The only change Skull Merchant needed was reload drones from lockers. The rework is horrible
I honestly preferred the 3 gen camping Skull Merchant over the random buffs/debuff new Skull Merchant.
The complaint about old Skull Merchant was that she could easily make a 3 gen at the end of the game. This is because once a survivor disabled a drone it would just instantly reappear in her inventory. However if all they added was a (slightly longer than Huntress) Drone reload time from lockers (Only for drones disabled and not removed due to hook placement) than her 3 gen camping could be great'y diminished. I don't know why BHVR needlessly likely to complicate things.
New Skull Merchant is just as annoying, boring, and unfun to play against as the previous old Skull Merchant. I honestly think Drones causing damage should be removed from base kit and be a iridescent add-n, other debuff's are fine.
Right now as a Solo Que only Surv (who has been playing since 2019.) I'm at 3 escaped vs 10 deaths. Only other killer with that level of discrepancy is Blight with regards to escapes vs deaths.
Comments
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Wrong.
The only change needed was a full delete.
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Bit unfair for the players who enjoy her.
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"I honestly think Drones causing damage should be removed from base kit and be a iridescent add-n, other debuff's are fine."
I completely agree here. The emphasis was on the tracking ability and other negative effects. And now this.
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I'll just leave this here....
Dull Merchant is still an issue, the crux of the problem has just shifted a bit. This guy breaks it down in detail.
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No what they shouldve done was keep those boxes that spawn in the trials that they shown in her teaser on twitter. It looked like a box where she couldve reload some drones but it never showed up on release.
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I must admit, when it comes to this killer, I do not care. 🫠
I would send her away in a heartbeat. She’s the least enjoyable killer in the game, and that’s a majority held opinion.
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Still see potential in her myself.
Her kit is overloaded atm, but the change to the sweeping drones was a great improvement. Avoiding the beams MGS style while going for saves or moving to gens/looking for totems is the fun part of her kit. However getting shut down at loops is not.
I'd personally:
- Remove the Hindered effect from getting scanned while claw trapped.
- Remove the scaling scanned survivors speed.
- Make her a flat 4% faster when a scanned survivor is in her terror radius.
- Make her a flat 4% faster when a claw trapped survivor in in her terror radius. (Claw traps last longer).
- Getting scanned while claw trapped zaps the survivor, preventing them from vaulting or dropping pallets.
This makes it so that her setting up a drone will make her undetectable, and cause her to lose her speed boost from having a scanned survivor in her TR, meaning closing down a loop by setting up a drone doesn't come for free and can be outplayed.
It ensures every player understands what speed of Skully they are dealing with at any time, and ensures those speeds booats are related to teh lamyer being currently chased, not a rando who stepped ina trap on tbe other aide of the map. (its even hard for Skull Merchant herself to keep tabs on how fast she is going sometimes currently).
Between the broken, deep wound and the fact survivors positions can be easily tracked by Skull Merchant, she can decide who to pursue, and will have a speed boost while engaging on that target. Closing down a loop and using the rotate option at the right time to get the zap and help her score her hit will grant her skill expression.
With these changes a lot of the things like her drones coming back online instead of being disabled, her fast recall, etc, etc all are in a fair spot.
It also keeps the parts of Skull Merchant that are fun to play in tact, so people who do like her, don't lose their killer.
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I play skull merchant regularly without intention to 3 gen from the start and i think she's pretty strong. the only aspect that i think is annoying base-kit wise is her bugs and her cooldown for placing drones.
there is currently bug where if you place a drone, it does not spawn and this is annoying because you go on cooldown for no reason. the cooldown in general is clunky because it impairs to take advantage of her "new" stealth buffs. In regards to base-kit, other than that, she's pretty good as m1 killer.
add-on wise, i think her add-on are a bit underpowered/under-tuned numerically compare to her previous self. In particular, I wish expired batteries, supercharger and high powered mode had better numerical values. Still, Prototype rodor+Ultra sonic speaker is decent and other two add-on that provide good value are adaptive lightning(yellow add-on) and Vital Targeting Processor(Green add-on). So while I wish add-on selection was a little bit wider, she does have "ok" add-on's. Another add-on that i wish was reverted was Low Power Mode because static drones not very useful compare to cooldown.
Other than fixing bugs and add-on adjustment, i do not think she needs any changes. Knowing BVHR, you never know what kind of negative changes they'll on put on a killer. I disagree with OP post in regards lockers. She does not need that. That suggest has been common one for Trapper traps.
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Skull merchant after the rework sure.
anybody who enjoyed her before the remake only enjoyed it because they could make people miserable
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Old Skull Merchant was an issue, new one isn’t (or not more than any other killer could be at least). What situation makes her more oppressive that what for example Trapper or Plague could be? “Oh if I go there I get 3rd ticked and injured” well yes also do you if you step on a Trapper’s trap. “Oh I can’t loop this because she slows me” well yes also does Clown. I do not get how is she more problematic than any other killer of her same style.
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Clown gotta m1 you twice whilst cuck merchant only requires to place a drone that can scan you for free removed health state AND slowdown
Post edited by Rizzo on1 -
Holding W away from loops will always save you against her power as soon as you see her deploying the drone, just like against Artist and many other killers. She won’t 3rd tick you if you learn how to manage the stacks you have. Sometimes it’s worth going on your own to a drone and getting injured when you know she is far, work on gens injured while your’re broken and then reset and this way you won’t get tagged by her drones directly next time you get in chase. She is strong of course, but a lot of people would figure out how to play against her if they didn’t give up instantly, trust. But you do you! The arguable issue imo is her ability to recall drones that are hacked since she is able to just replace them with a new one, that should probably be looked into and hacked drones should not be recallable until they are back active.
Post edited by Rizzo on3 -
While it's certainly a popular opinion you can't just say it's a majority held opinion without actually polling a decent amount of the playerbase.
Also they're obviously never going to outright remove a killer as that sets a terrible precedent, people can complain about any killer enough and eventually they'd get removed.
Also SM has and has always had a higher pick rate than a bunch of other killers in the game. Should we just delete less-picked killers because they're clearly not very popular either?
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You do realise the obvious response is:
I don't care you don't like her. Eat your DC penalty.
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https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1043741486828761158/1187291824860180501/data-chart-final.jpg
blob:https://forums.bhvr.com/5e177935-0a2f-4c0c-b205-81c98d6026a2A poll of 1,000 players showing she has over an 80% dislike rate. That is a large enough polling group to assume that trend would continue, and can call the dislike for dull merchant majority held.
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I can't take any Skull Merchant criticism seriously that doesn't start with
"yes, I know the drones do nothing if stay still, crouch-walk, avoid the scan-lasers or leave the loop, but..."
The only explanation for a Skull Merchant being better in 3-gen than any territorial killer is if the survivors doesn't know this. Also there is no explanation for a Skull Merchant being better in chase than a Clown besides the comparison-Clown being bad.
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yes, I know the drones do nothing if stay still, crouch-walk, avoid the scan-lasers or leave the loop, but…. she remains the absolute worst killer ever made and implemented. Her “power” is brainless and boring, her “counterplay” is brainless and boring. She requires no thought to play, no mechanical skill, and her kit reaps more benefits from simply pressing m2 than any other killer.
Better?
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Much more. It's lacking any explanation or reasoning, almost as if someone only parroted a popular opinion like everyone else does.
Though her being easy to play is a valid point - but I don't see why every low-tier killer must be hard to play. Not everyone has to be Hillbilly.
But to display the balanced nature of my views - I think her walk is absolutely abysmal, only comparable to Jessica Rabbit's - but she was meant to be a parody of sexy. Lucky for me I don't have to see it from first person. :P
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I wonder why that opinion is popular. 🤷🏻♂️
What about what I said lacks explanation or reasoning? Or better yet needs one?
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Oooh I've not seen this. I'd still be skeptical that she's -the- most disliked killer, especially since other killers like Trickster and Knight are, even in these results, so close to her as well.
Regardless it doesn't really matter how disliked she is, BHVR is never, nor should they ever outright delete a killer. They already reworked her so she's much better than she was, and they'll likely continue to give her some small tweaks to help her feel better to play against in future.
If you -really- hate SM -that- much that you simply refuse to even play a game against her, you shouldn't really be playing DBD to be honest.
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Well, the latest Killa Whale survey suggest that the average survivor doesn't like playing against more than 40% of the roster. I'm not particularly interested in the 'why', although I don't think it's reason enough for removing 40% of the killers. Neither 20%, 10%, or even 2% of them.
What I really like in your previous post is that you don't try to rationalize your opinion on Skull Merchant with things like "she's a strong 3-genner, she's strong in chase, she's busted, etc". You just say "she's simply the worst, boring, boring and too easy to play".
That's respectable. I personally don't like Felix Richter. Just like you with SM, neither I claim that Felix is op or that he's faster in loops than others, or anything like that. He's just boring. His scream is dull, and so is his face. He's also very easy to play (all survivors are. You just do gens and pre-run, and you are already better than a high percentage of the others). Though unlike you, I don't feel Felix should be removed.
Post edited by Evan_ on6 -
Ive seen this video, and he goes on and on and on and on about how survivors can’t counter her but hold W but that’s simply not true.
The real issue here, is that people just hate her. (Not everyone) so they want her gone.
It doesn’t matter what the devs change about her. People will continue to hate her. It’s stupid. She’s way better than 3 gen mommy. 🤷🏼♂️
More important stuff to focus on.
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oh no, I gotta quit playing DBD because I heavily dislike 1 of the 30+ killers in the game… shucks…
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Reload from lockers with a drone that can fly back to her? Not a good idea. Maybe just a slight cooldown of recalling drones.
I don’t think she needs to be touched. She’s way better to go against now and more fun than the 50 minute long agonizing 3 gen mommy’s.
I’ll take this new rework any day.
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You're putting words in my mouth now. You can dislike her as much as you want, god knows there's plenty of killers I hate playing against. So long as you don't just give up straight away and you actually play the match out you're good.
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If a killer is so hated that people complained that much about it, then the removal is deserved and its a good precedent to set, since by its very definition everyone would be happy that their complaints got a horribly designed killer removed.
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Try leaving the loop without giving her something in return. She either gets a hit or a pallet and you might still get a lock on stack.
Also, a killer that has a large range area denial ability will always be good at playing territorial. It doesn't matter that the survivors don't have to worry about lock on stacks while doing gens. As soon as you get near them, they have to leave and considering that you have an inbuilt stealth ability and can deny any loop they get to, it's no surprise that you'll get some easy hits. This forces them to heal and allow you to regress the gens for a bit. Until you eventually gain the haste effect of a claw trap. Then, you'll start snowballing and getting even faster hits and more lock on stacks.
Skull Merchant doesn't require any more thought than: "Press M2 at a slight distance to the loop and adjust the rotation to either cut off the survivor or force them to stand still multiple times per loop." and playing against her always reduces your 'counterplay' to: "Pre drop pallet before anything happens and leave the loop."
I do not see how any of this could be considered fun. I really don't, so if you would be so kind to explain, I'd be grateful. Then I'd at least have an idea why people actually play her. Or is it just because she is easy to play and guarantees results?
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I agree that the rework is also terrible but I don't think lockers would have been the best solution. They should have just made it so lock-on and tracking did not buildup/apply when working on gens or when the drone was within the radius of a gen.
Unfortunately we are here with this current rework. An easy fix to save it or make it bearable imo is to just either reduce the radius that the drones cover so they are not as oppressive, or make it so drones cannot overlap. Right now it is way too easy for SM to just make a whole section of the map a drone chase kill zone that injures or gives haste.
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You just described killers with anti-loop.
One of the reasons I'm not playing survivor is that I feel it's mind-numbingly simple. You are holding m1 or W during 95% of the match. I don't have to understand what people enjoy in that - I'm just happy that they do, because that means I can chase them! Sure, Skull Merchant is not a Hux or Twins, but she still requires much more focus and thought than what the average survivor puts into the trial.
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But not EVERYONE hates Skull Merchant. Many people genuinely enjoy her, and many other survivors at the very least have other killers they hate even more than SM.
Removing killers just because they're really unpopular is not a good idea. Because then people would just be even more vocal about hating the killers they don't like to try and get them deleted.
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"Anti loop killers" (describes almost every killer in DBD history) still have to actually play around loops (with few exceptions). Slog Merchant on the other hand puts you in a lose-lose scenario simply by pressing M2. It's mind numbingly simple.
Slog Merchant doesn't require focus to play against because she leaves you with only one option every time she presses M2. To drop the pallet and leave the loop. It's the same every time. There is no thinking involved. You play the same around every loop against every SM and do not vary in any way because it's the only way to delay her even a bit.
She turns both sides into bots and if that isn't bad design, then I don't know what is.
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There are people who played the old Skull Merchant that enjoyed playing her, and not with intentions to make the survivors' matches miserable. Those people focused on her chase ability, utilizing drones in a smart way, both for chase and for info. Those people did not play the 3-gen game. I didn't play her much, but when I did, I found her somewhat fun. Using drones in chase was quite fun (with either the addons that slowed the survivors down (like clown's bottles), or those that revealed their auras).
I feel like both Skull Mechant and Onryo had some problems in their power, and both got reworked to much easier to play as, but worse to play against. Both of their skill caps lowered significantly too, imo. I hope 2024 will bring something better for these 2 killers, especially once the general 3-gen problem has been solved.
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old skull merchant was BS in literally every way, useless chase power, almost useless tracking and useless stealth, the new one at least needs map knowledge and a good macro, but no survivor tries to play against her or at least understand how to counter her (it's super simple, she's basically an improved clown), and she´s still boring to loop against because she´s a basic m1 killer (safe drop is cringe)
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How can the funny 3 gen drone no skill killer not be hated? I get maybe 2 people like her but I am not convinced that ere are "Many" people who enjoy her.
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Well she's not particularly-amazing at 3-genning anymore.
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Old Skull Merchant was a necessary evil in DBD. She was the only Killer that could maintain a constant presence on the map that allowed the slow objective that Killers must endure (hooking Survivors) to actually be logically achievable by making Survivors generator objective just as slow.
Now, that being said, this new version of Skull Merchant feels like the true vision of what she was meant to be. A tracking and defending killer that has a good interactable power while maintaining a 'jack-of-all-trades' dynamic to her kit. She can defend generators and hooks while also being strong in chase for a simple Basic Attack character.
I don't agree at all with turning her into a locker reload Killer. That style should be reserved for throwable powers that deal damage.
Ultimately, I agree with @Devil_hit11 that atm bugs and add-on numbers are the only thing that could do with looking at. Only then, if it's still felt that other stuff needs looking at, then stuff like her kit can be looked at: Her stacking speed increase, status effects etc
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Drones causing damage should be removed from base kit
She would just be worse Clown...
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Undetectable killer with power around TR, genious...
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I am currenty Prestige 32 and want to get to 100 unless BHVR listens to crying survivors, again...
She is good for players who enjoy basic M1 killers imo and I really like her skins.
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Doesn't make it true, just because some small youtuber made a video about it...
He ignored quite a lot of things and also incorrect about others. Saying she has good addons made me laugh...
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While her add-ons aren't "good" in the sense that they turn her from F-tier to A-tier, she has everything in her add-ons. She has add-ons that gives her claw traps pocket Huntress's Lullaby, pocket Sloppy Butcher, inflicts Oblivious, increased Hindered on Survivor and increased Haste on herself etc.
Her add-ons aren't game-breaking like Blight's or Myers's but some of them are downright bootleg versions of perks by themselves and give her an absurd amount of versatility for the low effort it requires.
Whenever I have to play Dull Merchant (due to daily challenges or customs) I don't have to mindgame or really do anything in chase since even god loops like the infamous GoJ house, Saloon or RPD main Hall (those stairs are annoying for M1 Killers if the Survivor has a decent head-start but the drones invalidate the whole thing) are easily circumvented. All I have to do is press M2 once or twice and the Survivor will eventually be hindered, broken and deep-wounded (and that's without add-ons, not that they are needed) while I get faster which makes the speed gap even wider if they don't immediately leave the loop.
The hardest Skull Merchant games I had were against SWAT teams that always Sprint-Burst away early to use her only flaw: If she can't start a chase then it's tough to win them. And even then I never got anything less than a 2k (and that's because I'm not going for the 4k if someone DCs/dies on first hook, it's just meaningless and demoralizing for everyone involved, bots will die though for the sake of bp but otherwise nobody's going past 2nd hook).
The Survivor can't even hope that I run out of drones mid-chase because I can recall drones from across the map, even if they are disabled, without losing speed and re-use those drones in the current chase. The only possible move to waste as much time as possible is to pre-drop and leave loops as soon as the drone is dropped, they'll still go down eventually and likely either waste a bunch of pallets or accidentally draw the Killer to their teammates but there is no real counterplay outside of holding W.
Furthermore, the drone can be used to make flashlight saves/Decisive Strike almost meaningless. After downing a Survivor and if a wall isn't nearby, just walk a couple steps away, drop a drone so when you pick up you are in the zone but not under the drone. If the Survivor somehow wiggles off they instantly gets scanned (maybe alongside the potential rescuer if they had to get too close) which makes the Killer faster and the recovery almost meaningless unless a god window or pallet was right there.
The only "good" thing about her right now is that she is one of the few Killers that makes people not want to get chased like the old days when most people didn't know how to loop. Most SM games I play, on either side, are among the slowest since Survivors don't want to take risks and are utterly focused on avoiding a potential 3-gen.
Side-note: the fact that your argument for the video's validity is that the Youtuber is "small" isn't exactly reassuring. Otz's word isn't law and stats speaks for themselves: Skull Merchant has the highest killrate in the game despite some Killers having a far higher maximum potential (Nurse, Blight) because she requires almost zero learning curve to use outside of common sense.
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Most of her addons are connected to her claw trap. Getting claw trap on survivors is way harder than used to, you will usually get claw trap only on chased survivor, who lose it when gets downed, so they get little to no value. Most of her addons are trash.
Otz's word isn't law
When did I mention Otz? I just said video doesn't make it true.
All comparisons in video are made in quite pathetic way to display authors narrative.
stats speaks for themselves
Well, not hard to get high kill rate when survivors give up every other game. They just hate skull merchant in general, doesn't matter what you do it her unless you delete her or make her unplayable.
Current Skull merchant is way more managable compare it old version, even for soloQ.
- haste is worse (harder to get on more than 1 stack)
- information is worse (you get info on survivors mostly in chase only)
- pallet breaking gone
- exposed was just replaced with broken -> worse
- totem defense is gone
- 3-gen holding is mostly gone
- drones working on multiple floors gone
- addons are definetly worse
What exactly improved on her that she is such a big issue? Hindered that takes 12 seconds and survivor needs to stand in a loop?
Only thing that improved is stealth, but it's simply easier to use, not that much better.
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That's precisely the point, setting up a drone at loops isn't free, you lose your speed buff 🙃
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Why exactly should it cost anything? It's her power...
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The thing that improved is that, despite needing to move a bit more than her previous iteration, she can still do area-denial better than every other trap Killer in the game and at no real cost (every other trap Killer either has to manually replace/move their traps or the Survivors can disable them permanently in some fashion) Skull Merchant has the equivalent of the Trapper's Iri Stone add-on but basekit since her drones will repair themselves after a while even if Survivors take the time to disable them without needing any imput from her. And she can recall and replace disabled drones mid-chase. She got more drones than before and said drones can slightly overlap each other (making guarding exit gates disgustingly easy if close enough, especially on Midwich)
Guarding gens directly is superfluous when you can simply keep every strong loop around the gens impossible to use, every time Survivors leave a gen they will get a stack by going to a strong loop, if they avoid the loop then they will likely be either in a deadzone for an easy hit or will have to quickly use a pallet.
Skull Merchant isn't, and never was, a Killer that gets a 4k at 5 gens. Forcing Survivors to overuse resources early and taking unavoidable damage, especially if the Survivors 3-gen themselves, basically gives free victories if the Survivors aren't equipped with gen-destroying perks and items.
Quite frankly, all she would need to be a tad more bearable (though still annoying due to area-denial in general being annoying to varying extent) is to make it so drones that are disabled cannot be recalled until they repair themselves and to make Hindered/Haste add-on dependant rather than basekit.
Side-note: I'm not sure if it was doable pre-rework but it's sometimes possible to put a drone in the middle of the basement stairs and put another at the top of the stairs. This works especially well on Ironworks of Misery where if a Survivor is put in basement in main it's basically impossible to get them. Happened to me a couple times and it's pretty annoying seeing my teammates just giving up and slamming gens, there's no other choice really since interacting with the drones in any way will bring the Killer right back and running out will net me 2 stacks, speeding her up.
Also you said "just because some small youtuber made a video about it" which implies that notoriety is a factor in validity of opinion and experience.
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The thing that improved is that, despite needing to move a bit more than her previous iteration, she can still do area-denial better than every other trap Killer
That didn't improve, she used to be way better at this. You can ignore her drones unless you are in chase with her.
every other trap Killer either has to manually replace/move their traps or the Survivors can disable them permanently
and what are you comparing with? Freddy and Trapper, the one of worst killers in dbd?
Hag? one of least played killers?
Doesn't seem like something to balance around to me... Actual effect of their traps is better than her drone trigger anyway, except freddy, but he is just bad.
especially if the Survivors 3-gen themselves
well, they deserve to lose for that...
it so drones that are disabled cannot be recalled until they repair themselves and to make Hindered/Haste add-on dependant rather than basekit.
so make her useless, nice... Everyone loves to play killers who are valid only using addons, right?
Without hindered you can completely ignore her drones when you are injured.
Without haste she is completely useless as a killer.
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Because, Skull Merchant's kit is overstacked. It's got too much in it. Skull Merchant has very punishing Anti-Loop, both at shutting down loops with a drone to force survivors to leave, as well as perfect information for when they do leave after they've been scanned a single time. She also has some degree of global slowdown, between broken and forcing survivors to slowly approach gens, hexes and/or hooks she protects, and even breaking her drones gives her information she can capitalise on. The video posted by @Skillfulstone explains it with very good argumentation.
The speed boost is an issue to my mind. She already has the power to shut down loops, she can get perfect knowledge on mind games, she can force you to stay or take a hit, and then to top it all off she can get a 13% speed swing between her Hindered effect and speed boost that just makes downs trivial.
I'm not claiming my idea is perfect, but I also don't believe "Just delete her" is at all reasonable or helpful. Some people actually like Skull Merchant and want her to be good and fun. The motivation for my suggestion is she needs to lose something from her kit. We could be boring and say "Just remove her speed boost", or we could be a little more creative and tie it to her 'excitement of seeing the terror in her victims' or something, hence attaching it to her TR, with some trade offs imposed accordingly vs. Her very power anti-loop.
It's not the only option. I've suggested elsewhere make her a 4.4 killer and give her a flat 3% boost when there is a scanned survivor, and a flat 5% when there is a claw trapped survivor, making her 4.4, 4.52 and 4.6 respectively. At 4.4m/s at least her near uncounterable anti loop and all her effects are somewhat justified cause she can be pre-run quite effectively.
If you have better suggestions I'm all ears, but I for one really want to break this "Skull Merchant sucks and there is no hope for her" mindset a lot of people have.
Switching the traps to always use scan lines was a great change. Her unavoidable AoE was dumb, but having to sneak past her traps to disarm or work under them was a solid change. She has the potential to be pretty good if people smarter than me would engage their minds in the conversation.
Maybe she is fine as is, if you want to argue that, then sure, I'll happily listen.
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I mean, as I said before she already lost quite a lot of things and got worse on most others.
She is way more managable for survivors compare to old version.
I play her a lot and main issue is survivors still don't know how to play against her. Amount of times I managed to get claw trap on survivor outside of chase is just sad. That should never happen.
I really don't think killer should be nerfed just because survivors don't know how to play against it. We have seen it with Pig, several times...
The video posted by @Skillfulstone explains it with very good argumentation.
That is quite a lot of things missing / incorrect in that video. Those comparisons against other killers are made in a way it seems better than it is just to support the narrative.
It's definetly not true she doesn't have a counterplay. Seems kinda funny to say she doesn't have counterplay and then display Knight as an example with counterplay...
Even as chase merchant she is not better than old version. Only thing that improved is stealth, everything else about her is worse. That's why she is more managable.
She is completely useless without haste, she has nothing without it.
For all I care you can remove hindered and push it back to addon, but definetly not haste. It's already worse than it used to be.
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I will admit, I do think she is more managable, but I'm low, maybe mid elo tops... I'm not sure how much is players not bothering to play, and how much is her being insane at anti-loop/me being bad.
She in my opinion is not quite hitting the levels of obnoxious that some would have us believe... however the 13%-17% speed swing is just insane in combination with everything else she gets. When I get it as Skull Merchant, it kinda feela bad, like I didn't earn my down. I'm a Pig player usually and rely on mind games for downs, the scans make those mind games pretty easy, as there is no chance of me completely misguessing while I have them on radar, so I wouldn't say she gets nothing without her haste. Especially as she has a 4.6m/s stealth speed, which is great for sneaking up on gens.
With that in mind removing Hindered is one option for chopping something out of her kit. The only issue I have with this is getting scanned while you have a claw trap should do 'something'. The shock suggestion from PixelBush was pretty cool... maybe sn add on for a 3% Hindered effect would be fine?
Another thing that erks me personally about her speed boost is it is never clear how much speed Skull Merchant has. It's something you can possibly learn, but unless youre paying close attention to the HUD in the middle of trying to deal with her at loops, it's really hard to know what speed she has. People getting scanned across the map can suddenly grant her a speed boosts that have nothing to do with the survivor she is actually chasing.
I'd prefer her speed be standardised in some way. Part of the suggestion for the TR option was to make it so the survivor she is actually chasing is the cause for her boost. Alternatively 3% for a scanned survivor and 5% for a clawtrapped survivor, and leave it at that at least let's you know where you stand, rather than it being somewhere between 3% and 7%... and it would help me keep track k as Skull Merchant a lot easier too, as even playing her sometimes I'm not sure.
So between the standardised speed and the shock instead of Hindered, I would think Skull Merchant would be quite reasonable.
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it kinda feela bad, like I didn't earn my down.
why? It's her power, which is just movement speed bonus in most cases, and in longer chase possibly hindered. How is it exactly different from clown?
Clown can get 10 % Haste and give 15 % Hindered
Skull merchant usually has only 3%, max 5% speed boost and 10% Hindered.
Her values are way lower than Clown and you realy on survivors to use them, it can be denied for quite a long time.
So I really don't see her chase as an issue.
With Dredge on many loops there is nothing survivor can do to avoid downed/injured. (try Dredge on Hawkins, that's fun)
Knight? When I am just eating popcorn and watching my guard down survivor, who went to corner?
Artist? Basically same as Dredge.
Trickster? Good luck playing short loops.
My main problem is those so called "issues" are not unique to Skull merchant. You can easily find it on many other killers.
You worry about many status effects? Remove broken. I couldn't care less about it for my gameplay.
Skully is basically Jack of all trades, master of none.
how much speed Skull Merchant has
I mean, if she has more than 3%, someone screwed it. You can easily see on yourself if you got tagged or not, you start glowing red for a while. Other than that you can see if someone else has active claw trap. That covers most of it.
I'd prefer her speed be standardised in some way.
Thing is there is not really reason for it.
Do you know how fast is Blight? Spirit? Wraith? Perks on both sides?
With merchant, if you make some effort you can track it with HUD. It's already nerfed a lot compare to old version. You almost never get over 5%, not really hard to track in my opinion...
shock instead of Hindered
Shock like a Doctor?
Do you realize Shock would be way stronger? How the hell is that better for survivors?
If you make it on windows only or something, then it's kinda useless. If it works on pallets, or even just pallets only, it's way more annoying to deal with than Hindered.
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