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Honest Discussion: What Do You Consider Tunneling and Slugging?
Hey everyone,
I’m genuinely curious about how both Killer and Survivor mains define tunneling and slugging, as I’ve seen a wide range of interpretations across the community. I'm hoping to better understand where the line is drawn from both perspectives, and maybe figure out where the real disconnect lies.
Tunneling:
From what I understand, tunneling typically refers to a Killer focusing on a single Survivor—often the one just unhooked—while ignoring other Survivors and overall map pressure.
As someone who plays Killer occasionally, I try to rotate targets and spread pressure as fairly as I can. That said, if I happen to run into the same Survivor shortly after they've been unhooked and they’re in a vulnerable spot, I’ll usually take the down. In those cases, it’s not intentional—it just makes sense in the moment. But does that still count as tunneling if it’s coincidental?
Personally, I believe tunneling also extends to camping a hook and immediately chasing the rescued Survivor—especially when the Killer has a clear opportunity to go after others but chooses not to. To me, that's where it crosses the line into what feels like unfair gameplay.
Also, for Killers whose powers revolve around chase potential, isn't it natural to stick with a target who's looping well? Is that considered tunneling, or just leaning into the Killer’s core strength?
Questions for Survivors:
- Where do you personally draw the line between standard play and tunneling?
Questions for Killers:
- Do you tunnel strictly to secure an elimination, or are there other factors—such as targeting a strong looper, specific perks, or simply personal preference?
Slugging:
To me, slugging means leaving a Survivor in the dying state in order to pressure others or control the game. I understand slugging as a situational strategy, but opinions seem divided on when it's "acceptable."
Questions for Survivors:
- Do you consider it slugging if the Killer leaves you temporarily to break a pallet, regress a gen, or chase someone nearby?
Questions for Killers:
- Why do you choose to slug instead of hooking? Is it to snowball, apply pressure, or are there other strategic reasons?
- In your view, when is slugging justified—and when does it cross into poor sportsmanship?
Final Thoughts:
Over the years, I’ve noticed that Dead by Daylight has become increasingly competitive, with many players defining a win strictly as either escaping or killing all four Survivors. But personally, I think there's more to the game than just the final screen.
Mechanics like tunneling and slugging often stir up frustration—not just because of how they affect the outcome, but because of how they impact the flow and enjoyment of the match. When used intentionally, they can create a one-sided experience that removes opportunities for counterplay, especially for newer or solo queue Survivors. At the same time, I understand that these tactics can also serve strategic purposes for Killers, especially in high-stakes or high-rank matches where map pressure is key.
Still, I feel the true measure of a "win" goes beyond escaping or killing. The post-game screen shows detailed stats—how well you supported your team, how many gens you completed, how long you held your chases. I personally see a successful match in the bloodpoints earned, the iridescent emblems achieved, and how effectively I played my role, even if I don’t make it out alive.
I completely understand the desire to win. But what I don’t understand is giving up entirely—disconnecting, throwing, or not trying—just because escaping seems unlikely. Yes, the game has its balance issues (and there’s always room for improvement), but when you focus on playing smart, helping your team, and adapting to the situation—even in the face of tunneling or slugging—the game becomes a lot more fun, win or lose.
Would love to hear your honest thoughts from both sides of the player base. What’s your personal philosophy around tunneling and slugging, and what do you consider fair vs. unfair play?
Thanks for reading!
Comments
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I think both of these should considered in a scale rather than a "yes or no" stuff.
Tunneling: going after the same survivor to take them out of the game. Can be done as strategy to create pressure, to control the game or just for "fun".
Tunneling, IMO, should be divided into two types: Hard tunneling - when you actively go for the same survivor until he/she is out of the game
Strategic tunneling: alternating targets but focusing into one survivor to take he/she out of the game.
To me, the strategic tunneling is not problematic at all.
Slugging: leaving a survivor on the ground, because you can't hook them or you want to create pressure.
As tunneling, Slugging can be divided into 2 types:
Strategic Slugging - leave someone on the ground to creature some form of pressure in the survivors
Full Slugging - Slugging as your primary objective, hooking only when strictly necessary.
Since we got the abandon feature, i think both are fine, although the first one is much healthier than the second one.
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Ok so you asked a lot of questions here and since I play both roles equally I am going to do my best to answer them all. Of course, this is just one person's opinion. As your original post says, you want to better understand where the line is drawn from both perspectives. Since this is opinion based, I fear you may not have any more clarity from the community at the end of this than you did at the start, but I love good discourse.
So to combine several questions you asked around tunneling, I personally draw the line at what is considered hard tunnelling. This usually includes proxy camping someone on their first hook and upon being unhooked, solely focusing on the person that was just unhooked. This particular strat is used to get someone out of the game quickly and put increased pressure on the remaining 3. Lots of killers going for win streaks use this (Momo comes to mind especially) because it's one of the best ways to secure a win. For me personally, I do not do this when I play killer UNLESS there are 2 gens or less left in the game and at that point all is fair game. As far as your question about accidentally running into the same person again, I don't consider that tunnelling as it's not purposeful, though I doubt the survivor will see it the same. And lastly keeping with the strongest looper is actually a bit opposite of what most people that tunnel are trying to go for. It would be better to tunnel out the weakest player because they won't waste as much of your time vs the strong one.
So far as the slugging questions go, it's not really slugging if the killer takes a moment to break a pallet or gen. However, it is when someone is left on the ground and the killer is chasing someone nearby, BUT it shouldn't be considered toxic. The killer is not being toxic when not picking up the downed survivor to avoid the slugging allegations when teammates are nearby waiting for save or otherwise progressing the game. I personally try not to slug as best I can, but there are scenarios when it is valid as mentioned, teammates nearby for save, few gens left trying to force a snowball situation, last gen is nearly done and the survivor is downed by said gen, etc. I think reasons like this make it justified, however, I would consider it poor sportsmanship to slug just for the sake of slugging. I've only ever had this happen with Blight players for some reason, but had a dozen or so matches where they are only wanting to slug everyone from the start and then bleed everyone out. At that point, I would consider it poor sportsmanship, though this is an extreme form of it.
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I think it's as simple as you've stated. The issues come into play given the state of the game itself and how BHVR chooses to interpret the term "asymmetrical".
When tunneling is as prominent and powerful as it is, it starts to get a little nuanced. At the heart, tunneling is simply chasing the unhooked Survivor off the hook and ignoring anyone and anything else. But being found too soon before the Survivor has time to reset and start a new objective feels like tunneling, which is where a lot of the confusion comes from. That's the point where you start to plateau with BP/XP and you stop playing the game in any meaningful way. I believe it's tangential to tunneling and that it does count to a degree, regardless of intention, because the end result is ultimately the same.
That goes for slugging too. There are lots of ways slugging can go down, but there isn't much nuance there since it's literally being in the dying state while not on hook. The main issue is what happens while you're slugged. The Killer downing you and ignoring you so other Survivors can pick you up and heal you is very different from the Killer downing you and standing on top of you all trial. While not as powerful as tunneling, it still does more than I think it should. I don't believe that Killer should be able to down one Survivor, go off and down others, then have enough time to come back and hook that initial Survivor with ease. It's part of why Abandon is getting so much use in trials since being implemented.
Personally I think they should be as closely aligned to catchup mechanics as possible, which should also be the goal of any "anti" system. That is where they become fair and healthier for gameplay. Gutting them would fall into unfair territory, but so is leaving them unchecked.
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I'm not going to get philosophical about made up terms lmao When there's 1-2 gens left, it's just about whatever wins the game for either side, so any sort tunneling or slugging or camping from Killer is to be expected and is strategic as Survs just have to finish a couple more gens. I believe that's standard play.
However, tunneling and slugging at 5-4 gens is just egregious and what people are complaining about as it's happening in most matches. That, I do not believe, is standard play and is what should be heavily punished in this game to prevent Killers from doing it. Whether it's that ultra sweaty Blight that from the jump is slugging and tunneling before anyone has even touched a gen or even a wraith who's tunneling at 4 gens after their first hook to turn the game into a 3v1 as quickly as possible, both are instances of tunneling or slugging that should be deterred.
However, I do believe that any sort of anti-tunnel or anti-slug is impractical until SWF's are nerfed as any changes will benefit SWF's the most and SoloQ the least, which is the complete opposite of what should happen as this is a SoloQ predominant issue since SWF's can already counter most of it.
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Thanks for the well-thought-out reply — I really like your idea of treating tunneling and slugging as a spectrum rather than a simple yes/no judgment.
Breaking it down into hard vs. strategic tunneling and strategic vs. full slugging adds a lot of clarity. I agree that strategic tunneling and slugging often serve a valid purpose in terms of pressure and control, and they don’t usually feel unfair when used sparingly or tactically.
It’s really the extremes — hard tunneling or full slugging without any real need — that tend to create a frustrating experience for Survivors. And like you said, with the abandon feature, slugging isn't as punishing as it once was, though I still feel strategic use is healthier overall.
Appreciate your perspective — it helped frame the conversation in a much more balanced way.
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I agree that hard tunneling, like proxy camping and immediately re-focusing a freshly unhooked Survivor, is where it starts to feel more deliberate and less strategic. I also find it interesting that you mentioned going after weaker loopers being more efficient than chasing stronger ones — that’s a solid point I hadn’t considered in that way.
Same with slugging — I like how you made the distinction between tactical decisions (like leaving someone down while teammates are nearby or breaking a pallet) versus intentionally bleeding everyone out. That kind of excessive slugging does feel like poor sportsmanship, especially when it’s clearly not being used to gain pressure or tempo.
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I appreciate how you tied it back to the overall design philosophy and how BHVR interprets "asymmetrical." You're absolutely right that the intent vs. impact of tunneling and slugging is where a lot of the confusion and frustration comes from. Even if it's not deliberate, if a Survivor doesn’t get time to reset, it still feels like tunneling because the outcome is the same.
Same goes for slugging — the act itself is simple, but what happens during that time (like being left on the ground for extended periods) really shapes the experience. I hadn’t thought about the catch-up mechanic angle, but that’s a great point. If tunneling and slugging were better integrated into fair catch-up systems, I think we’d see less tension around them.
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Fair take — I get where you're coming from. I agree that tunneling and slugging in the late-game (1–2 gens left) often comes down to survival and strategy, and at that point, both sides are just trying to secure the win. I don’t think most players mind that as much.
Where it gets frustrating is exactly what you said — early-game tunneling and slugging, when no real pressure has been established yet. Turning a match into a 3v1 before gens are even touched really cuts down on counterplay and makes it hard to come back, especially in SoloQ.
You also raise a solid point about SWF vs. SoloQ. Any anti-tunnel/slug system would definitely need to account for that imbalance — otherwise, it risks helping coordinated teams more than the ones who actually need it.
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In my opinion:
True tunneling = Going out of your way to remove a survivor from the trial as fast as possible. This means, dropping chase or not applying pressure anywhere as soon as the "target" is unhooked.
Staggered tunneling = Same as true tunneling, but alternating between two selected survivors until at least one of them is sacrificed.
Accidental tunneling = When you are going for someone else, only for the last unhooked to cross path with you mid chase (often when injured). You can choose to ignore that survivor completely, or just go for the easy down and hook.
Excessive slugging = Going out of your way to down and bleed out all 4 survivors, thus eliminating any chance for a comeback, unless Boon: Exponential or Unbreakable is in play.
Strategic slugging = If someone is bodyblocking you when trying to go for another Survivor, you can choose to slug the bodyblocker, while focusing on your initial target. This is especially true if you have a feeling that the bodyblocking survivor has DS.
Petty slugging = Slugging for the 4K / finisher mori
Timeout slugging = When the survivors are doing silly stuff, sometimes it is better to slug them as a "time-out" and go for someone else instead. They can't do flashlight saves, or sit on gens while on the ground now, can they?
You can also use the slug as bait for another survivor, especially if you play stealthy builds and doing jumpscares.2 -
I would consider tunneling as unnecessarily forcing a survivor out of the game, even though you don't need the extra pressure to win, or essentially warranting tunneling only when theres only 2 gens or less left and forcing someone out is kinda your only shot at still 4king.
I draw the line when tunneling before at least 2 gens are done. At this point of a match, you not having split hooks and some pressure is your own fault, but you can still recover not playing scummy. Tunneling when its not necessary to win is just annoying and boring for both sides.
As a killer, its the exact same, tunnel only when you need to. I typically don't target specific players based on their hours, (forcing weaklink to die) kinda just the first person whos death hook. Survivors can do alot to prolong and stop tunneling through perks and strategies, like dying under pallets and having one guy follow the tunnelee with hit takes and downs while the other two crank.
Short term slugging such as doing a break action isn't really slugging. Slugging I consider to be when you intentionally leave all 4 survivors on the ground (specifically all 4) to catch the last one standing. Thats what I refer to as extreme slugging, and though if survivors misplay themselves into that situation, its very hard to get out of if you don't have any anti Slug perks.
Snowballing mainly and misplaying on the surv side to try and get a rescue or a do a high progress gen. Mainly just when a survivor sells, naturally the killer will exploit that.
Slugging isn't warranted when you're completely ignoring hooking survivors and looking for all the others, intentionally trying to have them all downed before finally sacrificing them. Though I only consider it extreme and unwarranted when all 4 are alive, otherwise slugging seems rather strategic if 3 or less survivors remain.
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I wrote this big ass comment but my power went out twice while doing it. Is this a sign of something?
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For me tunneling is the first sacrificed survivor being hooked twice in a row without rotation. But also divides on different categoriesHardtunnelling - simple, only proxycamp and straight go away for hooking person three time in a row
Situational - you didn’t start match from tunneling, yet you decided to go for survivor to hook twice in a row, because he is more available for chase and it brings more advantages
Imposed - it’s more about how survivors played, aka insta unhooks, stealth from other players so u can find only one player, teammates don’t trying to take chases when it’s needed and prerunning, while their teammates who is death on hook takes all the pressure
Slugging is something more straightforward - you just didn’t pick up survivor within short period of timeHardslugging - killer refuse to hook until endgame and his build specifically working for it
Situational - killer takes an advantage of other survivor being available for chase while other is downed to create more pressure, or to avoid perks, save time or whatever happened in match
Imposed - killer can’t pick up survivor to hook, because sabo/bp/flashlight/saves and survivor actively resist to be picked up
I assume for general community tunneling means hooking survivor twice in a row and also not picking up survivor straight away for slugging
Are people using it when needed/wanted or does it straighforwardly defines toxic behaviour is other discussion. Me personally - too much scenarios too say definitely. But I won’t argue that it brings value-1 -
For context: I'm not a main anything. My 30 day numbers are 178 survivor matches with a 48% ER and 218 killler matches with an 80% KR. So I'm currently playing an even amount of both and doing decently. I haven't done any soloqing in months and don't plan to without changes, because thats where the suffering lives. I have no complaints as killer, but as survivor I have a few, and they revolve around this topic. I actually don't think what many people call tunneling and slugging matches my definitions, or I guess, my grievances. It's not every match, as many claim. I also think pretty much anything goes at 1 gen or end game if the killer is doing bad.
Hard tunneling is when someone sets out, from the get-go, to shove the first unlucky player they see out of the match, and ignores every other person, even when handed free downs from them as they try to protect their teammate. This is what I consider problematic tunneling.
My issue with it, aside from it sucking to be that target if you're back in the lobby with 6k points, is that it's the easiest path to the cheapest win. It tells me the killler is unable or unwilling to spread pressure properly and has to handicap the team to win. You're immedialty displaying your inability to handle the four opponenents the game is designed around having in play. Hard tunneling at 5 gens is embarrassing. There's also no survivor equivalent. There's nothing I can do as survivor to insure a win 1 or 2 minutes into a match in a similar fashion. I've had many great and impressive opponents but I've never once thought someone who hard tunneled was skillful.
As killler, I don't ever set out to tunnel. The exceptions for me, personally, is if the person is inviting my attention. If you click your flashlight, BM, and repeatedly sabo or body block--in other words, if you're really aggressive--then I will stop being chill and match your energy. So in order to be targeted by me, you must earn it.
Slugging is actually a bigger issue to me than tunneling because tunneling can backfire terribly if you choose the wrong target and it's at least interactive. The only way to recover from mass slugging is to either 1) have the right perks or 2) have great team plays, which is particularly hard for soloqers.
Slugging is a contagious tactic. I started the game as a killler-only player. I had zero external interaction with this game. No videos, no streamers, no social media (that's still the case, aside from this forum.) I just played the game in isolation. At no point did it ever occur to me to slug. It wasn't until I started playing survivor that I experienced tunneling and slugging. I didn't understand why they were leaving me on the ground, and why I couldn't fill up the bar and stand up. I still don't understand why 30s can pass and I can't stand up. The 90s from the ptb wasn't quite good enough for me. If you can't pick up your slug in 30s-45s you deserve to lose the down. People should be able to reengage with the game at that point. You can always chase them again.
But I don't consider checking the area and breaking a pallet slugging. They don't need to pick you up the very moment you hit the ground. That's sometimes a foolish move. I will also sometimes put someone in timeout with slugging. If you get unhooked and hop onto the closest gen still injured, I might do this, because I don't want to tunnel you but you're also dumb and it's time to spend some time kissing the ground and thinking about your choices.
Many people claim hook denials as a reason for egerious slugging. If hook denials tilt you so hard, bring a build for them. They do, in fact, tilt me that hard, and my current build not just makes them pretty much impossible but detrimental to the potential savior/s. I can't remember the last time someone successfully sabotaged me, but there's been many a game-deciding attempt in my favor. You dont need to slug, just use the altruism against them.
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honestly, for me it's just simple.
is the killer trying to get one survivor out of the match because they're behind and need to slow the game down? not tunneling.
is the killer ahead and still just trying to grind one survivor out of the match as fast as possible? tunneling.
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You have same opinions as I its either strategic or hardcore/sweaty play. One is done in order to gain advantage in loosing game like downing someone who wasnt been hooked and spoting near survivor who is injured and was already hooked so you leave the first one on the ground and go gain more preasure to chase and down,hook the injured one and now one guy must use perk to get up or someone has to save him and one is chased which leaves just one survivor doing gens if he can which buys you more time that if you hooken the first down here and then went to find another one.
Strategic tunneling is for me the one where you have few gens left and no one on dead hook so you go for one guy to get him out fast so you can control the game more and get more hooks which lead to kills or another situation someone rushes for unhook and has not been hooked so you trade and guy he unhooked is now dead on hook which you risk deliverance here so you leave him on the ground as form of preasure and go to kill the unhooked one (this is strategick but all that depends is on state of the game like how many gens are done and being worked on compare to killers hooks if the gens number is 5 undone gens and killer does this trade to slug and tunnel then its not strategic for me but sweaty or hardcore play but if one or two gens are left than killer has limited options and for me its strategic.
Hardcore tunneling or slugging for me is when killer does it on 5 gens and continues (we can argue that he is trying to win asap but its still dirty play till mid game around 3 gens then its kinda understandable tactic).
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Yea people never want to acknowledge how SWF's keep the game unbalanced, but it needs to be addressed since it's not Surv vs Killer but SoloQ vs SWF vs Killer, there's three sides to this game. Buffing SoloQ in any meaningful way just strengthens SWF's x10, so then Killers need buffs and changes to compensate which then invalidates the original buffs to SoloQ while keeping the bulk of the buffs for SWF's to use. It's all circular since BHVR refuses to actually address any issues in a meaningful way beyond band-aid fixes to push out DLC.
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tunneling : focusing a guy after they got unhooked.
and no,
just because you hit someone else or chase someone else,
does not mean you cant just switch back to tunnel them for a 2nd hook while everyone has none.
(there are some situations that the killer is forced to hit other survivors for pressure or because of bodyblocks)
slugging : being left on the ground for around longer than 30 secounds,
when you have no danger to picking up
(I:E sabo, under a pallet, flashlight/flashbang save)1 -
Tunnelling is when you try your best to get someone out of the game no matter how far away they are when they're unhooked, like if you ignore easier stuff just to get that person regardless of the actual detriment to your game.
The following things, IMO, don't really count:
-punishing survs for an unsafe unhook
-going after that person because you caught them healing/they just ran into you/they're still injured
-They just randomly run into you by bad luck and you chase them because of course you wouldSlugging, in the griefing sense, is when you down someone just to make them bleed out, as opposed to more tactical reasons like them running to a dead zone, or having a chance to down two survs in quick succession.
That being said, I condone it in the case that a surv just tries to give up the game, or grief the survs (pointing to where others are) or trying to abandon the game, etc, and I may also do it to someone who's been exceptionally obnoxious (pick me behavior, constant clicking and teabagging, etc).
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It´s kinda hard to bring this on one simple term.
Since everyone thinks that tunneling is something else.
Last time I played Killer and went out of my way to hook everyone twice so that my first kill was on the 9th hook. Sadly the 8th hook wanted to bodyblock hard for his rescuer (which was healthy) was downed and hooked again.
The Endgame Chat was horrible, filled with messages to off myself because i can´t win without tunneling.
Another great example was the new Anti Tunnel on the PTB, where many claimed that it´s useless since the killer will just tunnel two people out.
I won´t say something about slugging because in my opinion no killer is designed to tunnel someone but some killers (Oni, Twins, etc) are designed to do that and as boring at it is, its their design that leads to this. (Would be funny if Oni gets his Power for each hooked survivor so that he can interrupt his power to hook someone.)
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Tunneling and slugging is when the killer leaves people on the ground or intentionally ignores everyone else to target one survivor out the match.
But these are also choices that survivors can influence. If survivors want to throw their second chance perks in my face then yeah I'll slug them because why not free pressure and possible waste of unbreakable. They can also incentivize me heavily to tunnel if they just keep running up to hook to save basically in my face.0 -
Tunneling requires "intent" behind it. IE I don't believe "accidental" tunneling exists. Tunneling is intentionally ignoring other survivors for the purpose of removing a specific one out of the game. If the killer just coincidentally runs into me twice he isn't tunneling, I either messed up or just bad luck. Me expecting a killer to just be like "oh bro my bad didn't see it was you, carry on", when those scenarios happen would be completely silly of me.
Like if the killer is downing survivors, ignoring them on the ground, and still driving forward at that same guy only wanting to hook them, that would be tunneling, as he's ignoring other survivors with a purpose of removing a specific one.
In my experience people call way more scenarios "tunneling" when they really aren't, those people just don't like accountability and want to make excuses for how the game turned out. I'd probably say like 9/10 times I see "tunneling" thrown out, it's not.
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Does it really matter what you define as tunneling when youre still vilifying the people doing this perfectly normal strategy also used by the other side?
Anyways tunneling is getting one survivor out asap, one survivor 2 hooks in a row.
Slugging is, surprise surprise, not picking up a slug.
I'm killer biased, so take this with a block of salt, but imo some survivors do have some hardcore scrub-mentality when it comes to killers using certain strategies.
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I'd say it does matter, because people on both sides define tunneling and slugging differently — and those definitions often shape how each side views whether it's fair or not.
As you said, people sometimes "vilify" others, but maybe if we actually look at both sides of the coin, some of those perceptions could change.
Sure, tunneling is generally understood as focusing on getting one Survivor out. But the context is what I’m curious about. When is it considered okay? Is it strategic at 5 gens? During a 3-gen? When someone's looping forever or is the weakest link? Or is it just something people do casually for fun?
Same with slugging — yes, it's not picking someone up. But why do it? If you’re Killer-biased, I’m genuinely curious: when do you think it's a justified tactic?
My post was meant to go beyond just defining the terms — I’m more interested in understanding the reasoning behind them.
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Why would it be problematic to deploy at 5 gens? Survivors focus down gens at 0kills, 0 hooks, 0 chases. They dont swap targets (ive seen someone claim swapping gens or moving between them, is the same timewaste as being afk). Why should the killer not start doing their chosen strategy as soon they can/want? Survivors are already doing so.
As for justifying slugging? I understand the problem with letting [all remaining survivors] be slugged at the same time for the whole 4 minutes, that's the only problematic case. It may be solved by the ptb proposed unbreakable solution (another meta perk free wohoo) or by simply sacrificing all survivors who are irreversibly hooked and slugged. All other instances of slugging is just betting on trading time spent hooking for disabled unhook perks and the missed hookstate. Picking up a slug isnt that different from unhooking, right?
In the end, I dont think there are any deep reasons behind these strategies. They work, people use them.
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As a killer I, and I believe most other killers do this as well, don't go into a match with a gameplan. I adjust my gameplan with what helps me win the current game. If you want to unhook someone last second I'm not afraid to come back to defend the hook and potentially tunnel of the hook. If you want to sit on gens injured all games I am going to slug when it's convenient. Etc…
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Thanks for the reply — I don’t disagree that efficiency is a major factor, and I get that Survivors are doing gens from second 1, so why shouldn’t Killers use the best tools at their disposal from the start? That’s a fair point.
My curiosity wasn’t really about whether these strategies work — obviously they do, or people wouldn’t use them. What I’m more interested in is how players justify or interpret them, and what kind of impact they believe it has on the game experience — for themselves and for others.
When you say there aren't really "deep reasons" behind tunneling or slugging — that it's just what works — that’s a valid take. But that also supports my original point: definitions and intent vary, and while some people see those tactics as just strategy, others see them as intentional fun-killers. That gap in perception is what leads to all the drama, DCs, and post-game salt.
Also, I agree with you that full 4-man slugs with no hooks are where things really get messy — and I’m curious to see if the proposed PTB changes (like basekit Unbreakable) will shift the balance a bit there.
At the end of the day, I don’t think using these tactics is bad. I’m just trying to understand the philosophy behind them and see where players feel the line is — if they feel there’s a line at all.
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There is only one problematic form of tunneling - Extreme hard tunneling. Hooking the same person three times in a row with that goal from the start of the match. Comp strategy that is used to achieve degenerate win streaks like the 2000 game Blight win streak. This should be punished with no compensation. I wouldn't care if we had a strict MMR system but the devs have made it abundantly clear that we are never getting that. Everything else is fair game. Most discussion about tunneling is just people whining.
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There are exceptions to every rule, but I’d say slugging means leaving a survivor on the ground to pressure others. And tunneling is targeting a survivor who is vulnerable due to being unhooked and/or is close to being on their final hook state.
The more casual community seems to think that good killers don’t need to tunnel or slug to win, which is only true against weak opponents. I personally play to win and prefer my opponents to do the same, but I understand how frustrating the experience can be in solo queue as someone who’s been on the receiving end of it many times. The sad reality of this game is that not even the strongest killers can afford to not tunnel and slug if the survivors are playing well, and changing that without breaking the balance of the game is really hard.
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If I'm playing survivor and I get sacrificed, that's tunneling. And if I'm playing killer and the survivors escape, that's genrushing. Simple as that.
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