Why are there unspoken rules for killers?
Hey guys, this is my first post so sorry for any mistakes I make.
I’m a relatively new killer main, I basically only play killer (not a big fan of the survivor playstyle). I’ve been playing for a little over 3 months now and there are some things I just wanted clarification on or to have some kind of discourse about.
I realized that there are a lot of unwritten rules in this game, all of which seem to be directed towards killers exclusively. I don’t really understand the concepts of tunneling and camping, in a lot of the instances I’ve been accused of doing these things I feel like I was just playing the game in the way that makes the most sense.
The game has mechanics that actively encourage me to do things I’m apparently not supposed to? It feels like survivors are often relying on me to follow some kind of “killer code” because I notice them making many decisions that make no sense to me then they flame me for doing things that, in my mind, only make sense.
For instance, if I just hooked someone and can see another survivor approaching the area or hiding nearby to unhook them and I patrol the area I’m apparently “camping”? You’ve made it incredibly obvious that you are going to try and unhook this person, am I supposed to just play dumb and walk away?
Another situation is when a survivor will unhook their teammate right in front of me and I’m expected to ignore the injured survivor and chase down the uninjured one? I don’t see how that makes any sense, but apparently if I go after the obvious target I’m “tunneling”?
I’ve even been accused of tunneling by chasing already injured survivors who may or may not have been unhooked, even when I was nowhere near the hook when they were pulled off. Am I supposed to just ignore the injured survivor or something?
It feels like I’m expected to actively act against my own interests or I’m somehow a terrible killer and person. I only ever see these types of rules directed towards killers, I never see any rules for survivors.
Should survivors intentionally mess up generators to alert killers to their location? Should they only drop a max of 2 pallets during a chase? Should they only vault one window during a chase? Should they not flash bomb or flashlight killers who are carrying a survivor? Should they not drop pellets on killers trying to pick up a survivor? Should they allow themselves to be downed when they’re injured and on the final hook stage?
Of course not, those requests sound ridiculous, survivors would be actively playing in a way that makes no sense for them and goes against their interests. So why are killers expected to do it?
I don't intend to come off as rambly or ranty, I just genuinely want to know why the game has these unspoken rules and why I'm expected to follow them or be considered a bad player.
Comments
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I completely understand.
Killers are expected to abide by a lengthy, inconsistent list of things to do and not to do - and if you violate this, you get people DCing, AFKing, cussing you out in postgame and posting nasty things on your Steam wall.
On one hand - things like facecamping are crappy and genuinely unhealthy for the game. On the other hand - survivors don't have any sort of rulebook, unspoken or otherwise.
It does feel petty and unfair at times.
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Welcome to the fog, and welcome to it's sometimes awful player base, lol. You're not the first to experience or ask about this, as vets here will tell you.
If you played survivor you may encounter a few killers with their unwritten rules for survivors, but typically not, as you see that a lot more from the survivor player base. It's entitlement, nothing more.
Nothing you detailed above is wrong. Play how you want to play, and ignore these types of complaints. Sad to say that, but survivors would rather complain than get better. Typically if you're getting salt like this, you're doing something right.
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There aren't any unspoken rules. Play how you want. That said, you need to decide if your focus is BP and pips or you want kills. For BP and pips, the best strategy is to hook multiple times, chase a lot and use your power a lot. The more survivors there are, the more opportunities to chase and use your power. Think of the survivors as big, juicy BP sandwiches that you want to savor. MMR, when it works, will overall keep your games at a level where you can do this.
If you just want to kill, you'll get worse BP since you're hooking less, chasing less and using your power less. You're wolfing down your sandwiches now and MMR, when it works, will make your games harder and harder overall.
That isn't explained anywhere so you have to decide which playstyle suits you best but neither is wrong. Just ignore complaints and play how you want.
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Survivors can "have up to 3 tries" but insist to "have 3 tries", if that makes any sense to you.
While theyre kinda right in their accessment that its "unfun" to get eliminated early in an elimination game, theyre wrong in it being "unfair" to be eliminated in an elimination game.
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Remnants from old 2016 dbd when everyone was all buddy buddy and the community was a lot smaller
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There aren't.
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The best advice I can give you is to ignore/disregard whatever is said/typed.
People trying to tell you how to play are usually the most entitled/toxic people around - the time you waste typing a reply to them is infinitely more important than whatever they have going on in their heads/lives.
I play both sides (solo) and I'm well aware of the peanut gallery....except in DBD's case, it's more of a hollow peanut shell/echo chamber.
I'm genuinely saddened that this is your first forum post, but rest assured, you can play how you want in 99% of scenarios...these people are trying to exert some sort of digital control on your game/bash you for playing...and this is INFINITELY MORE PATHETIC than anything you can possibly do in the game.
You've seen one of the worst/trashiest aspects of the community, but they are the vocal minority, and you can safely disregard whatever they say as nonsense/irrelevant.
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Play how you like. Survivor's always be complaining.
Survivors are the masters at shaming killers for made-up rules, but as yet there doesn't exist any single rule that survivors as a whole will agree it bad-form on their part.
Gen rushing? Nope, just doing objectives
T-bagging? Nope, just getting the killer's attention
Flashlight clicky clicky? Nope, attention... and in specific cases it's used for fast turns (since the character turns to face the same direction as the camera to click the light)
Body blocking? Nope, strategic play.
I'm fine with all of the above. But the same applies to killer too. Regardless of whether the survivors think the killer is camping, tunnelling, etc, it's a strategy and they have the tools to defend against it. It's not up to the killer to make the match fun for survivors. Killers play for themselves.
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The only rule is, so long as you are not cheating, play however you want. The survivors do not care about you or your fun. Dont ever let them tell you how to play.
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Like everybody else said just ignore people complaining about how you played 99% of it is just sore losing. Same applies if you play survivor, you see killers complaining all the time about “gen rushing” and using good perks, it’s just sour grapes.
That said, for reference
- “Tunneling” has no actual consensus definition. The best I can figure is tunneling is either downing someone multiple times in a row or chasing someone specifically to down that person while intentionally ignoring other survivors. Either way the worst you can say about it is sometimes not breaking away from a survivor and chasing them exclusively is bad strategy. While you spend two minutes trying to down a survivor looping you in a remote part of the map all the other survivors are free to finish the gens. Knowing when to break off a chase and apply pressure on survivors who are actively working the gens and who you might have an easier time catching is important.
- “Camping” is really just zone defense. You’re defending a spot versus doing one on one chases. Zone defense can be a good tactic sometimes, but too much of it is a bad idea. If you stand in front of a hook for two minutes waiting for someone to die that pretty much lets the other survivors spend all that time finishing the gens. It’s typically better to proactively go and chase another survivor off a gen while you have someone on a hook, that way you have one on a hook, one going for a rescue, one being chased and only one survivor working on a gen at a time. And once you get your first kill the math is even more in your favor to aggressively chase someone else because it squeezes them into deciding whether to let that hooked survivor die and try and continue on a gen or abandon the gen and get the rescue. Of course if someone is close to dying on hook or advancing a stage then hanging around a few seconds to make sure they are rescued at the last second can be worth it, so zone defense has its uses. Just don’t overdo it or you’ll end up spending your time inefficiently.
- There are definitely some perks on both sides that are more popular and effective than others (i.e. meta). Obviously there’s nothing wrong with using them, they’re in the game because the devs want people to use them. But it’s good to understand why, for example, Dead Hard is so popular so you know how to play around it as a killer. Also, while the forums are filled with tons of posts complaining about how various perks are “overpowered”, the biggest factor in losing a match is you making mistakes. If you make mistakes and the opponents don’t you’ll almost certainly lose regardless of what perks you run, and vice versa if you outplay your opponents you’ll almost certainly win with any loadout. The perk balance questions mainly just impact games at higher level of skill where all the players are playing equally well and making few errors, that’s when these loadouts and perks and add-ons become relatively more significant. But as a brand new player I can almost 100% guarantee that if you lose a match you would have lost it regardless of what you or your opponents had in their loadouts.
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"when everyone was all buddy buddy"
I don't believe you
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It's definitely a both sides thing, but it's pretty ridiculous either way. Each side has their book of unwritten rules. You eventually learn to tune it out or deal with it. Just find a playstyle you find fun and roll with it. I'm a good killer who happens to run NOED and a good survivor who plays pallets super safe/gen rushes. Do what you find fun.
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When there's like 15 people playing pee region you kinda had to get along or you'd be dodged to high hell and nobody would ever play with you.
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There's no unspoken rules if you don't care about random made-up nonsense from people of either side. They don't like it? Tough. They can get over it.
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OP, It's posts like yours that make me want to repost my list of "unbiased rules" that I've been developing with feedback from the community for years. It's last iteration was posted right after the Resident Evil/Nemesis chapter release, and while a long read, really spells out what should be acceptable, and what shouldn't be, and as of the last time it was posted, It gained a decent amount of praise.
If you're interested in checking it out, or want to give me some pointers on anything I should add, here's the link to it:
Again, this is a long read, and I never got around to doing a TL;DR, so only read it if you have the time.
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