Suggestion: Windows of Opportunity -- What a fun but healthy change could look like -- WOO!
With the recent description change and having seen pick rates climb and climb over a couple of years, it got me thinking of ways to improve the experience windows of opportunity provides--the ability to see pallets and windows through obstacles to help know where to run for safety or where not to run to avoid dead zones.
In my experience playing with friends of varying skill levels (ranging from beginner to veteran) and playing against it, windows of opportunity (WOO), in its current state, generally has two use cases:
- Safe, Information playstyle. Often, this group of survivors, who are usually more experienced players, will forgo part of the thought process behind looping, chaining, & tile skipping. It helps instill a survivor with assurance that they have a safer location nearby to avoid and/or prolong the killer. It also enables a more casual, relaxed play. "Where do I go from here." [Player looks for bright yellow]. "Perfect."
- Beginner-friendly, Road map playstyle. Often, this group of survivors will decrease the information gap of learning tiles (memorizing pallet & window generation) with some even forgoing it altogether. It's very similar to how (most) killers would be absolutely lost without generator auras. Over time, the survivors that forgo learning tiles have become reliant on the perk. Some players might find themselves returning to this use case upon the release of a new map or after a map receives an update--especially for more complex maps like Toba Landing or indoor maps. This is more akin to needing navigation on your phone/gps to drive somewhere, especially when you're first starting out.
The second use case, in particular, got me thinking.
Is this an issue? No, players enjoy the game in both of these use cases, and the information doesn't remove the killer's agency in a chase.
If WOO were changed to include a cooldown again after dropping a pallet or vaulting a window, how would this affect the current use cases? It would slightly burden the first group in that those players would have to memorize the location of the next safe area or loop the current tile for the cooldown duration. It would considerably burden the second group in that those players no longer get the information. But, I'm talking about something we already know, assuming this line of thinking is what led to the cooldown being removed originally.
But, if it were improved, what would that look like?
Idea 1: Keep WOO as is, but give it a new basis for cooldown. One such idea would be when a pallet is broken or a window is blocked by any means (maybe only the pallet one).
This creates new counterplay for killers and agency for survivors without being too oppressive. Plus it'd synergize with chemical trap! (no cooldown until killer interacts with your chemical trap pallet).
Idea 2: Convert WOO into a base-kit feature (opt-in/opt-out through settings) with a short, appropriate cooldown or activation condition. Maybe the entity shows the location of the closest pallet and window at the start of chase for 20 seconds and reactivates when the killer achieves bloodlust, kicks a pallet, vaults a window, and/or some other reactive factor.
Just as killers receive generator information, survivors would receive information on where they should go.
Whereas, initially, it may feel boring or unfair to give survivors this information, from what I've seen and heard, newer players really struggle with the information gap DBD imposes. Thankfully, the DBD team has already significantly changed the level of information in pursuit of a better UX through features like hook count, chase indicators, and objective and progress information. Hook grabs are gone. Locker saves have counterplay. Base Kit BT offers unhooked survivors a chance to body block for 10 seconds avoid going down immediately. Anti-camping changes are coming. This kind of change for WOO feels in line with how DBD is evolving.
Both of these ideas help improve DBD. Adding a reasonable cooldown encourages survivors to use any of the other 100 perk choices they have for information (troubleshooter for example), which means they explore and may play and engage with the game more. Base kit WOO would also prioritize healthy mechanics and player onboarding over perk reliance (rebalancing pick rates just like the blood web & perk bp bonus rebalance did).
If a base mechanic WOO feels threatening in terms of survivor-killer balance, then why not give killers something more? Maybe a generator noise notification (+ visual for accessibility) when there's a lot of total progress since you last checked on the survivors' objectives (a hiss of steam and flashing caution ! generator symbol or something)?
P.S.: Maybe change WOO's aura to more of a friendly look? The yellow aura everywhere makes me question how anyone plays with it. It'd be cool to see a scratchmark-colored aura/highlight for windows and pallets or something. And, with this, it may be more in line with the entity's line of thinking (killers get scratchmarks & noise notifications for rushing survivors, survivors get safe loop information--idk). This kind of UI design surrounding the entity (spike and tendril blocks, scratchmarks, etc.) is partly what made me get into DBD back in 2017 and continue to play as more and more of this interaction was added over time. It's always cool to see more of that unique DBD design.