Feedback on the ideas for the upcoming PTR

SoulPriest

This post is a direct response to your Steam Announcement:

https://forum.deadbydaylight.com/en/kb/articles/352-developer-update-finishing-mori

BHVR, please listen --

Removing Moris and forcing "Final Moris" will ruin part of what makes DBD special to several people. Please read my feedback carefully.

Last Standing

- Game ends the moment all Survivors are Downed/Dying/Hooked with a finishing Mori.

This is an interesting idea, and I get part of the idea behind it. Moris arent always seen, and are very stylistic for each killer, so having it be more integrated does make sense. But reasoning the removal of Moris because "they have gained a negative reputation" is a bad reasoning, because it doesn't apply to everyone. How about Killers trying to end the game as quickly as possible through Last Standing? That could get a negative reputation. What about The Nurse? The Nurse definitely has a negative reputation. Are you going to remove her for it? The actual idea also has issues. I want to give feedback on both:

1 / Gameplay wise: There is always the chance that a survivor can wiggle off, use DS, or escape from a hook to save the game, or escape through the hatch or an open exit gate. This particularly is true if a lot of survivors got downed in the same area. The amount of available hooks will be less and less, and each survivor may be able to chance their way off a hook to rescue the others. Certain Killers are significantly more efficient at Injuring or Exposing all Survivors and may succeed at triggering Last Standing in many games, and once Survivors die, Last Standing is significantly easier to trigger -- meaning that it will be even more optimal to tunnel one Survivor out of the game than it already is. There are also always going to be rare moments where all Survivors will be downed in a short amount of time. Instead of giving the Survivors a chance to recover with perks or with luck in these moments, and clutch the game saving other Survivors, the game would now outright end. That is brutal.

2 / Fun wise: Moris are fun. They aren't just an "end the game faster" tool. Selecting a location/angle to do a cinematic Mori, having survivors coming over as the Mori is playing, or just Mori-ing every survivor are some of the things that makes a Mori fun. Having Moris only be limited to ending the game once all survivors are downed takes away a part of what makes DBD charming. 

3 / Friendly wise: Not all killers are interested in ending the game fast. Some killers like to slug a person to find and give them hatch. Maybe they think one particular person deserves hatch, and they would rather have other Survivors in the trial die, so that particular Survivor can escape. I personally always give hatch to a Survivor I felt like played well, and it ends the game in a nice friendly way for both parts, where people like to thank or compliment eachother in the endgame chat.

What else can you do to achieve your goal of having Moris be a more integrated part of the gameplay loop?

If you want a non-toxic way to have Moris be a part of DBD, you need to make Moris basekit. The way you have suggested to make Moris basekit is bad, BECAUSE it REMOVES PLAYER CHOICE/FREEDOM from the equation.

Here is an example of suggestions that ENABLES PLAYER CHOICE/FREEDOM:

After EVERY Survivor reached 2 hook states, you are granted the ability to Mori any Healthy, Injured or Downed Survivor (similar to The Shape's Iridescent Tombstone add-on).

If you are the last Survivor alive, you are granted the ability to "Give Up", enabling the Killer to Mori you, revealing your Aura to the Killer, and reducing your Bleed-Out timer to 30 seconds.

+ Increased FOV for both Killer and Survivor when a Survivor is Last Standing

I just had to comment this, because this is actually a really cool idea on its own. That's all.

Hope Is Not Lost

- Survivors can recover from the Dying State after 45 seconds, as a result of Last Standing.

While I rarely experience it, I personally don't enjoy being pointlessly slugged for 4 minutes. But 45 seconds is not a long time. Those who weren't bothered by it will be the ones who suffer from it. If I accidentally find a Survivor who is on their Death Hook, I like to Down them and leave them alone, so someone else can get pressured off a gen to save them. With this basekit Unbreakable change, I kind of have to hook and kill them, because other Survivors can just sit on a gen while they recover. It really just feels like it limits your options and freedom as a Killer to opt to take another chase. You're encouraged to pickup the downed Survivor and hook them every time unless you specifically want to go for Last Standing.

If your goal could instead be to just prevent 4 minute slugging and stalling of the game, then you could enable Survivors to recover from the dying state after a total of 120 seconds passed where:

 1: all living Survivors are slugged

 2: there are no Hooked or carried Survivors

 3: there are no Survivors currently being Mori'd.

Mori Rework

- Reworked Moris to only give Bloodpoints when Survivors die to Last Standing

This is bad, because this is now an offering that offers nothing to players who don't care about Bloodpoints or don't like bringing personal Bloodpoint offerings. Bringing a Mori is currently a way to spice up the gameplay. It takes time to execute, that other Survivors can use, and you might as well have died on a hook as a Survivor anyway. As I mentioned earlier, there are also more fun uses of Moris that includes player freedom in choosing a location/angle to Mori a Survivor, etc..

Other points:

What makes Devour Hope and Rancor appealing? Exposing people or giving you an opportunity to Mori Survivors? It's ALWAYS the Mori. They are both fun perks that work under specific conditions that the Survivors can play around. You can clearly see that people like Moris, so you SHOULDN'T REMOVE WAYS TO GET THEM!

What needs to be worked on instead?

There are currently content creators who are completely burnt out from the amount of cheaters and streamsnipers they find in their games. Chances are, every single DBD player has experienced a cheater in at least one of their games. It can't hurt to listen to what your content creators say a bit more. They draw more people to your game.

The Solo Survivor experience is completely different from the Survive With Friends experience in a negative way. Solo Survivor needs to somehow be more in line with how Survive With Friends works, with experimental features such as pinging in the fog, position/warning/help call-outs, ...basically keep Solo Survivor close in line with how a game would play out if a random group of Survivors suddenly had access to voice chat. I don't think experimenting with that would be unheard of.

An average Survive With Friends group is significantly more oppressive than a random group of Survivors. If it was suddenly possible to make an average group of Survivors able to do just 80% of what a Survivor With Friends group could do, I think balancing the game will be a lot easier for you, as some perks are significantly stronger or weaker with communication alone.

You could start by letting Survivors be able to see the Perks of their teammates on their HUD, such as if they have Unbreakable, Decisive Strike, Deliverance, or even perks like Plunderer's Instinct and Ace in the Hole. It will let Survivors be able to play around their teammates strengths and weaknesses. Then you could start to tune Perks so that they don't only benefit a single Survivor. That way, Aura reading perks aren't super powerful for a group of Survivors that can communicate. You could also choose to implement some sort of "pinging in the fog" system, that lets Survivors call out basic things such as their positioning, the killers positioning, grouping up for heals, warning of incoming killer, etc.

I know that suggestions like these will make the game seem different, but I'm afraid this is the only real way to balance out Survive With Friends vs Solo Survivor, and both sides deserve to have their fun without feeling super limited.

Certain Killers are much, much more powerful than others. At high skill levels, The Nurse is universally seen as the most powerful killer in the game, while at the lower skill levels, The Nurse is one of the worst killers. When there is such a disparity in skill, something needs to be done. The Nurse needs to be easier to play for newcomers, and less oppressive at high ranks. The opposite is true for The Pig. At low skill levels, Survivors will just finish gens and die to their trap, while at high skill levels, traps are almost exclusively seen as a "slowdown ability". Something needs to be done that makes it easier for low skill level Survivors to deal with traps, while it retains functionality as a slowdown that can potentially kill at high ranks. The Skill Floor and Ceiling needs to be adjusted so that ideally all Killers are viable at all skill levels. Stats don't tell you everything about a Killer.

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TL;DR:

You are removing A LOT of player freedom by forcing and removing Moris, such as:

- Giving Hatch to a certain Survivor.

- Mori Interactivity (Fun wise (eg. Photobombing) and gameplay wise (eg. Playing around Perks))

- Clutch recovery moments when all hope seems lost.

- Mori-ing people is fun.

- There are more pressing problems that need to be addressed before you experiment with new features.