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I do not underastand balancing around 2K/2E

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Comments

  • pseudechis
    pseudechis Member Posts: 3,904
    edited December 2021

    balancing around a 75% kill rate doesn't guarentee survivor losses it just makes sure the power balance is 4v1 not 1v1.

    You use a useless statement like "nothing guarantees anything" then base your whole argument on higher kill rate guaranteeing survivor losses and ruining the game, you are contradicting yourself.

    I'm just making the point that the game should be balanced around 4v1, meaning you'd expect a high kill rate overall rather than a 50/50 kill rate. A 50/50 kill rate is balancing around 1v1 or 4v4 it doesn't work here and results in unbalanced games and backwards pressure meaning survivor is often less pressured to achieve their goal than killer is.

    When you consider the theme that's pressure going in the wrong direction as killer should be the threatening pressence that justifies the 4v1 layout.

    Balancing around an expected 75% kill rate is not a mad thing to suggest. Because if the game is balanced 4v1 you'd expect a higher kill rate overall due to the nature of assymetric play. 1 power role vs 4 lesser roles that are only competitive when they work together.

    Business models, killer releases etc are irrelevant to the point the OP made. Which was "I don't understand why they want to balance around 50/50 escapes" I don't either given the theme of the game.

    If they want a 50/50 balanced e-sports scenario there should be a defined win condition and equivalency on each team. Neither of those things exist here so it seems foolish to try and balance the game around that ill defined outcome. Then go and base the MMR system around it so that it borks match making even more.

    It strikes me as an odd thing to do especially when they promote the game as big scary killer chasing fearful survivors in a slasher movie setting. I can't say I'm even remotely scared of the killer in the majority of my games and I think this equalized balancing probably has something to do with that. It just feels too safe 1v1 to be a 4v1 survival horror.

    As I said thopugh its PVP and people value winning over game experience so they'll undermine game experience to make an equal chance of winning because that's what the crowd want. Even if it means the killer is a lesser threat to the survivors in doing so.

  • BubbaDredge
    BubbaDredge Member Posts: 815

    A 3k is definitely a win. I consider a 2k a tie, but a 3 is a clear win.

    Also, classically one survivor usually escapes in a horror movie, that's what the term "final girl" refers to. So a 3K should feel like canon.

  • drakonukaris
    drakonukaris Member Posts: 132

    I agree, you don't need to win, only to have fun. I only ever get stressed when toxic SWF abuse near-infinites and badly designed perks like circle of healing.

    You should be able to forfeit a match or honestly just DC without a penalty because this isn't a serious competitive game and never will be with Behaviour at the helm.

  • zarr
    zarr Member Posts: 921

    I don't get what's hard to understand about a PVP game being balanced around a tie. That ensures more than any other balance approach that each player has as equal chances at succeeding as possible. Very basic stuff.

    Sure it could be attempted to balance the game around not being a competitive PVP format but instead a "cinematic" playing experience of having less chances to succeed as a survivor, but I'd wager the game would not be nearly as successful as it is if that were the case, in fact it would probably not be around anymore for anyone to play and complain about its balancing to begin with. And not just because your average player does not like losing most of the time, but because it would be more boring being favoured to win as well. I'm pretty sure many of the players professing they hate having to "sweat" as killer would grow bored of the game and stop playing it if they would comfortably win most of their matches.

    Beyond that, DbD has a unique balancing aspect where the asymmetry of objectives allows killers to snowball in a way survivors cannot. Repairing 3 gens does not make repairing the last 2 any easier, in fact the game dynamic is regularly such that the last two gens are the most difficult to complete. Anyway, killing even just 1 survivor on the other hand makes killing the remaining survivors tremendously more easy. And we don't even have to look at complex game scenarios to understand this, just imagine a situation in which only 2 survivors are left alive before all gens are done - it's incredibly easy for the killer to control this situation and turn it into a 4k. Not only that, but since killers can very reliably secure at least 1 kill in the end game, any scenario that ends with less than 3 survivors alive before all gens are done is already all but guaranteed to result in a killer victory. For that reason, a balancing approach around 2 kills total is basically necessary to prevent a sort of runaway imbalance of more and more games snowballing into 4 kills and 3 kills being all but guaranteed.

    Of course, changes to the game aren't unthinkable, and I for one do think the game would stand to benefit from being changed at least to concentrate more on hooks rather than kills, in its gameplay and balancing, such that games on average last longer and see more chasing and hooking and less camping and slugging. But either way, the current balancing approach is also sensible, and we if anything only have reason to assume that the current approach already does favour killers - global stats are above a 2-kill average across the board, good killer players win the majority of their matches decisively and almost never kill less than 2 survivors, tournaments trend toward kill rates slightly above 2. It can certainly be argued the game experience could be balanced better, but in terms of "fairness" the balancing is already pretty good, and favourable for playing killer. In fact, it does seem like BHVR balances for average kill rates of around 60% rather than 50, so it's seemingly already not strictly a 2K2E balancing approach.

    There are definitely still specific balance issues that should be addressed regardless of the overall balance approach and state of balance though, of course. SWF with voice comms and coordinated builds is a big one, from a killer perspective. I want there to be restrictions for SWFs to where every perk and item can only be equipped at most once among all SWF group members. There's also some balancing issues on the killer side, such as certain add-ons, or the effectiveness of camping, tunnelling and slugging against non-SWF/non-coordinated SWF survivors.

  • Alphasoul05
    Alphasoul05 Member Posts: 601
    edited December 2021

    There's 4 survivors, 1 killer. The developers looked at their overall kill % statistics, counted the amount of survivors, and picked the easiest path to balance the game, statistically, on paper.

    The reality is if, as a killer, you only walk away with a 2k, the likelyhood that it was a really, really difficult and stressful game, and for the survivors a more relaxed one, is very high. Because 4 equally skilled survivors will not feel the pressure from an equally skilled killer, at decent MMR levels, due to the balance of the game as a whole. You might see it complained about more if 95% of this playerbase didn't fall under the below average skill levels.

    Personally I think it's hilarious that escape rates are even as high as they are in a 1v4 asymmetrical game where there's a killer who should be killing everyone and escaping should be a large benefit. But of course my idea of balance is different than a lot of peoples and doesn't align with the current SOTG

  • Plsfix369
    Plsfix369 Member Posts: 566

    You did great though, these people on the other hand, just want results tipping on their favor regardless of the means so they all just go for each others throat without in depth value or meaning,

    This game needs to balance out SWF and SoloQ first then buff the Killers so they can truly gauged the quality of every matches rather than focus from the results of low mmr potato survivors and bad killers who can't even chase and just camp kills.

    The devs couldn't even be bothered to make important features and they mostly only do it because the community is forcing them to do it.

  • Clevite
    Clevite Member Posts: 4,335

    Yeah, but it's not entirely true.

    For instance, Halloween, original,

    Laurie survives, as does Dr. Loomis, Sheriff Leigh, Nurse Marrion and Thomas and Lindsey.

    And even more in the others.

    Now, the game is just that, a game. And while we enjoy our 4ks as killers, a 75% kill rate would be about 100 for new players, people just won't want to play a game so stacked against them.

  • Clevite
    Clevite Member Posts: 4,335

    I think you're taking my words out of context.

    My point was of course, little in life is guaranteed.

    However, you can stack the odds towards a certain outcome.

    And if that outcome is a 75% loss rate, then who would want to play that role? As killer, where is the challenge with a kill rate almost guaranteeing a 3k? Would that not get boring?

    And as you know with the law of averages, if great players are surviving 50% of the time, casuals would rarely be getting out.

    And like it or not, new killer characters bring in new killers, rarely do they bring in new survivors

  • CyberDragoon656
    CyberDragoon656 Member Posts: 960

    How long till we get something like this then with the way this game is going?


  • Lenox
    Lenox Member Posts: 234
    edited December 2021

    Holy crap. This guy gets it. Brains on the forums!

    Balancing around 8-10 hooks makes more sense than 2Ks.

    Additionally, maybe they should have made this game more like Friday the 13th: The Game, and had more survivors. That game has 7. Maybe DBD could have done better with 5 (improved queue times also). It might have fixed some of the camping, tunneling, and killer snowball issues. And perhaps given the killer 3rd person camera for improved vision.


    I would definitely get bored playing killer if most games ended in a 3K. No tension.


    I play all 3, killer, soloQ, and SWF. And while I don't have a problem with any of the difficulties, mostly, I'd be fine with them bridging the gap between soloQ and SWF and improving killer QoL and/or power to reduce the need for cheese tactics like camping.


    I don't really care about escape rates tbh. I'd be fine with a game where I make it to the end, die more often, but still get my bloodpoints. I just want the playtime to be significantly higher than queue time. Maybe they should increase exit gate opening time to 30 seconds or something. Since it's the most exciting part of the game.


    What's atrocious about it? This is exactly how I hope all of my killer games go. It's exciting. It also means that all 5 people got to play most of the time. Instead of sitting there spectating or playing queue simulator.

    I don't want to play matches where I get a 4K with 3 gens done. Very boring.


    The issue with your argument is that you're comparing winning and having a good time but forgetting the most important component - participating. A killer, whether a 0K or a 4K is able to play/participate in 100% of the game. A survivor that dies, especially ones that die early, only participates maybe 25-75% of the time. And then has to play queue simulator. Paying to play a game that you're only utilizing a non-full fraction of the time is horrible game design. So, that's why it's more acceptable, albeit bad feeling, to have a 0-1K as a killer than a camp or early death as a survivor.

    I would be fine with a game design change that significantly increases the chances of securing a kill at the end of the game than throughout the early-to-middle parts of the game. If as a survivor, I miss the last minute or two of the game, oh well. But I don't want to spectate for 10 minutes.

    Hierarchy:

    1) Participation

    2) Having fun

    3) Winning

    Post edited by Lenox on
  • woundcowboy
    woundcowboy Member Posts: 1,994

    That's not true at all. Friday the 13th was balanced around 6/8 people dying, and was even a point while the game was being promoted. Now granted, Jason was weaker than they intended, but the thought was there. F13 was a much better game than this mess imo, but unfortunately the licensing issues killed it.

  • Clevite
    Clevite Member Posts: 4,335

    I never played it, but considering it died out, hard to use that as an example

  • woundcowboy
    woundcowboy Member Posts: 1,994

    It didn’t die because of the balance. It died because they couldn’t release or support it anymore due to licensing.

  • cantelope
    cantelope Applicant Posts: 343

    No, I'm talking about the overall hypocritical nature of the herd in this game and how it stalls out any real conversation.

    The game is a serious competitive game one post then a silly party game the next.

    Side A winning means side B was bullied. Side A shouldn't be so sweaty.

    Side B winning means side A was Bullied. Side A shouldn't be so sweaty.

    Neither side can win without somehow stealing somebody's fun. It's a reoccurring theme here. The second someone playing well means someone else loses, they were being toxic/lazy/hateful/inconsiderate. The second they win and someone else loses, well git gud scrub.

  • Lenox
    Lenox Member Posts: 234

    Oh, yeah. I agree then. Human nature. Sux.

    I'm usually not like that. But that's because I like to steal my opponent's moves to work for me. 😂

    I'm in the minority in that I think this game is for the most part fine. Like 85-90%. Actually the best PvP game I've ever played.

  • Clevite
    Clevite Member Posts: 4,335

    Fair enough.

    Still small sample to know if it would have succeeded.

    But, point taken.

  • cantelope
    cantelope Applicant Posts: 343

    I'd have had a similar reply prior to trying out halo infinite the other day. Honestly the first time I've joined an online shooter that wasn't strictly pve in a long time.

    But yeah, 80% of the time games fine. Can suck, be frustrating and even a kick in the teeth... But I still like it most of the time to. Hands and feet above any other pvp game.

  • Lenox
    Lenox Member Posts: 234

    Makes sense. For those of us looking for a non-shooter, non-racing, non-MOBA, and non-fighter, our options are limited. Enter DBD.

  • Puddles
    Puddles Member Posts: 95

    Killers in this forum are so full of themselves.

    They think they are entitled to 4K every game, and when they don't... it's not uncommon to see bad words in the chat or complains about survivors OP.

    As a survivor main, I don't care if I escape or not. I just have my fun.

  • AnxiousRiddle
    AnxiousRiddle Member Posts: 14

    I've come to honestly appreciate good survivor gameplay and have the ability to grant survs on good plays, that said, if someone sends me to game map and camps every single pallet and calls it "looping" at endgame, I'll laugh in their face.

  • DBDVulture
    DBDVulture Member Posts: 2,437

    The stress comes from the gap between maximum survivor skill vs the maximum possible survivor skill. There are only two out of twenty six killers who can consider handling high mmr play : Nurse/Blight.


    The current balancing suggests a game with two hooks is the same as a game with 6 or more hooks if both end with two kills.


    Maybe every killer should just play insidious leatherface and camp the survivor they catch to death without exception. You camp the first survivor and then do the same to the second.


    Everyone has a nice chill game, right? wrong.

  • pseudechis
    pseudechis Member Posts: 3,904

    Yeah sorry that sounded aggressive I didn't mean it to but tone is often lost in text.

    You make a fair point and I agree it makes sense in a PVP setting, I just want a better horror experience which is kind of diluted by the PVP balance.

    Over performing killers would create that experience and make survivor more interesting in my opinion. I don't think its a mad idea to balance more skewed around killer for that reason but people often jump down the throats of folks who suggest it. Its a suggestion not without merit though that's only really undermined by the expectation of a fair and balanced PVP experience.

  • Lochnload_exe
    Lochnload_exe Member Posts: 1,360

    No killer doesn't. It takes a lot of sweating or trying hard to get a 4k, because that is a 100% stomp, but to get a 2k it is fairly easy. I can hop on with the most basic build, kick back, play casually, and get a 2k.