My view on the "DBD is Survivor sided" argument.
Quite a few people argue that DBD is Survivor sided. While I see what they mean, I don't directly agree with that specific statement. This isn't in the suggestions forum because I am not directly suggesting anything in particular to be added, but instead trying to have a discussion about this topic. Coming from a Survivor main here's what I think about this.
As a Survivor, getting generators on is a joke. The times for repairing gens is embarrassingly fast. You'll see what I mean when you go against an organized SWF. Gens pop left and right, even when it feels like you are doing really good. Even with a whole build of slowdown perks, you can still easily get genrushed. To make matters worse they could bring something like brand new parts and repairing perks. Even if you're catching Survivors super quick, the time it takes to catch, pick up, carry and then hook them allows the Survivors to get far too much repairing done. The only reason this doesn't happen to Killers every game is for two reasons. One, you don't always go against parties, and two, not everyone likes to play like that. Some people like to run the Killer around and mess with them and have fun.
However, Killers can still win against good SWFs, but only if they play extremely scummy, doing things like tunneling and camping. While getting tunneled or camped is annoying, I don't whine about it because I completely understand it. I've even started to do it myself when I play Killer, depending on the situation, even though I don't enjoy it. Many Killer mains would agree with me that camping and tunneling are the only ways to win against good parties. The game is Survivor sided when the Killer tries to play nice, but not when they play really scummy.
So then you might say "oh then the game is fine because you just said it's not Survivor sided" that isn't exactly true. Tunneling and camping, despite being the best strategies, make the game quite unfun, for both sides. Nobody enjoys getting tunneled or camped, and I personally don't enjoy doing it myself when I play Killer, but as previously said, I do it because I have to.
In my opinion, a way to make the game more fun for both sides would be to allow solo q Survivors to communicate, whether that be through a text chat, some sort of commands, or voice chat. And in exchange for that, balance the game better around parties, whether that be by buffing the Killer or by nerfing the Survivors, or both. This way, playing solo q wouldn't be so annoying, and going against parties wouldn't be so annoying. Both sides would be satisfied, and Killers would no longer need to play really scummy.
However, even if this were done, Killers could still very much play scummy if they really wanted to. Then people might start complaining about the game being Killer sided, as Survivor could still potentially be unfun. My suggestion for this would be to discourage tunneling and camping somehow. Yes, we do have DS and BT, though I don't think those would be enough anymore if my suggestion above went through, since Killers can already partially workaround both of those perks. Some people have suggested making DS or BT basekit, while that can sound good on paper, I think this would be problematic. For DS, the Killer would know you have it and thus easily workaround it by simply slugging you, and then everyone might start using Unbreakable so Killers can't do that, and I think this would lead to some huge problems, DS should not be basekit. For BT, it COULD work, however I feel like it would be too abused by people just using it to bodyblock, the duration would have to be reduced quite a bit, but then basekit BT might not even be enough. I'm not quite sure what exactly they could do to discourage tunneling and camping, without it being too much, not enough, or being abused by the Survivors.
Some people complain about things like NOED and The Nurse. However, while both of those are certainly powerful and annoying, in the current state of the game I don't think either one should be changed. If the game were made less Survivor sided, then perhaps they could be nerfed, though I'm not so sure about that.
Anyways, to sum it up, the game is not strictly Survivor sided. It is SWF sided, if the Killer tries to play nice. But when the Killer plays super scummy, it could be considered "balanced" but it does not mean it's fun. Sorry for the big wall of text, congrats if you made it this far. I just wanted to express how I feel about which side the game is on, and how fun the game is based on that.
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To have good results against a strong SWF, you have to down someone quickly with Leatherface so you can guarantee the 2-hook or 1-hook, and then if you're lucky and brought NOED, you get a second kill. Any other combination of killers and perks will result in you getting body blocked, dealing with BT/DS/Dead Hard, and 3 or 4 survivors getting out. The fact that going for chases and regressing gens is unviable proves that the game is survivor sided, because that's what the killer's gameplay is supposed to be built upon. No, you don't go against SWF teams of that caliber every time, but even if it's some of the time, it shouldn't be so luck-based whether you do well against them or not. The fact that if you don't go in prepared for their caliber, and change the way you play that match from beginning to end, you should statistically lose that match, proves that the killer has no inherent advantage against the survivors when compared to what they can do.
Most survivors don't scratch the surface of that level of play, but they don't have to, because you might not have decided that you're gonna play in that way from the get-go, because you wanted to test the waters first. But you quickly realize that the survivors, regardless of loop skill or game knowledge, are doing the gens too fast for you to control, and by that point you've lost the match, whether you come to that realization 5 minutes into that match or 1 minute into it. You didn't bring an instadown killer who can force 2-hooks and 1-hooks, and you didn't bring NOED, or the survivors cleansed it instantly, so you deserve 1 kill at most.
Move the survivors down to the killer's level of weakness, or move the killers up to the survivors' level of oppressiveness; I don't care how we go about it. But we've got to do this or the game will die.
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The game is way too fast when the survivors know what they're doing and are try harding. For example, if you lose a survivor in chase or commit too long by mistake, you lose 3 gens. It's insane
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i think a huge issue that people don't think about is just how many killers and perks there are already. for each game, there are dozens of different killer powers, sixteen perks on the surv side selected randomly out of seven pages of them, and then four killer perks as well. the reason this is an issue is that there are times when the killer has the perfect kit for the types of survivors they're playing against, and there are times where they have the worst one, too.
a huge issue with SWF is that they can coordinate things like flashlight stuns, body blocking, and all-too-altruistic tactics to keep everyone alive, and they can meet at gens with prove to get them done immediately. some things that could help is by reducing flashlight range, making the penalty for hitting a survivor while carrying a bit less, or making perks like prove a little less effective [something they've already done].
unfortunately, while this game isn't new, it is still unique, so it's hard to look at other games that would be similar and see how they solved it. i mean, i know VHS is coming out soon, but i'm not even sure they'll have a solution either. i'm a surv main but i genuinely want the game to be fun for both sides, and if killers have to resort to things like camping or tunneling, that's not fun for anyone :/
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My opinion is simple. It isn't.
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Well I agree, but the point was to thoroughly explain why.
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My opinion is that the game is
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Literally skill issue
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I feel the way Killers are treated by the devs rather than the way to game can be played shows more the unconscious bias.
Keys changed a year after Mori's.
Player asks a question on Killers, gets told to play survivor or civilization.
Deadhard negating certain killers abilities, via a bug gets left.
To your point on swfs they will never change, money is involved. Nothing to do with player attitudes, they help make money, nevermind they screw any semblance of balance and will prevent there ever being any balance.
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I never said to nerf SWF. I said to buff solo q so it's roughly equal to going against a SWF. Then buff Killers or nerf Survivors. Balance the game better around communication, as it's clearly not balanced for that.
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I disagree with HAVING to play a lethal killer only. Unless you're playing against the best SWF teams from comp (who will crush almost every killer all of the time) with STBFL will help you on nonlethal killers with unhook games. Even if you're bad at getting the grab during unhook; 8 STBFL stacks let's you knock the unhooker before they can realistically escape guaranteed. I recommend you remove any gen regression perks you got on, slap on BBQ, STBFL, meme perks and get good at your killer power before slapping on the regression. You want to get settled at a place where your skill wins games not perks. Then worry about sweating with the good builds.
If you're looking to sweat wins you just can't play the killers with no right click power like Legion & Pig.
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Neither did i? Id rather give them a handicap or the killer one.
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You're not supposed to protect all gens. On average, survivors finish 4 gens. The first 3 gens are almost always meant to pop.
You're gonna get 90% of your hooks between the 3rd and 5th gen being popped. For killers to get more hooks before that by slowing gens down artificially and the first 3 gen would be slowed down by lets say 85%, it would mean that the final gen would need to be sped up by 200% just to compensate for 3-gen scenario's.
Just ignore the gen count, focus on reducing the map area you patrol. Keep survivors hooked closeby your patrol, make survivors come to you. Turn your patrol into a deadzone ASAP.
You could play any killer as an m1 killer if you just focus on those principles.
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Nerfing SWF is gonna be impossible. Why would you punish 4 players for playing together? Just because of that 0.1% that uses SWF to play as optimal as possible?
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Yeah first gen or two should pop around the time you hook your first survivor. I often get hook number 3-5 when the exit gates are available. Then it's all about how you play in the EGC to get your kills. If you're really sweatin', try to tunnel one out before the fourth gen is completed.
If you're slaughtering 2+ people before exit gates are powered you got a little mismatched that game and were more skilled than the average of the party.
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The game is definitely survivor sided, but it need to be. BHVR is a business. In any business you cater to your majority. The survivors buy more cosmetics, they bring their friends to play with them who in turn buy cosmetics and packs.
The killer is outnumbered 4 to 1. They need the survivors to feel they have more power that they can win more often. In doing so the survivor players stay. If it was too hard or the killers were super oppressive they would not stay and play.
So I get why BHVR makes the game favor one side. It makes business sense to do so. At the end of the day it's about as Mr. Krabs would say, Money, Money Money 💰 🤑
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The game should be Killer sided, tbh. Isn't the Killer supposed to be big and scary? Because they aren't.
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The weird thing is, as far as the general playerbase is concerned the game IS killer sided, Nurse is the worst killer by far, and Pinhead is bonkeres powerful. The general person doesn't care that just because a SWF playing comp and curb stomp the killer most of the time because when you include the stats from all games all killers but nurse are killing more than 50% of the time. Killers are killing 50+ on the worst map for them aswell.
I think it's pretty clear that for the most part BH does not balance around high level play. As for us, there's always someone better, always someone worse. I win more than I lose as killer and lose more than I win at survivor.
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Did this guy just call The Nurse the worst Killer?
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Did you even read what I wrote?
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For me, honestly I just don't care. I will do my best to win. Some games I wreck. Some games I get stomped. Some are in-between. Never can tell. I just roll with it.
Truthfully, I have the most fun when I don't give a rats a** win or lose. I know the game favors the survivors. I accept it when I load into the match that I am at a disadvantage. I still play anyway.
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As a killer main, who is fed up with the super fast gen speed, huge volume pf pallets and endless loops and 2nd chance survivorperks...... and 100% convinced the game is survivor sided...... I really enjoyed reading your post and found it difficult to argue against.
Thank you for a fair and well articulated post. Fair play.
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Yes, but anything you say becomes invalid when you call The Nurse the worst Killer XD
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By statistics - that’s correct.
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Statistics are wrong and we all know that.
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It's inherently survivor sided because it's a 4v1. It's the numbers game, I don't know many games where the 1 player has an advantage over the 4. By it's nature the side with 4 players will have an easier time than the side with 1 player. And yes, it's even more survivor sided when the 4 players happen to know how to play the game, and be able to communicate.
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Would it still be like that if it was 3v1?
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I mean if anything this game is killer sided. Especially at high mmr
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Then it would be Killer sided, proven by how hard the game becomes when someone disconnects early in the match.
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You're a funny one.
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If you chase for long enough for three gens to pop, especially if you lose the survivor at the end, I think it's perfectly reasonable for you to lose. That's basically a minute and a half or so in which you didn't do anything to prevent those other three survivors from doing gens.
With four survivors alive, the difference between one hooked survivor and zero is huge.
0: 1 survivor in chase, 3 survivors doing gens.
1: 1 survivor on the hook, 1 survivor rotating for the save, 1 survivor in chase, 1 survivor doing gens.
The first chase is just massively important to the outcome of the match for both sides. That doesn't make the game survivor sided. You could just as easily see a comment from a survivor main saying "If you get hit through a pallet and you go down quickly, you get like no gens done. The game is basically already over. It's insane." They wouldn't be wrong either. It doesn't mean the game is unbalanced, though.
That's why it's so important to get it down to a 3v1 as soon as possible.
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It's the laws of nature. The side with more players has the advantage in most videogames. I don't many games where the side with less players has an advantage.
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The game is also inherently asymmetrical, so having a numbers advantage means nothing. You may as well argue that 4g must be more massive than 1kg because 4>1.
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I see you point. But the thing is we are talking about 4 human brain vs. 1 human brain. Even with some built in advantage for the 1 side in this game, the 4 brains can easily outplay the 1 brain as seen on a daily basis.
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If killers leave the game, survivors wait in endless queues, survivors leave the game, and the game dies. Behaviour has every incentive to make the game balanced. Kill rates suggest they're doing a decent job, even if I have my gripes with MMR.
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That doesn't logically follow. You can easily give four people enough of an additional challenge in an asymmetrical competition that their task is harder than it is for one person. Imagine you have one person drink a pina colada and have four people work to reconcile relativity and quantum mechanics.
In DBD, the consequences for making a mistake as killer are much higher than they are for survivor. That's in part because each survivor only controls a quarter of the team's time, though, not because killers have to play better in order to win. Kill rates show that killers are doing just fine.
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You just copy and pasted that didn't you.
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An easy fix to the bt bodyblock is to make unhooked survivors lose collision for 20s and they cannot take protection hits
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That's what I was thinking of a while back. They couldn't get tunneled right off hook but also couldn't take a hit for someone.
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Its just bullshit that they can do that
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Agreed. BT is to protect the person, not to have them protect you.
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I also yearn for the day that survivors cant stop you from hooking another just by standing behind you or crouching in front of you
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Nope. I'm the original poster. I had to change my forum name. 😀 was Evilbarney666. This is my actual account as I changed my name awhile ago.
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Game's "side" is not related to skill, but environment.
Since most killers doesn't have real counter to things survivors can do, they are forced to waste time, and by doing so, they lose a gen for a survivor no matter what.
If they 3gen, they can't kill a survivor, if they kill a survivor, they can't 3gen... if you think it logically, this game is survivor sided.
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Kill rates are skewed by endgame kill securing though, killers can inflate that rate by at least 25% average pretty much no matter what.
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Still survivor sided when you play scummy. You are just relying on their altruism and that is a choice they make, not you. If the team is dead set on making a killer depip then they will just power gens and leave while you camp.
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How is that "skewed"? Killers should be getting most of their kills late in the game, just as survivors should be making the most progress on gens in the beginning of the game. That's just how it goes. People aren't just killing themselves en masse in the EGC, just like killers aren't just letting people escape en masse in the EGC. Both happen, but I'm confident that sort of thing is not the major driver of kill rates.
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There is no real things survivors can do at end game, at most they could change who dies but that's about it.
Baseline kills are 25%, not 0%.
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Feel free to show stats if you have them, but that 25% number isn't at all realistic to me.
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It is.
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