The skull merchant situation.
There has been a lot of mixed feelings about the recently published patch notes for the upcoming ptb. The loudest feedback came from the Skull merchant changes, which are undeniably nerfs.
A lot of people rejoiced about the changes due to the killer still being majorly unfavoured by the community. (Which might be linked to bias from her 3gen days, but i digress)
Other people have pointed out, that gutting her is just going to make her vanish from matches and would result in a Freddy - like situation, where nobody wants to play them and nobody wants to play against them. This being bad practice towards the playerbase of the character if no changes happen over a longer period of time.
I personally emphathize with the second group of people, despite not liking the killer very much.
What is important now, I feel like, is an official statement adressing the situation. BHVR should openly state the idea behind the nerfs, which due to the lack of compensation, give the impression to just serve the purpose to send her into the void.
Additionally, and this might be a bit much to ask, there should be a statement about prioritization of balance changes. I greatly applaud BHVR for making changes happen a lot faster over the last few years. However, I feel like this resulted in priorities being presented incomprehensible.
I personally dont get why Plague, a killer that I deem fine with the exception of some overtuned addons, has higher priority than Freddy. Skull merchant should also be very high on the list now as should Myers.
I hope a community manager adresses the situation soon, so that we stop going at each others throats.
What do you guys think?
Comments
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I’ll say remove her completely, give people who bought her a refund, rework her from the ground up (upgraded or a completely new power, fixed lore and tonally consistent cosmetics) and re-release her into the game.
Might as well do it instead of creating this fiasco.
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I recall being refunded in DBD being close to impossible. Especially with a product this largely sold.
It might be a better solution though. The steps taken here are pretty drastic.
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Honestly, not the most insane idea ever. Just rip the bandaid off and get it over with. Send out compensation, open yourself up to the backlash, criticism, and all that comes with, put your PR team to work, and make a statement telling the community you are deeply sorry and that you will do better next time.
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I agree with you 100%. I'm in the 2nd camp of ppl who don't like how they handing SM in this patch. These nerfs do nothing to make her more enjoyable to play against(ppl will still go next against her I believe even if these nerfs go live). These nerfs only will make her feel really bad to play, meaning very little ppl will play her. In my opinion, this isn't balancing, it's artificially lowering the pick rate of a problematic killer so no one will play them and in turn, survivors will stop complaining since they will rarely even see an SM. This is a really bad solution esp if the rework takes a long time to come out.
I think the devs should come out and give us a statement about the prioritization of balance changes. As you said why is Plague who is by large fine getting changes when Freddy and Myres are left in the void? I know Mandy said on Tofu stream that the changes for SM are planned for next year but that is so vague and honestly too long to keep a killer super weak. If the rework was planned within next few patches (1-3 patches) then I would ok with the nerfs SM is getting but when it comes to killer reworks the devs have had a track record of taking years to do them, look at Twins, and Freddy. Personally, I think it's time to call the devs out on these bad practices. We need more timely and healthy changes to the game and fewer killers like Dark Lord whose power is largely is weaker versions of other killer's powers.
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P100 Skull merchant here. The haste being removed is a good change. The only other thing I would have changed about her is adding a timer that allows scans to fall off after about 30 seconds.
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I'm glad they're continuing to work on her kit. You can argue that this isn't a great way to deal with the situation in the interim, but something is certainly wrong with this killer and needs to be fixed long term.
I'm glad they're looking into it, and hopefully they can find a rework that is both fun to play as and against.
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Im with you about the haste. It made her basiv´cyl unstoppable at amny loops. At least from my experience. The changes however seem to not be targeted towards balancing her but making her unappealing to play. Hence why I would love to see an official statement.
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I would prefer for this to happen sooner than later. Or again, some form of official statement about the situation.
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I think the worst about it is that it sets a precedent for how they can "balance" killers. If survivors complain about a killer enough bhvr won't hesitate to nerf them into F tier until they feel like reworking them some day.
It makes me worry for any killer, is any killer even safe from this?
Pinhead and plague might be up next, since they consistently get high kill rates. After that they will probably gut chucky at some point. Been losing motivation to play after the dev update, it's been really disappointing.10 -
Completely agree, I don't think they've handled this situation in the best way.
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i think your over-thinking it. they're nerfing skull merchant because survivor disconnect too frequently vs the killer. by nerfing the killer, the killer will be more easily 4 man out and grant free wins for survivor. this will make survivor play more games vs skull merchant.
i think very obvious problem will be that skull merchant will be very low play-rate due to being weak so even survivor does d/c less, they'll play vs merchant very little.
this precedent has been there for many killers. freddy is pretty much F-tier because survivor complaining about his gameplay.
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To be fair, Freddy's reworked power was not healthy for the game.
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The changes made to her were undeniably harsh, and it seems the devs deliberately went overboard to discourage people from playing her. That being said, I don’t agree with those who believe she didn’t need changes at all. When a large majority of players agree on something, it doesn’t make sense to ignore them in favor of a small minority. Ultimately, both sides want the same thing—to have fun. Those who loved the character were already having fun and didn’t care that others weren’t. Those who hated her couldn’t enjoy the game and didn’t care that some players liked her. But those who disliked her far outnumbered those who didn’t, and I don’t understand how anyone could argue that this majority opinion should be ignored.
At the end of the day it’s a live service game and everyone should understand that everything is subject to change. You don’t buy the game and own it, you buy it to play what someone else owns and they’re completely within their right to make changes on any part of the game.
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the complaints were two folded on both his iterations. i think only positive for skull merchant is that since she won't be listed for any changes, there is more chance for other more important killers to receive changes. skull merchant's reworks are wasted opportunity costs changes for other killers. Now that she's bad, bvhr doesn't have to care for changing her as high priority.
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I’m so sorry if anyone here finds out this way, but it was confirmed by the community manager that these nerfs aren’t accidental or done out of balance.
The community manager made a statement saying the point of these changes are to kill the character until they can push out a rework, which is so abysmally stupid that skull merchant is gonna get Freddied for atleast a year or 23 -
Killers need to be big boys. Killers should not be immune to nerfs. Skull Merchant was totally unfun to verse and was overpowered at the same time.
Distortion was completely obliterated. These things happen on a continual basis for survivor and are conditioned to it.
Skull Merchant is still playable. And if you actually try, I bet you will still win a majority of your matches easily. This is simply because the game favors killer that much.
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If the nerfs go through, that is. Maybe there is a chance.
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I'm sure SM will receive some more tweaks before the patch goes live based on the feedback (the -1 scan line change sticks out like a sore thumb IMO), and I think the reactions to Mandy's comments are overblown.
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God I hate the live service excuse...I firmly believe that live service games have ruined games and the gaming industry. Gamers are so willing to take whatever ######### the devs give them nowadays. I may sound old but I ######### miss the 360 and PS2 days
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The only thing what Skully need is Regress when someone is scanned and not staying forever.
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Conforming as a Employer that they nerfing Killer for Example now Skull Merchant to the ground until her full rework its not the right way. Maybe some overreacting. Sure. But for me i saw and read that and was saying wow BHVR thats is a BIG-F to your community.
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That's a horrible excuse, sorry.
Distortion got changed because of survivors not participating in normal gameplay and going full stealth. And before you bring up 'But killer-' I also think the perk Eruption needed changes too because of the unhealthy way it stalled the game before the 3 gen changes.
SM's current iteration is not impossible to face, nor gives her free wins against teams who try against her. SM's only crime is 'boring' and left over complaints about her release state. I can play no drone SM and people still throw on hook at first sight, the stigma is that bad.
It does not excuse nerfs to this degree. BHVR should have focused on the rework over this if it was that big of a problem to them.4 -
I think the consequences of BHVR doing nothing about Skull Merchant or not doing enough to reduce the negativity she brings to the game until her proper rework outweigh the consequences of upsetting her dedicated mains. I also don't think one CM's interpretation of balance/design intentions (especially since they were stated in a lighthearted environment) are wholly indicative of the live team's thought processes, and in fact I think matching the tone of the platform is a sign of a great CM. Though if BHVR feels the need to clarify or make some changes based on the reactions here, I'd understand.
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Except we knew they had plans to change her for some time. If they focused on a rework over this, nobody would be as angry other than the diehard anti SM mob, and probably would have been more receptive to feedback.
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I mean sure, talking about the ideal scenario of "what ifs" is fine and all. Unfortunately ######### happens in development. But clearly the SM rework isn't happening as soon as we might want and in that scenario toning her down significantly in the meantime is as good of a call as they can make. Again, they can tweak things before it goes live if they feel the need to, which they probably are planning already. But she is getting nerfed regardless.
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The idea behind her is not completely off brand and her themes are there, its the lack of background and engaging gameplay thats the issue here. Mainly where did she get the inspiration for using drones? Was it from the manga or was it just something she thought of herself?
Also the drones mechanic when it was first released, as well as now just doesnt feel right... I do like the idea of Lock-On but she doesnt feel like the stealthy-predator that we see in her lore.
I could easily see her being another stalk esque killer, give her the ability the crouch and while crouching she can stalk to give lock on. While also in crouch she gains the ability to perform a leap, which injures on hit or insta downs if theyre fully locked on. Survivors can also be locked on from drones. Said drones dont have a visual on their range, making them more stealthy. A Survivor may hack and disable a drone, but leaves them with a claw trap for some time. While they have a claw trap they cannot gain lock on. Any Survivor who is locked on or has a claw trap is revealed on her radar.
She has the foundation to being a good character, its just they need to do it right
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Hey, I understand. I miss playing my PS2 every morning (big spyro fan, i played all the games but riptos rage was my absolute fav) But live service games is not an excuse it's just the reality. An excuse implies shifting responsibility/blame, and an online service game making changes is kind of the entire point, it's meant to constantly evolve. Luckily there are still plently of games that aren't live service, but different types of games require different expectations. But that's also while many games like this are either free or they are significantly cheaper than typical full $60 - $80 games that aren't live service. Cause you're either paying for a full story or an evolving one.
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I can see why they would try to mitigate a problem until they have a better solution. But on one hand, Plague is up for changes, which seems to indicate that their priorities are mixed up and on the other hand you don't need to freddy a killer for the issues to be less prevalent.
I'm far from a Skull Merchant fan but really, why did they have to nerf everything about her? Had they removed the haste effect and nerfed the hindered effect it would already be pretty hard on her. But why did they need to remove the stealth mode and a scan line? Especially that last part sounds like a bad idea. Even just visually that would be weird.
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What is normal gameplay? Just because someone is not conforming to expectations does not mean it is not good. It's true that most survivors can't last longer than 10 seconds before dying. Removing a play style is removing accessibility. Killers have many play styles, which can be abused btw, the double standards are absurd here.
And let's be perfectly clear, using distortion to do gens (objective) and avoid the killer is exactly what the game is basically about. Not everyone wants a frequent aura read and be chased all the time.
Wasn't Dead Hard's nerf based on killer complaining that it was boring? It didn't win games. Skull Merchant does. I don't see a problem with Skull Merchant being nerfed. They can't leave her like it was until a rework.
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Normal gameplay is not holding the game hostage for 20 minutes by hiding and avoiding the generators. That's why it's getting nerfed.
And dead hard got nerfed because it guaranteed safety too often.And why are we bringing up double standards? Did we all suddenly change our minds on every other issue? No.
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You are welcome to look up what Double Standards means. You are complaining that Skull Merchant is finally nerfed, yet justifying the obliteration of Distortion as fine and dandy. In reality, nerfing distortion is incredibly more impactful as now a huge percentage of killer perks and add-ons have zero counterplay.
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I didn't even say that.
If you've seen me talk about SM before, I've asked personally for nerfs to her hindered or haste. I still believe in fair and reasobable nerfs, however, and distortion WAS fairly nerfed because of what survivors did to abuse it. Same with Dead Hard, Eruption, 3 gens, off the hook downs before basekit BT, and currently hoping for something for the worst of full lobby slugging that can't be abused.
I do NOT condone intentionally nerfing something to the ground just to change it later, that's my personal beef with the SM changes. It's also why I'm still mad about Call of Brine's nerf.
Don't just assume I'm a diehard SM fan.2 -
I'd say don't go through with the changes and instead killswitch her until 2025 so they can actually have some time to work on her without any complaints from people who have to verse her, give all players who own Skull Merchant 5 million bloodpoints and 1,000 auric cells.
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I don't think she was nerfed to the ground, it's an overreaction.
Being stealthy is abusing a perk?
If we want to talk about unfun play styles, Why are the devs not nerfing Knockout? This is my pet peaves about DBD balancing.
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If you truly don't think removing a scan line, forcing drones to always be active, AND cutting down both hindered and haste at the same time isn't nerfed to the ground, you're not paying attention. This isn't an argument about if SM is boring, too easy or whatnot. It's about BHVR's approach to how they're handling the situation.
And yes, distortion when used to stall the game for 20 minutes because survivors refuse to touch gens and hide all game is an abuse of the perk. And I'm getting tired of the whataboutisms and you trying to derail the conversation, because you're acting like everyone who isn't happy about the SM nerf WANTS all the other stuff in the game too and it's getting tiring.2 -
And that's why we have community backlash, to ensure things don't get out of hand.
And from BHVR's track record, I've seen them go through with things people despised many times. I'm just saying resources would have been better allocated if they focused on the rework a bit more, considering the community's outlook on SM over the past year.1 -
But why did they need to remove the stealth mode and a scan line?
Here is an example of how a good company handled essentially the same situation, with competent communication and without mocking the community (scroll to the bottom, read the section about Smiter's Boon):
Smiter's Boon was a problem in PvP and it had to be removed. The developers acknowledged that, said they are looking into finding a way to make it viable without it being overpowered (in other words: reworking it).
They don't want anyone to play Skull Merchant until the rework. They are just doing a terrible job at communicating it (or they are intentionally not flat out saying it, for whatever bizzare reason).
Except not only is the communication terrible, the implementation is too. Players who like playing Skull Merchant will keep playing her. They will then drop in MMR, until they settle into a new, lower MMR where the Survivor players will still not have fun playing against her. The only way this could work is if every single Skull Merchant player was unable to get any kills at the absolute bottom of the MMR rating and then stopped playing her completely, but that seems extremely unlikely.
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I dont think that this is how this "problem" should be handled though.
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I think most of us are not complaining that SM is getting nerfed, we complaining that she is being nerfed to heavily with the so-called promise she will fix it in the unknown future. It's like you have a decent size crack in the wall but instead of fixing that crack by filling it in the devs are just use a sledgehammer on the wall and then after pulling a hole in the wall they drop the hammer and turn around to tell us "There the crack is gone, and don't worry we will fix the wall eventually, it just may be two years before we do it".
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I couldn't have said it better myself, honestly.
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I think its really messed up.
This is a character and skins I paid for. Spent bp on.
This creates a very bad precedent. Especially when you get things like a planned big rework like twins, and most things get revoked and they just give up.
Its like, how many SMs did you really go against? 1 every 2 weeks?
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Honestly…when I played survivor I saw more trappers than SM lol I think the month I played more Survivor than killer I saw maybe one SM once a week or so.
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Same, I see her maybe every week or 2, once.
Its not like I see her every 3 matches.
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Her power is bloated, a tiny crack is not the problem though. A responsible dev can't sit and allow a majority of their playerbase to play against a problem. They already made a terrible disservice allowing her to be a problem for soooooo long.
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Its also a disservice to intentionally ruin a product many people paid for. And according to what many people heard, this is literally supposed to ruin the character.
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At the end of the day, even if the PTB changes go through in their entirety people are just still going to DC or kill themselves on hook againt Skull Merchant. Doesn't matter how weak she'll be people are just gonna keep doing it, keeping her kill rate inflated.
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Did I say tiny crack? In my analogy I ref her to a decent size crack…also the dev had a WHOLE year to balance her but instead of doing that they have chosen to take a sledgehammer to her and just tell us to rwait for them to fix them. Didnt give us a timeline or anything so it could easily be like twins or Freddy where ppl have to wait 2+ years for a rework. My issue here is we need to call out the devs for their lack of foresight and planning. Don't just accept whatever they give us…
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Currently Skull Merchant, from someone who plays her a lot and has no problem playing against her, her current state is relatively fine as is with only a few core problems being 1) she shouldn't have Hindered because the 3% (sometimes 5%) Haste during a chase is fine, but the 10% Hindered was a problem and 2) there isn't a reasonable/fair way to remove Lock-On stacks which removed any interactivity purpose with her power. Those are the only core issues she has at the moment.
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While I don't think nerfing the killer into the ground was the right way to handle this… I do think the Skull Merchant presents an interesting problem that I can understand them not knowing how to tackle. Her stats indicated she was wildly overperforming, but everyone knew those stats weren't accurate because so many people were giving up against her. But I'd argue the stats are also inflated because between her changes and her second tl;dr power, many players didn't actually know what her power did, and would use the wrong counterplay (a big one being people thinking drones would detect you if you were sitting on a gen. It was very rare for me to play against SM without at least one teammate being afraid of gen drones, when loop drones were the actual threat.)
And she wasn't fun to play against, she was the most brainless type of antiloop killer with irritating stealth, but the droves of people hook suiciding on sight was a holdover from her Chess Merchant days. You don't see this kind of immediate and widespread refusal against other unpopular killers, like Pinhead or Plague or Legion, even though they are arguably more annoying to verse than current (pre-nerf) Skull Merchant. The extreme hate was a reaction to something that didn't really exist anymore… and I'm fairly sure that hate will continue as long as her identity persists.
I think reinventing her is the only way to go at this point, with entirely new mechanics that work in an entirely different way, maybe even a different visual for the power, so that nobody can mistake her for how she was before… and ideally it has to be with a power that's simpler than her second incarnation (because it was so complex and riddled with conditions that most people didn't understand it beyond Drones Bad.)
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I don't know...as a legion main I see a decent number of survivors DCing or giving up against me.
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