Balancing SWF via gen time

NoShinyPony

My idea for balancing SWF / the gen rush problem:
Depending on whether it's SWF or a random group, the gen time should differ.

• 4 random players: 80 secs per gen (as it currently is)
• 2 SWF + 2 randoms: 83 secs
• 3 SWF + 1 random: 86 secs
• 2 x 2 SWF: 89 secs
• 4 SWF: 92 secs

Those times are a suggestion, but you get the gist. What do you guys think?

bloxe

Its a good start

Master

So you believe that a full squad has 15% more power than a team full of solos?

NoShinyPony

@Master said:
So you believe that a full squad has 15% more power than a team full of solos?

The numbers are a suggestion, I think they work for a start. The important question is:
Do you like the idea itself that gen time should be different, depending on which kind of group the killer is facing?

If you like the general idea, then let's discuss this more in detail and let's work out some good numbers.

PureHostility

Why are you punishing solo survivors?

Dreamnomad

I don't like it.

The_Trapper

I think it's interesting. Gen rush is a counter to every killer, so could do with a bit of sorting out. It's terribly dull when 3 survivors are working on a gen because they know their buddy is being chased.

NoShinyPony

@PureHostility said:
Why are you punishing solo survivors?

How is it punishing? Nothing changes for a group of 4 solo survivors. And if solo survivors are matched with a SWF group, the solo survs benefit from the other survs playing more coordinately.

NoShinyPony

@Dreamnomad said:
I don't like it.

Why do you think it's not a good idea?

Bigyo369

I like this idea, maybe it could be that way, that solo survivors won't get higher repair time even if the other 3 guy is swf, so there is no punishment for solos. BTW your idea is far the best i've seen.

aarongai

I know SWF groups are a problem, but addressing it by inflating generator times isn't how it should be done.

The devs should try to grant solo players the same advantages that SWF groups have so playing solo feels almost indistinguishable from playing SWF. Give Survivors things like:

• Bond perk baseline (SWF groups can tell each other their locations)
• Kindred perk baseline (SWF groups will mention when the killer is camping them)
• Additional emotes (SWF groups can communicate with each other)

Then the devs can buff killers since Survivors are being given more tools. Maybe give Killers things like:

• Overcharge perk baseline (helps with generator rushing)
• Faster generator regression after kicking (helps stall the game out)
• Increased Field of View (helps find Survivors more easily)
• Lower cooldown on successful attacks (shorter chase times)
• Each time a Survivor is hooked, permanently reduce their action speed by 10%
• Allow Killers to choose a dull totem to place a hex on instead of it randomly being chosen
• Movement speed boost after hooking a Survivor (helps the Killer traverse the map)

Just some ideas.

NoShinyPony

@Bigyo369 said:
I like this idea, maybe it could be that way, that solo survivors won't get higher repair time even if the other 3 guy is swf, so there is no punishment for solos.

Glad you like it! Imho it would be okay that in mixed groups everyone gets the same gen time, since solo survs benefit from being in a group with SWF players (and it would keep the thing simple).

NoShinyPony

@aarongai said:
I know SWF groups are a problem, but addressing it by inflating generator times isn't how it should be done.

I get you. Repairing gens is not super exciting, therefore you need to be careful with raising the gen time.

Nevertheless, I stand by my suggestion. Compared to other options, this idea is simple and could be easily implemented into the game and it would not change the game for SWF groups too much.

bloxe

Removed.

bloxe

aarongai said:

The devs should try to grant solo players the same advantages that SWF groups have so playing solo feels almost indistinguishable from playing SWF. 

No. Just no. SWF is the problem, thats what should be nerfed.

Jago

omagad genrushing

aarongai

@bloxe said:
No. Just no. SWF is the problem, thats what should be nerfed.

You can't nerf 4 players communicating in a Discord channel, it's external to the game. Also, how does one quantify the value of voice communication? Is it worth 20 extra seconds on each generator? 10 less seconds on the hook? Or maybe the voice comms work against the team and they just yells at each other, which makes these handicaps even more challenging for a team than for a solo player.

Also, there's no way to know for sure that the SWF is actually using voice communications to begin with. I've played SWF before where we didn't use voice at all, we would just type to each other. And since nobody can communicate (outside of emotes) once they're in game, it was a pretty standard DbD experience for everyone.

So it wouldn't be fair to have one ruleset for solo play and another for SWF just because everyone assumes the SWF is coordinating their every move, because they might not be. And even if they are, the developers can't possibly determine what communication is worth in terms of in-game values to create an entirely new ruleset just for SWF groups.

The only logical thing to do is to give all Survivors the tools SWF groups use, then buff the Killers to help them deal with the stronger teamwork that Survivors will have.

NoShinyPony

@aarongai said:
The only logical thing to do is to give all Survivors the tools SWF groups use, then buff the Killers to help them deal with the stronger teamwork that Survivors will have.

It's not possible to bring random survivors to the same level as SWF without them having voice communication.

Since the game is kind of balanced for non-SWF, the flexible gen time would be an easy way to bring some balance to SWF matches without changing a lot of different things.

You have to consider the amount of effort the devs would need to put into the game when they would make changes to balance SWF. This is a comparably effort-saving idea and I am convinced it would work.

Entità

I understand the problem, but gen repairing is still boring: would you add extra time to fix each of them?

I prefer secondary objectives, like this: https://forum.deadbydaylight.com/en/discussion/27565/secondary-objective-shrines-to-the-entity

PureHostility

@NoShinyPony said:

@PureHostility said:
Why are you punishing solo survivors?

How is it punishing? Nothing changes for a group of 4 solo survivors. And if solo survivors are matched with a SWF group, the solo survs benefit from the other survs playing more coordinately.

1) So many people use this silly argument and I will quote here once here too, as it is a double edged sword "Not all SWF players are playing seriously".

2) Solo survivors in most cases of ~3 SWF teams are nothing more than BP pinatas, as they are farmed or left behind without second thought.

3) Solo survivors have no idea if they are going in with SWF or not, thus they cannot prepare accordingly for the debuff.

4) Playing as solo with SWF players is annoying AF due to many other minor issues, such as "SWF trolls" (run around doing thing, suicide for each others, etc.).

You are punishing solo players, who may need these precious seconds to GTFO from this shithole SWF has just created.

NoShinyPony

@Entità said:
I understand the problem, but gen repairing is still boring: would you add extra time to fix each of them?

I prefer secondary objectives

To me it doesn't matter whether I sit on a gen or a chest or a totem or a Halloween event petula flower: It's the same action. You sit down and press a button. Harvesting the Halloween flowers has not been more exciting than repairing a gen.

The big advantage of my idea is that it's
1) easy to implement into the game and
2) SWF and random groups are treated differently, so it creates balance.

Entità

@NoShinyPony It's the same action for the animation, not for the meaning, the usefulness and the tactics choices a large number of objectives implies. For example, is it better a gen rush or to slow down the escape to prevent NOED with the due cleansing of all the totems? If a mate is hooked, is it better to rescue them immediately or to finish the gen (which saves the progresses, but can be damaged in the meantime) or the totem (which, if abandoned, must be fully cleansed again)?

Not all parties begin before the matchmaking, with the SWF mode: sometimes, in the lobby, a small team sees a player who speaks the same language and invite them to join... How could the system be sure about solo players?

pandorayr

@NoShinyPony said:
My idea for balancing SWF / the gen rush problem:
Depending on whether it's SWF or a random group, the gen time should differ.

• 4 random players: 80 secs per gen (as it currently is)
• 2 SWF + 2 randoms: 83 secs
• 3 SWF + 1 random: 86 secs
• 2 x 2 SWF: 89 secs
• 4 SWF: 92 secs

Those times are a suggestion, but you get the gist. What do you guys think?

hello, u play on ps4 right?

NoShinyPony

@PureHostility said:
You are punishing solo players, who may need these precious seconds to GTFO from this shithole SWF has just created.

I understand that you sometimes get bad games with SWF groups when you play solo surv. But the problems (like getting farmed by other survs, trolls, survs dc'ing) are in general a lot worse with random players, not with SWF.

In an average match as a solo surv, you will have more success if some of the other players are SWF. Therefore I believe my idea is a good one.

An additional point: You can't balance a game under the assumption that - for example - 25% of survs in a match will troll. Trolls don't count for balancing, trolls get banned.

NoShinyPony

@Entità said:
It's the same action for the animation, not for the meaning, the usefulness and the tactics choices a large number of objectives implies.

At the moment, most groups play "focus on gens, but friends before gens" and that's the way to go. The "friends before gens" part is usually performed better by SWF than random players. And random players are more likely to waste time with totems and chests. That's one of the reasons why I believe that my idea would work well as a balance for the current game.

@Entità said:
Not all parties begin before the matchmaking, with the SWF mode: sometimes, in the lobby, a small team sees a player who speaks the same language and invite them to join... How could the system be sure about solo players?

That is a valid point, but how often does that happen? I would not dismiss this idea when it would not work properly only in 0.X % of games.

NoShinyPony

@pandorayr said:
hello, u play on ps4 right?

Yup.

PureHostility

@NoShinyPony said:

@PureHostility said:
You are punishing solo players, who may need these precious seconds to GTFO from this shithole SWF has just created.

I understand that you sometimes get bad games with SWF groups when you play solo surv. But the problems (like getting farmed by other survs, trolls, survs dc'ing) are in general a lot worse with random players, not with SWF.

In an average match as a solo surv, you will have more success if some of the other players are SWF. Therefore I believe my idea is a good one.

An additional point: You can't balance a game under the assumption that - for example - 25% of survs in a match will troll. Trolls don't count for balancing, trolls get banned.

I have to disagree.

As a solo only player, in my whole dbd experience that spans over over 1,8k hours, most unfun games are when SWFs are present in the game. I actually tested by checking the profile of said survivor players to make sure they are indeed a premade, in vast majority of cases they were.
Guess, I will need to go back to archiving my games as stats into exceel.
That type of data would be extremely easy to include.

NoShinyPony

@PureHostility said:
I have to disagree.

As a solo only player, in my whole dbd experience that spans over over 1,8k hours, most unfun games are when SWFs are present in the game.

Then we have roughly about the same playtime and made different experiences. That happens.

Do you think that "nerfing" SWF is in general not a good idea?
Or would you be okay with my idea if it only concerned the SWF players and not the solo players?

xllxENIGMAxllx

The game is well balanced for non-swf games but is not for SwF one. a simple fix is to reduce Gen rush by adding more time to repair a gen currently is weak overall.

Here some numbers.

Solo : 80 seconds
Duo : 44.44 seconds
Trio : 33.33 seconds
Quatuor : 28.57 seconds

This is the current time required to repair a gen without any buff (Toolbox , great skillchecks , leader , PTS ) only base speed numbers. As you can see there is not a huge difference between those numbers. If you buffed the numbers by 15%. ( except solo).

Solo : 92 seconds
Duo : 51.10600 seconds
Trio : 38.3295 seconds
Quatuor : 32.8555 seconds

As you can see he doesn't do a huge difference when doing gens with teamates but does a lot for solo players. How to balance that is some kind of hard but SwF are the one who needs to get nerfed.

1. Apply same system when there is D/C's ( 3 players - 4 gens 2 - 3 and 1 - 2 gens ) now you apply the same but with gen time for SwF ( 2,25% per SwF for a total of 10% )
2. Put an overall increased time to repair gens solo/swf both affected.

what do you think about that change.

NoShinyPony

@xllxENIGMAxllx said:
1. Apply same system when there is D/C's ( 3 players - 4 gens 2 - 3 and 1 - 2 gens ) now you apply the same but with gen time for SwF ( 2,25% per SwF for a total of 10% )
2. Put an overall increased time to repair gens solo/swf both affected.

what do you think about that change.

I'm not sure if I understood your suggestions correctly so I have to ask:

1. Are you talking about when survs are working on a gen at the same time? (Since the numbers you listed above are reffering to survs working together on a gen.) Or a you talking about a general increased time, regardless whether survs are working on a gen together or not?

2. So should that time be added to no.1 or do you mean the devs should use option 1 OR option 2?

Someissues

Use MLGA to block SWF in the mean time

MLGA can tell u whether its a SWF so u can dodge, easy

here is download link

its officially allowed in DBD since the devs said its up to EAC, and EAC confirms its okay and they won't ban people for it

Mandy

@Someissues Please stop spreading misinformation. MLGA is not officially allowed in DBD, it has been removed from the whitelist and as I told you in a previous thread, it is USE AT YOUR OWN RISK! If EAC do decide to ban for it in the future then BHVR will not unban you.

Someissues

@MandyTalk said:
@Someissues Please stop spreading misinformation. MLGA is not officially allowed in DBD, it has been removed from the whitelist and as I told you in a previous thread, it is USE AT YOUR OWN RISK! If EAC do decide to ban for it in the future then BHVR will not unban you.

You guys the mod said its up to EAC to ban. Which EAC response by saying they will not ban people for it. wouldnt that make it official in this regard, since EAC is the person in charge of the ban and not you guys. Since you guys gave the right to them in this regards

EAC has no intention of banning, i'll make a post about this on reddit and forum once i get their official response this year

This should be bannable anyhow, as people are using this to block and blacklist players for playing good, nurses and such. and yet you guys allow this to happen

SmoothieKnight

A really good idea, NoShinyPony, but maybe we can consider somewhat of an inverse of what youre suggesting. I say we put an individual debuff on the survivors in SWF. Make their generator repair, self heal, and healing others with said debuff (as to not punish solos trying to be altruistic or needing a heal) a percent amount slower. This way solo survivors are not punished on speed and are playing normally, and the coordinated (and probably on comms) SWF groups have some sort of balance to counter their increased efficiency. For example:
Solo: No debuff
Duo: 5% decrease in action speed
Trio: 10% decrease in action speed
Full SWF team: 15% decrease in action speed.

This could be represented in the SWF lobby as youre inviting others down by the "ready up" indicator. Thoughts?

NoShinyPony

@SmoothieKnight said:
I say we put an individual debuff on the survivors in SWF. Make their generator repair, self heal, and healing others with said debuff (as to not punish solos trying to be altruistic or needing a heal) a percent amount slower.

I like that idea as well! And such a debuff could be implemented as easily as my original idea.

What I would change: Apply the debuff only on gen time, not on healing time. If gens took a bit longer, I believe that would be already enough for a killer to gain momentum in a match.

Lodosslight

@Dreamnomad said:
I don't like it.

Ok? explain yourself ,than being silent and not back up your reason to say "I don't like it.".