A Simple Mechanic to Stop Tunneling and Camping for Good
As a player with several thousand hours in Dead by Daylight, one of the most frustrating experiences—both as survivor and killer—is dealing with camping and tunneling. I’d like to propose a simple, effective mechanic to discourage this behavior without breaking the core gameplay loop.
The Suggestion: Temporary Stealth After Being Unhooked
When a survivor is unhooked, they receive a temporary stealth effect lasting 20–30 seconds (duration adjustable for balance). During this time, the unhooked survivor will:
- Become invisible to the killer
- Have their aura hidden from the killer
- Make no grunts of pain or breathing sounds
- Leave no scratch marks and trails of blood
- Not alert crows
- Not scream (from perks or killer powers)
- Have no collision with the killer or his power (cannot body-block or be hit)
This would allow the survivor to get some safe distance away from the hook and possibly get themselves healed.
Balance mechanic: Interaction Cancels the Effect
All of these stealth effects end immediately if the survivor performs any gameplay interaction, such as:
- Healing (self or others)
- Repairing generators
- Cleansing/blessing totems
- Opening chests
- Using any perks that require activation (e.g. Blast Mine, Wiretap, Bardic Inspiration)
Endgame Exclusion
Once the exit gates are powered, this effect is disabled—similar to how perks like Decisive Strike and Off The Record function. At this point, the killer should be able to see and interact with the survivor normally.
This idea isn't without precedent—Eye of Vecna already implements similar stealth mechanics. So technically, this should be feasible to implement as a core feature.
Yes, this would make some current anti-tunnel perks obsolete, such as:
- Off the Record
- Decisive Strike
- Borrowed Time
- Babysitter
(…and probably a few others I forgot to mention.)
But honestly, if those perks are no longer needed to counter tunneling, I think most players would welcome it. The perks could then be reworked into more creative or fun effects rather than being forced “band-aid fixes”. My suggestion is not a band-aid but a solution to an on-going issue since the game's release.
I’d be happy to offer rework ideas for the mentioned perks if there's interest—but that’s for another post.
The idea was reviewed and approved by Hens333 <3 Thank you!
Comments
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Why should you get a 100% safe unhook? Killers should absolutely be able to punish for unhook attempts when they're still in the area.
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Because camping and tunneling aren't fun or healthy for the game. This change only protects the unhooked survivor for a brief moment and doesn’t give the person doing the unhooking any advantage. You can still mess up the save or get punished for it. The fact you're asking why survivors shouldn’t get even a chance to escape this toxic playstyle kind of proves my point — it only threatens people who rely on it.
Post edited by StickyFingaz on-11 -
You are taking away agency from both sides. Sometimes the killer has to tunnel. Sometimes the smart play is to bodyblock. It's dumbing down the game by removing potential decisions.
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I’m discouraging the lowest-effort play with zero counterplay. The killer still has full control - chase someone else, defend gens, trade the person on the hook with the one that saves them or simply find the unhooked person later. Survivors still have to move somewhere or risk getting caught once the stealth ends. Sure, this removes some cases where you use the unhooked survivor to bodyblock and take a hit for the person who unhooked them, but that’s a small price to pay to prevent constant camping/tunneling. At least the unhooked survivor gets a fair shot.
Right now, one bad unhook can basically remove someone from the match. I’d rather lose one niche tactic than keep rewarding one of the most toxic and frustrating behaviors in the game.This isn’t about dumbing the game down. It’s about giving both sides meaningful decisions instead of rewarding proximity camping and tunnel vision. If a killer has to tunnel to win, maybe the design needs to change — not the survivors chances.
Post edited by StickyFingaz on-7 -
I'm going to be honest. I don't like this mechanic because of the two conditional aspects of it. If someone is getting tunneled out, you have to give them a mechanic as beefed up as tunneling itself. When you balance it in the Killer's favor by having it shut off so easily or eliminating its presence in the endgame, you're barely making a dent.
I think you would have to target tunneling specifically in a way that regardless of what stage of the game it is, it is only effective if the Killer is actively trying yet underperforming.
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You are pruning decisions from both sides. It's absolutely dumbing the game down.
Let's say I go against a team judiciously using their hook states. Two survivors on death hook. Unhooked survivor comes and trades 1:1. There's two gens left. The absolute dumbest thing you can do in that circumstance is to hook the guy with no hook stages or piss off to go wander around gens. It's game losing. The only thing you can do is to get the guy with no hook states out of the game and then maybe you can claw the game back. Maybe. You are removing that possibility.
Conversely I am playing survivor. I have DS, and dead hard. My unhooker is on death hook and is about to trade. The smart thing to do is is bodyblock and try to lead the killer away and use DS offensively. Can't do that anymore. That agency has been stripped away because I am a spectator now.
You can't make it illegal for players to do this stuff without addressing why they do that stuff. Like unicornmedal says it has to be tied to progression. There's no reason to tunnel somebody out at 5 gens. You might have to at 2.
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We will get it in some way soon anyway. It will be too late, when current Clown will be average level of killer in future dbd. No options, no form of pressure are allowed, just pure unstoppable chase machine. Game plays itself on both sides, constantly equalize course of the match. No one wins, no one loses, everyone is happy and throw flowers at each other. Cute and healthy gameplay community wanted.
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So your issue is that it doesn’t completely solve tunneling, so it’s not worth doing? That’s like saying unless we make tunneling impossible, we shouldn’t even reduce its effectiveness.
The stealth mechanic isn’t meant to remove all pressure — it just gives the unhooked survivor a chance to reposition instead of being deleted instantly. It’s a step toward healthier gameplay, not an invincibility shield.
If you want to propose a better system that targets tunneling, regardless of stage or effort, then I’m all ears — but criticizing a practical fix for not being a perfect one isn’t much of a counter. I think my solution is one of the most elegant, practical and somewhat easily implemented anti-tunneling solutions I have seen since it already basically exists in the game as different perks and Vecna's item. It directly targets tunneling and camping, which are widely recognized as frustrating and unfun - even by many killers. If this became a base mechanic, it could eliminate the need for multiple band-aid perks and allow for more creative perk design.
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You’re not wrong that tunneling can sometimes be the most efficient play — especially when you're behind. But that’s exactly the problem - it becomes a crutch, not a choice. It’s rarely about outplaying anyone — it’s just the lowest-risk option to force a 3v1.
This mechanic doesn’t stop a killer from tunneling if they really want to. It just makes it harder to do so and require more - like how survivors have to spend time healing or resetting. It encourages the killer to earn downs through chase, skill, and game knowledge not just camping and tunneling. That’s not dumbing the game down — it’s raising the skill ceiling.
As for survivor ‘agency’ — you're still free to bodyblock after the mechanic wears off, trade, or take hits. The only thing being removed is using an unhooked injured survivor as a shield. That’s not smart play — that’s desperation. If we’re talking fairness, both sides deserve better tools than that.
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So your issue is that it doesn’t completely solve tunneling, so it’s not worth doing? That’s like saying unless we make tunneling impossible, we shouldn’t even reduce its effectiveness.
The stealth mechanic isn’t meant to remove all pressure — it just gives the unhooked survivor a chance to reposition instead of being deleted instantly. It’s a step toward healthier gameplay, not an invincibility shield.
If you want to propose a better system that targets tunneling, regardless of stage or effort, then I’m all ears — but criticizing a practical fix for not being a perfect one isn’t much of a counter. I think my solution is one of the most elegant, practical and somewhat easily implemented anti-tunneling solutions I have seen since it already basically exists in the game as different perks and Vecna's item. It directly targets tunneling and camping, which are widely recognized as frustrating and unfun - even by many killers. If this became a base mechanic, it could eliminate the need for multiple band-aid perks and allow for more creative perk design.
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You make it seem like it's the survivor's fault for being careless, when the reality is people get proxy camped intentionally by killers all the time. The killer has all the agency here. They force the survivor team to either do gens and let one of their own die (which is in itself highly disadvantageous), or to come in for the save with them hot on their tail. Because they never left sight of the hook, nor a distance of more than 24 meters from it.
So maybe I should ask you: why should the killer just be able to proxy camp and be entitled to more free health states and downs, and an easy peasy snowball?
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I didn't use AI in my feedback but I do use a browser extension to check for grammar and spelling errors, which also offers suggestion on how my sentences can be improved for clarity. I use it since I'm not a native English speaker, although I have studied English for many years, as I do not like to make mistakes. It only corrects my mistakes and if more people used such extensions, I believe it would improve our communication. Thank you for the feedback nonetheless, however, the discussion here is aimed at the anti-tunneling suggestion, not spellcheckers. If you have feedback on the idea itself and how it can be improved even further, feel free to share it. Otherwise, no need to change the subject.
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I agree with this as 90% of the killers just tunnel even on 5 gens, the new or "weak" survivors don't get to play the game at all and it can get frustrating. They keep promising changes and anti tunnel,anti camp bla bla but so far it has been just false promises or useless "features".
The point of the game is to chase survivors and keep the pressure up, not sit at one spot camp and tunnel out a survivor, destroys the gameplay for everyone and tbh its boring af. In addition, to your suggestion, they could've made DS 80 seconds like off the record and maybe when using off the record and you are hit right of coming off the hook , it could reset and you have another chance.Anyhow, i doubt they'll implement anything because they don't really listen to the community, still , fingers crossed :D
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I don't think you realize how boring the game will become when survivors have no threat of danger after unhook. I really don't get people's obsession with removing all forms of risk from the game.
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The survivor isn’t completely safe - they’re just not instantly downed the moment they come off the hook. They can’t heal, touch gens, or interact with anything without breaking the effect, and killers can still pressure the team in plenty of ways.
The goal isn’t to remove risk, it’s to not get screwed no matter what you or your teammates do. There’s a difference between danger and having zero chance. Survivors still have to play smart — they just get a short window of opportunity to avoid being tunneled straight out of the match with no counterplay.
-3 -
Yeah,now is really fun when someone is dead hook on 4-5 gens remaining and DC after his second hook
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No offense but you're really glazing yourself here. 😵 The issue is that it'd be another bad play by the developers to add a "better than nothing" feature that also nerfs more Survivor play, that being offensive protection hits like @Ohyakno mentioned. It is so easily negated by simple altruism that it wouldn't be likely to become any more than that.
Personally I think the only way to combat tunneling is a scaling difficulty system that takes both progress and scoring events into account, which 2v8 uses some form of currently. It limits both camping/tunneling/slugging and gen rushing based on how the trial is going and forces them to become natural comebacks only.
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There's nothing in this idea that would protect the rescuer. Why should the person being unhooked be punished for someone else making a bad play? If someone gets unhooked while I'm still around, I go for the savior, not the one unhooked. It's not their fault.
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But with this changed why do you want to hook at all? Just remove the hook and when a killer downs you you respawn somewhere on the map.
That would stop tunneling and camping once and for all. But whats the fun behind it? i mean if you want to avoid camping and tunneling at all cost just remove hooks.
Or make it like pyramide cages a cage appears somewhere random on the map and if the killer is to close it respawns somewhere else
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That wouldn't work because it removes a lot of key gameplay elements. Survivors wouldn't be able to go for flashlight or pallet saves, sabotage hooks, or even use perks that interact with hooks. And on the killer side, perks like Pain Resonance or simply scourge hook builds would be useless.
Pyramid head's cages already have this issue - they don’t work with most perks, and even if they did, it still wouldn’t fix tunneling or camping entirely. This suggestion removes too much from the game and creates more problems than it solves.0 -
No offense taken, but I think you're missing the point. This suggestion doesn’t nerf survivor play - it helps survivors who are getting tunneled by giving them a short chance to escape out of harm's way. You still have plenty of opportunity for bodyblocks, trades, and protection hits before or after the effect ends. The only thing being removed is the option to use a broken survivor as a shield two seconds after unhooking. This was already discussed earlier in the thread.
Also, something being “better than nothing” isn’t always a bad thing - especially when the “nothing” is survivors getting eliminated right after getting unhooked with no counterplay. This mechanic would take pressure off solo queue and make killer play more dynamic, not less.
Your idea about scaling difficulty could be interesting, but that’s a much more complicated to build, test, and balance. Mine is small, clean, and easy to configure and balance - and it directly targets the problem.1 -
not all unhooks should be even close to that safe that would make it really boring on both sides honestly, it would trivialize it but yes something to make tunneling less appealing must be implemented really soon, for real.
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Yes, because it is very fun currently for both sides to camp and tunnel someone out of the game on 5 gens remaining. Measures have to be taken pronto and I have already offered a somewhat easy to implement solution using tools that already exist in the game that would address the issue directly. There is still danger for the one doing the unhooking. It is only safe for the person getting unhooked and only for a few seconds that can buy them some distance and time to not get immediately tunneled out of the game.
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Not too deeply though. Whether it's a desperate play or not, it still does have its place. There are a lot of clutch plays you can do by using hook endurance as bait to buy time. With this mechanic, you would be removing it which does affect autonomy and that's something Survivor is very much lacking. I think it's always a better approach to see what we can add to the experience without having to take something away (at least at this stage of the game).
It's not, you're right. It's just that that's the majority of what we've been given. A lot of little things that do help, but the elephant in the room is still there. Thankfully they're not locked behind perks as frequently anymore either—they are basekit. But it's still not impactful enough. What I end up seeing from this change is that unhooked Survivors will have to run off alone or else they risk another Survivor outing them by trying to heal. Or the Killer guesses where the Survivor is while they're self-healing and they get downed immediately anyway.
A scaling difficulty is more complex, but it also targets everything at once. And again, it's already implemented as is in the game already. The only thing I don't trust is that I don't believe BHVR would balance it the way that it needs to be balanced. Especially when you see how it works in 2v8. So even with its potential to do a lot, it would end up as another "better than nothing" mechanic.
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I get where you’re coming from, and sure, clutch plays using the endurance after being unhooked do get used sometimes, but that is more of an exception. Most of the time, those plays don’t happen at all because the unhooked survivor is already getting tunneled before they have a chance to contribute to anything. That kind of agency only exists because the system allows a bad situation to keep happening.
This idea doesn’t remove teamplay - it just discourages tunnelling from breaking the match at the beginning. You still have time for trades, protection hits, etc. - just not with someone who just got unhooked and is still injured.
As for the risk of survivors healing and revealing each other - that already happens with Off the Record, and most people manage around it fine. The stealth window is short and ends on interaction, so it rewards repositioning, not hiding forever. The idea would be to either go in some corner and heal yourself or go to some survivor at a safe spot to heal you unless the one who unhooked can do that for you already. There are obviously risk but it is a solid solution in my eyes and the majority of people I have shared the idea with.
I actually agree with you on scaling mechanics, however, like you said, the trust in bhvr to balance that system fairly across all killers/matches isn’t very high. Given the history of what changes bhvr has tried to implement to combat this type of toxic gameplay, do you believe that the measures they plan to implement in the next few months to counter camping and tunneling would be better than mine? Cause I firmly believe it will suck for both sides or be pointless just like the anti-camping mechanic they added some time ago. That’s why I think simple mechanics like this are valuable — they’re clean, easy balance, and solve one major issue without a ton of side effects.
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No, I think they'll be on par at best. Regardless of what either of us think, they're going to do what they're going to do.
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Would be no problem to change scourge hook to normal perks. Yes pallet saves and sabo are not nessesary andmore and you can go for other perks instead.
I thought thats what you want? Remove all benefits from hooks a killer could have?
But i think we should also pair this with basekit unbreakable so killers cannot slug to win the game. Or give survivors the ability to work on gens while on the ground
Post edited by Hanuka5 on0 -
@Hanuka5
You seem to have completely misunderstood my suggestion. That’s not what I suggested at all, and I think you know that. My idea doesn’t remove hooks, perks, or key gameplay mechanics. It just gives unhooked survivors a brief chance to not get instantly tunneled out of the match with no counterplay. That’s a far cry from "removing all hook benefits" or suggesting survivors do gens while slugged wow.If you disagree with the actual idea, that is fine. But if your response is just going to be sarcasm and exaggeration, then you're not really engaging with the topic - you're just trying to twist it into something it isn’t.
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Well congratulations to all who were against my idea. Bhvr has announced what their anti-tunneling mechanic is going to be and it is 90% of what I suggested here with a few additional effects that make it worse for killers. Hope everyone who was against my idea and downvoted is happy now, cause you got a worse one implemented that actually has some negative effects for killers tunneling unlike mine :D
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