My suggestions for clown/PTB feedback (please read)
This post is in regards to the clown's current state and what I personally found the solution to his current problems to be. I have given these things A LOT of thought so just know I'm not throwing random things out here. So, to give a quick background, clown is the literal reason I bought DBD, as I found a video discussing him on Otz's channel, and I was hooked. Clown has been my main ever since, and I have continued to learn and enjoy him more and more as time has went on.
So, to get straight down to business, I think it is quite fair to say that the clown is in the worst state he has been in in a very long time, perhaps ever in terms of health. In order to address this though, we have to understand why clown received the changes he did in 9.1.0. To put it simply, survivors have always not been the biggest fans of clown, with most considering him to be quite boring to go against. The purple bottle only playstyle is also a thing I would assume BHVR found to be an issue. On the killer side of things, most people that weren't invested into clown thought he was quite weak and useless, but good clowns were well aware that clown's potential was quite high with the combination of both bottles. I believe BHVR saw that these two issues (frustration from survivors and the purple bottle only playstyle) needed to be addressed; making the changes they did as the solution.
The two percent buff to haste and the reload changes helped clown with his struggle with map pressure, which were good changes, and the one percent nerf to the tonic and the add-on adjustments to slightly nerf the playstyle helped to remove the purple bottle playstyle, which were also good. But, then we got time adjustments to the invigoration activation time and the hinder duration time, which, as BHVR now sees, became the issue, but the reason why is what is important to understand: Haste becoming so accessible to the point where it became usable by itself in chase, combined with the tonic being nerfed for it's activation time was the issue. Survivors now hate clown more than they ever have, and clown players have a different killer. Bottle combinations in chase was nerfed, purple bottles by themselves were nerfed to the point where yellows are now the meta.
So here's what we should of learned from clown in 9.1.0: Purple bottles MUST be stronger than yellows, or else we get this mind numbingly boring killer to play, who is even more frustrating to go against than before. So, what's the problem with his version in the current PTB? It has the same issues that clown has now, just on a smaller scale; Bottle combos are still nerfed, and yellow bottles are still clown's main bottle, keeping the same playstyle as before. 1.6 seconds is simply not enough.
So what are the conclusions? First and foremost, survivors will always not enjoy the clown, as that is just his design. There is no way to fix this issue. The changes to percentages and the reload changes were a great change that pushed yellow bottles to be a better choice for purple bottle only clowns, and clown mains have the same killer as before, but with a small overall buff to some things with those changes. THAT IS ALL THAT SHOULD OF HAPPENED. Two seconds for both the activation time of the yellow and the hinder for the purple IS the right balance, as it gives clown his surprisingly high skill ceiling and enjoyment, and survivor players for the most part prefer old clown compared to this new version. So here is my feedback from this PTB: Revert the activation times and the haste and the hinder duration times back to what they were, and I have absolutely zero doubt in my mind that players from both ides will be significantly happier. Please consider this. Thanks.