Pig Buff Idea with Current 2.5 Patch
The Synopsis
Currently as The Pig stands she can safely be said to be one of the more balanced killers of the game, no insta-down mechanics, no cheap anti-looping or chasing mechanics, and a kit that has a good vision and design with ways to slow down the game potentially without making it too overpowered. The Pig, in all things accounted for, is an balanced and effective killer... however in the current climate of the Dead By Daylight meta, this "honest" killer can many times be put behind others due to her current design and tier list wise, every factor accounted for, she is high C and very low B at her highest potential, not to say success cannot be gained with her; it is to say comparably, she could use just a small nudge to gall her along to new heights.
The Scales
Now before i were to mention the proposed thought i have i think it is key to understand the actual recent changes The Pig has foregone that highlights the recent upcoming change of mind i had for this idea.
Changes:
Adjusted the Combat Straps add-on in accordance to the crouch duration change, decreased value from 1 second to 0.3 seconds. Changed the Terror Radius fade time for when crouching / uncrouching to fade out/in ~4 seconds, down from 6.6 seconds. Decreased the base crouch and uncrouch duration from 2 seconds to 1.3 seconds. Increased Terror Radius from 28 meters to 32 meters.
Surveillance: Increased audible repair sounds by a distance by 8 meters. Any regressing generators will be highlighted by a white aura. If regression on a generator is interrupted, it will be highlighted by a yellow aura for 8/12/16 seconds.
As you can see these changes revolve mainly around two key premises, her crouch ability and her terror radius, the changes resulted to making her crouch overall faster to use practically and her terror radius increasing to accommodate said buff, some may not like her 4 meter terror radius change as it "goes against her stealth design doesn't it?", well yes... however it is more for balancing, I believe that the terror radius change was implemented because of her being able to crouch faster more consistently, and with her terror radius shrinking to nothing even quicker when she crouches, the goal of the increased terror radius is to warn survivors earlier of her presence and to act as a buffer of sorts to where they surmise whether she is crouching towards them or not.
The Idea
With all of the current changes in mind now, I would like to present the idea and explain as to why i think this way...
Deep Wound Status (mend) Added to Her Ambush Attack: Upon a successful hit of The Pig's Ambush attack, the survivor is put into a mend state in which if they do not fully mend or have another survivor mend them in the allotted time they are put into the dying state.
The Reasoning
Now there are a few key factors that explain the justification for this change...
Pig's ambush attack is situational: With how her ambush attack currently works it can only be practically used in one of two scenarios at a time...
- When sneaking up on unwitting survivors traversing the fog at an disadvantaged angle, and on a generator, totem, or unhooked survivor.
- Or using it as a possible anti-looping tool at a pallet and possibly window, why I say possible for each is because the chances of you getting the hit is heavily dependent on line of sight and the type of loop The Pig is currently at.
Thus Meaning...: The Pig cannot practically use her ambush attack on what you mainly spend most of your time as killer doing... the chase, and if an ability cannot be used effectively during a chase then it isn't the strongest of abilities.
Pig's ambush attack doesn't have the best payout: Currently when you do get an ambush attack in one of the few instances that you can, your payout is either getting a hit potentially very quickly thus initiating a potential chase for 1 survivor in the killer's favor, or potentially getting a hit at a loop that can cut the chase length down. In both cases, the payout of a single hit isn't enough to warrant consistent or enticed usage as one measly hit that isn't much guaranteed is hardly worth it. In most cases you can play pig by simply using the crouch mechanic to negate your terror radius and uncrouch to regain full movement speed and generally you are close enough to the survivor to get a hit anyways than risk wiffing the ambush hit. There needs to be a reward for the risk or a reason to over-exert yourself to use the move than simply uncrouching and getting the hit even more easily.
The Reward for Risk: What giving her attack a mend property would do is give her a tool to effectively slow the game down without having to rely on perks or trap rng while putting in a little risk of wiffing your ambush attack, this reward for hitting your ambush attack would cause someone to have to heal themselves once to get rid of the mend then twice to heal themselves up fully all in one hit, say there are two survivors in the area and you hit the ambush attack on one of them, one of them is guaranteed to go down if they do not get healing so you can safely chase the other person leading to TWO people not on gens for the time being, say the person that was hit doesn't have self care? Then they must find another person to heal them up, thus leading to a now THREE people not on gens for the time being... see the trend here? The reward of this move went from meh to now a USEFUL tool to slow the game down, which is the point of this buff, to make her ambush attack now useful.
Conclusion
This buff alone would rise the pig from the status of C maybe B, to a definite B solid class Killer, the buff is not too strong to make her overwhelming or too snowbally or give her insane movement or map pressure, it all revolves around giving an already existing tool a solid reward for its risk upon usage, an ability to effectively slow the game down without the needed help of perks, add-ons, or trap rng; and turn an otherwise mundane attack variation that you could go entire games without using once (which i and many have at a high level of play) and still succeed without it. Overall this change is a balanced, fair, and technically viable buff that would not be able to be abused because of the limitations of the ability itself that keeps it in check.