Buffs for Fog Vials from PTB salvage
As a basekit effect, I was very much against the PTB feature to obscure the unhook from the Killer. It is an important part of the game for the macro control of the killer to track unhook timings and Survivor state, even if not tunneling.
That said, the HUD effect was kinda interesting and stewing on this in conjunction with the recent Fog Vial nerfs I had an idea that could be pretty cool. So my buffs for Fog Vials are: -
- Increase base Fog Vials charges by 1.
- Fog Vials now hide loud noise notifications made while under their effect.
- Survivors in the Fog Vial smoke have their HUD status obscured for all players. This effect lingers for 4s after leaving the smoke.
This opens up more lot of options for using Fog Vials in interesting ways. Now of course, Killers aren't stupid, they can see Fog go up and know the Survivor will unhook if they see the hooked Survivor also gain this obscurred hook status. However… there are several factors that make this a little more interesting.
- Reassurance or Camaradarie can be used to bait and directly waste the time of the killer coming back to tunnel, only to find their target safely on hook. So there is a threat that coming back to tunnel will directly punish the killer vs. this combo. This of course can be also used to mess with killers trying to proxy even better.
- The Survivor has their scratch marks obscured by the smoke, which only reaches so far, but the fact Survivors can also take vaults silently and have their base BT boost, this gives them faster avenues of escape, which are also conveniently located on LoS blockers most of the time to help them get away.
- Survivors can also use perks like Lucky Star or Iron Will and use the Fog to jump into lockers without a notification with no scratch marks and no grunts of pain to give them away. The fact this is possible can make coming back to tunnel a time consuming endeavor if the Survivor is smart with their locker choice.
- Perks like Babysitter can capitalise on the above points to disappear away from the smoke on the opposite side of the location to the killer and due to the obscured auras and vision, it is much easier to get clear.
- Even a killer there for the unhook, will have trouble with Fog Vials being comboed with Duty of Care and/or Borrowed Time.
- It can even be useful on Slugging plays, particularly in conjunction with the likes of WGLF and even Buckle Up or a clutch FTP.
Seems like a cool re-use of the mechanic to expand upon the existing functionality to give Fog Vials some nice features to warrant their limited charges.
Thoughts?