Patch 9.2.0 VERSION 2
So that patch was crazy, but you know what? We kind of need crazy right now. The game is getting stale, EVERYONE is miserable, and things are just getting worse. So LETS GO CRAZY!
First, lets make some changes to what was on the table.
Unhook Protections
1.) Effects are disabled except Haste/Endurance and reduced to 10 seconds when the exit gates are powered.
2.) Reveal the killer's aura within 16 meters. (Was 32)
3.) All effects are reduced by 50% while in a Survive With Friends group.
WHY: Solo queue needs buffs, SWF does not.
Hook Status Update
1.) All removed except: There is no loud noise notification when a Survivor is unhooked.
Unique Hook Bonuses
1.) 10% Haste for 15 seconds, but effect is not lost when breaking a pallet or damaging a survivor. It's not necessary, no killer is going to snowball the game in 15 seconds.
2.) 20% Bonus (multiplicative, not additive) to the next ANY damage generator action.
Tunneling Penalties
1.) When a Survivor that was previously hooked is Killed or Sacrificed, the Killer loses the ability to block, damage, or regress generators by any means. (REMOVED)
Slugging Reduction
1.) The Resolve bar is reset when the Survivor picks themselves up.
2.) Survivors can now crawl and recover at the same time. (REMOVED)
EDIT: TO BE CLEAR, these changes will be applied to the original 9.2.0 patch noted, everything else NOT mentioned would also be going into the patch.
Alright, now, this patch is still incomplete. It's got ALOT of great stuff for survivors, but on it's own, this patch would still kill the game, as kill rates would plummet. Let's fix that next.
NEW CHANGES
CHANGE #1: For every Dull/Hex/Pentimento totem standing, 1 generator at random is blocked by the entity. This effect ends 10 minutes into the trial. When a totem is cleansed, all totems are blocked by the entity for 30 seconds. If a Survivor boons a totem, that totem's corresponding generator becomes unblocked while the Boon remains standing. If the killer snuffs it, the entity blocks the generator once again.
WHY: If we're going to force killers to get 6 hooks before they can kill someone, forcing them to play inefficiently, the same must be done to survivors, otherwise trials will last less than 2 minutes and kill rates will drop to 10%. This will require survivors to destroy atleast 3 totems before escaping, which should help even out trial runtimes again. This effect has a 10 minute duration to prevent situations where 2 generators and 1 totem spawn in close proximity to each other, allowing the killer to just sit on them (BORING).
CHANGE #2: No One Escapes Death and Corrupt Intervention are now base-kit. Corrupt Intervention will need to be reworked, NOED can simply be deleted.
WHY: The killer is at their weakest at both ends of the trial. At the beginning, all 4 survivors are up, and there are 7 generators to protect, and at the end, all that remains are 2 20 second exit gates. This should help even out the experience.
Keep in mind, NOED and Corrupt are a shadow of their former selves, not nearly strong as they originally were. Corrupt will give the killer a leg up on their first down, and NOED, being changed from a slim possibility to an absolute certainty, will cause survivors to rethink their approach to every trial. Do we crush 3 totems, bang out the gens and risk the NOED snowball? Or do we take some time and crush all the totems?
CHANGE #3: When a Boon is snuffed, its effects persist for 30 seconds. When a Hex totem is cleansed/booned, its effects persist for 90 seconds*.
Hex: Plaything and Hex: Pentimento: When cleansed/booned, these effects will persist for 18 seconds.
NOED will not persist when cleansed.
WHY: With the paradigm shifting towards totems as a required secondary objective, this will have a dramatic impact on the value of both Hex and Boon totem perks. These perks have questionable value to begin with, due to their unreliable nature. In order for players to get SOME value out of these perks, a persistence mechanic must be in place. Boon perks should only persist for 30 seconds, because they can simply be relit, Hex perks cannot, and survivors have 16 perk slots while the killer only has 4.
Plaything and Pentimento should only persist for 18 seconds because of the reocurring nature of these perks.
This should help balance out the patch and change gameplay for the better for both sides. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.