My thoughts on the recent dev update
Before i get into my thoughts i want to stress that I have no interest in getting into a US vs THEM argument and i want to look at all the changes subjectivly and explain why i do or don't think its a good change.
So firstly the map change to autohaven is great. The car walls were far to long and just in the way majority of the time not just for chasing survivors but also for getting across the map. Well done on this much needed change
Killer Changes
Not much for me to say here as out of all the changed killers I personally only play clown so i'm not sure how the addon changes to the other killers will effect.
On the clown change I think its a little un needed due to the fact that the addon makes the survivor exposed it doesn't instantly down them. Having 2 bottles allows for a margin of error and let's face it if anyone has played clown then unless your basicly giving the survivor a back rub getting a direct hit is extreamly hard. Overall though this nerf won't have much effect on clown as I assume the only players running pinky finger are those looking for a quick win not a fun game.
Perk Changes - The big one
Let's start with killer.
CoB, Pain Res and Overcharge have all been nerfed. Its not surprising this has happened especially given that the forums have blown up recently with the skull merchant and the "3 gen" issue. The CoB and Overcharge arn't to big of a nerf and when using them the average player won't see much difference but the Pain Res nerf is a bit over the top. If Pain Res was being used to much by killers then instead of limiting it to 4 uses only reduce slightly the regression. I don't think anyone is going to want to run Pain Res now because if you hook a survivor on a scourge hook now and there are no gens with any real progression then its just a wasted hook.
Gearhead - This was an interesting buff to gearhead and I think it may actually get some use now. Previously it was so trash it could be seen as a buff to survivor as it wasted a perk slot but now it will work extreamly well in a skill check build. The aura reading ability on any skill check hit plus the fact that if a skill check is missed you get notified aswell means killers will always know what gen is being worked on after a hit (as long as a skill check is triggered)
Now for Survivor
Circle of Healing - Not sure I understand this one. I have always seen CoH as kind of a survivor nerf when someone brings it because it distracts survivors from the gens so i don't see why it needed to change. The healing speed was fine and the ability to heal yourself was fine and didn't need to change. The changes they have made will kill this perk as no one is going to waste a perk slot on the off chance someone else will follow them and heal them in a boon. It will make much more sence to just heal outside the boon rather than waste time running to it.
Overzealous - This is a great change to the perk from a survivors perspective. Being able to bless a totem and gain the benifits from it along with the fact that you have a bonus to repair speed makes this perk very viable for support style players. The only issue is they destroyed the most used Boon (Circle of Healing) so although the change to this perk is a great one it isn't really going to see much use. Unless survivors realize that shadowstep is actully the best boon and all start running that one instead :)
Dead Hard - THE BIG ONE - Let me start by answering NO. I don't play survivor to much and when I do i DO NOT run dead hard. This change was for all intense and purpose STUPID. The previous change to dead hard going from distance to endurance was a great change as the main issue that a lot of killers had was the distance gain that survivors got. Trading that distance for mend was a fair compromise and despite the outcry when it first got nerfed i believe majority of the community quickly accepted the new version.
This version of Dead hard though is just pointless. Its expected now that you have to safe unhook someone to gain a single use of dead hard and that puts a hard limit to its use. On top of this it doesn't always work due to latency issues. An alternative change to Dead hard would be to instead change exhaustion all together and reworking that mechanic instead of just nerfing dead hard so much its never used.
Med Kit Changes
This was long needed. Med kits have always been slightly to powerful in the game with the only real counter being Franklins Demise (Which i Proudly run as a perminant perk on my builds). I think that having base kit 24 seconds is a little to much and instead should be more 20 seconds. Unsure why they changed Altruistic heals as this was always the worst thing for survivors to do IMO as it cause you to have no charges left to use on yourself. Altruistic heals should have been left alone just increase base healing time to 20 seconds.
Flashlight Interaction Changes.
I think this personally is also a stupid change. They state "As the killer roster has grown, these mechanics have started to feel out of place" and "The majority of Killers do not have any interaction with Survivor items, leading to the ones that do feeling unfairly punished by something beyond their control" however this is total hog wash.
Wraith for example has always been fairly strong because of their ability to speed up to a survivor, uncloak and hit them. The counter to this was to loot/bring in a flashlight to hopefully stun him first so to remove this aspect from the game gives the wraith such a big buff to his strength. Same with Nurse and given that it took a lot of skill to burn a nurse out of her power it seems stupid they would remove a skill based mechanic.
The Hag change is slightly better as to replace the ability to burn away traps survivors can now remove them at a long time which brings it more in line with trapper's traps.
Finally the Artist's Crows seems a bit unfair to remove that ability. This was again a big counter to artist but as stated in the dev update this didnt come up to much so why remove a mechanic that only a few more skilled players are using.
All in all I don't agree with the flashlight interaction changes speaking from a balance point of view.
And finally the blood web changes.
What is there to say about this except its about dang time. Blood point spend simulator was the worst game on steam and its about time it got shut down for good.