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Why do people criticize 'W Gaming'?

Just got some major salt in the EDG. A Nemesis running Lethal found me first and got into chase pretty quickly. I managed to keep him busy for two gens, with a third popping shortly after I was hooked. He managed 1k as he had NOED with the other three of us escaping. In the EGC he said stuff like "no skill"/"mindless W gaming" and said we only won because we gen-rushed whilst I 'held W' for a couple of minutes at the start of the match which allowed my teammates to do gens.

Firstly, I play killer quite a lot and if I feel I'm not going to get a survivor downed in chase, I drop the chase and pressure gens/target someone else. Secondly, I only dropped like 2 pallets in the entire chase; everything else was connecting tiles together and using vaults.

I see this critisism thrown around a lot and I just don't understand the mentality. Why be salty just because a survivor is trying to escape, which is ultimately their main objective? Saying "W gaming" is the same as saying "M1 gaming" or "hook gaming" to a killer trying to do their objective... like what do you want the survivor to do? Deliberately mind-game a really unsafe pallet so you can down them? Run in a straight line in a dead zone?

For context, the match was on Azarov's so it's not like it was a pallet-heavy map like Game or Eyrie where you can just pre-drop pallets and run to the next tile (which I guess is considered 'W' gaming!?).

Comments

  • Sonzaishinai
    Sonzaishinai Member Posts: 7,976

    This nemesis sounds bad and salty tbh

    But the reason why "w-holding" is despised is simply for how effective it really is compared to how hard it is.

    But just like with tunneling and camping the definition is really blurry and people blame it instead of their own mistakes a lot of the times

  • HugTechLover
    HugTechLover Member Posts: 2,482

    Holding W is the most boring chase mechanic. One of the main reasons I main blight; he eliminates holding W.

    It’s effective, just boring.

  • Bwsted
    Bwsted Member Posts: 3,452

    Players in general, regardless of side, are prone to blame their losses on anything but themselves. Don't lose sleep over such things.

  • mischiefmanaged
    mischiefmanaged Member, Alpha Surveyor Posts: 374

    I personally think it's more taken as a criticism of the game and sometimes map design. Midwich is probably my least favorite map in the game as both killer and survivor because of it. The hook spawns are annoying to be sure, but the map is generally killer sided because it's so hostile to survivors. But, it's also ridiculously boring to play as certain killers because the only option for survivors is just to hold W through the hallways and it's boring and uninteractive to chase someone down an empty hallway.

    In the game you mentioned, it sounds like more of a salty player and also someone who can't really differentiate between holding W and strategic looping and connecting tiles. It can sometimes be difficult as killer to realize just what the survivor is doing to outplay you so much and it can be difficult to see your own mistakes in the moment. With Nemesis in particular, there's not really a whole lot survivors can do in chase against him except for break line of sight and then try to make some distance. It's unclear to me what some killer players expect when they play a killer whose primary counter is running to a new loop and making some distance.

  • StarLost
    StarLost Member Posts: 8,077
    edited January 2023

    On one hand, it's a bit of a douchey thing to complain about - but what he's complaining about isn't just holding forward being way more effective than it should be, it's how sometimes map RNG can cause things to spawn in such a way that your map basically plays itself and you can basically vault a window into another window into a great pallet then back to the original window, then another pallet and by then several gens have popped.

  • edgarpoop
    edgarpoop Member Posts: 8,442

    I don't really see an issue with someone playing survivor well. The DbD community is weird and way too influenced by content creation. People think you're only good at survivor if you play suboptimally and take unnecessary risks.

    Players tend to draw a false equivalence to camping and tunneling. Not really the same thing. One takes advantage of poor matchmaking and solo queue. Holding W is optimizing pathing. Again, the community is really weird and has to draw a knee jerk false equivalency to the other side with everything.

  • StarLost
    StarLost Member Posts: 8,077
    edited January 2023

    Eh...no, I can see the similarity there.

    Camping and tunneling are annoying, but are possible due to a design issue.

    Holding W to abuse a pseudo infinite on Garden of Joy, Pale Rose, Borgo, Eyrie or Badham is annoying, but also only possible due to a design issue.

    Abusing the 'you can't hook me from here' spots on Ormond is also annoying.

    If you want to take advantage of this sort of thing then....sure, that's your camel. But you don't get to act surprised when people are cross with you.

  • Trollinmon
    Trollinmon Member Posts: 691

    Why do survivors hate when killers camp and tunnel? They are just trying to do their objective of killing the survivors. The reason players complain about holding w is because it is requires low skill, is strong, and is boring. Kinda like the same thing when killers camp.

  • RaSavage42
    RaSavage42 Member Posts: 5,566

    Because it's new... seen as less skillful then running around in circles (or figure 8's... or ovals... or rounded off squares)

    It's the same as Camping and tunneling is seen... Something that newer players do "cause they don't know the game"

  • Krazzik
    Krazzik Member Posts: 2,475

    I'm curious in which map you can hold W for three gens and not hit a wall.

  • KSzerker
    KSzerker Member Posts: 191

    No player should be insulted for holding W. It's BHVR's fault for being terrible at map design.

  • Reinami
    Reinami Member Posts: 5,638
    edited January 2023

    Most of them? The average map size is 9850 square meters, so around 99.25x99.25. Let's say you are dead center in the map, and see the killer running at you, so you run in the complete opposite direction. Killer is probably around 24 meters or so from you, and you are ~49 meters from the edge of the map. Killer moves at 4.6 m/s, survivor moves at 4.0 m/s. Even if the survivor runs to the very end of the map, and just touches the wall and stands there and does nothing, its going to take the survivor 12 seconds to get to the end of the map. During which time the killer gained 7.2 meters on the survivor, making them 16.8 meters away. Meaning just holding w and doing nothing but touching the wall and standing there will still waste around 16 seconds of the killer's time. This is probably like the worst play you can possible make.


    When people talk about "hold w" they aren't also just talking exactly running in a straight line. They basically mean "refusing to loop" similar to a killer's 3-gen strat of "refusing to chase" When you "refuse to loop" and you just "hold w" (hypothetical) and just maintain distance without actually mindgaming or looping, you can waste so much of a killer's time. And it's more than just "hold w" = 3 gens, it's a whole equation, and generally it's 1st chase = 3 gens done. Yeah after that first down and hook it slows down a bit, but survivors are far too powerful at the start of the game which has lead to the 3-gen meta. Why both doing anything other than 3-genning if you are basically guaranteed to lose 3 gens during the first chase?


    Some math:

    Survivor movement speed: 4.0 m/s

    Survivor post hit movement speed duration: 1.8 seconds

    Survivor post hit movement speed: 6.0 m/s

    Killer movement speed: 4.6 m/s

    Killer movement speed while carrying survivor: 3.68 m/s

    Killer Terror Radius: 32 meters

    Killer hit cooldown: 2.7 seconds

    Killer pick up speed: 3 seconds

    Killer hook speed: 1.5 seconds

    Generator repair speeds: 90 seconds

    Average distance to hook: 12 meters

    Average human response time: 273 ms (https://humanbenchmark.com/tests/reactiontime)

    Average map size: 9850 square meters (~99.25x99.25 meters for a square)




    So, let's assume killers and survivors all spawn at opposite ends of the map. The survivors spend the first 20 seconds looking for a generator and the killer spends the first 20 seconds running to the opposite end of the map. With a killer having a 32 meter terror radius, and taking into account movement speeds and human reaction time. if we take the human reaction time and 6x it to account for figuring out the direction the killer is coming from and making sure you can run the opposite direction, the survivor will spot the killer in 1638 ms. To make math simpler let's round it up to 2 second. during this time the killer gets 9.2 meters closer. So now the killer is 22.8 meters away. During this time the survivor runs in the exact opposite direction of the killer.


    Remember, no powers, no pallets, no windows, just a straight line. In order for the killer to catch up to the 5 meters (lunge is 6 meters but taking into account human reactions and lag and spinning and such, we say 5) required for lunge distance the killer needs to move 17.8 meters to close the gap. The difference in movement speed between them is .6, this means the killer closes the 17.8 meter gap in 29.66 seconds. The killer then lands a hit.


    The survivor then runs in a straight line and the killer is unable to move much for 2.7 seconds. During 1.8 of those seconds the survivor is moving at 6 m/s and for 4 m/s for .9 seconds. This means the survivor gets 14.4 meters way. The killer now has to close a gap of 9 meters for a lunge. It takes the killer 15 seconds to catch up to the survivor and land another hit.


    The killer now picks the survivor up taking 5.7 seconds (3 seconds for picking up, and 2.7 seconds for attack cooldown), and they walk to the nearest hook about 12 meters away. This takes 3.25 seconds, the hooking action takes 1.5 seconds.


    The time to find this survivor, hit them once, catch up, hit them again, pick them up walk to a hook and hook them took: 29.66 + 15 + 5.7 + 3.25 + 1.5 = 55.11 seconds. This would mean the killer would likely lose 2 gens in the first chase. (just barely reaching the 3rd survivor before it finishes).


    And this is assuming the survivor doesn't use vaults, windows or pallets. The better move is to just predrop every pallet you come across. Each one adds an extra 16 seconds of distance if the killer doesn't break it. And if they do, then you can start looping it if you need, or fake loop it, then run the next loop

  • Beatricks
    Beatricks Member Posts: 857

    Because only killers are allowed to complain that the other side is too strong, despite Nurses and Blights destroying even tournament squads.

  • Reinami
    Reinami Member Posts: 5,638
    edited January 2023

    TLDR:


    Holding w and never looping will waste at minimum 55.11 seconds of the killer's time for the first chase to get the first hook. If you add in pallets it adds 16 seconds of time to the first chase for each pallet dropped, meaning all you have to do is win 1 50/50 mindgame, and the killer will lose 3 gens in the first chase. This is why killers are opting for the 3-gen strat, because they only have to patrol a tiny area, make a dead zone, then just wait it out.