Proposed change to Hexes
I feel like the system of hex totems needs to be changed in some way because if you hit a SWF (And at higher ranks you will) and run a hex then I can assure you that the moment the effect of the hex shows itself these people will just leave what they're doing and just run through most if not all of their memorized possible totem locations.
As a killer I'm supposed to be on survivors to kill them, on gens to prevent survivors from doing gens, on hooked survivors to prevent unhooking and additionally on totems so that survivors don't throw one or more of your perks out the window in the first 20 seconds of the game. The killer is generally spread fairly thin across the board.
Survivors should be discouraged from cleansing unless necessary or the method of hex delivery should be changed or possibly the idea of hexes in general reworked:
- Bonus per hex - My first idea would revolve around discouraging survivors from cleansing hexes by offering a good BP bonus (25% of total maybe?) per each hex that remained active by the end of the game on top of what they earned (Survived or not). And maybe alternatively, award this bonus to the killer for each hex that WAS cleansed by the end of the game.
- Cleanse costs a hook state - Every time you cleanse any totem, it would take 1 hook state away from you so that if you get hooked afterwards, you'll immediately go to stage 2 if you cleansed just one or die instantly if you cleansed 2 or more totems. Only applicable to the person who did the cleansing, not everyone. As another variant to this I'd suggest that dull cleansing does nothing but cleansing a hex would instantly put the cleanser on death hook so if you get hooked afterwards, you die. Since the killer can only have 4 hexes at most, if each survivor would cleanse one hex they would all be on death hook but if someone cleansed more than 1 hex, they would "take one for the team" and keep the rest of the team safe which would encourage the rest to do whatever they can to save the person who's dead on hook now, even if it would mean going down while bodyblocking the killer who's carrying the survivor.
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- Random spawn - The first idea of random spawn would be to have the totems not have fixed spawn locations and instead be placed randomly along the map instead of in pre-defined positions. (With rules in place regulating the spawn conditions. E.g. Only one totem per section of a map so that you can't have the RNG of having 5 totems neatly next to each other. etc.) I honestly think this would be the worst way to remedy the situation due to situations where the game would decide that it would be nice to spawn a totem in a wall or tree or something but if it were implemented I think it would better the situation nontheless.
- All spawns, Invisible hex - Alternatively I'd suggest making the active hex totems appear dull and not spawning 5 totems in 5 of the pre-defined positions but spawning a totem in every single position on the map. If the active hex doesn't appear active, it's a significant time commitment to cleanse the hex which is much better than the killer getting an unlucky spawn in the open with neon signs above it. This way if people want to get rid of a hex, they can either not work on gens to speed up the cleansing process or have just one or two people work on totems while the other two progress gens. Either way, it gives the killer a bit of time to be spread all over the place.
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- Every killer perk can be a hex - This idea would take a fair bit of work but basically the killer could pick and choose any perk to either be a hex or not. The hex perks would be significantly more powerful versions of the perk but cleansable while if it's not a hex, it would just be a less powerful version of itself. (For example Ruin might only regress at 50% speed while not a hex or devour hope might take 8 hook states to achieve full power to mori and not unlock the exposed status while it's not a hex.) This would basically require going through all the perks and creating their alternative version so I don't think BHVR would take this up but you get the idea.
That's my take on hexes and totems and I believe that it's very obvious that hexes and/or their implementation need a change when the META of Ruin Undying is a thing where the killer players are willing and see it as more beneficial to give up two perk slots to maintain one effect instead of having two. And generally since many of the hex effects need time to build up, the chance that you'll actually get that time before a survivor ends that dream in 10 seconds is smaller the higher up in experience the survivors go.
Comments
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Okay so let me get this straight - you want to discourage doing totems... even tho totems are supposed to discourage gen-rushing.
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Please tell me you're joking:/ losing a hook state for cleansing a totem? Seriously?
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So a quick run around memorized spawn locations by a single person while the rest sit on gens is discouraging gen rushing? You know... Because you can see many locations extremely far away so you don't even need to get remotely close to them as the actually active totem will be very obviously lit up like a christmas tree.
And let's not forget that survivors can find those totems just while looking for a gen.
The entire issue with the current system is that survivors who have spawns memorized will clear hexes really quickly. Even faster if they're in a group and effectively double their search speed the first time a hex effect shows up.
I put in variants on ideas because with how obviously distinct an active totem is as opposed to an inactive one. If all were dull, the survivor couldn't just run within a 100 meter radius, see that a specific location doesn't have a light and just run off to the next one, they would actually have to go there, cleanse and see if that was a hex or not.
The BP bonus or hook state tradeoffs are just mechanic ideas so that the survivors don't just make a field trip round the map the first minute of the game, taking away all hexes from the killer and just continuing the game with a weaker killer. You either take a BP bonus from yourself and give it to the killer or you weaken yourself by sacrificing a hook state to actually help the entire team from ruin for example. The proposed change variants try to make it so totems aren't a matter of "Hurr durr glowy thing, kneel there for 10 seconds, mission done."
Imagine if a glyph spawned somewhere in one of several fixed locations on the map and if the killer communed with it, all survivors would lose DS from that point for example. Wouldn't that be fun? That's hex totems.
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