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Decisive Strike is a symptom of a much deeper design problem
No one likes to be tunneled. It is not fun to killed within the first 5 minutes of a game because you were farmed off the hook by potatoes, or just got unlucky enough to be the killer's designated target. But tunneling is fundamentally the best decision a killer can choose to make if they want to win the game.
3 survivors are obviously a lot easier to deal with than 4. And with gen speeds being what they are most killers, especially those who struggle in chases, cannot afford to let survivors live longer than they have to. Please do not misinterpret this as killer main rhetoric:
I am not saying that tunneling doesn't make the survivor experience unenjoyable.
I am saying that killers are encouraged to tunnel because of the objective advantage it gives them.
Thus, we have a very serious design flaw in this asymmetric game. The most beneficial action for one side, completely ruins the experience of the other. This is where DS comes in.
Originally just a straight-up free escape, it has since been toned down to activate for 60 seconds after getting unhooked. It now acts as one of the strongest survivor perks in the game.
Why?
It's not just because it slows down the killer's most effective way to win a game. It gives a safety net that catches a survivor no matter if the killer was actually tunneling or not. They could have someone saved right in their face, down the savior and hook them, only to see the person previously on the hook attempt a save and grab them, and then be stunned.
Since DS can only have its timer activate 2 times per game survivors are highly encouraged to play aggressively, giving bad survivors a free escape if they accidentally run into the killer, and good survivors 60 seconds of what is existentially invincibility, by exploiting lockers and grabs.
Slugging doesn't help in the slightest, since Unbreakable exists. And make no mistake, eating the stun is an option. But all that does is encourage the killer to go after the person who just stunned them since they know that person no longer has DS, while the rest of their team still might.
The end result of this, a perk designed to stop tunneling, is just encouraging the killer to tunnel more. It rewards bad survivors for messing up, gives good survivors temporary god-status, and doesn't even solve the actual problem with tunneling still being the most viable way to play killer. It's a old band-aid that doesn't even fully cover the wound it was meant to heal. A noticeable pattern looking at dbd's design decisions.
TL;DR: Tunneling is a fundamental issue with how dbd is designed and DS only punishes killers for playing well while not actually making tunneling non-viable.
Comments
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Fantastic analysis. If you want to stop tunneling, make it not optimal to do! My DbD balancing dream might be a strong trial warmup mechanic so I could actually exert pressure before gens gain substantial progress. On top of this, a dramatic speed-up to gen repair speeds, but the first time you hook a survivor it permenantly and dramatically damages their ability to repair. So there's an actual tactical decision between 'hook diversely to slow gens' vs 'rush a kill'. Currently, rush a kill is the ideal choice.
Alternatively, recently hooked survivors could suffer slower repair speeds and possibly be given another objective, meaning you counter gen pressure more by not tunneling someone out.
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"disabled" sound like a lot of work that devs wouldnt be paid for. A dorito dlc is a lot better fix.
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This seems like a possible solution, reducing the overall gen times but making hooks against different survivors slow repairs.
Perhaps this idea could be tested on the PTB at some point?
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I think the small rework they did to DS was a step in the right direction, however I think the power it provides is still frustrating in specific scenarios. I'll use a recent game as an example for this.
I just had a game where survivors were very efficiently completing gens to the point I had to pick my targets and chases very carefully. I decided my best strat would be to heavily punish unhooks when they went for them, as trying to overly protect my gens would cost me time I couldn't afford to lose. I did not tunnel, in fact I went out of my way to always go for the unhooker even though it would be easier to down and hook the person who just got saved. I did this for a majority of the game while also applying pressure to gens, but as fate would have it the gens get done and everybody is still alive. I protected the exit gates fairly well, gave everybody plenty of chase time, and injured them all before the gates inevitably got opened. It was looking real bad for me so I decided to just down the survivor most recently saved from a hook and leave the game with a 1k, at least it's something. You can see where this is going.
I chase everybody else out of the gates, go to pick up the last survivor, I get DS'd. Everybody gets out scott free, and the "ggwps" go out in chat as I rank down from something that was out of my control, even though I played "fairly" and relatively well.
Bottom line is, I understand this is supposed to be an anti tunnel perk, but the thing is it always finds a way to ######### you over even if you're not tunneling. I think they should take another look at it and try and figure something out, because it's NOT fun to deal with.
TL;DR: Had a game where I went out of my way to not tunnel, downed a recently hooked survivor as the 3 others escaped and was hit with a DS, resulting in a 0k instead of a 1k. Absolutely great "anti tunnel" perk.
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Devs have stated DS is an "anti momentum perk", antitunnel is idealogical spin by the community to defend it.
Of course, even BHVR's statement is kind of busted, because killers live and die on momentum; they start the game on the back foot with 4 survivors splitting on different gens, and tend to swiftly lose if they get stalled for any length of time.
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Something like this would be great. Currently the way things are, by the time you down your first survivor, two gens pop, and that's if you actually did pretty well and ended the chase relatively fast. So now survivors have 2/5 of their objectives done, while you're only 1/12 of the way there. It makes you want to take shortcuts, like killing a survivor early or slugging everyone.
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I agree, but not getting into a locker. Otherwise you can still get tunneled easily, but just get slugged. It should get canceled if you touch a gen, or heal yourself/another survivor, or if another survivor gets hooked.
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the problem with it disabling if another person is hooked is that its easily manipulated. its not hard to down someone doing a 1 for 1 and hooking the unhooker then rehooking the ds person for free. they were still technically tunneled and therefore would have 0 defense against it
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Make it so that the perk will not be deactivated when downed, which also counters slugging against DS
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"But tunneling is fundamentally the best decision a killer can choose to make if they want to win the game."
False - you can win this game (IE: pip up) without killing ANYONE in a match if you play well. The circumstances in which Killers NEED to tunnel are very limited, yet it is abused almost every match starting with the first survivor.
"3 survivors are obviously a lot easier to deal with than 4. And with gen speeds being what they are most killers, especially those who struggle in chases, cannot afford to let survivors live longer than they have to."
This is a 4 v 1 game. If you cannot play against 4 people, then go play something else. No one deserves to have their game ruined because a Killer finds that fourth person to be too cumbersome to allow them to play the same. Gens have never been slower or easier to get to than they are RIGHT NOW for Killers.
"Thus, we have a very serious design flaw in this asymmetric game. The most beneficial action for one side, completely ruins the experience of the other."
This is true. Tunneling is a huge problem and the allowance of it is a design flaw. This current event is a prime example why.
"It gives a safety net that catches a survivor no matter if the killer was actually tunneling or not."
And? This is exactly how this perk was INTENDED to work.
"Since DS can only have its timer activate 2 times per game survivors are highly encouraged to play aggressively, giving bad survivors a free escape if they accidentally run into the killer, and good survivors 60 seconds of what is existentially invincibility, by exploiting lockers and grabs."
DS only works 1 time per match. And yes, it states literally ON the perk itself "There's nothing to be afraid of"...it's intended to allow survivors to play bold for 60 seconds. Whether they are good or bad. It also is not "invincibility"...it's a 5 second stun that elongates a chase, AT BEST.
"Slugging doesn't help in the slightest, since Unbreakable exists."
Unbreakable is not that common of a perk. So slugging should help, considering a large swath of survivors don't run it.
"And make no mistake, eating the stun is an option. But all that does is encourage the killer to go after the person who just stunned them since they know that person no longer has DS, while the rest of their team still might."
Which is fine...the more time that person can waste of the Killer's - the better off their team will be for it.
"The end result of this, a perk designed to stop tunneling, is just encouraging the killer to tunnel more. It rewards bad survivors for messing up, gives good survivors temporary god-status, and doesn't even solve the actual problem with tunneling still being the most viable way to play killer."
This perk isn't designed to stop tunneling. Stopping tunneling is one of its most common and best uses, yes. But it was designed to allow survivors to make a variety of bolder plays within the confines of 60 seconds after getting off the hook. To that end, it works exactly as intended and functions perfectly. It doesn't "reward" bad survivors for "messing up"...it allows less skilled survivors to get back in the game. And no survivor gets "god status"...this is ridiculous verbiage. It gives decent survivors use of a 5 second stun for 60 seconds after getting off hooked one time in a match.
I love that you made this entire thread and explanation and not once did you actually offer a better solution, but you're extremely quick be critical of BHVR.
Anyone who has to tunnel every match to win needs to spend more time trying to improve their game play. That is sad.
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So based on what you are saying. The problems are there on purpose.
Great, they are still problems that need solving.
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That's not true, tunneling is not "the best decision a killer can choose to make". It is sometimes, like when there are few gens remaining or someone is a potato, but most of the times it's a waste of time since you renounce to build up pressure in the present to get some in the future, when it might be too late.
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Don't like DS? Use Pyramid Head.
Easy solution, easy fix. Stop complaining.
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So p2w? Seems fair.
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I think that only a Timer nerf might do. Or DS should deactivate as soon as you do any interaction. So you can keep it permanently but you can't heal, do gens, sabotage, do totems, search chests, go in a locker etc. to compensate.
You might use your DS after getting unhooked to instantly get chased again. Throwing pallets and vaulting won't deactivate it but the Killer will probably ignore you or slug you.
Or you can make it that it deactivates when someone else gets hooked, which is the most famous change in the community.
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Maybe not everybody wants to play the same killer
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You need to adjust your play style if DS is preventing you from "Winning."
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Yeah, I don't tunnel but DS still pisses me off, because even when I don't tunnel, they strike me, it just annoys me but doesn't prevent me from winning.
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The release of pyramid head shows exactly why DS is in the game. This killer pretty much makes tunneling and camping easy. Not surprisingly a lot of killers are taking advantage of it.
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Ds should not be able once the survivor repair, unhook or heal
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Arent you the guys complaining though that ds is countered by ph?
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It would be a lot of work and no idea how they could implement it but I had this idea of like a Director like the AI in Left 4 Dead. A program that views the progress of a match and acts accordingly. If the survivors are finishing gens too fast the Entity slows down progression to giv ethe killer a chance to catch up. If the killer is hooking a lot of people speed up gen repair, healing, chance to kobe ect.
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I don't know how to quote one phrase.
As for the DS can only be used twice. I think the OP meant you can only be hooked twice before you are dead hook. So once your freed from your first hook survivors are encouraged to make use of DS while they have it.
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I purposefully dont pick up people if they are downed quick after an unhook, you can run around chase 3 other survivors, then 30 seconds later find the dumb Claudette healing behind shack, bam you get DSed, I dont tunnel and still get DSed because its actually bad plays by the survivor that cause meto get DSed. BS perk.
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But that's not a design flaw. That's just how it is. You have 2 sites that play against each other. What's fun for one site, is not fun for the other and vice versa. You can't fix that.
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Piping means nothing. lmao How about we stop acting like its the actual goal of playing or a sign of "winning". Most Killers don't even want to rank up too much because it gets too toxic.
Killers' Objective is to Kill Survivors and its easier to do that when there are three. Mathematically the game swings wildly in the Killers favor once the first Survivor is Killed. This encourages Tunneling.
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What if you get tunneled by a gen an ran past a regressing gen. Just tapping as running by to stop the regress shouldn't disable DS. Also, there is the gen grab trick to force the killer grabbing you (if he doesn't pay attention) so you can use DS instead of getting slugged (and moried).
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Except that tunneling isn’t always the optimal thing to do. You can’t split pressure if you ain’t chasing anybody else.
Many times killers who go out of their way (break chases, throw the game) just to tunnel off the hook is because they are targeting one survivor for whatever the reason may be.
You don’t win if you tunnel in every situation, and because of that DS at that point is fair game.
This is why DS isn’t an “anti-tunnel” perk because if it was it would force the killer to stop tunneling, which it doesn’t.
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I mean you each their own but if pipping means nothing why is it in the game?
You can earn maximum points by pipping, not just getting 4ks.
In fact, the part you are right about is that pipping means nothing to those killers who only want to tunnel because the game allows them to abuse this action because all they care about is killing before the survivor could get decent points.
Tunneled survivors aren’t getting saves or heals or fixing gens for that matter. That is the bottom line... and why most don’t care if they die, but seems unfair when you can’t even land your feet when being unhooked because the killer is already on their way back.
Perspective on the problem is not one-sided.
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No, our complain is if the cages are preventing many of our perks needed to counter tunneling (WHICH AGAIN IS A GOOD THING) then why is he able to see the cages? The entire point of Pyramid Head is to counter certain perks, which again, I'm totally fine with, it's a good thing, we need counters, but I'm not for the ability to see where the cages are. What's the point? Killers have been taking advantage of this and it isn't fair. Our complaint isn't because it disables perks, our complaint lies in the fact that he has the full 100% ability to tunnel and camp without setbacks.
All we're asking for it to remove the ability to see the cages, what was the point of the decision? I've been playing Pyramid Head since release and I don't see the point, I've played at best 2 survivor matches in the past week.
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Yes, we both have a decent understanding of the game and are aware of pressure. However, while applying split pressure, of course a good killer playing sweaty always has an eye on killing off a player as quickly as possible, because that's their win condition vs a good team. That's all I mean.
If anti-x perks need to force rather than incentivize, Sloppy Butcher isn't an anti heal perk, Iron Maiden isn't an anti locker perk, nothing is an anti anything perk. I will say that DS is not per se an antitunneling perk, it's a "force you to tunnel and then punish you for it" perk.
If I two-hook a 4 DS team without eating DS, I'm dealing with up to 8 minutes of survivors with active DS repairing vital gens in my face while injured, unhooking injured and jumping in lockers. This is simply not viable. But if I'm rotating back to my tunnel victim once DS expires, that can work. And once I've eaten the DS, I have strong incentive to get value out of that action by tunneling that player to death at the first good opportunity. Tunneling someone out relieves a great deal of the pressure put on me by multiple DS users able to make suicidal plays with low risk.
If your concern is sour or ignorant killers tunnelling players non-strategically, rewarding killers more for diverse hooks would result in those players getting destroyed.
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Nope. You can get DS on shrine. But not pyramid head
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So you want free uncage? Sure, no problem..
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Please, re-read what I've stated before putting words in my mouth.
That's clearly, so obviously not what I stated.
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If PH can't see the cage, what's stopping you for getting the uncage? It'll be basically risk free. Not to mention the cage usually spawns close to survivors already.
Imagine if you as PH cage someone in EGC. What are you going to do as killer? Do nothing besides not caging them? Or hook them and they just DS Borrow and get away?
Sure you're fine with PH counters certain perks you don't use (non-meta perks), just like how trappers are okay with slippery meat or small games, or doctors okay with calm spirit, because chance of meeting them are as well non-exist.
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I agree shrine is rigged. It's always perks from the initial survivors when you bought the game..
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So answer my question because I've asked it about 5 to 10 times and no one has replied to me.
What happens if I cage someone from the middle of the map?
Let me give you an example.
This is me. I've been playing non-stop Pyramid Head and I made this video to make a point.
Put yourself in the shoes of this survivor and ask yourself.
How is this fair? No BT, No DS, No Second Wind. I'M okay with my Pop not working because I CHOSE to send her to a cage.
But ask yourself. And it's VERY easy to cage survivors from the middle of the map, I've done it several times. I pick them up and drop them off in the middle and proceed to go to the cage and set traps.
Personally, as a killer main. This is extremely unfair.
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Honestly please, I can't anymore with tunneling
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2 things!
- BHVR themselves are saying that DS isn't a anti-tunnel perk (even though it activates and the only counterplay's to it is not to tunnel), their saying it's an anti momentum perk, which makes absolutely no sense to me since the whole killer roaster (besides Sally and Rin) has to rely on survivor's making mistakes in their chases and if the killer captilizes on their mistakes DS practically punishes the killer for being a killer.
- The main reason why I agree with what your saying is because I've had games where I'll hook 2 different survivor's and I'll still get punished because "I played well and the other 2 survivor's made mistakes"
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Then what's the difference between what you do and a camping with leatherface, or any other killers? Only no DS and BT, and they aren't stopping killer to camp or tunnel. If the killer decides to camp, he will, no matter who he's playing, and what perks survivors have.
So, the same counterplay to camping can be applied again. Others are gonna rush the gens and get out, making the killer depip, and you'll most likely never see him again if the matchmaking is working as intended.
If PH can't see the cage, it'll be unfair to killer, especially in EGC where he can't even secure a kill.
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It really isn't. Everyone doesn't have money just lying around to spend on the game. Weak argument.
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I was just stating the obvious and you change the subject and mock how I play even though you have no idea how I do. I have no problem with DS but saying to people who do to "just spend money on the game" isn't helping the problem. Ph is just a band-aid and DS is still a problem for other killers.
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