Balancing Around Kill Rate Doesn't Work
It's easy to look at the most recent stats and say that things are imbalanced in favor of killers, but I think they actually reflect other problems:
1) The red rank statistics show the disparity in ranking up between survivors and killers. When the developers implemented the most recent iteration of the emblem system, there was outcry among survivors that it was too difficult to rank up. In response, the requirements to earn certain emblem tiers was lowered for survivors but not for killers. Consequently, this means that in order for a killer to stay in red ranks, their skill has to be greater than survivors in those ranks, because the killer emblem system is inherently more punitive for bad play at those ranks. Simply put, it is easier for survivors to reach (and stay) at red ranks while it is an order of magnitude more difficult for killers, so it's obvious that the killers who are able to stay there would display a higher kill rate, because such a kill rate is required.
2) Piggybacking off point number one, these statistics show (at least to me) that there is a strong disparity in the overall skill level of survivors. If these kill rates represent the mean, then the difference between the mean and the (apparently) outlier high-level survivors is quite large. Upon reflection, I think this skill gap is pretty discernible, at least on my part. Between playing the game myself and watching other streamers/YouTube content, I probably take in anywhere from 30-35 matches a day (I know, I'm lame) and this phenomenon, in my experience, is quite observable.
3) Balancing the game around kill rates is inherently flawed. Survivors can die and rank up. Killers can kill four people and depip. If you're going to have a ranking system, and more importantly if you have any aspirations of this game being competitive, then balancing the game around ranking is the only true metric to measure success. If you really want to have a 50/50 balance, then you have to tune the game in such a way that a killer/survivor pips in 50 percent of matches. I wouldn't go so far as to say that you should make that curve linear, though. You probably don't want to scale it in such a way that a killer/survivor has a 25 percent chance of two-pipping in matches. Personally, I would suggest that two-pipping should occur around 10-15 percent of the time in order to truly reward exceptional level play.
Comments
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How did you get to such conclusions?
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Your title got me interested in, but rest is just your opinions about irrelevant stuff with contradicting statements presented like they are based on the stats.
1-2. How could you ever draw any of the conclusions from just kill rates. Skill levels? Really? How do you read it from just killers and percentages? We don't even know how many matches against SWF which could include many ranks. Or mori, key usage in the included matches. There are just too many unknown variables to makes these conclusions.
.3.you just contradict yourself in this one. You are basically saying kill rate doesn't mean ranking up or down. Doesn't guarantee pips, therefore doesn't effect the rank. Then say they should change the already existing non kill depended system, into.. Into what exactly? Giving prop pips for just joining game.
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It's cool. We can disagree. I think the argument at it's core hinges on these things:
1) Escape rate for survivors is not a measure of their overall success. You can do a lot to help your team (gens, unhooks, chases) and still die, which is why the game rewards you post-match with a pip. Survivors can also escape and depip because they didn't do anything helpful in the match. So that's why I think it's a little disingenuous to look at kill rates and say that the game is unfairly balanced toward killers.
2) Conversely, kill rates actually matter more for killers at red ranks. It is extremely rare to get two kills and receive anything other than a safety pip. It doesn't matter how well you do in your emblem categories. The only chance you have at pipping is by killing three survivors in all but the most extreme of edge cases. But even if you get four kills, you can still depip because emblem categories, while not overtly helping you, can absolutely hurt you. So not only do you have to get as many kills as possible, you have to get them in a certain way whereas survivors can just play the game (gens, unhooks, chases) as normal and get rewarded.
3) The above two points are exactly why the numbers are skewed. Killers at red ranks have to focus on getting as many kills as possible while still following them emblem rules in order to rank up, whereas survivors can rest easy in the fact that they can still die and rank up (or stay at Rank 1). The pressure is unfairly distributed to the killer. Simply put, the killers who get to Rank 1 and stay there are typically the most skilled, but you can make Rank 1 as a survivor and still have a wider skill gap compared to other Rank 1 survivors.
So what I'm saying is that the ranking system needs be more balanced on its own (or totally reworked) and that the game should be balanced around that ranking system rather than kill/survival rates because, as you have astutely noted, there are so many factors that can leads to kills/escapes that really aren't indicative of player skill.
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Gotta' chime in here; #1 is not true. There are also statistics on the amount of people ranking up on each side. The percentage was significantly lower on the survivor side when the emblem system first came out. These days it's much closer to what it should be.
That would also invalidate #2, although it's pretty nebulous to say in the first place since different killers earn emblems at different rates. The Legion, for example, gets a ton of chaser score because of their fast first hits and multiple chases. Meanwhile killers like the Plague, Hillbilly, etc. only hit survivors once to down them, meaning they lose out on a lot of chaser score, making them harder to rank. If it was just a matter of emblems, a killer like the Legion would be doing much worse as some of the people playing them would rank up further than they should and drag down the kill rates.
Anyway, long story short, we actually don't balance around kill rates alone. Kill rates are just one of the many things that might show us where a problem could be, but we do our research first.
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Any chance killers like Plague or Billy will have their power count for emblems? Plague's sickness damage and Corrupt Purge don't appear to count for emblems, and bringing a survivor from Healthy to Downed in one hit like with Billy's Chainsaw should count for two hits in Malicious. Makes ranking up and getting Adepts as these killers nearly impossible when using their power, I only got Adept Plague by completely ignoring her power altogether.
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Hey man. Thanks for clarifying. I'm totally cool with being wrong about ranking up if that's what the data says. Do you have any insight as to why killers feel like it's harder for them to rank up compared to survivors? I play both sides and it certainly feels that way to me. Is there something we are missing about gameplay on the killer side that we should be focusing on in terms of ranking up?
It's cool that you guys balance the game around other factors besides kill rates. I think it would be nice to see some of that data, though. Releasing only the kill rates sort of creates a narrative (game is imbalanced in favor of killers) that maybe isn't true if we had all of the information, since the message I'm getting from you is that the game is in a relatively balanced state from the developers' perspective.
Thanks again for the information!
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The real reason why statistics mean nothing is because:
- Most players are bad even on red ranks
- the only thing that matters is a full group of the best players playing as good as humans could vs a killer player that plays as well as a human could.
Then play multiple matches for each killer on each map (gotta get a big sample size because of random spawns etc.) and that in a lan environment because internet can ######### up stuff too.
Also compare no items vs no addons and best items vs best addons.
I know this is pretty much impossible to do but the least you can do is take 5 very good players and you will see that the results wouldnt match the statistics at all. Its funny how people think beeing rank 1 makes you any good. You meet so many potatoes on rank 1 as well and that dosent even count that most players dont play seriously or the people who try to ruin your game on purpose or just dc.
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That would be the end goal, although it would need to be looked at separately for each killer so it would likely take a lot of work, so it's hard to squeeze it in.
A lot of it comes down to perception. As the killer, it's just you. You make a mistake, you're going to feel it. As a survivor, you've got three other people watching your back. You make a mistake, they're there to help you. Survivor can be a mixed bag, though. Sometimes you get a string of good teammates that do generators and work together well, other times you get stuck with people who hide in lockers for 30 seconds any time someone is hooked and self care in a corner. There's the good and the bad, and it averages out.
As for the rest, there's far too much data to just dump all at once.
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Since you already seem to have the numbers for this particular data in your hands, can you provide us with the following?:
At Rank 2-4, % of Survivors who are able to still pip up despite dying (losing).
At Rank 2-4, % of each specific types of Killers who are able to still pip up despite having only 0-1 kill (losing).
At Rank 2-4, % of Survivors who lost pip despite surviving (winning.)
At Rank 2-4, % of each types of Killers who lost pip despite having 3-4 kills (winning.)
And you also stated that "these days it's much closer to what it should be." What is that, exactly? What is it supposed to be?
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