Thoughts and suggestions about The Skull Merchant
I've been enjoying playing as The Skull Merchant, I really like the idea of a surveillance killer and she fits that fantasy pretty well. I love the uniqueness and feel of the radar tracking, but I do feel like she has room for improvement, even after the buffs.
My main problems playing as her are:
- The Drones don't feel threatening enough. Lock On builds up very slowly, a survivor can run from one end of an active Drone's radius to the other without becoming exposed, or hang around until they are nearly Locked On and then leave. There are also no drawbacks to injured survivors getting Locked On besides Killer Instinct when within a Drone's radius.
- Drones don't feel like they cover much area. They can barely cover one tile when placed in the dead center, which isn't much for tracking when you only have four. This often means the most effective play is to just put them on top of generators. The exception is in maps or areas such as The Game where an Active Drone can cover two floors at once.
- The Undetectable effect feels underwhelming. Aside from the cool noise it makes, it requires the Killer to effectively wait in place under a drone to catch people off-guard, and that's assuming they didn't already see or hear them there.
Overall, I think she is an awesome concept but lacks effectiveness. Here are some of my ideas:
- Survivors within an Active Drone's radius, or who are fully Locked On, become Oblivious. This would replace the Undetectable effect. This allows the Killer to move unexpectedly on Survivors who are caught out by the Drones. This also gives injured Survivors something to watch out for when they're fully Locked On.
- While in direct line of sight of an Active Drone, Lock On builds up slightly faster. This allows the Drones to become a lot more effective while adding some extra decisions to where you want to place them to get the most value. It also adds strategy to Survivor, who could try to break line of sight with nearby drones while avoiding the Killer.
- Slightly larger radius for the Drones. This would let the Killer cover a bit more of the map and incentivise more creative placements.
I know there's also the 3-gen strategy where she hovers around the last three generators, while using her drones and regression perks to prevent the game from ending and refusing to commit to a chase. I feel like this is an issue which any powerful Killer could pull off easily though, and the upcoming nerfs to certain perks should help discourage this playstyle. Regardless, I'm enjoying The Skull Merchant in the future and will continue to play her!