Thoughts about the announcment on Skull Merchant's Rework from a p100 Merchant Main (Since OG PTB)

GageBeast1n

As a long time Merchant enjoyer, the most fun and impactful parts of her kit that led me to main her despite the communities perceptions and negativity was:

1. Unique Trap-like Playstyle
   1. Being able to create areas of control that could make normally strong areas for survivors dangerous was amazing.
   2. It helped with the often unfair spawning of maps and the strength of most structures.
   3. Unlike Trapper and Hag, I had my drones on me and I could recall them easily, allowing for a more fluid playstyle
2. Benefits for smart drone placement around the map
   1. Being rewarded for smart drone placement and for survivor mistakes makes the power feel impactful
   2. Scanning survivors across the map due to your intelligent drone placement and taking advantage of survivor mistakes to reward yourself in chase felt great
3. Interactive for survivors
   1. Survivors are incentivized to disable drones, the hacking mini-game being very easy
   2. Drones have bright lights shining out of them with a very obvious radius on the ground
      1. The only way survivors could get scanned outside of chase is via their own ignorance, which should not be something the killer gets nerfed/punished for

What does current Merchant have?

1. X - A unique play-style that is sometimes worse than having no power at all
2. X - No benefit for setting drones around the map since only newly set drones and recently rotated drones give any benefits. Might as well keep them on you and spam in chase, the biggest complaint about Merchant before she got murdered
3. X - No one is setting up drones around the map, instead just dropping in chase, so there's no drones for survivors to interact with

What does this idea for a Rework provide?

1. ~
   1. It seems like setting up drones around the map for intel is still the plan, but getting no benefits except seeing their location (that Merchant has no movement ability or speed to take advantage of) feels bad.
   2. The map wide detection tool is cool, interesting to see the add-ons for that and how it'll impact matches
   3. Drone Propulsion makes me nervous. If it works like Pinhead chains, then fine. If it works like Houndmaster, when you redirect the dog and just pray it works, then it won't be worth using.
   4. I know this is very early but with the Power system, what happens if a drone is set-up but runs out of power? If you want to truly get rid of "Set and Forget", then where's the buff to Trapper and Hag? Her unique twist on the "set and forget" made sense for her lore and overall character.
2. ?
   1. I mean, you might get info on people but you have nothing in the kit that guarantees that you can take advantage of it.
      1. Unless the drones are meant to be that? Then, you better pray there's nothing in the way. There's a bunch of random ######### in the way of maps these days that ruin killers with fun powers and LOS killers. I can imagine many times where I survivor gets away simply because they hide behind something or have 7 different rocks/trees/barrels/boxes/etc to hide behind.
3. X
   1. Where's the interaction with the hacking mini-game? Previously, messing up a hack got you a stack of lock-on while giving her haste and information on your location. Now? You get your position revealed…oh no? If they do hack it, they get to see Merchant's aura, for what reason? Why? Unless the hacking is incredibly difficult, this reward is not warranted. Maybe make it so messing up the hack causes the drone to lock in on survivors automatically?
   2. If Drone Propulsion is like Houndmaster Redirects? Ridiculously easy to dodge. If they are like Pinhead Chains? A bit harder but these drones better have Huntress Hatchet hitboxes to make them viable. Either way, it's another dash-esc power, it's unoriginal and bland.

I appreciate the openness and the willingness to hear feedback, it's very nice to see. Please, it's ok if a killer isn't easy to figure out, that's part of the game: learning and adapting. It's ok to have the Lock-On, to have claw-traps, haste and hinder. I truly think the original change to Merchant was perfect. People refused to learn and she was punished, unfairly. Some number changes and nerfing freshly set drones was what she truly needed, to stop the lame "drop drone in chase" playstyle, the true complaints from people. Please, look to move a different direction with the update.

MrMori

I think failing the hacking minigame should injure the survivor while not disabling the drone, that would be more balanced. Also, that way, each of the survivors can find a drone, fail the hacking minigame 2 times to get into the downed state, then immediately surrender once all four survivors are downed.

Rigbeta

I'm really hoping the devs are seeing these posts. There's so many players who main Skull Merchant that don't want to see entire chunks of her playstyle/mechanics removed. I've said it before but id rather have the current "gutted" version instead of the proposed changes.