out who it is, aim at it and recall it, where there is high chance you are middle of chase. I really want to see you trying this :D
Two things: First, hidden drone spots typically also remove the ring on the ground. This is one of those things about Skull Merchant that people don't realise, and over time will separate decent Skull Merchants from very very good ones. These drones aren't just placed wherever, you're taking advantage of the specific placement restrictions and quirks that come with her power to remove as much information from survivors as possible. There are also plenty of structures where the drone's beams shoot straight through the wall because of a small gap, and even if you know there's a drone there, you can't know if the beam's actually passing through that gap while it's invisible and the drone itself is blocked from view.
Pixel Bush's video on Skull Merchant showcases this pretty well, though it's also pretty long and I don't have a timestamp for when he talks about those parts specifically on hand, sorry.
Second, I'm not saying that reacting to the scan and recalling the drone will be incredibly easy. It'll require you to remember where you've placed your drones, and quickly ascertain which one just turned yellow, on top of whatever you were doing. I will remind you that you're doing this in service of spreading your Lock On stacks, which is a very powerful outcome to be in; even if you never get a claw trap out of it, having everyone at two stacks means any chase you take is going to be quite short.
I'll also say again, if this does end up too difficult, I have a buff in mind to alleviate it, as I already said.
Finally, you're doing it again. The "funny how" and the "I'd like to see you try" while alluding to my gameplay or my games specifically. It's not constructive, I'm politely asking you to stop.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3677110#Comment_3677110
They have to have drones nearby to hack.
If I get lock on, there simply HAS TO BE a drone nearby. So outside of chase, survivors can always remove it.
If they have lock on, it means they got in chase, which means I had to drop chase against a survivor with two stacks.
How is that so hard to understand?
Once you put in the effort to keep your drones away from their reach
If I take aways drones, then they will never trigger it on their own. This logic has lot of holes...
you would put the active effort into making sure the stacks aren't removed by recalling drones
again... this means survivors will never get injured outside of chase, even if I chase every survivor and get two stacks on them.
How the hell is not supposed to be less effective? It's terrible way to play and you are going to lose most of your games for this.
It's not hard to understand, but there's a hole in the logic.
If a drone is tripped outside of chase, there is a delay before the survivor starts to hack it. The more hidden the drone, the more the delay, generally; usually the hidden drones require navigating around an object before you can actually reach the model itself. If your active strategy is to spread stacks, you'd put drones in those hidden spots and react to the survivor being scanned, recalling the drone before they can hack it. Generally, you're probably not going to be relying on this, but they'll be the exception to the whole "don't leave drones out" thing- the drones that take a second to get to, giving you time to recall them after someone's scanned.
(I have considered making it so drones can't be hacked while you're on the Skull Merchant's scanner, to embolden this playstyle, but I'm wary about buffing her when she currently needs nerfs + does fine otherwise.)
Additionally, if your active strategy is to spread stacks, yes, you would be dropping chase on survivors after tagging them directly. That wouldn't actually be changing from the way it works now, that's just a part of playing Skull Merchant this way.
I keep italicising "active strategy" because right now you don't need to do those things, right now you can passively benefit from stacks spreading across the map without putting in any effort at all. That is the thing I want to change, and anyone who wants to benefit from multiple survivors having stacks at once should need to adapt to that requiring a small amount of effort.
You aren't inherently going to lose based on this if you're actually good at it. If you know the trap spots, if you know the right time to drop chase versus the right time to actually progress your objective, if you're good enough with the drone's mechanical skill expression to reliably force scans quickly... yeah, it'd be viable. It'd be kind of a risk/reward playstyle where the reward is way way higher than the more traditional chase-based playstyle, but it also requires more management so there's more room to mess up.
You would lose if you're just tagging survivors once in chase, recalling the drone, and aimlessly wandering to someone else. That's good. Killers putting in that little effort should do noticeably worse than killers who do put in effort.
Still, there's middle ground between those two scenarios, and real games are messy. You'll face survivors who just don't react to being scanned properly, you'll face survivors who make the wrong decisions about when to hack, you'll face teams that accrue more scans accidentally than there are drones to remove them, etc. I don't anticipate this being something you have to do perfectly in order to get value, you'd just have to put in some effort.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3677080#Comment_3677080
you have failed to really evidence your argument.
so did you... just saying
Take your statement here, where you say it gets less effective: How?
For example if you let survivors to heal 50% faster. Is hit&run strategy less effective? Hell yeah
So if survivors can remove stacks, is spreading lock on less effective? Hell yeah
Getting multiple claw traps is completely unchanged with my suggestions
No, it's near impossible unless it's first game against skull merchant for all those survivors... If they get lock on, it means there is drone nearby, which means they can remove it.
Also you not only would need to drop several chases with two stacks, those survivors would also have to be blind and run into some drone...
they'd become extremely easy to tunnel out with a claw trap
How do you exactly apply it on them, even if they have two stacks? You can't place drone next to the hook, so that won't work. Then they can just keep running, other survivors can bodyblock. It's same as any other M1 killer.
Only scenario I can see is survivor got into basement with two stacks, but at that point, if I want to tunnel someone in basement, I don't need claw trap to kill them, I can just bodyblock them on stairs for 10 seconds.
Right, so, this comes back to the same thing I have to keep repeating: Letting survivors remove stacks of Lock On by hacking drones DOES NOT MEAN that stacks are inherently temporary. They have to have drones nearby to hack.
So, does this make spreading stacks less effective? Nope! Once you put in the effort to keep your drones away from their reach, spreading stacks is just as effective as before. The thing that changes is the barrier of effort before you get to start doing it, not how effective it is once you've started.
I'll hit that point again, because it's important: If they get a stack, you recall that drone. If you want to spread stacks, you do not keep drones out as a rule. There may be exceptions for specific drone spots, but by and large, if your strategy is to spread stacks, you would put the active effort into making sure the stacks aren't removed by recalling drones. This is the part that cannot be ignored or waved away, it is THE most important part of this argument.
Which leads to, getting multiple claw traps is not less powerful or less impactful than before. It is harder to do, though it's not even close to impossible, but it's not less effective.
As for your last question: You... place the drone down by them after/as they're unhooked? You're tunnelling them in this scenario, so you use your power in that chase. It wouldn't be immediate, but no killer currently gets to down someone as soon as their feet touch the ground, it takes a few seconds for their power to circumvent anti-tunnel where applicable.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676945#Comment_3676945
It's bullet proof, because it will always happen and you can't prevent it.
Claw trap will not make tunneling that much faster compare to any other killer, so I don't understand why you worry so much about it.
You do not get punished for playing well as killer because you get a hook.
You get punished by losing your power progress. That's a cost. Hook is something that would happen no matter what.
Removing Broken wouldn't change anything here
it wouldn't change anything for tunneling, but it would make it less punishing for survivors overall.
We've also talked at length about how other playstyles would still be viable, that's just repetition without anything to back it up.
Talking doesn't mean I agreed. You just said it would be viable, I disagree. It would make it more difficult and less effective. Why bother?
Your argument was: "You can still try to do it, if you want". But that's about it. I can also play completely without power, if I want. That doesn't make it good idea...
That doesn't make it a bulletproof strategy, it just makes it a thing that'll happen as the game progresses. It's not a way for you, the survivor, to actively remove your Lock On progress, because the Lock On does its job in this scenario: it makes you easier to down.
That's why you're not "punished" by "losing your power progress". The whole point of your power - any power, even if it's sometimes indirect - is to make survivors easier/faster to down. Once it does that job, it is totally fair for it to reset where applicable if it can't be removed manually, because you already got rewarded for using it with the one thing it's meant to do.
Claw Traps don't make her better at tunnelling now, because the stacks get reset. If someone could come off the hook with two stacks, especially if the power still inflicts Deep Wounds to cancel their anti-tunnel, they'd become extremely easy to tunnel out with a claw trap. That is, obviously, a bad thing.
While talking doesn't always mean agreeing, you have failed to really evidence your argument. Take your statement here, where you say it gets less effective: How? Getting multiple claw traps is completely unchanged with my suggestions, so how is it less effective on top of being harder?
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676208#Comment_3676208
I don't mind Lock On resetting when the killer gets a hook or a down
Because you don't use it properly, but that doesn't mean your playstyle should be only viable and ignore everything else.
If killer denies survivors option to remove lock on (recall drones) that means there are no drones prepared in advance. I see that as a fair trade.
Right now there is basically bullet proof system how to get rid of lock on -> get downed. All stacks are wasted when you down survivor, so you kinda gets punished for playing well as a killer at that point.
If you want give survivors option to get rid of lock on with their actions -> ignore their mistakes while walking into drones, then there is no reason to clear stacks for them whenever they get downed/hooked.
If you are worried about that, then we can simply get rid of broken and just make it always mending as I suggested. Then it can't really get out of hand more than Legion can do.
What?
How is it a bullet proof system for getting rid of Lock On when it gives the killer a free hook? That doesn't make any sense, the reason it clears when you get downed is so that the Skull Merchant can't tunnel you out with a claw trap and thus Hindered when you're unhooked.
You do not get punished for playing well as killer because you get a hook. Those progress you to your goal, killing survivors, so they are a reward. Your power exists to make those easier to get.
Removing Broken wouldn't change anything here, because it's the Haste and Hindered that help tunnel someone out. If someone's unhooked, you should start from zero again, because the stacks you put on them did their job: They made that survivor easier to down. That, or they weren't needed to reach that goal in the first place, in which case it doesn't matter.
Also, I would appreciate if you'd stop insulting my gameplay, especially when you haven't actually seen it. You have no idea whether I'm using Lock On correctly, you can only judge based on the way I talk about Skull Merchant's power-- and I could be just as unhelpful by saying that it sure seems like I understand it better than you do. That wouldn't achieve anything, though, it'd just devolve the conversation into name-calling.
We've also talked at length about how other playstyles would still be viable, that's just repetition without anything to back it up.
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I don't think this is a problem, and I'll explain why. First, we'll look at two true statements I'm using as the basis for my claim- these are not the claim itself, they're just the baseline.
1: Your job as killer is not to defend gens. They are not your objective, and while stalling out gens is a tool you can use, it is not your bread-and-butter for slowing down generators either- that would be spreading pressure and dragging multiple survivors off generators at once.
2: This system exists to combat excessive gen stall. That became necessary because of 3-gen matches that stretched out for an hour due to killers not committing to chases, etcetera, but the mechanism that those matches utilised was gen stall. The system, by design, exists to limit how much any gen can be stalled.
So, those two statements lead to my conclusion:
If you're noticing that you're getting gens blocked in the course of your regular play, you should take that as an indication that you're focusing too much on attacking generators. Stop kicking gens randomly between chases, definitely stop ignoring nearby survivors in favour of kicking generators, and start honing your killer fundamentals to slow down the game without even needing to interact with generators at all for 90% of any given match.
As an aside, I don't think it matters if there's a game where all the survivors are congregating at one generator and you block it with Surge, because that's eight downs and presumably eight hooks gained before that generator is actually finished. Maybe this is just me, but I genuinely do not care if the only false positives in this system kick in when I've already won a match, that's a pretty benign ""flaw"" to exist in a system like this.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676174#Comment_3676174
why they shouldn't keep lock on, when there is an alternative to remove them?
Sadako keeps it, Pyramid head also.
Claw trap is not that good for tunneling in my opinion. It won't instadown. She would be nowhere near best tunneling killer, or slugging killer. It would simply become passive slowdown, because survivors would have to give it some effort.
This is the way how I can imagine it could be used.
There is a way how to lose lock on in the game, there shouldn't be multiple of them. Otherwise drones are just a joke.
Considering there's only sometimes a way to remove Lock On with my suggestions, and considering the killer can completely deny survivors the opportunity to use it at all, I don't mind Lock On resetting when the killer gets a hook or a down.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676159#Comment_3676159
Hmm, I have a good idea.
Let survivors remove lock on by disarm, but they don't lose their current lock on when they are downed, or hooked.
If survivors can get rid of lock on with their effort, there is no reason to also remove it for skull merchant's effort.
Maybe not when they're downed, that would need to be tested, but they should definitely not keep Lock On stacks when hooked.
We don't want Skull Merchant to be too good at tunnelling with her power.
Which also raises the question, when would keeping Lock On stacks when downed be useful, and the answer is kind of just "slugging", so I don't love that either.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676147#Comment_3676147
That would be near impossible to do. That would be harder than Sadako getting condemn and she can mori survivors...
Again, I don't think so. Sadako's Condemned stacks are removed from a static map object that Sadako has no control over.
Lock On stacks would be removed by hacking drones, which Skull Merchant doesn't have to leave out if she doesn't want to.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676113#Comment_3676113
if you make it harder, then sure, but then make it more rewarding to do, because it would be definetly not worth the effort.
I don't think that's necessary, getting multiple claw traps on different survivors is a very strong position. It really doesn't need to be more rewarding than it currently is.
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To be honest, there doesn't even need to be a huge overhaul of multiple killers to do it. There are only a handful of truly weak killers in general, and the only one that's substantially weaker than the rest is Trapper. Pretty much everyone else can do well with a good build (NOT a full slowdown build) and good play.
Rather, what they'd need to do is tackle toolboxes and survivor spawns. If the survivors spawn all together or in groups of two, and nobody has toolboxes, then the pace of the match is absolutely within the killer's power to affect. If they spawn spread out with toolboxes... it's gonna be a lot harder.
So, if they wanted to do a sweeping nerf of slowdown perks, the "other side" of those changes would be nerfs to toolboxes and spawns, rather than buffs to weaker killers.
Not to say that weaker killers couldn't use help, mind you, but that's more for their own sake than for overall balance.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676101#Comment_3676101
All it does is expect some skill expression from you
It's funny going 1 by 1 is exactly same with your change...
Only dropping chases and trying to pressure multiple survivors is more difficult to do properly than just playing "I see survivor, I chase"
Well... yes?
Dropping chase and spreading Lock On stacks is made harder because that's the thing it's currently easy to try and cheese. The thing that requires you to be more on point with aim, positioning, and placement is unchanged because that's the thing that currently requires skill expression.
If you aren't putting skill expression into 1v1 chases then you're going to lose, it'll take too long to get to three stacks and you'll only have it on one person. If you aren't putting skill expression into spreading the stacks, it can still work out for you because you don't actually have to put much effort into it to benefit from claw traps. It isn't guaranteed, mind, but when it works it doesn't require nearly as much from you.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676051#Comment_3676051
It does not force anyone to play like me.
It makes it more difficult (it already is harder then just go 1 by 1 in my opinion) and less effective. Sounds like limiting options to me.
It makes it more difficult, yes, but that's because basically no effort has to go into it right now.
There's no way to remove Lock On stacks, so the only limiting factor is how fast the generators get done. Otherwise, you can cheese out basically free claw traps cross-map with barely any effort beyond regular M1 chases. I want to see her power and its skill expression be more of a focus, and the only way to do that is to make it so you have to put in effort before getting serious rewards from it.
The options are limited but they aren't removed. All it does is expect some skill expression from you.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3676023#Comment_3676023
You'd have to start being active and putting more thought + effort into what you're doing to spread Lock On stacks.
Not really, only option would to play like you
I focus on trying to build them on one person quickly
just go 1 by 1
I enjoy hit&run killers, that's why I play skull merchant (also Wraith, Legion). She is quite decent for it, not best, but decent. That means I am dropping chase often, survivors usually are injured with 1/2 lock on stacks (kinda hard to tell, when you don't see it).
I don't really care if they will get claw trap when I am chasing someone else, point is to have chance to get claw trap faster and possibly instadown (very rare tho) in my next chase with that survivor.
Letting them remove stacks negates most of my chances for this. That's why it is massive nerf for me at least. That's why I don't understand why even go for any other nerfs for her.
It does not force anyone to play like me.
If that's what you want to do, you would still be able to do it. The requirement would just be to be on point with recalling your drones so they don't get hacked, and hiding the ones you do leave out so that it takes longer to get to them and hack them after they're tripped, thus giving you more time to recall them.
I genuinely have no problem with that playstyle. I only want it to be something the killer has to actually commit to doing while paying some kind of attention.
It's important to remember that letting them remove stacks in this regard doesn't put something on the map for them to consistently do it with, like a Freddy clock or a Pig box. The thing they use to remove stacks is something completely in your control, and you don't have to let them have access to it.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674729#Comment_3674729
I was talking about this comment. It simply doesn't make sense.
Even more when you admitted before, that dropping chase with survivor having multiple stacks is waste of time.
This whole comment works only if you would drop chase with multiple survivors having two stacks, which is simply pointless thing to do.
Right, gotcha.
So, I did explain this poorly, I 100% admit to that. I'll start from the beginning again and try to clarify what I meant from the start.
The issue is, I was too caught up thinking about the way I play Skull Merchant, where dropping chase on survivors with one Lock On scan is a waste of time. I don't generally try to spread the Lock On stacks (unless given a very easy opportunity to), I focus on trying to build them on one person quickly, because I find that a little more fun overall.
For me it's a waste of time. It is worth pointing out that it doesn't have to be a waste of time. Right now, you don't actually have to put much effort into making it worth your time because any stacks you get can't be removed, meaning you don't actually have to try very hard to get random claw traps mapwide from survivors that aren't very aware.
So, the right way of phrasing it would've been this: If you are playing Skull Merchant in an active and skill-based manner, dropping chase on survivors with one Lock On stack is usually a waste of time.
With my changes, playing passively and aimlessly would be punishable because survivors could reset and remove their Lock On progress. You'd have to start being active and putting more thought + effort into what you're doing to spread Lock On stacks. If you do that, dropping chase strategically would be worth it again, but in a more balanced way.
Again, I explained this poorly, that's on me.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674859#Comment_3674859
I have a lot more to say, but we disagree on major levels about her, where there is no chance to get any result.
There is a lot of errors in your logic. Like whole broken / mending conversation and effect of drones outside of chase. There is one whole comment completely nonsense, whch is probably why you didn't clarify any of my questions about it.
You are also unable to express yourself effectively and I am too lazy for that. That's why I usually point out only part of your comments, because most of that text is useless. For example your next post:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674904#Comment_3674904
Do these get worse with the proposed changes?
Yes and almost all claw traps addons are just bad and unreliable. I don't care about most of those effects in chase.
Mangled + Haemorrhage is completely useless, when survivor is broken. Ha, another reason for removing broken instead of mending... Blidness, Skill checks, Oblivious are way worse, when claw trap could be used only in chase.
Almost all of them should be reworked no matter what changes she gets.
If you want to take another shot at specific questions, I'll try and answer them. These messages can get a little long and so some things get missed out unintentionally.
While I agree that those addons are bad, they aren't made any worse by my changes, they're just bad. Though, to speak up for one one of them mildly, the Mangled + Haemorrhage only applies when the survivor is hit, which downs them, which breaks the claw trap, so they're not actually afflicted by all three status effects at once.
Either way, though, they're just bad. They're not good addons being made bad by these changes, so it's kind of irrelevant to bring them up.
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@Nos37 said:
Why?
Because of that new stupid perk... "Spend 100+ seconds in the basement equipping No Mither"
The killer knows I'm in the basement because of aura reading, so I have to equip Distortion.
The killer interrupts the invocation and knows I'm in the basment because I screamed, so I have to equip Calm Spirit.
Killer instinct tells the Legion that I'm in the basement and there's nothing I can do about it.
I mean. You did choose to equip the perk and go into the basement. If you don't want any risk of being interrupted, surely you just wouldn't bring the perk at all, right?
The risk of Invocation perks is gonna be that the killer might find out you're in the basement, and you can't prevent that all of the time. I wouldn't recommend running it in solo queue, it's gonna require a buddy either to massively lower the time investment or to keep the killer occupied while you do it.
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...Why?
They usually don't even get to capitalise on that, since they can't traverse that far in a single Frenzy. Generally speaking you don't try and hide from a Frenzy, if that's the concern, you just outrun it by splitting up quickly. So... what's the functional reason for that change?
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@Devil_hit11 said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674556#Comment_3674556
having no passive gains on drones means that skull merchant has to do everything manually which is already the case vs non-bad teams. Alongside having lock-on removal, you statically will not be able to get 2 claw traps if everyone removes every lock-on stack. The default 10 second detection is low duration that I am not going to count.
This is where I'll point out again that if it's tied to hacking drones, you can deny survivors the ability to do it. If you want to split pressure on your Lock On stacks, you just need to make sure there are fewer drones out than there are scans to remove. Hell, if you're quick enough on the draw you can recall a drone immediately after a survivor trips it and deny them the chance to remove that stack.
Yes and this encourages 3 gen gameplay in order to camp drones. the entire rework for skull merchant was specifically done to make 3 gen less. Nerfing skull merchant would just make me camp more and tunnel more. Camp hooks+3 gen and tunnel people off-hook because split pressure is meaningles. Right now lock-on mechanic incentives me to spread pressure.
2: No, actually using her drones and playing around them is the skilful way of doing it. If anything is brute force, it's forcing single scans and relying on random mistakes to win a war of attrition.
There's a lot of skill that goes into using her drones properly, they aren't just fire and forget.
I disagree. The nature of trapping killer is that they rely survivor mistakes to win. Their viability hedges on the capacity to win a war of attrition. Skull merchant does this somewhat better in my opinion compare to trapper & hag but game-play principle is the same.
I believe that most player over-think trap placement on killers. For me, traps are fire and forget. They either provide value or they don't. They're also some of low-skill floor+low skill-ceiling killers as well. Unfortunately, this means that these killers often hit max potencial for most killer players very quickly as there is not much to learn.
It's also worth mentioning that a Hag's traps don't do anything unless she decides to act on it.
Debuffing survivors with hindered, Haste and tracking doesn't do anything either unless killer acts on it. I suppose the trap does injure you and put into broken. Maybe changing it to be exposed though this one of the changes between Skull merchant 1.0 and 2.0.
1: You should have to do most things manually against teams that aren't outright bad, though. That's not a bad thing, that's part of the point.
I'll also point out, once again, that survivors can only remove every stack they get if you leave drones out for them to do so. If you want to spread Lock On stacks, you would need to pay attention to how many drones are out and evaluate how likely they are to be hacked. In other words, building split-pressure Lock On would require active effort and wouldn't be passive.
2: You do actually have to support this point with some kind of argument.
What it actually encourages, if anything, is recalling drones instead of leaving them out. I don't see any reason why it'd encourage 3-genning in someone who didn't already want to 3-gen, and, we've already laid out why attempting to build Lock On stacks in a 3-gen wouldn't actually work with these new changes.
3: Just saying that they're fire and forget doesn't make it true. The mechanical depth in exactly how the beams work and how you'd play around them exists either way, so placement and positioning still matter a lot.
Skull Merchant is a trap killer, that much is true, but she doesn't work exactly like Trapper and Hag. There's more mechanical depth to her power than those two.
4: Or, instead of changing the injury to Exposed, you could just make it so the claw trap is very unlikely to trigger outside of chase, so the killer only gets the Haste and the tracking on someone they aren't actively chasing.
The whole point of these changes is that getting a claw trap shouldn't be passive. The other stuff, sure, that much can be relatively passive and I think it'd be fair, but the claw trap should require active effort.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674824#Comment_3674824
Anyway, there aren't that many
So there is 12 addons around claw traps... That's more than half of her addons.
Most of her addons are already bad, she has like 5 decent addons.
Okay, I was actually in game so I went and checked, you're right, there's twelve.
The reason I was thinking there weren't so many is that were some I wasn't counting for this purpose. Like the ones for extra Hindered percentage and time, those don't really matter to our conversation because they're only for chase.
So, let's tally up the addon effects that are only for chase. To me, this includes: Extra Hindered percentage, extra Hindered time, Exhaustion, and arguably the aura when the claw trap is first applied and the Mangled + Haemorrhage. I say those last two because cross-map info isn't useful when you can already see them on your scanner, it's more useful for mindgaming in chase, and because the Mangled one requires you to get a down on a claw trapped survivor. Taking these off the table, we have seven addons.
These include: Blindness, battery life duration, smaller skill checks, silent skill checks, aura reveal when the claw trap is removed, Oblivious, and the Expired Batteries iridescent.
The next step is to see which of those are actually good. In my opinion, both skill check addons and the Expired Batteries are bad now + won't get worse with my hypothetical changes. The skill check ones are a meagre effect for a small duration only if you're ignoring survivors with claw traps entirely, and the Expired Batteries are just a hot mess of backwards effects that don't do anything noticeable.
Taking those off the table, we're left with four. Blindness, battery life, Oblivious, aura reveal when removed. Do these get worse with the proposed changes?
Not really. Blindness and Oblivious are still somewhat useful in chase anyway, battery life is useful for if you choose to drop chase on a claw trapped survivor, and aura reveal when removed is... fine? Honestly I don't think those last two are good to begin with, especially the aura one which feels very vestigial from an earlier design of her power where it made more sense, but I'm trying to be as generous as possible here.
Considering you'd still be able to spread your Lock On stacks with careful play, and considering most of the addons that affect claw traps at all seem more geared towards either using them in chase or dropping chase after getting the claw trap anyway, I don't think much changes here.
Honestly, the bottom line is, the addons here that aren't good need reworking anyway. My changes don't really change much at all for them.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674824#Comment_3674824
I just don't think you actually play skull merchant with your takes, or I have no idea how are you playing.
Feel free to show your gameplay how you skillfully manages your drones and spread lock on... Also drop a chase on broken survivor.
Your changes would make her terrible. Simple as that.
If that's all you've got to say on the matter, I think this conversation has concluded.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674757#Comment_3674757
You can't seem to decide how it works...
So far you are fine with it being impassible to get claw trap outside of chase, based on giving up completely on your idea of three survivors with 2 stacks, because even you have to realize it's impossible. So I think you got back on it.
Ok, so should be impossible to get claw trap outside of chase, we can work with that. Just don't try to act like it's possible to do with your skill, because it simply wouldn't be.
Can we at least aggree that this is massive nerf?
Why remove mending? You make it harder to get claw trap and effect is also worse? Shouldn't we buff claw traps when it's so hard to get them on survivors with your change? It doesn't make any sense.
And there would need to be addon pass and just rework most addons that works on claw traps only, because those would be useless.
What I just laid out is how it should work.
I am fine with it being functionally impossible to get random claw traps outside of chase. I haven't given up on the idea of multiple survivors having multiple stacks, because I laid out that I don't mind the killer trying to spread those stacks IF they have to manage their drones and avoid as many hacks as possible while doing it.
My problem with the current scenarios where multiple survivors have multiple scans is that there's no effort or skill involved on the killer's side. It's a war of attrition that, if they win it, won't have required much from the killer. I don't think this currently a huge must-fix-immediately problem, since the killer's also fairly likely to lose the war of attrition, but it's still an unhealthy element that should be fixed.
So, yes, with skill and effort, you could get traps outside of chase. You'd just have to pay attention and be smart with your drone placements + recalls. It'd be harder than focusing on getting a trap on one person, which it should be because you're doing it to multiple survivors at once and trying to avoid needing to focus on them, but it would be doable.
So, no, we don't agree that it's a massive nerf. It's a noticeable one if you're the kind of player that does try and rely on stacks being permanent to drop chase frequently, but if you use her drones more actively you'll barely notice it at all and if you just put more effort into spreading stacks you'll be able to overcome it. That breaks out to a moderate nerf at worst.
I want to remove Mending because I don't feel that it does much of value, isn't particularly coherent with the rest of her kit, and probably contributes to the feeling of her kit being bloated with too many status effects. I'd rather keep the ones that make sense and help her, while removing the single one that doesn't really add much.
As for the addons: I was going to go and count how many claw trap addons she actually has, but apparently the wiki is broken and specifically won't show addon lists at the moment? That's really inconvenient, goddamnit.
Anyway, there aren't that many and if we discount the ones that obviously won't change (specifically, the aura reveal on claw traps being applied and on them being broken), most of them aren't even that good to begin with. I'd welcome changing those to something more useful, but it'd be inaccurate to claim these changes would really affect them much. The ones that are bad now will be bad afterwards, and the ones that are decent now will be decent afterwards.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3674729#Comment_3674729
So, if they're sitting at two stacks
This doesn't work with your other comment:
Dropping chase before getting the trap, even on live, is kind of a waste of your time
Tell me exactly how survivor gets two lock on in any other way than skull merchant leaving him with lock on stacks -> which would be bad idea, when they can remove them.
Every time survivor on their own runs into drone, they are free to remove that lock on. So survivors outside of chase will never get above 1 stack.
Three survivors are sitting at two stacks
How the hell this situation would even happen?
Btw skull merchant can't recall drone when survivor started disarm, so you can't really even try to deny it when survivor get tagged.
At one point you say dropping a chase before claw trap is waste time and on other hand you say broken is needed, so you have option to drop a chase. Where at point of broken survivor, you overcommited a lot for this, so you need to get that down. Leaving survivor with 1/2 stacks probably didn't take much time.
This whole comment you just made only works if you keep leaving chase against survivors with lock on, which is waste of time as you said...
I don't believe Skull merchant is in state for direct nerfs. There is definetly room for changes, so she is not a massive noob stomper, but your idea is basically 6 nerfs and some of them are massive. She is already weaker and easier to play against comapre to her previous versions. You are just trying to create Freddy 2.0
Alright, I'll pull back a bit to try and explain what we're talking about here.
The major point I've been trying to get across, something that we might've lost sight of when dissecting very specific sentence fragments outside of their context, is that Skull Merchant shouldn't get given the whole value of her power without having to try. So when I say that survivors shouldn't be running around with single Lock On stacks, there's an asterisk.
That asterisk reads: Unless the killer is employing some kind of strategy revolving around leaving survivors with single stacks. On live servers, it'd be to win a war of attrition by getting them to two stacks and having a really short chase afterwards, which I think is rather unhealthy and passive, and I'd prefer to see that made harder so playing her more skilfully and actively is encouraged more.
With my changes, you'd still be able to do it, you'd just need to juggle drone placements and try to deny hacks wherever you can. This could just be not leaving drones out for too long, or it could be hiding them and trying to react to the survivor tripping it so you can recall the drone just before the hack starts. It'd still be doable, but it wouldn't be passive anymore, you'd actually be putting in active effort.
To make it even more simple, I'll lay it out like this:
If a survivor trips a drone outside of chase, here is what you should get: Information on your scanner, and twelve seconds of Haste.
If you want more than that, you should have to actually chase that survivor. If you want a claw trap on them, you should have to chase them. If you want to try and build them to that point without chasing them, you should have to pay some kind of attention and exercise some kind of skill and effort.
What you shouldn't be able to get is random free injuries on the other side of the map, because you played sloppily and had to drop chase a lot but stacks can't be removed so they still end up claw trapped from one unexpected drone.
Getting full value from skill expression, trap management, and chase fundamentals: Good.
Getting full value from sloppy passive play that requires little effort: Bad.
Getting small value from survivor mistakes: Acceptable, but it shouldn't match what you get by actually trying.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3673721#Comment_3673721
Letting survivors remove lock on on disarm is massive nerf that basically removes her 1v4 element and it's just stealth / weak 1v1.
You compare it with pig traps. Those are "traps" just by name and their slowdown is completely different level compare to drones.
I have no idea what went through your head, when you thought there is need for more nerfs on top of this massive nerf, which makes it brainless for survivors in my opinion.
Also quite important topic, if they would ever go for something like this, don't forget full addon pass. Most of her addons are around clawtrap, which is useless, if you completely remove even a chance to get claw trap outside of chase. Those addons are already quite bad, but they would be nemesis level trash with your change.
Something I've neglected to really elaborate on, and that is my fault, I'll cop to it, is that getting claw traps out of chase would be something the killer can make happen. I've been hitting the point that it shouldn't happen randomly and without input from the killer, and I stand by that, but we should of course acknowledge that the Skull Merchant would have some control over it.
Remember, with my hypothetical changes, survivors would have to hack drones to remove a single stack of Lock On. So, if they're sitting at two stacks, but there's only one drone on the map and it's nowhere near them... they're just sitting at two stacks, permanently. That might seem like an extreme example, but consider a more plausible one: Three survivors are sitting at two stacks, and the fourth is in chase, but there are three drones out. Not everyone can hack twice, there aren't enough drones, so those stacks are going to stay-- and if any of those traps are hidden ones, trying to find something to hack might result in an unexpected claw trap instead.
If the killer is actively paying attention to Lock On stacks, keeping track of their drone locations, and making sure to recall drones that look too easy to get to and hack, they'd still stand a reasonable chance of getting claw traps outside of chase-- at the very least, they'd be able to keep survivors close to being claw trapped for their next chase.
They'd just have to try. It wouldn't be passive, there'd be room for messing it up, and there'd be room to counter it. That is all necessary for a balanced and fair power.
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I don't think the pallet size is all that problematic considering how few of those resources are actually particularly strong. It's a quantity over quality approach, and anecdotally, I haven't had much of a problem on it as killer so far.
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@Devil_hit11 said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3673922#Comment_3673922
Or, y'know, anything else. I don't much care to dictate playstyle, I just want to take passive value out of her kit for the most part.
The passive is integral part of her kit. Although you are unlikely to put more then 2 claw traps at one time, the speed bonus scales with number of arm claw traps present on the map. The building of passive stacks allows skull merchant to have multiple claws in certain instances. It is still on survivor to make mistakes in regards to drones.
I don't want Skull Merchant to win wars of attrition where she never commits to a chase until the Lock On builds enough to make it very quick, I want her to actually have to use and play around her drones in the smart and skilful way.
gaining stacks is skull merchant using her drones tactically. Your suggesting skull merchant to brute force her ability alongside removing the finesse of her ability.
If there's nothing to actually use to gain that information, it's not skill, it's guesswork.
I am curious for how you approach playing against Hag traps? Hag traps are a small sigil on the floor which in many instances are difficult to spot. Do you crouch the entire map vs hag? You do not need to see the outline to identify drones. they are visible out in the open. A small amount of using 3rd person camera and crouch walking can counter the less visible drones.
1: The speed bonus stacks for every survivor that is shown on your scanner, not just for claw traps. Either way, though, at no stage have I suggested making it impossible for multiple claw traps to be attached to survivors, I've just stated that it shouldn't happen randomly, for free, with no input on the killer's part.
This is where I'll point out again that if it's tied to hacking drones, you can deny survivors the ability to do it. If you want to split pressure on your Lock On stacks, you just need to make sure there are fewer drones out than there are scans to remove. Hell, if you're quick enough on the draw you can recall a drone immediately after a survivor trips it and deny them the chance to remove that stack.
2: No, actually using her drones and playing around them is the skilful way of doing it. If anything is brute force, it's forcing single scans and relying on random mistakes to win a war of attrition.
There's a lot of skill that goes into using her drones properly, they aren't just fire and forget.
3: So this is more of a fair point and I'll try to be as specific as I can in responding to it, because I do have an answer.
Hag's Phantasm Traps (and also Trapper's Bear Traps, for that matter) are different here for two major reasons. The first is that they're much smaller- not in terms of physical model size, but in terms of effective range. You have to step on them (or at least very very close for Hag) before they activate.
The second is that they have a logic to where they'd go, unlike the spots we're talking about for Skull Merchant that are highly specific and would require flat out memorisation to counter on the survivor side.
Those two things combined mean that you don't actually have to crouch walk everywhere, you can just take a wider path around the areas that traps would go in. This wouldn't work against Skull Merchant's drones because they have a pretty hefty radius, especially compared to a Phantasm Trap.
It's also worth mentioning that a Hag's traps don't do anything unless she decides to act on it. You don't trip a Phantasm Trap, build up a stack of something, and eventually get injured without the Hag ever having to even look in your direction while you're doing it. Similarly, if you trip a drone and Skull Merchant comes to chase you, that then matters because you don't have time to remove the stack. It's about whether the killer actually has to do something to capitalise on the trap triggering, and Hag does. Right now, Skull Merchant kind of doesn't, though I wouldn't go so far as to call it overpowered. Just an unhealthy element that should be scaled back so there's more skill involved.
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I can't speak for these SWF mains you're talking about, but I'm against it because lobby dodging is bad and we should not be encouraging it.
As an aside, I like going against bully squads. They're fun, and if they're committing to it they're an easy win. It's the teams that are actually trying to win that give me difficult games.
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I don't think Trapper does need better grass, personally. Think about it- that means one of two things. Either every future map needs to bend around having consistent dark grass no matter what the aesthetic is, just for one killer's power, or every future map is going to have specific dark patches that are basically neon signs saying "Traps here!"
Rather, I'd sooner see his traps get changed to better fit in with the design of each map, as you alluded to in the post. That's a good start, that helps him, but he'd need a few more things.
First, adjust trap spawns again. What he has isn't actually that bad, but it could be improved. Have the traps spawn on the same side of the map as him, trending towards the centre, so he doesn't have to lose specific traps due to them being on the other side of a giant map or anything. I'd also suggest having them spawn in regular trap spots so you could choose to just arm them and move on, but that'd probably require lots of manual effort for each map, so I understand that's not very feasible.
Second, make traps automatically re-arm if he grabs a survivor out of them. Hitting a survivor is quicker and applies basic attacks, but would now leave the trap closed, whereas grabbing a survivor would be slower and open the trap up again. Just... some reason to use that interaction that isn't bloodpoints, is my thought.
Third, do an addon pass more geared around giving him interesting effects that aren't just status effects. For instance, a high rarity addon that gives him Undetectable when a trap is disarmed, or when he sets one. Things like that. Funky effects he could play around more, instead of flat buffs to his current gameplan.
That's about all I'd suggest to start. If you want crazy wacky stuff, I did once propose that Trapper force every map to have thick ankle-height fog to better hide his traps, but that would have some logistical concerns, so I don't tend to suggest it too seriously lol.
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@Devil_hit11 said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3673536#Comment_3673536
1: I've laid out a few times when the survivor wouldn't know, because the information they'd be using to gauge when to crouch would be hidden. Are you going to acknowledge that at all?
A drone that is in the middle is visible to the survivor regardless of stealth mode. These drones are not invisible like Wraith's cloaking. If you think there is a drone around the corner then you can crouch.
To your point, removing lock-on stacks makes placing drones in obscure place irrelevant because regardless of what the outcome is for survivor playing, they will not be punished as they can conveniently remove lock-on's.
What happens next is that Survivor A returns to their generator, hacks the drone to remove their Lock On, and keeps repairing. Now, when Skull Merchant returns to harass them again, she has to replace the drone, meaning Survivor A gets to remain at zero stacks while running away-- and all the while, Survivor B is hacking their drone to remove their one stack.
The gameplay becomes more about interrupting survivors from hacking drones. when a survivor is interrupted, they get a lock-on stack for failing to hack the drone. encourage lesser fun gameplay style for the opportunity to get split lock-on pressure is ill advised. I rather be able to move around the map and individual pressure survivors. your change is creating flowchart gameplay.
The way you'd end up playing to utilise Lock On most effectively is... exactly how you'd play her well now. Get the stacks in chase, and use smart drone placement ahead of time + good aim and prediction for lasertagging to make that as quick as possible.
my play-style doesn't involve brute force lock-on. I vaguely chase survivors to put lock-on stacks than setup drones in attempts that a survivor walks into drones and becomes injured and broken when they have 2/3 lock-on stacks. After that, I use my stealth to get an instant down. It is something like a bounty hunter play-style. I don't really use hindered mechanic all that much. The main time I use hindered mechanic is when a survivor is on death hook and I am tunneling the survivor off death hook. For me, the killer is something like hit & run trapper that sometimes tunnels optimistically. The lock-on stacks and stealth addition to the kit made skull merchant amusing to play.
your changes make her into a boring 3 gen killer with clown that has setup time with traps in the chase if they commit to the 1vs1.
1: The key word there is think, because you wouldn't be able to tell just by keeping an eye out. Ergo, you would have to crouch walk around every corner just in case, because that is the only way to check if there's a drone in one of these spots. Because the ring on the floor that indicates where they are, the thing you're keeping an eye out for, is hidden. If there's nothing to actually use to gain that information, it's not skill, it's guesswork.
Smart placement would still make them better traps. That hasn't changed. They just won't build up Lock On stacks passively around the map without any interaction from the killer, and that's good.
2: This is getting kind of absurd at this point, surely? All these extra steps and conditions on a playstyle that already took major hits between her rework and the anti 3-gen system, just to get a worse Clown power and Broken on those survivors, and somehow after these extra steps and conditions are added it encourages this playstyle?
No, it just doesn't make it 100% impossible. Anyone who wants to do something other than 3-genning would have absolutely zero incentive to do it, and anyone who DOES want to 3-gen is going to pursue it regardless, even with my hypothetical changes making it awkward and finicky.
She'd probably still do well in a 3-gen, of course! Almost every killer does if their goal is to actually win the game, since it's inherently a tight area that shrinks the map considerably. There'd just be very little in her kit to encourage it.
3: What I am describing is not brute force, it is the literal opposite. It would be finesse in using the drones actively, rather than relying on them building passively with little effort. I don't want Skull Merchant to win wars of attrition where she never commits to a chase until the Lock On builds enough to make it very quick, I want her to actually have to use and play around her drones in the smart and skilful way.
Or, y'know, anything else. I don't much care to dictate playstyle, I just want to take passive value out of her kit for the most part. She gets stealth without commitment, and sometimes she'll get info + Haste without commitment when survivors trip drones accidentally, everything else would need to be something you're actively trying to capitalise on.
Also, I really cannot stress this enough, this hypothetical would only kick in if survivors hack drones, meaning you could recall drones to deny them that option if you really wanted to pursue this kind of option. I wouldn't mind that gameplan if you had to think about where your drones are and which ones would be at most risk of getting hacked + by which survivors.
As an aside, you are harming your argument extensively by highlighting that anything in her design or gameplan involves tunnelling by default. We want to minimise and weaken tunnelling, not create killers who excel at it. I don't even think Skull Merchant does since survivors come off the hook without any Lock On stacks, but still, if the gameplay you want to highlight as her core identity involves tunnelling, you're making an extremely hard sell.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3673689#Comment_3673689
they're massively messing up
How is running into 5 drones not massively messing up? You already need to massively mess up to get claw trap without ever being in chase...
It's possible
It wouldn't be if disarm removes lock on, as I said...
which is that survivors will run more blindly into them in chase
There is no need for it, I can just put claw trap in middle of the loop, most of them have walls around, so drones are not visible until you get close. There is 0 reason to even try being creative with drones.
Survivors being able to find and hack drones to clear Lock On is good,
That's the thing, they don't need to try, they don't need to avoid. It's not really slowdown when survivors don't need to pay attention that much.
Broken is better than Deep Wound because it allows you to drop chase on a claw trapped survivor
Why would you drop the chase against survivor with Claw trap? Have you actually ever done it? That's 1 tag away from Hindered, which is going to end the chase on most loops.
Only thing that survivor can do is work on gen when broken, with meding only thing survivor can do is mend and possibly heal. If you expect to return in stealth, then it doesn't really matter, if you return to survivor working on gen, or healing...
Responding to entire sentences might help you here, instead of just fragments.
For instance, the full sentence for that second point is this: "It's possible, but as a hypothetical, like a head-pop on Pig: it's not meant to actually happen, it's meant to be a possibility that pushes players to act."
Taking the entire sentence into account, we can see that when I say it's possible, I do not mean that you'll actually get to rely on it happening in a real match. When survivors go hack drones, yes, they won't be claw trapped outside of chase. This is what we want, because it's forcing survivors into certain actions, and they wouldn't be forced if the possibility weren't there. As I say, it is a hypothetical, not a guarantee.
What we don't want is for survivors to end up getting claw trapped outside of chase because they messed up once after the Skull Merchant kept passively hitting them with one or two scans and dropping chase, for whatever reason. What we don't want is for the thing people say about Skull Merchant - that she takes no skill because everything she does is passive value for hitting a button - to actually be true.
It isn't true, currently, because there are plenty of elements of her kit that take skill and aren't passive. Those are the things we should emphasise, and the passive, cheesy, war-of-attrition stuff needs to be de-emphasised. Ergo, survivors need a way to clear Lock On stacks. I think this being tied to hacking drones is a good idea, but if there's some other good idea out there I'm open to hearing it.
If survivors do blindly stumble into a drone because they weren't paying attention, yes, they should get to clear that Lock On stack. They've already given the killer information and Haste-- if the killer wants anything more than that, they should have to try. They should have to actually put some kind of effort, skill, and gameplay into capitalising on the survivor's mistake, instead of getting given it for free. That's already how you play Skull Merchant well, so losing this would be completely immaterial, it shouldn't affect you.
Remember, also, that survivors getting scanned outside of chase shouldn't happen. They can see drones both in the air and in the ring projected onto the ground. So, if we give lesser skilled players a helping hand to make sure they aren't getting scans built up outside of chase if they react to the drone they missed (or more skilled players a hand when they couldn't see the drone's ring, if the placement is good), that means we can adjust Skull Merchant on the assumption that scans only accumulate in chase, which means that hypothetically she can be buffed in that area if she needs it. You can't make scans or claw traps too punishing if they can build up randomly across the map without any input from the killer.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672901#Comment_3672901
And it'd be possible afterwards if survivors are careless
It would be possible only if you drop chase with survivor having 2 stacks, then he needs to not look around and run into your drone. Otherwise it simply won't be possible to get claw trap outside of chase.
Everytime survivor runs into a claw trap, they can disarm it, which would mean removing that stack they already got. They don't need to look for it.
I can run into 5 drones on my search for hex totem and I will have 0 lock on, because everytime I can just run directly to it without crouching, because I have immunity after tag and disarm the drone -> back to 0.
Dropping chase before getting the trap, even on live, is kind of a waste of your time
and as you said, dropping chase with 2 stacks left is waste of time, so that's not an option....
You said you like creative drone placements, then why make it invalid and pointless? If I chase survivor into it, I don't need creative spots, just drop it into middle of the loop is good enough.
drone does do something against an injured survivor
That's what it does against survivor with claw trap, not as effect of placing the drone.
I don't really get why are you so attached to broken. You changes would make it simply impossible to get claw trap outside of chase, so that's useless there and you are not going to drop chase on survivor with clawtrap, so broken is also useless there. Unless you play every game against insta-heal, which I doubt.
Mending at least makes harder to see for survivors, so it kinda helps in chase and survivors can't just stand for infinite amount of time, so in chase Mending -> Broken.
I don't think I should keep just repeating myself, so I'll say these about one more time and then I think we'll just have to go our separate ways:
You shouldn't be getting random claw traps on survivors outside of chase, unless they're massively messing up and completely ignoring drones. That isn't something that'd be fair if it were reliable, you should have to put some kind of effort into getting claw traps onto survivors. It's possible, but as a hypothetical, like a head-pop on Pig: it's not meant to actually happen, it's meant to be a possibility that pushes players to act.
There's still a point to creative and hidden drone placements, which is that survivors will run more blindly into them in chase. Hiding traps is better than putting traps right in the middle of the loop where the survivor can see them from a mile away no matter which trap killer you're playing. Survivors have eyes, if the drone is obvious they'll be doing their best to avoid it. Plus, y'know, hitting survivors with random scans outside of chasing them is still good for you because it's information and Haste? It doesn't have to convert to a claw trap to be useful, you get those two things even if the drone is hacked straight away and the Lock On is removed.
Survivors being able to find and hack drones to clear Lock On is good, because it's a time investment away from generators and because it pushes the killer player to be less passive. This is due to it being less likely to win a war of attrition by relying on single scans at cheap loops, meaning you have to actually try. You, as a killer, can also deny them that possibility with your drone placements and with recalling, depending on how you want to play.
Broken is better than Deep Wound because it allows you to drop chase on a claw trapped survivor and have that actually matter. Deep Wound is a small time investment and makes a tiny difference in chase, sure, but Broken is both more powerful and more coherent with what she does. Getting scanned exposes your location, makes you vulnerable, and makes her more deadly. If you're claw trapped and Broken, you're at the mercy of a killer who knows where you are and can hide her terror radius. If you're claw trapped and just have Deep Wound, you can heal up safely and being claw trapped barely matters.
You still won't want to drop chase on claw trapped survivors either way, but with Broken, you can if it'd make sense and you'd be getting something out of doing so. With Deep Wound, you get next to nothing and dropping chase is something you cannot capitalise on later.
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@XenRedspike said:
Skull Merchant is fine, the playerbase is just a bunch of whiny brats that are going to cry and complain no matter what BHVR does. Skull Merchant was already fine pre-rework as it is, all BHVR needed to do was implement the anti 3-Gen mechanic to prevent braindead skilless Killer players from dragging on matches because they don't know how to play the game, which they did do. Aside from that, Skull Merchant always has been and still is fine. Players just love complaining about nothing instead of acknowledging their lack of skill and incompetence.
I've already acknowledged that Skull Merchant's hate is irrational and that these changes aren't in any way related to the way most of the playerbase talks about her, it's in the post.
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@UndeddJester said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/407645/addressing-the-skull-merchant
I actually posted something pretty similar. Though I do want her hindered effect gone in placed of getting her old claw traps back. This was something unique and interesting to SM.
A lot of the same points I tackle in my own thread, but to quickly address your points:
- Agreed - Though you need a mechanic to mitigate people juat running up and eating a scan, and immediately removing the stack they got. Survivors should always be trying to dodge beams.
- Fine, no complaints.
- Also Fine.
- I would opt to remove hindered and add deep wound as the penalty for getting scanned again, along with her old pallet break for a recently scanned survivor.
- I'm fine with this, though I would be more ring favour of a movement penalty recalling a hacked drone and have it take 2 seconds. Make the choice to grab it back meaningful. The fact you can remove a stack hacking a drone is plenty incentive to ha k a drone.
- I totally agree with this. I had the same idea.
- Fine no issues.
I also think SM needs her speed I'm chase relating to the survivor she's chasing, not some random goober stepping in a trap across map. The survivor in chase shouldn't be punished for something another teammate does unchallenged.
If you're interested here is my version:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/407609/skull-merchant-a-final-attempt
I did see your post halfway through making my own, and there's definitely some good stuff in there- it's where I got the idea for the Lock On turning red when you're scanned, that's a pretty genius idea! There are a few base assumptions that I disagree with in it, though, and I think I'll respond to points four and five here to get to some of my issues.
1: So, removing Hindered and giving her back pallet break. While I agree that her pallet break was a really neat and interesting part of her old kit, as I explained above in a response to someone else, I think that currently the best feature Skull Merchant has is the idea that single beams actually matter, and so everyone is trying to play around them. Survivors dodging them, killer trying to force them to run into it anyway, that's interactive gameplay and I think preserving that as her core identity is a good idea.
Without the Hindered, being scanned with a Claw Trap on isn't too threatening, especially when you're already Deep Wounded. However, I do have a bit of a compromise in mind: Currently, her Expired Batteries iridescent addon is kind of worthless, so maybe that could be what we have it do? Claw Traps no longer provide Hindered when scanned, but instead allow pallets to be broken when vaulted while they're active. Since it's an iridescent, we can keep them not breaking when that happens to make it a bit scarier.
2: I don't think this would be a bad thing necessarily, but I'm also of the opinion that cooldowns and slowdowns should both be considered very carefully. It's worth mentioning that old old Skull Merchant, the PTB version, had both of these features and it's part of what made her feel so awful and clunky. I'm somewhat hesitant to put them back, but this one in particular might be somewhat workable.
3: I'll also tackle the idea of SM's speed being based on just the survivor she's chasing- I get why this is frustrating, but it's only really being examined in SM's case because of how scrutinised she is in general. I would argue that it's far more frustrating for a teammate to feed Myers a ton of Stalk or Oni a ton of his blood, or for a teammate to waste all the Xeno turrets putting them in stupid places. These all impact your chase far far more than someone tripping a drone and giving her a little Haste, and they're all also basically fine imo.
It is a team game. At some point, your teammate's mistakes are going to affect you.
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@sizzlingmario4 said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672882#Comment_3672882
You do have a point about the first 2 scans not really being a threat in chase if the haste is gone, you’re right.
I just feel like the haste is a little too much for something that is passively obtained and for how often it’s active. Maybe it could be reduced a little instead of removing it entirely. The reason I wanted it to change doesn’t actually have anything to do with her having a bunch of status effects in her kit, I know that gets brought up sometimes but that by itself is not actually a good reason to change it.
No worries btw, I didn’t take your comment as being harsh or anything. I can be wordy sometimes too so I get it.
I don't personally think the Haste she gets just for one scanned survivor is all that much. It's definitely very, very noticeable when you start building up more than one, but how often does that even happen, realistically?
It's also definitely not passive, and I think that's where a lot of the arguments against Merchant are based, in this idea that she does just get to push a button and get Haste or that her drones passively cover an entire loop. The survivors need to be scanned in order for the bonuses to happen, and while that's strictly passive, it's not meaningfully so because the survivors have every opportunity to not run into the beams if the Merchant isn't doing anything to force it.
For her active effort with placement, timing, and zoning, she gets a moderate speed boost for twelve seconds. Personally, I think that's fair.
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@Devil_hit11 said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3673015#Comment_3673015
...So you just crouch walk everywhere, the whole game, just in case there's a hidden drone you wouldn't see coming somewhere on the map? That doesn't sound reasonable to me. Additionally, losing one Lock On stack for a hack is not a second chance, it's a reward for employing counterplay.
No. One of the skills required to defeat skull merchant is knowing when to crouch.
To the 3-gen thing: People have said this, and I suppose it's possible I'm missing something, but I just don't see how. Her power isn't an AOE so gens can be done while ignoring it, and survivors will only get scanned when they leave generators, which also isn't guaranteed to happen. Is there something I'm missing here?
The strength of skull merchant has always been the added risk of doing a generator in regards to 3 genning. The fact that drones do not detect you on gen is meaningless change in regard to a skull merchant that 3 gens from the start. That change punishes killer players that DO NOT 3 gen from the start. This makes killer 3 gen more because leaving their 3 gen becomes a risk
The gameplay that i describe in my post where I talk about purposely not hacking the drone then leaving a generator is where the strength of her 3 gen comes from. You leave the gen, you run into drone, you get 1 stack of lock-on. She leaves you alone. Pressures another gen, Survivor runs into drone, repeat x3 until survivor get claw trapped. Your encouraging this type of gameplay from skull merchant in order to use her lock-on system. Skull merchants that do not look for 3 gens and use her stealth to pressure the map are punished for leaving drones around the map because survivors acquire easy outlets to remove all lock-on stacks.
Solving the Lament Configuration, setting down flamethrower traps, grabbing EMPs, finding vaccine/first aid spray chests + opening them + using the item, these small timesinks all add up when combined with regular old pressure the killer's building.
Overrated mechanics that are at best minor inconvenience towards an experience team. Wesker First aid spray is probably strongest of the bunch however the mechanic got a sizable nerf because survivors can now hold the killer item and regular item. At best, it is mild corrupt intervention at the start of the game. Off-topic.
1: I've laid out a few times when the survivor wouldn't know, because the information they'd be using to gauge when to crouch would be hidden. Are you going to acknowledge that at all?
2: Okay, so, setting aside whether that actually works on live - though I don't see how that's any better than the killers who don't need to build stacks to begin with - my changes definitely don't encourage it.
Let's look at that scenario again, but assume my changes are in place. Survivors A and B are both working on a generator with a drone nearby, both sitting at zero stacks because the drone won't detect them while they're repairing. Skull Merchant approaches Survivor A, and chases them away from the generator, causing them to get a stack of Lock On in the process. She now leaves to go pressure Survivor B.
What happens next is that Survivor A returns to their generator, hacks the drone to remove their Lock On, and keeps repairing. Now, when Skull Merchant returns to harass them again, she has to replace the drone, meaning Survivor A gets to remain at zero stacks while running away-- and all the while, Survivor B is hacking their drone to remove their one stack.
These changes actually further weaken Skull Merchant's 3-gen capabilities. The way you'd end up playing to utilise Lock On most effectively is... exactly how you'd play her well now. Get the stacks in chase, and use smart drone placement ahead of time + good aim and prediction for lasertagging to make that as quick as possible. Encouraging the most skilful and most interaction-based gameplay is good, I'm sure you'll agree, and that's what this looks like.
3: You're falling into the recursive logic fallacy I like to call "no good survivors", here. The loop goes as follows: "That won't work against good survivors" -> "How are good survivors defined?" -> "The survivors that won't work against".
If that's the case, sure! All those mechanics are worthless against good survivors. You're not facing good survivors in this case, though, because those mechanics all provide small amounts of slowdown that build up in tandem with the pressure you build naturally, just like I said. Maybe there's a 1% of the playerbase who get to ignore it, somehow, but statistically facing those seems unlikely.
It's also not off topic, because it's the supporting evidence to my argument...?
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@Devil_hit11 said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672953#Comment_3672953
crouch walking beat every single possible drone location. The only question is knowing when to crouch walk vs when not to crouch walk. Frankly if you get scanned by a drone, you deserve to be punished, not given a near free second chance by disabling a drone.
You might feel encouraged, but again, I don't think that would actually be the more optimal way of playing her. It wouldn't actually be flat out encouraged, especially when Skull Merchant isn't considerably better than most other killers at doing that to begin with.
Skull merchant is still among best controlling tight 3 gens. It is single handy has made her one of the most despised killers. Your post is sugar coating the killer's capacities. That being said, I think the play-style is more what is disliked over the balance hence why d/c is still relatively common.
Skull Merchant's case you at least get a mini-Pig slowdown effect from that survivor going out of their way to find and hack a drone. Two, if they have two stacks and want to reset to zero.
slowdown effects that do not massively put the survivor in time deficiency are irrelevant. Pig is really only good game-delay power killer in the game. Everything else is moot towards a efficient team.
...So you just crouch walk everywhere, the whole game, just in case there's a hidden drone you wouldn't see coming somewhere on the map? That doesn't sound reasonable to me. Additionally, losing one Lock On stack for a hack is not a second chance, it's a reward for employing counterplay.
To the 3-gen thing: People have said this, and I suppose it's possible I'm missing something, but I just don't see how. Her power isn't an AOE so gens can be done while ignoring it, and survivors will only get scanned when they leave generators, which also isn't guaranteed to happen. Is there something I'm missing here?
To the last point: That's pretty obviously wrong, slowdown effects that don't put survivors at a massive time deficit are just a regular part of good killer gameplay. Anything that adds to the basekit amounts of slowdown the killer can generate is obviously pretty good, considering that basekit slowdown is usually enough if you're skilled, and Pig + Merchant aren't the only two in the game who have it.
Solving the Lament Configuration, setting down flamethrower traps, grabbing EMPs, finding vaccine/first aid spray chests + opening them + using the item, these small timesinks all add up when combined with regular old pressure the killer's building.
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@Devil_hit11 said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672769#Comment_3672769
If getting scanned outside of chase was always 100% avoidable and the survivor's fault, sure, but there is currently skill expression in her kit that allows for that not being the case. I don't want that taken away, so I want it to be something you have to actively capitalise on instead.
Getting scanned outside of chase is 100% avoidable in every single situation. There is only one situation where I ever scanned outside of chase. This is where there is a drone near gen and I am purposely not hacking the drone in order to reveal my position to skull merchant because I do not want skull merchant to gain surveillance on my generator.
In that particular case, I am purposely taking a risk to not disable drone with the risk that skull merchant might show up to my generator and push me off generator thereby setting the drone off where you are forced to walk through laser.
Every other case, Survivor can easily cheese every single drone using 3rd person camera. There is no skill-cap to placing drones vs organized SWF OR a compendent high mmr solo player.
Though, I don't think this change would encourage 3-genning at all, especially since SM can't really do that all that well anymore. What it'd encourage is committing to getting three scans in a chase, which isn't the worst thing in the world. Maybe add some kind of grace period where if they get a scan in chase they can't remove it for a while, or maybe they can't remove it while they're shown on SM's scanner, but that part feels like it might be over-complicated.
It would encourage me to 3 gen every game as skull merchant because split pressure would be unrewarding as every survivor might as well have 0 lock-on stacks entire trial. You might as well just reduce drone count from 6 ->1. The only way split lock-on stacking would be effective is if skull merchant places drones and guards them which is only possible in a 3 gen.
That's why I prefer a tell over a cooldown. I'd like both sides to be able to express their skill, and while you can keep track of a drone's rotation by looking at it constantly, I'd like to make that slightly easier to do. Most survivors don't bother even looking behind them in chase, so this won't affect too many players, and the players it does affect get a more dynamic back-and-forth.
Exactly, It won't affect 99% of survivor players but may affect chase times vs top 1%. Why would a killer need a nerf vs top 1% which is where most killer struggle against over 99%. Killer need to be more viable vs 1%, not less viable.
What it'd encourage is committing to getting three scans in a chase, which isn't the worst thing in the world.
I like being able to pick the correct chases and play my macro game effectively, Freedom is the spice of the game. While I am not opposed to killers having specific strengths in a particular strategy, I like being able to win in multiple ways without feeling that I am pigeon held in a particular gameplay style. Survivors controlling my power efficacy is large negative in fun factor.
These seem like you're agreeing with me? Those are good reasons to remove the Deep Wound.
Deep wound is strong for 3 gen play-styles because it makes healing take longer. Not dealing with dead hard is great. I would not be opposed towards removing deep wound. At the same time I don't have problems playing vs it as survivor.
1: It isn't, though. I already laid out the scenarios where it isn't 100% avoidable from the survivor side. The main tell for a drone that can't be outright seen hovering in the air straight away is the ring that spawns on the ground, showing you the radius of the drone. If the drone is a little bit higher in elevation than everything around it, though, that ring attempts to project onto the air, and thus just isn't visible.
This makes some drone placements quite hard to reliably spot before you're in a position to be scanned by them. Again, this is a good thing overall, but because scans outside of chase should be 100% avoidable anyway, that means there should really be a way of removing the scans you get when the killer isn't on you to capitalise. If you've got an idea for that beyond tying it to hacking drones, of course, I'm open to hearing it.
2: You might feel encouraged, but again, I don't think that would actually be the more optimal way of playing her. It wouldn't actually be flat out encouraged, especially when Skull Merchant isn't considerably better than most other killers at doing that to begin with.
The question I always have here is, why are survivors walking around with a single Lock On stack outside of chase anyway? You'd have to have dropped chase on someone who you'd built up stacks on for that to happen, and in that case-- well, in that case you're already making the decision to commit to something else, most killers have to give up some power for that, but in Skull Merchant's case you at least get a mini-Pig slowdown effect from that survivor going out of their way to find and hack a drone. Two, if they have two stacks and want to reset to zero.
3: I think giving aware and competent players (on either side) more room to make informed decisions is generally a good thing unless the information is supposed to be hidden, like a stealth killer's whereabouts. You can already see this effect in motion, so I would argue you're supposed to be able to know that it's happening. Giving players another small indicator would only be a nice QoL effect.
4: Yeah, not sure what there is to really say to this one. That's nice? It's still healthier for survivors to have ways to remove Lock On if they either successfully evaded the killer, or the killer dropped chase on them. My pitch is something that the killer gets to benefit from too, so it's not just survivors being in control of your power's effectiveness-- and it isn't that at all, also, you would still be just as much in control as you are on live, there's just another layer of decisionmaking if you decide to break chase.
Survivors can already hack drones, which already actually mitigates your power's effectiveness for any drone you placed ahead of time. That concept may not always be strictly the most fun, but it is sometimes necessary.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672887#Comment_3672887
Of course it'd be possible
Right now it's possible against survivors who just don't watch where they are running. Shouldn't happen often, but it does.
If they could remove lock on, it's possible to get claw trap outside of chase only against survivors who have no idea how Skully works, which is just pathetic waste of time.
Of course there's a point to doing it: Chase survivors into it
This also means you can use drones only on loops with no objective, because if you have it anywhere near gens, then it's just lock-on removal station. Well, some of best loops usually have gens around them, so it doesn't really work.
Chase survivors into it.
Decent survivors choose their pathing, your options to change it are limited as base speed killer.
That's a full half of Plague's identity
Why exactly she needs to have anything common with Plague? That's part we got after rework, so you can't even argue about some original identity.
The Mend action does not take that much time
mending + healing and you can see their location whole time. Better than just doing gens imo.
Deathslinger would be
Merchant is way better than Deathslinger for using Mending properly. She is quite good hit&run killer. He is far from it.
she has a lot more going for her and none of it requires Deep Wounds.
Same goes for Broken.... Deep wounds is needed so drones are not completely useless against injured survivors.
Broken is not needed for anything. You could easily make it so claw trap always make you injured in deep wound. That's it. There is no IF.
1: And it'd be possible afterwards if survivors are careless. What it wouldn't be is guaranteed for any player that knows the right trap spots, and it probably shouldn't be. If Merchant actually got random free injures across the map, people's complaints about her being skill-less would be more accurate.
2: That's where drones go...? You put them between objectives and in key loops, that's where they go. They're not really doing much for you if you put them directly on a generator, they don't work like that anymore.
3: Zoning survivors (the default killer concept, not a power thing) is a skill. Trap killers need to be able to influence the direction of the chase to some degree, or cover their bases by picking multiple spots skilled survivors would want to run to place their traps in.
4: She doesn't. That was an example, not a direct comparison.
5: Marginally, and after that small amount of time, they're back on gens anyway but they're healthy. Them being on gens injured is better than them being on gens healthy, especially if you can see them the whole time either way.
6: A fair point, but Deathslinger is still designed around it more than she is, it's to make up for the fact that he has to invest time into every hit due to the reeling mechanic. Merchant doesn't need it to make up for anything, because of point seven here.
7: That's the thing, a drone does do something against an injured survivor, I said this in the post. Even setting aside Broken, it provides you with Hindered, making the down significantly easier. The Deep Wound honestly isn't doing anything, especially without Broken, that you wouldn't get anyway.
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@VomitMommy said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672808#Comment_3672808
should it be possible to get claw traps outside of chase
yes
should it be easy? no
survivors need to screw it, or you need to place drone in unexpected angle. Your changes make this impossible.
There would be absolutely no reason to have drones around the map. You would be able to use them only for stealth (recall asap) and in chase. Which seems really boring to me.
I like those crazy drone placements
Well, there is no point in doing it when survivor can remove lock on by disarming. You don't even need to crouch to disarm them, you can just run towards them, take a lock on and then just remove it by disarm. Super brain dead.
that at least makes dropping chase after the claw trap worth it
How so? Only thing broken survivor can do is work on gen.
Dropping chase before getting the trap, even on live, is kind of a waste of your time
not if you have STBFL
If all you got was an injure and Deep Wound, there'd be almost no benefit to ever dropping chase
You already never drop the chase on survivor with claw trap, simply because you are one tag away from Hindered.
Issue is survivors who get injured outside of chase, which are mostly new players. Deep wound is just small slowdown for Skully, but it won't stop them from healing. New players are not good at playing injured, so broken is massive noob stomper for this.
For Skully broken doesn't mean that much, even if it would be deep wound, you still have information on that survivor with claw trap, so you would be able to get there in time to stop them from healing.
In order:
1: Of course it'd be possible, it would just require survivors to ignore their stacks. That doesn't change with my proposed adjustments to her power, that part remains the same, so it's just placing drones in unexpected angles. The thing about that one is that you see when they take that stack, which means bare minimum they're setting themselves up for a chase.
The part I think a lot of people miss is that hacking drones removing Lock On stacks only penalises setting drones down ahead of time if people are running around with Lock On stacks outside of chase. That isn't something that should actually happen, and if you do drop chase on someone with Lock On stacks, at least you know they're probably staying off generators to go find and hack a drone... which you know about, so they're not exactly safe in this scenario.
2: Of course there's a point to doing it: Chase survivors into it. Actually be there and capitalise on the fact that you surprised a survivor with an unexpected angle. Bare minimum, if they run to the drone and disarm it, they're spending time doing that instead of generators, but even so- they're traps, you should actually be there to act when they're sprung.
Also, if it happens multiple times, each hack is only one stack removed. It'd take time to get two gone, meaning you can ambush them for the third, especially if you are dropping chase on survivors with Lock On stacks for whatever reason.
3: They're injured, and you have stealth. Forcing them to not heal makes them vulnerable for later, or forces them to play much more cautiously, which slows down their efficiency.
4: I have no idea how STBFL would change this, but even if it does, that's one perk you may or may not have. I don't think it's super relevant to this conversation?
5: I agree that Broken is more effective against newer players, but I don't agree that this should mean we can't put it on a killer's basekit. That's a full half of Plague's identity, and while Plague doesn't have stealth by default it's hardly as though that makes a ton of difference against newer players and it's not as though she can't have stealth.
As for never dropping chase against claw trapped survivors, sure, you probably don't want to. With Broken, at least you know you could and have something to capitalise on later. The Mend action does not take that much time, it isn't all that useful for you and Merchant isn't really designed around it the way someone like Legion or Deathslinger would be. She has a lot more going for her and none of it requires Deep Wounds.
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@sizzlingmario4 said:
While I agree there needs to be a way to remove Lock On without surviving a claw trap, I don’t think tying it to drone hacking is the best way to do it since that would heavily discourage setting up drones outside of chase. If anything I feel like placing drones outside of chase should be encouraged more than just placing drones mid-chase. Placing drones mid-chase feels too easy and doesn’t have enough drawbacks since she isn’t slowed down at all for doing it unlike a lot of other killers with similar abilities (eg. Artist placing a crow) and drones initialize very quickly after being placed so survivors often don’t have any time to react to drone placement. I'm not saying she necessarily should get slowed down for it (that may feel too clunky at this point), but making drones take slightly longer to initialize after being placed may give survivors a little more counterplay.
As for lock-on removal, I think a better idea for it that wouldn't discourage setting up drones ahead of time would just be reverting it to a timer-based system like it was originally. For example, let’s go back to the old lock-on visual with the circular gauge on the survivor’s portrait (what used to take 10 seconds to fill up in active zones) but rework it a bit:
-Getting scanned once (or failing a drone hack) fills up the gauge by 40%. So after 3 scans it will be full and the survivor gets a claw trap/becomes broken.
-After getting scanned, lock on doesn’t regress for up to 30 seconds (this timer resets if scanned again).
-After that 30 seconds of not being scanned, lock on will regress at 1% per second. So if you get scanned once and then never again, lock on would be back to zero after 70 seconds. 2 scans would be fully removed after 110 seconds.
The numbers on this system could be tweaked but this is a starting point at least. Since there’s a 30 second delay on regression, you can still get a survivor claw trapped with 3 scans if you are actively chasing them. Making the per-scan amount 40% means you still need at least 3 scans to get a claw trap, but adds a bit more leeway for the Skull Merchant since you can lose up to 20% to regression without needing a 4th scan to make up for it.
As for her having a lot of status effects in her kit, the deep wound isn’t what bothers me at all. I feel it’s an appropriate penalty for getting a claw trap while already injured. What I think needs to go is her haste status. It’s too frequent and too easy to get for how strong haste is in general and it just doesn’t feel necessary anymore, it feels like the only reason it exists is because it’s a leftover from her old power. Furthermore if this is removed then it adds an additional reason why the deep wound should stay since otherwise without the haste it may become a good idea for injured survivors with 2 scans to just intentionally take a claw trap to get rid of their lock on faster, if they know the Skull Merchant is busy or won’t be interested in chasing them. So being forced to mend in that situation would add a necessary drawback to that strategy imo.
-Removed the Haste status effect from the Skull Merchant's basekit.
In return for removing haste and adding lock-on regression, I feel the following buffs would be appropriate:
-Tracking duration when being scanned without getting a claw trap is increased from 12 seconds to 15 seconds.
-Claw Trap battery life (and the associated Broken effect) is increased from 45 seconds to 60 seconds.
-The Hindered effect on claw trapped survivors is increased from 10% to 12%. This is intended to partially make up for removing the haste effect, to make this less of a nerf when chasing a claw-trapped survivor and to keep claw traps rewarding for the killer.
I agree with your suggestions for making drone rotation more obvious to survivors when switching the direction and in regards to overlapping drones. Your suggestion for drone rotation was perfect imo:
-Drones now make a beep sound when their rotation direction is switched.
As for overlapping drones, the current drone radius is 10 meters and the minimum distance between 2 drones is 12 meters. I think this would work:
-Increased the minimum distance between 2 drones from 12m to 18m.
This doesn't eliminate drone overlapping entirely but makes it less common and significantly reduces the amount of drone area that can overlap, without restricting drone placement as much as the original Skull Merchant (old Skull Merchant had a 22 meter minimum distance between drones).
Regarding how long drones stay hacked: I agree the current 45 seconds is too short and doesn't feel impactful enough (hacking often feels like a waste of time as survivor), but I also feel your suggestion of 90 seconds may be too long. I would try something around 60-70 seconds.
Then finally a few adjustments for addons:
-High-Current Upgrade: Removing the haste from the basekit is a significant nerf to an already not very good addon, so it should be buffed to increase tracking duration by 3 seconds (was 1 second).
-Vital Targeting Processor: This is one of her best addons and the above changes make a large portion of it basekit, so I feel it should get a new effect. New effect: Increases the delay after being scanned before lock-on begins to regress by 20%.
-Expired Batteries: I don't have an idea for this addon right now but since the haste is gone from her basekit this addon needs a new effect.
My issue with this list of changes is that it kind of guts everything that makes Skull Merchant who she is, and also what makes her actually better than similar killers.
With your Lock On changes, she now can't build up stacks over time, instead of it being possible if survivors neglect to manage their new secondary objective. With my changes, she becomes a killer with a small amount of built-in slowdown; if you're somehow in a position where someone's running around with one or two stacks and you're not in chase with them (which shouldn't really be happening anyway, but real games are messy, fair enough), you can leverage one of two things. They're either ignoring those stacks, which you can capitalise on later for a shorter chase, or they're finding and hacking a drone, which keeps them off generators for a bit longer.
With your changes, she needs to commit way harder to every individual chase, which actually reduces the potency of setting drones up ahead of time. She has to get her scans in that chase, and any drone she set down earlier could be hacked, so she might as well keep them on hand to force stacks however she can mid-chase.
There's also drones taking longer to arm, which removes part of her skill ceiling in an attempt to fix something that isn't currently broken. Survivors only don't have time to react if the Skull Merchant hits them dead-on with the beam, something that takes good aim and good timing. Otherwise, the beam just starts rotating, and they absolutely have time to react to that.
Moving onto the removal of Haste, that just makes the drones completely non-threatening until the third stack onwards. There's absolutely zero incentive to play around the beams and dodge individual scans if they just don't do anything beyond let the Skull Merchant see you on her scanner, meaning that the entire mechanical depth of that minigame is - at best - cut down to a third of the importance it had before. In my opinion, that is Skull Merchant's identity as a killer, especially from the survivor side of things, and I am extremely opposed to it being removed. Dodging beams is the thing that sets her apart from other killers, and making that basically unnecessary for a majority of the match isn't a good direction to go in.
Which sort of brings me to the big overall complaint, which is... what exactly do her drones do after all these changes? She gets barely anything for individual scans, so she's now building towards a ranged injure and a worse Clown slow. The Broken would help set her apart from other killers in this regard, but she's still gone from a comparable jack of all trades to just being flat worse without much in the way of an identity or appeal.
She gets Hindered in chase, but it's worse than Clown's and takes far far longer to actually affect anyone.
She gets Broken on survivors, but it's on a timer, and it takes longer to build up than Plague's without any of the potential passive gain via infecting generators and other objects.
She gets stealth, but it's also on a timer, so she's not a good pick for a pure stealth killer either.
Right now, she has an edge over those other killers because of individual scans affecting the flow of a chase, and that effect pushing both parties to play around each beam as though it's individually important, because it is. This is both a purely mechanical advantage, and also an experiential one, because actually playing as and against her feels very different from playing as and against those other killers due to playing around individual beams.
(Hypothetically, anyway. I know survivors mostly give up against her, but we're talking about the overall idea rather than the grim reality.)
Sure, keeping the Deep Wound makes sense if we're cutting out much more important parts of her identity and making her worse in the process, but I don't agree with that direction, somewhat obviously. I don't mean to come down on you too hard here, I'm just chronically wordy and passionate, so it comes out this way sometimes.
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@Rulebreaker said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672815#Comment_3672815
Ahh we thought it was per claw trap. Fair enough reason, though we're kinda opposed on a principle level. Or to elaborate we're opposed to it being completely obvious to the survivor that they're being tracked. If its something to show survivors that they can be tracked and not currently being tracked, which is what we thought you meant, then we're more ok with such.
We saw you gave and example but (to us atleast) the beams seem kinda obvious to us. If you think such an add on would be useful by all means, but thats our two cents on the matter. Also whats "lasertag" (its been a long day for us, we're to tired to deep dive atm)
For lasertagging - it's when you set a drone down with the express intention of tagging someone straight in front of you with a Lock On stack.
The beam always starts facing directly forward from where you placed it, and it only takes less than a second to arm, so in some scenarios you can use it almost like Xeno's tail to quickly hit someone directly in front of you. It's hard because the margin for error is small, and because there's no visual feedback for how far off you were, making practising a little tough.
I don't think this hypothetical addon would be picked much, but it'd be nice to have it available for anyone who wants a little feedback on spacing and timing. Kinda like Nurse's training wheels addon- probably not picked that much, especially not among more skilled players, but it's nice that it's there.
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@Ohyakno said:
https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/discussion/comment/3672756#Comment_3672756
"Unhealthy" is an impossible to define term used as a catchall for "thing I don't like". It doesn't mean anything.
Would SM be unplayable after these nerfs? Of course not. She'd still be better than trapper. The salient question is whether a B tier killer needs nerfs because people just don't like her, for the sake of folks seeing her less. The answer is obviously no.
"Unhealthy" is a word without an objective definition, but that doesn't make it impossible to define. For this purpose, I would consider anything that allows for subverting skill expression or interaction to be unhealthy; I like the skill expression of hiding drones to surprise survivors, but I think that getting to benefit from that crossmap with no further interaction or expression is unhealthy.
Granted, you still get a speed boost even with my proposed changes, but I think that's a fair tradeoff for the amount of effort you put in. If you want more than that, you should have to react and engage with that survivor.
For another example, I think showing survivors when SM can see them is healthy because it promotes actual gameplay reactions to her power. Skull Merchant doesn't get to blindside someone who didn't know she moves faster, the survivor doesn't get to actually avoid the fact that she moves faster, they both play around that fact.
You're welcome to disagree, but I'd ask you not to state or imply that my suggestions are just "for the sake of people seeing her less". I've given my reasons, and they aren't that.
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@Rulebreaker said:
- We agree. We don't really have anything meaningful to add.
- We don't really have much of a opinion on this. We've seen 1 merchant trying to spam switch and that was in a kyf and didn't do much if anything.
- We believe that it should only be big enough for a survivor to be able to run through (the circles don't cross), but that's our thoughts. From what little we've seen though it looks to be ok currently.
- We think that the deep wounds is to be a semi counter to things like DH while procing things like MFT and add Abit more punishment for getting scanned while injured. We wouldn't see it as a problem if the stacks could be removed but either way we agree deep wounds could be removed and wouldn't affect much.
- We'd be ok with increasing the timer but don't think changing the color would do anything. Nice little qol though. We're not sure if 90 seconds is the number though, maybe 60-70 but a whole gens worth of time is abit much to our tastes.
- We disagree. Survivors shouldn't need more info on when she's tracking someone. 1 to add suspense and 2 unless we're mistaken, claw traps are applied to 3 scans which is on the hud.
- We wouldn't know where to begin in creating a training add on.
Appreciate the feedback!
To tackle the last two points, which are the ones that seem the most constructive to talk about-- while the claw traps are only applied on 3 scans, what I'm talking about is when you're shown as a little white dot on her scanner, which is what gives her Haste. That happens for 12 seconds after every scan, not just the third one, and while people who know that can count it in their heads, I think a visual aid for people who don't know it would be useful. Both to help them learn how long it lasts without needing to look it up on the wiki, and also to maybe show some newer players not to hide because there's a big red symbol on their HUD.
That last part might be wishful thinking, but y'know.
For the last part, I gave an example! Show the beams in white for a few seconds after placing a drone, to give visual feedback on whether you've aimed it correctly. Mostly useful for learning how to "lasertag", as Pixel Bush calls it, but specific placements can be tricky in general so it'd be a nice little QoL effect.