How do we keep dbd alive?
If you look at the steam charts this game is declining. Content creators are getting frustrated with the game and devs, and I think we can all agree that the game is incredibly frustrating for both killer and survivors. I was wondering how we can keep the game fun and refreshing without saying "buff this killer" or "nerf this survivor perk/play style."
Just interested in seeing if y'all have anything like a new game mode or mechanic to keep the game fresh without the killer vs survivor debate.
Comments
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Do we want to? Keep it alive that is?
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Tbh I would say yes because it's a great concept but ran but some of the most incompetent people on this planet.
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Do bones
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Dbd is a beloved game for many people, myself included. If people didn't want this game to thrive; they wouldn't try to tell BHVR what they are doing wrong.
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I agree. While game balencing is hard; if they listened to their community and fog whispers this game would be better.
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It could get back a lot of the players if they perhaps did a questionaire but its slow decline is typical this time of year. As a lot of players are not stuck at home.
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I mean I know you asked for don't say buff killers or nerf survivors, but that's the issue. Genuinely that simple. Anything else I suggest or say is just going to be beating around the bush of the actual issue. Maybe remove half the dev team and replace it with people who actually play both sides and are willing to listen to people with more experience than them would be my other suggestion. A lot of people feel the devs just do not care AT ALL about what the players think (the fact some of the changes in the last patch went live despite mass community concerns is more evidence of that)
I can't give any other fix because those are the fixes. Much of the games issue (such as MMR being terrible as a system and inaccurate, and super long queues) are caused by a lack of killers which is caused by killers being weak and the devs constantly giving the optics that they don't care about killer players. If you want to keep the MMR system and have it function, you need more killers, and buffing them or making the role less miserable is the way you do that. If you want queues to not be 10+ minutes, you need more killers, and buffing the role is a way to get more of them back. The only other solution I can give you is to straight up FORCE players to play the role, having the game lock the survivor role out until they play killer, or locking the role out if too many survivor players are playing (which would be always) but those are terrible solutions.
The MMR system is basically hated by everyone. Almost no one seems to like it and the devs admitted it basically can't function due to no killers. People are 100% quitting because of that system and no one ever asked for it. Remove it and I promise you population would go up, even if the games didn't actually change, because the mere perception of the MMR system causes people to not play at all. A new game mode, like, didn't the devs say they are not doing a new game mode? So, why even humor it when they said no? The last mechanic they put in was boons and they're another part of the reason killers quit. So, no, I'd rather not have another new mechanic. I have to just suggest "fix balance" because I 100% think that's why the playerbase is declining. Not because people are bored they don't have a 2v8 mode or something.
The game playerbase is declining because the game is unfun due to bad balance on both sides. The only actual fix is to fix the balance. Adding a new mode or mechanic is a temporary band aid fix, at best.
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Yeah, you are right. People have jobs/school/etc. I'm just finding a lot of frustration from my fellow dbd players and content creators from the killer and survivor side. Personally, SBMM isn't the issue (as people were sweating wayyyyyy before it was introduced), but the game isn't heading in a healthy direction.
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Look back on their numbers for October-January of last year, you will see a fluctuation of similar proportions. You can actually see this year over year, and to be frank, their numbers are almost always going up.
However, if any other killer mains feel the way I do, I no longer play the game (haven't since September) and don't think I can ever come back. In regards to that, there are some tired problems in this game that aren't given enough attention. Also, given some of the interviews I've seen in the past 6 months, it doesn't look like those issues will ever be addressed.
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If you look at the last 3 months there is a decline. If you go year by year it's up 3k players. Lately there have been some questionable balance decisions, but to talk about "keeping the game alive" seems more than a bit premature to me.
Every winter (post Halloween) the player counts decline, as there are simply a lot of people who only want to play the "horror movie game" during the spooky season.
As long as this year still has more players than last year, there's nothing to save.
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Yeah I agree. I'm taking a break until the Ringu killer comes out. The game just wasn't fun. I have over 1,000 hours and I can't even imagine what the people (who are frustrated with the game) with 5,000+ hours are feeling.
Maybe when I come back things will feel better, but given the latest Q&A stream......I don't have my hopes up.
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I cans see where you're coming from. Queues are taking forever because if the lack of killers. Maybe instead of releasing killers/chapters so often; we could get game health patch?
I think the reason they're not doing well with the survivor/killer balance is because if you buff killers; the whiny survivors (who have very strong stuff) will beg for some survivor buff. Same goes for killer buffs.
They are walking on eggshells with killer perk buffs as well. Like ScottJund said, "an I'm all ears buff wouldn't be op on clown, but on nurse; it's broken.
About the new game mode, yes they said they aren't gonna do anything like that. It was just food for thought.
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Yeah, this game is here to stay even if many people are quitting, new ones are showing up. Granted, those balance decisions you're mentioning are consistent with what a lot of other games have done, and brought their game down much faster than it would have otherwise: they're balance decisions seem to cater to newer players. I can only imagine that's to sell cosmetics.
Regardless, I think you're right. However, BHVR does have a challenge in front of them, making their next game as successful. I think they've alienated a lot of people, and are making decisions with short-term goals in mind which might blow up in their face 3-5 years from now.
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I feel like the dbd boat is gonna sink if BHVR doesn't play their cards right. The Halloween events (that boost player count) are only a bandage to a gaping wound. If they somehow buff killer (and change some stuff), the killer: survivor ratio would be better; thus improving queue time. Plus getting rid of SBMM would be a welcomed change.
At this rate, people are gonna just leave. Content creators are getting frustrated with the game. While you're probably always gonna have your big content creators (i.e Dowsey, Otz, JRM, Zubat, etc), they can't carry the load of keeping people playing. That's BHVR's job.
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I'm just interested to see what BHVR will do if the boat rocks and people leave. Hopefully, it will be more than just giving us BP.
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Why?
It doesn't deserve to.
Not anymore.
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That will depend a lot, I think, on what that game is.
For some reason I believe if they went for a single player horror game, they may have a winner.
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So far, not so good :(
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While the balencing is terrible a lot of people live this game as a concept. In small instances of both sides playing in a healthy way; they game is fun.
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People are saying jobs/school is causing it, but, then...shouldn't every game be down? If it's because of the time of year, every game should have a similar decline in players, right? But...I can find lots of games that haven't lost players or that have gained players in that time. So jobs/school doesn't seem the issue. CS GO and DOTA 2 have had gains since August. Some games did lose a lot of people right around August but have since gained almost all of that back, or more so. DBD has not. It's not a school/work thing.
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Yeah I agree. I have faith in BHVR that DBD won't end up like Friday the 13th. They will hopefully be able to update DBD while working on a new game.
Only time will tell I guess.
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You do have a point. A lot of people are saying it's because of the time of year, as most people play during the Halloween events.
It could be a mixture of both to be honest, moreso people leaving due to queue times and game balance.
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That's poignant and insightful. A single player game is probably what this team needs after DBD.
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I mean the game has just simply gone back to its normal player count
People keep saying that with the arrival of Boons the game has gone down hill... and that players are leaving. While I don't doubt some are leaving because of Boons its not the reason why it looks like the game is taking a huge hit
Just look at the charts from May 2021 to September 2021, what happened during those months?
May 2021 - Resident Evil PTB
June 2021 - Resident Evil Release
July 2021 - 5th Anniversary Event
August 2021 - Hellraiser PTB
September 2021 - Hellraiser Release
2 major licenses back to back, thats obviously going to attract A LOT of new and older players that are fans of the series. And not all of them are gonna stick with the game. If you look at the months prior the game has about the same player count it has now
The game ain't dying and I don't see it dying any time soon
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Percentage lost between August 2020 and December 2020: Like 9%. August 2021 to December 2021: 30%+. That's a 3 times increase. August 2019 to Dec 2019 it went UP, not down.
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Yeah, I think the last time I looked they were almost as popular, if not more, than grand theft auto online.
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To be fair, F13 was killed by ######### copyright laws and lawyers, the bane of all creative fun.
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I went and looked at various other popular games and while some did lose a lot of players Between August to September (GTA lost a lot, for instance) it gained everything back within a month or two where as DBD's last gain was half a percent in September. Every month besides that has been a decline since August.
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Mega faxxx 😆
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DBD's most populous day on steam is lower than the daily high of GTAV players on January 27th 2022
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You can't be serious. Well I guess sleet ready for a long response
You basically just answered your own question for as much as you don't want people to say it is simple as buffing killers and nerfing survivors because right now there are obvious reasons for people quitting.
-no one wants to play killer cause the side is so gimped that you only have two real options now play scummy (which is also dying) or play nurse or blight which lead to people leaving do to variety being dead now
-survivor perks are way too forgiving. Right now boons and the usual meta has gotten to a point where you could call survivor baby mode.
- the whole cheater/hacker issue. Comms stretch res, hostage issues with hackers,etc, all of this needs to go and until it does no one would want to play pc under the fear of potentially getting their pc ######### up or worse getting dosed.
-the one mode. It's one mode what more do I have to say it gets boring easily.
- the grind. First off ######### the bloodweb. And secondly, since this game has a massive rng issue having to force people to spend hours upon hours just to get perks for a worthwhile build shows a massive part of the game is a run and feels more like a job in order to get to the fun part of the game.
-the mmr. It needs to die it is one of the worst matchmaking systems ever because much like the devs over reliance on statistics it only works if all of the variables are shows which it's not and since it favors speed having a lopsided ratio leads to people with 1000+ hours in the game being matched up with newbie survivor and more often newbie or I'll prepared killers.
-the meta. Right now it's a boring mess and idk if weeds legal where BHVR is but here is the basic run down of what is has been for a long time. Use meta perks such as DH,DS,COH,UB and now boil over for survivor use bbq,corrupt,pop,noed (which can change depending on killer but this is a universal meta build), nerf killers with maybe one buff every so often and buff survivors along with nerfs that do little to nothing to change the meta, sell licenses and cosmetics to try and keep the player base up to so current and future license holder and investors keep backing this game rinse and repeat at nauseum this and last week especially showed an excessive amount of cosmetic shoehorning to try and butter people up.
-the overall balance for as much as some on the forums try to say it's balanced and such it's cherry picked the main contentions are otzstarva's challenge and scottjunds tournament videos which both show glaring holes. For otz's case his results that he showed are incomplete since it doesn't show what maps, perk builds and items builds, and things such as dc's and has been shown more a result that if survivors want to try and win they have to camp and tunnel and be scummy which again leads to more nerfs because of for lack of a better phrase "entitled survivor bitching" and for Scott's case he never goes much into the maps and which killers were used the most he said was lower tiered killers like artist were used to which atm is not saying much because where does artist lie A,B,C ,F now if legion or an f tired killer won maybe you have something. But the other problem is one that shows another issue I said before "The tournament allowed everyone to bring in everything" how many players actually has everything? So unless you have done the grind,did a bloodweb hack or played exclusively in customs with everything unlocked this does not hold water.
-overall mentality. This community is the worst when it comes to this (try and try as people must to say overwatch lol and others are worse the fact that this has a lower player base and even the devs sharing this kind of mentality being able to be on par with those examples shows its the worst) and instead of someone putting their foot down and saying enough is enough they double down whether it's because of ego or having thin skin it doesn't matter it turns off people and makes them go to the other pvp options instead.
I know there's more but right now I can't really get into it cause of either repetition to a point or idk that was a part of it but this is a good overall understanding on what is going on.
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Honestly? Stop power buffing Survivors while power nerfing Killers.
It's like they forgot Killers are supposed to be a threat, and just throw that idea out the window with every update; more second chance perks, more Survivor-controlled Killer powers, and stupidly OP perks (CoH) and insane buffs to old perks (Boil Over).
While Killers get....Pentimento; A Hex that can only work if Survivors Cleanse totems...Right alongside Boons, which actively encourage Survivors to NOT cleanse totems!
I'm sorry but Pentimento being useless, CoH being OP as hell, Boil Over being turned godlike, and then the CoH non-nerf, and the Struggle QoL change giving Survivors a 1 second buff to wriggle-times simply because the devs can't add anything without buffing Survivors? This just screams that they literally could not care less about the Killer experience.
If that's not their intent, then they need to DO SOMETHING, because that's sure as sherbet ice cream what it looks like.
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If only they listened.
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The game has a lot of glaring issues that have been concerns of the community for years, and the devs have repeatedly kicked the can down the road for years rather than address them.
The grind is still unreal. This probably makes new player retention a huge issue.
Solo queue is pretty miserable. Others may feel differently, but I think the lack of info that solo players get is inexcusable when SWF get that info for free. MMR was supposed to address skill gaps between teammates and it absolutely hasn't done that.
Players find the killer experience to be unrewarding and stressful. I don't fall in this camp, but I see posts about it all the time. There's a huge learning curve with this game and so many good perks are locked behind paywalls and an obscene grind on top of that. Again, MMR was supposed to help with players feeling overmatched, but it's just tossing players into open lobbies as soon as there is any queue.
The fun factor often revolves around a code of honor. If 4 survivors decide to run their best perks and all bring medkits with instaheals, they can essentially win from the loadout screen. If a killer decides they've had enough, there are builds and playstyles they can employ to essentially guarantee a win.
The meta for each side doesn't make for engaging gameplay for the other side. The most effective way for survivors to win is to do generators as fast as humanly possible and not engage the killer. The most effective way for the killer to win is to stack slowdowns+NOED and proxy a 3 gen. It's not engaging either way when one side just plays to win.
Which brings us to MMR. Players are going to try to increase their MMR even if it's hidden. This is a pvp game. That means employing all those playstyles people don't enjoy. The game is an absolute sweat fiesta since MMR released. Players seem to be having so much less fun. It added a competitive element to a game that people didn't previously play competitively, and it incentivized competitive players to lean into the competitive aspect. And then it threw all of those players into the same queue. It doesn't work.
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It's just people defending the decreases instead of admitting there's an issue much like how the devs did on the QnA. They tried to say it fluctuate over the day but is that a good answer to not give an average ratio or was that to much for the statistics to do?
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By bringing in new blood.
There are many people that have yet to try out DBD.
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Yeah except even with releasing the game for free and the christmas event along with the new tome it decreased its not pulling people its a quick increase to dress up the numbers for license holders and others to keep funding and working with these people.
And remember this is something they keep doing is it no wonder that they advertised another licensed killer around the same time Boons were live and people were using them along with releasing the saw tome the same time this pile of ######### update released eventually when other games like Elden ring, Evil dead , VHS and so on come out they can't keep doing this cause only die hard defenders will stay and the rest will know the reputation it has by now and never touch this game.
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Expect no one wants to stay. They see this game is a jury rigged mess and go elsewhere. Right now with this update it has gotten all but clear that this game is only being defended by horror buffs with no other option, die hard defenders of this game and hopeless optimist who have given this game way too many chances to fix the issues only to have it spat back at them (unless they are survivor mains for obvious reasons.)
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And do you think new blood would stay? Not if they played Killer.
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Releasing the game for free? That was on EGS, those players wont be tracked on steam charts, same goes for console players.
Winter events never really had an increase in players because literally every game out there has one
Elden Ring isn't even close to DbD's genre, but a lot of DbD content creators do play it. Its not like these content creators will quit DbD for it since they've built a community who enjoys that content, they wont just ditch that. They may drop it for a bit but eventually pick it back up.
Evil Dead will most likely have a controversial release since the people behind it are also behind the NFT's that sparked huge controversy a few months back
VHS has so many issues and the hype around it has already died down significantly, unless they can score a big license or some how fix literally all the issues before live I don't see it sticking around for much longer.
Im sorry to say, but DbD ain't dying any time soon.
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Yeah yeah keep defending it.
Even if the egs is a different service there's a good chunk of people leaving dbd because of the glaring issues so tell me what will this game add to keep people invested that aren't already playing and as a follow up why should they care?
And saying VHS has bugs and the hype is down is ironic because it's the exact same thing as dbd except there it's more balanced and hasn't devolved into a survivor main circle jerks with horror window dressing.
Saying evil dead is bad because of nft is one thing but sure as ######### didn't stop people from buying pinhead and ignoring that little snippet when it was brought up so what does it change.
Even if Elden ring is different gameplay wise much in line with what cote said about playing a different game I got a follow up "why go back?" The devs don't give a ######### so why should the customers they have shown time and time again to favor one side and make excuses to rationalize it so when they have people playing a different game why should they bother returning to a game that is busted to the core and no one wants to fix it.
Also an event is an event whether it's Christmas or not it gives people a reason to play which right now has overstayed its welcome, tell me with the new saw tome and a new event happening at the same time how many players were added to this game keep in mind this update and the most recent QnA were also dumpsterfires which leads to something I put in before. Also remember even if the concept is unique they have had change after chance to fix it and now are showing they just can't be bothered anymore.
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Just keep playing it and it will never die. That being said, some sexy skins wouldn't hurt. Make them some money. I get it, a lot of the people here are into monster girls. That is fine, but can we get one killer that is Trickster, but for men? That would be great.
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Please tell me you're joking about something this dumb.
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Lmao. That would be nice, but dbd would (most likely) lose a lot of potential partnerships due to "nudity."
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When I first saw this I said the same thing.
In his mind Cosmetics > game balance
That mindset seems familiar......sounds like BHVR
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I mean if you want DbD to die that badly, you could like, yknow. Stop playing it? Or just stop keeping up with news on it? It simulates your weird fantasy to quite great effect. Civ 6 is an actual good game if you're not enjoying this either if you need another place to be pointed towards :). There is literally nothing stopping you from playing the game, if you really think its that bad. Don't. Play. It. Simple as that
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ThiccBuddha the goat
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They hate me because I am right.
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Fax
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Yeah I could however I spent money to get the dlc and some cosmetic I should be able to as a customer voice what I need to. And unlike someone trying to pull a Patrick by defending, sucking up and making excuses I have the right to say what I damn well please when the game is ######### and I see people asking the obvious when it is obvious.
And you are wrong about one thing I don't want it to die but I am not going to sit here and act like everything is ok when it's clearly not.
So I will leave this question for you as well "why are you defending this game and why should anyone care about this game enough to stay for long periods of time?"
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