http://dbd.game/killswitch
Please increase the amount of regression events available on a generator for killers.
To start this off, I want to clarify that I do not find 3-genning fun—neither as Killer nor Survivor. However, I do think the mechanic could use some tweaking.
In 2023, with the release of The Skull Merchant, the game went through a whole fiasco known as the "3-gen meta." Many of you reading this likely know what I’m talking about and lived through it. This was a terrible time for Dead by Daylight, and it was extremely boring for both Killers and Survivors alike.
The most infamous Killer who utilized this strategy was The Skull Merchant, and often The Knight as well. However, this strategy could work on almost any Killer at the time, and this was due to one main factor: the perks.
The root cause of the problem wasn’t the abilities of these Killers, but rather the perks that enabled the strategy. The "meta" perks for the 3-gen playstyle at the time were Call of Brine, Overcharge, Eruption, and Nowhere to Hide. I’ll explain what each of these perks did and why they made the game so unfun.
- Call of Brine caused a generator to regress at 200% speed for 60 seconds after being kicked.
- On its own, this wasn’t too problematic. HOWEVER, when combined with Overcharge, you could regress gens at a whopping 400% speed.
- This was incredibly broken by itself—but the problems didn’t end there.
- Eruption, at the time, had the same effect it does now, but instead of revealing Survivor auras, it incapacitated any Survivor actively working on a generator for 30 seconds.
- Nowhere to Hide wasn’t problematic on its own but synergized extremely well with the other perks, allowing you to pressure Survivors trying to push gens.
Now, onto the Killer-specific side of the issue.
In March 2023, the Tools of Torment chapter was released in Dead by Daylight, introducing two new Survivors and one new Killer. Obviously, we’ll be focusing on the Killer, as the Survivors aren't relevant to this post. The new Killer, The Skull Merchant, had a sort of "trap" ability. By default, she had three drones that could be placed almost anywhere—most notably, next to generators.
The problematic part came from what these drones actually did. They scanned the area around them, and any Survivor within range would build up a meter on their HUD. Once this meter was full, the Survivor became Exposed. While that was strong, the more troubling feature was the tracking. Whenever a Survivor entered a drone’s range, the Killer was notified of their presence and knew their general location. This, in combination with the aforementioned perks, created an extremely boring and oppressive era of Dead by Daylight. It became easy for Skull Merchant to identify a 3-gen setup early, place drones near each gen, and camp them like her life depended on it.
Other Killers could do this too—less effectively—but still with alarming strength.
To fix this issue, BHVR implemented an anti–3-gen mechanic. This mechanic, which remains in the game, limits a generator to only eight regression events.
What is a regression event?
A regression event is any time a generator is set to regress—either by a normal kick or by perks such as Eruption or Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance.
To clarify, I am not suggesting the removal of this mechanic. Rather, I’m proposing that the number of allowable regression events be increased.
Sorry for the long explanation, but I thought it was important to provide context on why this mechanic exists. Now, let’s fast-forward to the present.
In 2025, all of the problematic perks and Killers have been nerfed significantly. Skull Merchant received a full rework that made her ability completely different. The perks were also nerfed—Overcharge and Call of Brine were tuned down significantly, with the max regression speed now being 155% when combined—a huge improvement over the previous 400%.
Now, finally, here’s why I’m making this post:
In many of my games, I find that the anti–3-gen mechanic is making some matches feel completely out of my control. To be clear—I never intentionally hold 3-gens. If one or two gens are across the map and not realistically defendable, I’ll let them go and focus on applying pressure in the part of the map where gens are still present.
This mechanic made sense when it was introduced, due to the state of the game at the time. However, now, I find myself playing matches where I am actively chasing, downing, hooking, and rotating across 4–5 generators—not camping or holding—but still being punished by the game for "3-genning."
There are times when I’ve controlled five gens across the map, actively pressuring survivors, yet a gen becomes blocked simply because I kicked it once or twice early in the match. This is also a consistent issue in 2v8, where some games feel unwinnable no matter how well I play, due to how easy it is for Survivors to outpace regression with their buffed repair speeds.
My proposed solution:
Increase the number of allowed regression events per gen from 8 to 10–12. This would prevent the return of true 3-gen lockdowns while also giving Killers more flexibility to engage in normal gameplay without being unfairly punished by a mechanic designed to stop a problem that no longer exists in the same form.
Thank you for reading. If you have a differing opinion or think there's something I haven’t considered, I’m all ears and open to discussion.
Comments
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Okay, so, I use 3-gens to my advantage a lot. I mean, why not, if the opportunity is there.
I get a gen blocked by the mechanic every 40-ish games. Maybe even less.
The main 2 perks that are the problem here are Eruption and Surge. Those two block the gens rather quickly.
But,
with Eruption, the issue is worse, as you only have 4 uses. You can use Surge 8 times on a single gen, no problem. (That's about 80% of a gen if I'm not wrong. Pretty good value imo.) But Eruption? 4 kicks to trigger it, and 4 uses. (That's 40%+ 20% from kicks so 60%.)
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Hate to burst the rabid anti-Skull Merchant bubble(actually no I don't) but the 3 gen meta started in patch 6.1.0 with the the buff to Overcharge and Eruption, killer kick speeds, gen time increase, etc.
Imo 8 regression events per generator is more than enough for the average game. Though I do think eruption could do with a change just so that it doesn't take one of the 8 just to kick the gen to put eruption on it.5 -
I find myself playing matches where I am actively chasing, downing, hooking, and rotating across 4–5 generators—not camping or holding—but still being punished by the game for "3-genning".
I'd like to see this game, because it sounds like your survivors are making no progress, which is a MMR issue not a mechanic issue.
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and yet some matches feel like i get hit with surge, pain res and pop way too often on the same gen… so it's fine.
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My Suspicion is that you are over zealous in kicking them.
But this begs another question, are you playing C or B tier killers? High mobility killers don't have this issue, and its a shame that so much of the game seems balanced around that.
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yea but at least Eruption has consistency compared to Surge, which is quite easy to counter by forcing downs away from 3-gen. Not to mention how this perk is very bad for any killer that utilizes M2 for downs (Blight, Nurse, Oni, Billy, Dracula etc.)
And tbh, 90% of thematches where i use Eruption end before i even reach gen kick limit. It's such a valuable perk for protecting gens if you know how to use it to full potential.
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