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Is bridging the Solo/SWF gap and buffing Killers the way to go?
(I'm not going to bat for these ideas. I'm presenting them so they can get fleshed out.)
I've heard before that BHVR can get close to balancing the game by bridging the gap between solo and SWF, and then buffing Killers accordingly.
If we go with that idea, how do we do this? Here are some ideas I've heard and thought of:
In the lobby, Survivors will see the load-outs of all of the other Survivors (perks and offerings). For instance, if you're running Inner Strength and your teammate is running CoH, you know to either A., consider switching your perk or B, break an obvious totem over a hidden one.
Expand the in-game icons. Anytime a Survivor is in chase, there will be an icon indicating so. Same with working on gens. These would only be visible to the Survivors.
Some have suggested making Kindred base-kit, but if it were, Kindred would have to get adjusted. Would the new base-kit Kindred only show the auras of Survivors (and the perk would be reworked to only show the Killer's)?
If these changes do go live, Killers would have to get adjusted to account for it. Would every Killer get adjusted? (Looking at you, Nurse). Would every Killer get the same adjustments, to the same percentage? Those are TBD.
But the general idea is, should BHVR first bridge the gap and then balance the game around that? What are the pros and cons of that direction? And do the cons outweigh the pros? Would it make the game more balanced, or somehow make it sweatier? Does it take some of the fun out of the game? Of course, these are hypotheticals, but sometimes certain people have greater insight into which hypotheticals are more likely to be real.
Comments
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I think they should but BHVR very clearly wants the game to mostly retain the horror survival aspect of the game and they want you to have some feeling of isolation. Which adding a load of UI elements that tell you what your teammates are doing and where they are would kill that a lot.
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Interesting perspective. That is worth considering. I could see someone saying, "They've already made the maps much lighter/reduced the fog, so it doesn't feel like a horror game anyway." But there is a sense of isolation in solo, for sure.
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If survivors can see each other's perks in the lobby, then there might be a lot of lobby dodging. Do you seriously think survivors want to be on the same team as a sole survivor / wake up gamer, that will probably hide the entire game and wait for all their teammates to die?
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Personally, I wouldn't mind. Same as when I see Left Behind. When I run that, it's because it's a backup (and I'm doing a challenge that I have to escape the hatch). I don't play with the intention of screwing everyone else over. I play normally and use that as a last resort.
Fair point about lobby dodgers. I hope someone else reads your comment and adds to the discussion. Personally, if someone dodged because of my layout, I wouldn't mind. Solo is often a headache, so playing with people who aren't annoyed over my perks/playstyle would be better for my gaming experience. Keep in mind, my queue times are relatively quick (and I haven't had a 30-minute queue time in years), so I'm not too concerned about it. So for me, that con doesn't outweigh it. However, for people in certain regions with longer queue times, that might understandably bother them. Perhaps a compromise is simply to have the option to show your layout. If you want to hide it, you can. What's your opinion?
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There would be people that would dodge lobbies if someone hid their perks, because they would assume there's a good reason the perks are hidden. Most people just wouldn't hide their perks if they were stuff like prove thyself and dead hard.
And we would run into the 5 second switch problem anyway, where survivors would just switch to their anti-team perks at the last second.
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I think it's the only way to actually balance the game. As long as theres a disparity between the two it will never be balanced.
For example: Eruption is a nightmare for solo-que players but it's not a problem for swf.
Another one, which is just gameplay itself, would be two survivors committing to a save. They have no way to tell who's going to do what, so they put two people at risk of being caught and lose time on gens that they didn't need to lose. There is legitimately no way for them to tell and they lose time for that sole reason.
and ANOTHER example would be Pinhead. The box isn't hard to handle for swf, but it's hard for solo because they can't coordinate.
SWF balances the survivor gameplay by allowing them to coordinate properly and react to what the killer does as a team. When they would normally die because of this inability to communicate. While a SWF could easily recognize and prevent a 3 gen, a solo que team could not.
Communication is a key part of the survivor experience that just isn't in the game. Despite what many killers say, it makes the game balanced. And until we have it as a base feature of the game all the strategies only SWF can pull of will never be addressed. Perks, mechanics, maps, killers, all of them will not be designed around those strategies as long as survivors cannot communicate.
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just leads to massive extremes at higher-level where the killer stomps or has equal game vs swf if their killer is good otherwise the killer get stomped by swf.
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I'd be happy with just basekit kindred, as a solo player. I feel kindred is a necessary perk to play solo, and I've literally never taken it off in the 2 years I've been playing. Team mates are just too unpredictable. It'd be great to be able to play around with builds and other perks without feeling like I'm setting myself up for failure.
To add - I'd be totally fine with basekit kindred only showing survivors auras, and keeping the killers aura a perk exclusive. Though to be at the level of swf, it probably should show both (since swf can communicate where the killer is, if camping, etc) but I'm not gonna be picky.
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I don't think BHVR cares about keeping a feeling of isolation. They put SWF in the game. That destroys all sense of isolation.
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As Swf is untouchable, yes that is the preferable method to attempt to solve the problem that "survivor+c > survivors".
Its important tho that the killer compensation, be it base mechanics or individual killer ability tweaks, happens in the same patch or shortly after.
Personally I'd be more vary of the stuff people suggest to close the gap. Theres a lot of aura reading ideas getting thrown around when comms arent even that precise. A "chat wheel" or "message menu" are sufficient, but getting a ping tool (markers like in lol or the aura reveal runners had in DG when they hit stuff with an arrow) might not be too unreasonable of a hyperbuff, with a fitting cooldown.
But ive seen stuff like permanent bond gettong thrown around....
As for the killer side of things? People hated 6.1, they wont like whats needed minimum to cancel out that survivor hyperbuff. And im not talking minor qol stuff like actual useful seperate hook counter, im talking 105%ms nurse without nerfs.
Nurse joke aside. Take every brown and yellow addon that boosts a stat (charge, cooldown, etc) and make it basekit on every killer, still wouldnt be enough to compensate.
Years ago i had an idea to flinch/stun survivors for a small moment if theyre hit diring an action (repair heal cleanse) or have the remaining animation after getting hit be replaced by a slower one (vault). But that was before 6.1 qnd i doubt survs would appreciate another slowdown. Itd also require animation overhaul which survs also disliked last time.
While I cant provide good ideas for the killer compensation, i can present a concept:
- take an old tier list of your choosing. Lets remember those perceived powerlevels.
- Buff every killer on it. Buff those B-F tiers even more.
- Create a post patch tier list with the newly buffed killers.
- The whole new tierlist needs to fit into the old list's S-B tiers.
Closing the killer tier (/piwerlevel) gaps is just as important as for the survivor side.
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Yes, the gap needs to be bridged first and then killers can be buffed accordingly. Even simple stuff like a UI icons telling you who's doing what would go a long way to making solo queue better.
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Killer can be fixed with buffs. Survivors can be fixed by fixing matchmaking. But at the very least killers should be buffed. I get that the killer should have to outplay the survivors, but the extent to which you have to do it is just maddening, and would not be expected of players in any other game. You barely even use your ability on the survivors, with 90% of killers, on most maps, and/or against good survivors.
Balance for the top as well, so that players who know how to play and have skill get rewarded. "Balancing for the top will not impact the bottom; the bottom are the bottom because of their own skill, not because of the balance of the game." -Tru3
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Which it doesnt have to, i run this build only when i have an "open an exit" daily, and use sole survivor as a backup in case some survivors again throw the game by dc/suiciding. Doesnt mean i hide or dont do saves and stuff. But yeah, seening perk loadout will just lead to prejudging other players based on your own believes. Run self care? People yelled at me for it even though i had a medkit in the first place and carried self care as a backup because sloppy was used a lot at that time. Doesnt matter, people just look at their checklist, and not at the whole picture.
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