Should Freddy be reverted?

I think as time's gone on it's become increasingly clear that the Freddy rework was more or less a failure. The devs obviously went in with the intention of making him viable no matter the cost and in the process cut out everything that made him unique.

The new Freddy is much more effective than the old one but that's all he really has going for him. His thematic is dead, he has no form of skill expression, and he's somehow more boring to play as and against than before.

Now the devs have stated that Freddy is overperforming and intend to tone him down his performance. Usually that means gutting the killer. I seriously doubt any there's any killer players that just can't get enough of spamming puddles on the ground so if Freddy falls out of high tier he'll probably barely ever see play again.

At this point I think the devs need to really consider if this design is worth keeping around. And that leaves me with two questions.

  1. Are there any killer players that love playing Freddy for his gameplay regardless of his strength?
  2. Are there any survivor players that prefer playing against this Freddy as opposed to the old one?

Comments

  • twistedmonkey
    twistedmonkey Member Posts: 4,291

    Old Freddy was highly complained about by both sides in the past.

    I think the rework was warranted as all he was in the past was a slowdown the game killer who's power was rng due to breaking out with skill checks and could not stop unhooks.

    As for survivor it was was not very engaging to verse due to the slowdowns he had. Even though he was easy to beat it was just a prolonged match with tedious mechanics again due to the rng of his power.

    I think the new Freddy is better designed as he is more in control of his power and just needs some tweaks to the slowdown he still has and his ability to negate anti camping perks.

    Slowdowns imo are detrimental to all the other killers since it makes gen times harder to balance.

  • Healthore77992
    Healthore77992 Member Posts: 570

    I like new Freddy more, but if they do bring old one back, he will need some massive buffs

  • TAG
    TAG Member Posts: 12,871

    Even if new Freddy has kinda lost his identity to a point, I'd say that is preferable to old Freddy just sucking. Just needs a bit of a re-tuning to put him in line.

  • brokedownpalace
    brokedownpalace Member Posts: 8,793

    No. Old Freddy will never come back. Not as a complete revert and not at a choice for an alternative power. People really need to move on from this. All Freddy needs is some tweaks.

    And the idea that Freddy has no identity or theme is wrong. He has the lullaby, the ever present threat of falling asleep, he grows more powerful when you are asleep, cool blood effects like from the movies, teleporting, etc. He has much more in his character related to the license of NoES than Michael has of Halloween (knife, music), Leatherface has of TCM (just the chainsaw, doesn't even have a map) or Pig has of Saw (RBT).

  • Decarcassor
    Decarcassor Member Posts: 651

    I'll tell you what I enjoy about Freddy. Its the smoothness. He does not have arbitrary slowdowns when using any of his abilities, no weird camera locks, movement restrictions or fatigue downtime.

    That being said its true that Freddy has a bit too much in passive benefits. The sleep cycle is completly free, it highlight asleep survivors making them easier to see, make them waste time if they want to wake up, confuse them with the lullaby and apply free Oblivious. This is the part of Freddy that need to be looked at.

  • GeordieKiller
    GeordieKiller Member Posts: 409

    Freddy main here just want to point something out in the 2nd pargraph there.

    The passive sleep is actually part of his lore and film style freddy doesnt really attack them to drag them into dream world he lets them do it to themselves as they try to stay awake as long as possible. So it makes sense game wise that survivors will fall asleep passively and they have to do everything they can to stay awake.

    Also you entered his domain he should naturally have benefits over the survivors that are in the dream world it makes sense he should be able to spot them easier or survivors find it hard to pinpoint him (bar object users) his world his rules basically.

    I do realise this might of been a pointless post depending on what the devs changed but i thought i would give something for people to think about regarding the stuff you mentioned in the 2nd pargraph and give a different perspective on the matter.

  • Fog_King
    Fog_King Member Posts: 688

    I like the new Freddy much more than the old one. Not only he is more powerful, it is less annoying to play as and against, in my opinion, so I hope they don't change him back.

  • Clueless
    Clueless Member Posts: 340

    Having no self stuns/slowdowns is the main reason I like Freddy too. Going to be massively disappointed if they change that.

  • SnakeSound222
    SnakeSound222 Member Posts: 4,467
    edited December 2020

    I prefer the new Freddy to the old one. It really feels like this is my world with all the cool dream abilities. Old Freddy also was more annoying to play against and playing as him wasn't super fun because of how often you'd prolong the game to do good with him. I hope he doesn't come back and that the devs don't gut new Freddy.

  • OldHunterLight
    OldHunterLight Member Posts: 3,001
    edited December 2020

    I honestly prefer new Freddy over old camping tunneling dying light Freddy.

    Old Freddy as you know it was hard for new players since stealth wasn't an option and also the penalty for being asleep.

    I think there are only a few things that should make new Freddy more "skillful".

    1. Remove snare spam.

    2. Let bt work when asleep.

    That should at least help in some way I think.

  • Someissues
    Someissues Member Posts: 1,604

    These threads lowers one's intelligence, beware of such threads

  • edgarpoop
    edgarpoop Member Posts: 8,248

    Thematically, old Freddy was fine. New Freddy doesn't feel like Freddy at all, honestly. I feel like Myers when I play Myers, like Ghostface when I play Ghostface, etc. Out of all the licensed killers, Freddy really misses the mark thematically.

    I don't think Freddy is all that powerful. Top 5 or 6, sure, but certainly not what his kill rate indicates. I think his kill rate is more of an indictment of typical survivor skill. He's completely carried by Ruin/Undying or Pop if the survivors are remotely competent in a chase. Survivors usually aren't, but that's a different topic.

    He's just boring though. Boring to play as. Boring to play against. Zero skill expression for either side. You snare choke points and loops by holding a button. You either teleport or fake a teleport by holding a button. As survivor, you slam gens and pre-drop pallets. An A tier killer shouldn't be this brain dead.

  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278

    I genuinely miss old Freddy, and I would love to be able to play as him again. Was one of my favourite, most used killers, and I was damn good with him too.

  • Boss
    Boss Member Posts: 13,615

    Can't really say which i prefer more, i haven't played much of new Nightmare.

    But i know i wouldn't really like to go back to old Nightmare, he just bored me.