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What's with this player survey

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Comments

  • Reinami
    Reinami Member Posts: 6,607

    Don't you think maybe it is relevant to ask the players who are doing that game action why they are doing it?

  • VirtuaTyKing
    VirtuaTyKing Member Posts: 518

    Sorry it wasn't directed at you the last comment. Fully agree.

  • VirtuaTyKing
    VirtuaTyKing Member Posts: 518
    edited April 25

    Since 2 vs 8 more have got into killer it seems. People opting for strong killers mostly though. I don't think after the release of Ken we should overthink the current situation though. Ken I would guess would be a large factor right now. I know I hate going against them. They still feel incredibly cheap.

  • Reinami
    Reinami Member Posts: 6,607

    Don't you think that is relevant to the developers? Maybe its relevant to ask them why they feel they need to do that to win for example? Or why they think the strategy is effective?

  • SaltyNooty
    SaltyNooty Member Posts: 331

    Y'know, I distinctly remember a player survey awhile ago, perhaps when wesker or the killer previously/after him came out about how killers feel about the game and I was desperately trying to figure out why it was so oriented towards killers.

    This basically answers past mes confusion and honestly speaking, I'm not surprised. I just wish that the devs would strictly name it "Killer Survey" or "Survivor survey" so people aren't wasting their time answering questions that they'd usually have no answer too.

  • SaltyNooty
    SaltyNooty Member Posts: 331

    I've said it before, and I'll say it again, anyone who plays DBD has a love-hate relationship with this game. It's the type of toxic, yet intoxicating feeling of going in match after match hoping for something better and ending up with the same results. (Usually, by the current positioning of the game: A 4K.)

    Hell, I haven't played DBD in a good minute because I'm tired of seeing that white-haired spiderman bum, and the blood moon event is PURE misery at it's finest

    I see the survey as a good thing finally coming our way with the ability to voice our opinions. However, I hold little hope that the devs will actually take it seriously, as they've actively proven to me since I started this game way back in 2018, that they'll actually make the changes that NEED to be made — and instead, will just do the changes they want.

  • CLHL
    CLHL Member Posts: 429

    Disconnecting is also a crappy thing to do, you know. It is even worse, because you harm those who are supposed to be your teammates. But here we are, asking what more changes are needed for people to start accepting defeat. I just can't imagine Street Fighter developers asking about nasty gameplay such as zoning or throw-looping…

    It's clear that the game would be better without camping and tunneling, but you can't address the problems from the point of those who are throwing a tantrum and disconecting.

  • Reinami
    Reinami Member Posts: 6,607

    Because its relevant. You are very clearly showing some heavy survivor bias here if you aren't thinking about the other side at all.

  • Chiky
    Chiky Member Posts: 1,139

    yes, but that's not a survivor or killer issue, it's a core game issue, something BHVR has been refusing to aknowledge for years already. It's what's making the game die and why it's so miserable to play both sides, but as long as the devs refuse to aknowledge the issue and fix it from the ground up, there will be no change no matter what they do to either side

  • Ryuhi
    Ryuhi Member Posts: 4,442

    Thats a pretty wide net to put anyone who disagrees with you under, especially not knowing their perspective or methodology. Sometimes people use LCD strategies because they are their only viable option given the situation they find themselves in, which is not mutually exclusive to comments like Choy's. Anyone who wants to "win more" is going to do things that are more effective, the issues are related to difficulty vs value, and whether alternatives are equally viable. You learn more about people's behaviors when you actually listen to them instead of defaulting to an us vs them mindset.

  • Ryuhi
    Ryuhi Member Posts: 4,442
    edited April 26

    @crogers271 regarding your comment about why ask about the killer perspective and relating it to the playerbase as a whole, sorry it didn't quote for some reason. Must be tired.

    You're absolutely right, but it is still an insight that the devs should be trying to understand. The question "Why do you run infinites?" for example could be answered as either "because I want to not get caught" or it could be "because all of the tiles in that half of the map spawned garbage." Sometimes its not so much about the low hanging fruit obvious answer as it is how and why you got there. I make this distinction because its not uncommon for killers who don't default to the LCD strategies to have to adapt to them. That kind of vital context speaks about bigger issues further up the cause and effect chain. Actually to further emphasize, the "Why do you destroy all the hooks?" question could have answers ranging from saving teammates over comms to just trying to grind out counter-productive challenges. A lot of issues in the game have ripple effects, so its always important to get as close to the start of the ripple and start there.

  • danielmaster87
    danielmaster87 Member Posts: 10,719

    The surveys have been a waste of time for the longest, and take way too long to complete.

  • danielmaster87
    danielmaster87 Member Posts: 10,719

    They only win so much because the matchmaking forces them to smurf, giving them maybe 1-2 good survivors, and then the rest are terrible. When MMR first dropped, and actually worked, killers were getting destroyed.

  • danielmaster87
    danielmaster87 Member Posts: 10,719

    Yeah, you don't do that, man. You don't legitimize people who rage quit all the time. These devs basically tell them, "You're right to do that." So they'll just continue to rage quit against anything that gives them any amount of difficulty, and then the devs will nerf it.

  • crogers271
    crogers271 Member Posts: 3,258

    The question "Why do you run infinites?" for example could be answered as either "because I want to not get caught" or it could be "because all of the tiles in that half of the map spawned garbage."

    Except those are two different things. The first is a motivation, the second is why the player thinks they have that motivation.

    The first is the kind of thing that can be surveyed. What are you enjoying, what aren't you enjoying, etc. They survey maker can get a gist of general ideas/problems from the community and then put the main issues into a survey that a larger portion of the player base can answer. In this scenario you are looking for what the majority opinion is on the enjoyment of game mechanics.

    The second is an issue that would be best resolved by a short answer response (that realistically there is no way it would get read in a mass survey). Game design issues like that usually get left to things like testers and forums, such as this one. Instead of majority opinion you are now looking for the 'best' design which is going to be far more subjective and require a lot of weighing different priorities.

    To kind of continue with the example: if a survey asked killers how they felt about survivors pre-running or stealth game play, those would be opinions about enjoyment. Now I don't think any survivor particularly enjoys pre-running, so getting an idea of the level of dislike killer's have for it would make sense, though there would still be balance issues to discuss. Something like stealth would be difficult because some killers dislike it, but many survivors really enjoy it, so you now have contrasting desires.

    I presume no killer 'likes' to slug just to torment the survivors, and if they do, that's actually more of a reason to change it.

    I make this distinction because its not uncommon for killers who don't default to the LCD strategies to have to adapt to them. That kind of vital context speaks about bigger issues further up the cause and effect chain.

    Three points

    1: Again this is something they have data on / community feedback. People's opinion of why things are happening in games, especially one like DbD were so much is obscured and their are heavy bias issues, pales in comparison to a data sample.

    2: We don't even know what the changes will be. When we got the three gen changes it came with small buffs (that I would say meant a net overall killer buff though I think both sets of changes were good).

    3: As Mandy mentioned, they can always make additional adjustments. Let's say the high MMR escape rate goes from 40 to 45%. That would be a significant jump, but its not the end of the world. The things in the survey aren't even about survivors wanting to win, its about not losing in a way that is miserable. That's very different than balance issues.

    Actually to further emphasize, the "Why do you destroy all the hooks?" question could have answers ranging from saving teammates over comms to just trying to grind out counter-productive challenges.

    Except things like challenges they actually have the data on. It's their game, if they want to look up how many people were doing a challenge when engaging in certain actions, they can. A survey would be silly in that circumstance because they would have access to raw numbers.

    @crogers271 regarding your comment about why ask about the killer perspective and relating it to the playerbase as a whole, sorry it didn't quote for some reason. Must be tired.

    There seems to be a forum bug. If you quote reply to someone, then go to quote reply someone else, the second reply won't get the quote unless you refresh the page.

  • Ryuhi
    Ryuhi Member Posts: 4,442

    And why can't this apply to killers? The majority being one role in each match does not mean the majority is the same ratio in the overall playerbase, since most people play both roles at least somewhat. Surveys like the one in question completely ignore the issues an entire side of the game might be experiencing, while addressing ones that actively make their position both weaker and compounds existing issues without even asking about, let alone addressing them. Its a lopsided focus on multiple bipartisan issues, with promises like Mandy's not meaning much when you don't even bothering to ask the other side. If there were questions like "as killer, do you feel the need to use these strategies regularly?" or "If given a choice, would you rather not use these strategies?" they would be doing proper diligence on collecting proper opinions and perspectives.

    This isn't the first time there has been a lopsided survey, and I continue to maintain that BHVR have consistently been terrible at addressing issues that affect both sides in an any way that takes the considerations of both roles into their solutions. They just focus on the most immediate thing thats being complained about, and work their solution around how to appease the complainers. And since an issue like slugging or tunneling affects up to 4 people negatively each time they're employed, there will be more complainers just by sheer volume. This is especially dangerous because said complainers either ignore or try to invalidate anything about the situation from the other side, downvotes coming back are like a perfect metric for the way people dogpile arguments instead of actually considering how each situation affects both sides.

    I don't believe BHVR is inherently biased toward either role, but I absolutely think there are people who make important decisions about the game's health that are missing important perspectives on why the game plays out like it does, and why we get the metas we do. Limiting your approach just gives you more cleanup later, and considering how long some very important killer bugs take to get fixed, that type of "we'll get to it later" focus feels especially crappy for one role, let alone when there are satisfaction surveys that completely ignore that side's perspective on a matter. If the argument is "killers would just complain they need to do it regardless of whether they actually do" why would this not apply to people who complain about sensible applications of things like slugging or tunneling?

    To kind of continue with the example: if a survey asked killers how they felt about survivors pre-running or stealth game play, those would be opinions about enjoyment. Now I don't think any survivor particularly enjoys pre-running, so getting an idea of the level of dislike killer's have for it would make sense, though there would still be balance issues to discuss. Something like stealth would be difficult because some killers dislike it, but many survivors really enjoy it, so you now have contrasting desires.

    This is exactly what I mean. Are these questions on the survey? Is there pre-balance "does this bother you" opinion gathering like there is for the issues that currently plague survivor? They constantly make changes with things like audio and don't even acknowledge them, then ignore feedback until people stop bothering. They only care because there are a massive number of people in the community who get their way through boycotting and complaining, and killers have straight up been sent to the graveyard of unsuitability instead of having nuance in addressing people's issues with them. They just continue to reward that bad behavior, and it feels awful to see this stuff if you're trying to play a killer who is not only already in bad shape, but will be hurt even worse when these complaints get addressed. I am all for finding a solution to LCD issues, but it needs to be a solution that incorporates the concerns, methodology, and insights of BOTH sides.

    As a last point, I have to again ask concerning this quote:
    The things in the survey aren't even about survivors wanting to win, its about not losing in a way that is miserable. That's very different than balance issues.

    Why is this not allowed to apply to killers? Its not whataboutism when the developers are clearly favoring only a portion of their userbase when collecting feedback.

  • crogers271
    crogers271 Member Posts: 3,258

    And why can't this apply to killers? The majority being one role in each match does not mean the majority is the same ratio in the overall playerbase, since most people play both roles at least somewhat.

    Sure they could. A few reasons on probably why not

    1: Surveys need to have some sort of limit or people won't do them. As is, they are probably longer than they should be.

    2: BHVR likely has ideas about changes they want to do or areas they are already looking at based on other feedback and internal testing and they are fine tuning those.

    3: Where the need for fixes is based on players (this has been mentioned a few times in the thread). This isn't about being the majority per se, but the game needs an 80/20 split in its player base. Based on incentives, and most recently queue times, the survivor side has been struggling to find those players.

    4: Don't give false hope. A common killer complaint is against SWFs. If BHVR has, and they probably have, decided that they aren't ever going to change the way SWFs work (i.e. no restriction) because there data shows it would lose far more players than they would gain (among other possible reasons), then putting it on a survey just creates community anger from one group hoping for a change and another angry that it's being considered.

    If there were questions like "as killer, do you feel the need to use these strategies regularly?" or "If given a choice, would you rather not use these strategies?" they would be doing proper diligence on collecting proper opinions and perspectives.

    This gets back into the Overbrine meta when the idea seemed to be by making tunneling less necessary killers would tunnel less, but it didn't yield that result. It shouldn't be a surprise. Players want to win. I think one of the biggest mistakes BHVR ever made in their design was creating a game that players were expected to play in a nice way.

    They only care because there are a massive number of people in the community who get their way through boycotting and complaining,

    The level of organized effort it would take to move BHVR's numbers on player counts would be fairly massive. You bring up complaining, but I think the far more likely answer, backed up by the queue times, is player counts.

    If players are quitting that's a problem that a company has to address.

    They just focus on the most immediate thing thats being complained about, and work their solution around how to appease the complainers.

    I've been complaining about slugging basically from the moment I got onto the forums. It's not a new issue by any means.

    But surveys are meant to address things that are current. Making game changes takes a long time, by the time something gets to a survey they likely have mock ups of possible ideas and directions they could go. You don't want a survey that brings something up, get feedback that its a huge problem, and then tell players its going to be another year.

    Why is this not allowed to apply to killers? Its not whataboutism when the developers are clearly favoring only a portion of their userbase when collecting feedback.

    I've mentioned it a few times, but if that is the portion of your playerbase that they are losing, it is critical for the game's survival to examine why.

    Additionally, lots of killer complaints have been addressed without going to a survey. Hook respawns after elimination, making the 'unhookable' builds much harder to pull off, flashbangs, FTP+Buckle Up, and then we can go back further to things like Dead Hard. Lots of these weren't primarily balance issues, an unhookable had a clear counter but it kind of sucked to play against, they were enjoyment issues. Given the smaller role size they might be using other methods (forums, testers), to primarily get their killer feedback.

  • Ryuhi
    Ryuhi Member Posts: 4,442
    edited April 30

    3: Where the need for fixes is based on players (this has been mentioned a few times in the thread). This isn't about being the majority per se, but the game needs an 80/20 split in its player base. Based on incentives, and most recently queue times, the survivor side has been struggling to find those players.

    and as I said, this is flawed logic because you do not have to lock into one side. In fact, players should be encouraged to play both sides, idealistically (but not practically, of course) an even amount. Each match needs a 4:1 ratio, but players stagnating to one role over the other is both unhealthy and a big part of why tribalism is so rampant in the community. If you are making changes specifically to entice one side or the other, you constantly have to go back and forth making the "lesser" role still desirable enough to play. This was witnessed leading up to the big 6.1 shakeup, as killers before that were leaving due to the state of the game. I'm not saying that survivors don't have issues that make the role unappealing, far from it. But as someone who specifically rarely plays killer due to multiple issues I have with how the role is handled, my perspective is a bit different on that one.

    4: Don't give false hope. A common killer complaint is against SWFs. If BHVR has, and they probably have, decided that they aren't ever going to change the way SWFs work (i.e. no restriction) because there data shows it would lose far more players than they would gain (among other possible reasons), then putting it on a survey just creates community anger from one group hoping for a change and another angry that it's being considered.

    Thats all well and good, but most survivor complaints are about things like gutting high tier killers, treating every killer as if they are as strong as nurse and blight, being beholden by the shared agency of their teammates, "not having fun", and so on. Meanwhile there are plenty of legitimate issues on the killer side that continue to get ignored, which is my point. You can't use extreme complaints on one side to remove validity in their reasonable concerns, but it seems to happen to one role a lot more than the other. This is why I always talk about how dangerous hyperbole is in feedback.

    This gets back into the Overbrine meta when the idea seemed to be by making tunneling less necessary killers would tunnel less, but it didn't yield that result. It shouldn't be a surprise. Players want to win. I think one of the biggest mistakes BHVR ever made in their design was creating a game that players were expected to play in a nice way.

    And I've always said that you need equal parts carrot and stick. Just carrot, and people will keep abusing what they can to make things easier on themselves. Just stick, and they will move on to whatever else they can find, creating a new problem in its place. You need to both incentivize good behavior while disincentivizing bad behavior. If you do just one or the other, you can't use it as an example of why particular improvements or nerfs can never work. People want to win, AND people want to have fun. Design changes around BOTH and you will have more healthy gameplay.

    The level of organized effort it would take to move BHVR's numbers on player counts would be fairly massive. You bring up complaining, but I think the far more likely answer, backed up by the queue times, is player counts.

    Which is incomplete data. Player counts (especially role specific ones) say absolutely nothing about people who would like to play one role, but feel forced to play another. It comes up constantly in topics where survivors mains complain about how they 4k with no effort every single game, they always say they WANT to play survivor but feel like it is far too weak by comparison, and they do occasionally play killer but find it boring how effortlessly they apparently win every single match. Hyperbole aside, the takeaway is that they very clearly prefer one role but find it unplayable by comparison, which is a driving force behind their frustration. This is why these considerations are important to gather from both sides, because we have no idea where player counts and role interest actually stand relative to one another. Its a nearly impossible metric to measure in terms of raw data. Again, statistics without context are just numbers.

    If players are quitting that's a problem that a company has to address.

    Exactly. My point has always been that killers quitting is just as important as survivors quitting, especially in a game where anyone can play either role at any time. If someone is a 50/50 player but stops playing because they find half the game unplayable, then they are both 0.5 survivor and 0.5 killer being taken out of the pool, shrinking the user base ever so slightly. Your focus is specifically on maintaining the optimal ratio, not actual player retention.

    Making game changes takes a long time, by the time something gets to a survey they likely have mock ups of possible ideas and directions they could go. You don't want a survey that brings something up, get feedback that its a huge problem, and then tell players its going to be another year.

    Which is exactly why killer players feel ignored by how things like the taking a break question are worded. There are current issues that can stop people from playing the killer role. They are being de-prioritized, and not even acknowledged, in a survey that is asking about player satisfaction. That is telling them that their concerns don't matter for the foreseeable future, and in a game where killers like freddy got hung out to dry for years and things like hug tech went ignored for years as well, thats not a good impression to give off. People want to know their concerns are at least being considered, whether or not there are actually plans to address them in the near future. Also some things like adjusting audio balancing can be done in a hotfix, they don't require the amount of manpower that things like reworks do.

    Additionally, lots of killer complaints have been addressed without going to a survey.

    This is kinda irrelevant, as many survivor complaints have also been addressed without surveys. Were there even any killer issue focused surveys, or just the vague tester/forum out (which is also up to 4 times as saturated by survivors per match?) My point, once again, is about parity. I get the feeling we're not going to see eye to eye on this, but it was worth a shot.

  • crogers271
    crogers271 Member Posts: 3,258

    and as I said, this is flawed logic because you do not have to lock into one side. In fact, players should be encouraged to play both sides, idealistically (but not practically, of course) an even amount.

    Two points:

    1: You're reading too literally into the idea of survivors quitting. Whether this is people who only play survivor quitting, or those playing killer/survivor switching to killer more, or those who play killer mostly/survivor occasionally switching to killer only, you have survivors quitting.

    2: As much a company might want people to behave a certain way, there are only so many ways to encourage it. If the killer role (or survivor) is completely unappealing, than a player is never going to, or extremely rarely, touch it. How many players are like this we have no idea (this will be a theme I come back to about us not having the data).

    If you are making changes specifically to entice one side or the other, you constantly have to go back and forth making the "lesser" role still desirable enough to play. This was witnessed leading up to the big 6.1 shakeup, as killers before that were leaving due to the state of the game. I'm not saying that survivors don't have issues that make the role unappealing, far from it. 

    I think this is a misconception of how live service games work. Being in constant flux is good (its a feature, not a bug). There is not a state of perfect stasis that the game is going toward. You deal with the most pressing problems. That likely creates some new problems, then you deal with those, and so on.

    Thats all well and good, but most survivor complaints are about things like gutting high tier killers, treating every killer as if they are as strong as nurse and blight, being beholden by the shared agency of their teammates, "not having fun", and so on.

    And those issues weren't on the survey anymore than there were questions about killer issues. Part of this is a design decision on BHVR's part to be fine with killer tiers (many disagree), part of it is that balance issues about killers aren't a great topic for a survey.

    Meanwhile there are plenty of legitimate issues on the killer side that continue to get ignored, which is my point. You can't use extreme complaints on one side to remove validity in their reasonable concerns, but it seems to happen to one role a lot more than the other.

    'Legitimate' is generally a perspective issue, unless we're discussing things like bugs/hacks.

    I'd say there are plenty of complaints on the survivor side still not being addressed. Again, it's a survey, not an open response, which is what things like this forum is for.

    I'm not sure how extreme complaints ties in. If anything a survey is moving away from extreme complaints and trying to get a better overall feel of the entire community.

    Which is incomplete data. Player counts (especially role specific ones) say absolutely nothing about people who would like to play one role, but feel forced to play another. It comes up constantly in topics where survivors mains complain about how they 4k with no effort every single game, they always say they WANT to play survivor but feel like it is far too weak by comparison, and they do occasionally play killer but find it boring how effortlessly they apparently win every single match. Hyperbole aside, the takeaway is that they very clearly prefer one role but find it unplayable by comparison, which is a driving force behind their frustration. This is why these considerations are important to gather from both sides, because we have no idea where player counts and role interest actually stand relative to one another. Its a nearly impossible metric to measure in terms of raw data. Again, statistics without context are just numbers.

    I think this too extreme in the interpretation.

    Text is a hard mode to convey intent, but this comes off as if you think this is THE survey to end all surveys and that BHVR will throw out all other feedback and opinions from everything else and just go off this. They have other sources of feedback and we'll get another survey with some new issues in just a few months.

    And I've always said that you need equal parts carrot and stick. Just carrot, and people will keep abusing what they can to make things easier on themselves. 

    Sure, but we have no idea what they are going to do as of yet.

    Exactly. My point has always been that killers quitting is just as important as survivors quitting, especially in a game where anyone can play either role at any time. If someone is a 50/50 player but stops playing because they find half the game unplayable, then they are both 0.5 survivor and 0.5 killer being taken out of the pool, shrinking the user base ever so slightly.

    Again, we have no data so we don't know if players who primarily play killer are reducing the amount they play. Hypothetically if both killers, survivors, and players who play both equally were all quitting/reducing their level of play, than it would be a dumb way to form a survey, but I find that unlikely to be true

    Your focus is specifically on maintaining the optimal ratio, not actual player retention.

    On the optimal ratio - this is directly tied to maintaining players. No one likes waiting around in queues. If you have a 30/70 split eventually this will become 20/80. BHVR's best case scenario is attracting new players/bringing players back to the survivor role, their next best case is killers moving to the survivor role, the worst case is killers also reducing their play because the queues being too long.

    We see this in 2v8. It's been massively successful on the player numbers, but because of the lopsided ratio it also causes players to quit the game because the queues are too long and they don't want to play the other role. This means long term if that problem is not resolved it is potentially damaging to the game despite the initial increase (any time a player 'takes a break' there's a good chance they never come back, which was another type of question on this survey if I recall).

    My point, once again, is about parity.

    And my point is that if you have a survey, you need to be focused. There's far more to the game than just survivors and killers. Survivors can be solo or SWF, they have different playstyles (before we even get into the different metas in different regions), and different levels of experience face much different issues. On the killer side you have the same thing on experience, but then you throw in that you have 38 killers, each of which have different issues and challenges within the game.

    No survey is going to get to all of that. You need to focus on a few issues.

  • Ryuhi
    Ryuhi Member Posts: 4,442

    text is a hard mode to convey intent, but this comes off as if you think this is THE survey to end all surveys and that BHVR will throw out all other feedback and opinions from everything else and just go off this.

    I think thats where we're misunderstanding. I'm not holding it up to that high of a regard, I'm just pointing out that one side is very clearly getting preferential treatment in how these things were worded. I honestly don't see a point in continuing as like I mentioned, I don't see us seeing eye to eye. It just feels more like arguing than anything, especially with how much we both keep reiterating and repeating ourselves.

  • Nomade
    Nomade Member Posts: 329

    If BhVR really cared about the game health for both sides this would be very useful information for them to ask for. It's omission is at best an egregious oversight.