Thoughts on The Plague
(I think I'm posting this in the wrong forum, so I do apologize in advance).
I know that this topic has been discussed about over a million times, with some people saying that the Plague is overpowered and some people saying she's underpowered. However, I wanted to contribute my thoughts on the character in terms of fighting her and playing as her. I understand that there will be some people that will just tell me to get good at the game or that I'm just a random person who only joined the forums and that I don't know what I'm talking about. However, I want to mention that I have played Dead by Daylight for a cumulative of 1130 hours (1002 on Xbox, 83 on PC, and 45 of the Switch. I know I have wasted my life on this game, but it's basically my haven. I love this game a lot).
The issue is that - although most people are aware, this is mainly for those who are confused as to why I say she's overpowered/underpowered - the Plague has to depend on people cleansing in order for her to gain her Corrupt Purge. If people start cleansing in fountains, she can be overpowered as she gains an unlimited range attack capable of hitting multiple people for 60 seconds (unless the person playing her has Prophylactic Amulet, Exorcism Amulet, or Devotee's Amulet). However, if the survivor team starts to catch up on the idea that cleansing isn't worth it, then the Plague can be weak in that situation.
Usually, you'll find the people saying that the Plague is overpowered tend to be around Rank 20 to 12; and vice versa with Rank 8 to 1 saying she's underpowered.
Personally, I believe she can be a bit overpowered when people cleanse, and a bit underpowered when people don't. Playing against competent survivors can be annoying to deal with when they don't cleanse, while playing against people who do cleanse will make the easiest game in the entirety of Dead by Daylight. At the same time, playing against a Plague and how fun the match is can be determined if everyone cleanses or not. If people cleanse, the match is a done deal. If they don't, it's still a done deal.
It's like either way, you run the risk of dying faster. You don't cleanse, you risk being one-shot. You cleanse, it's 60 seconds of constant red vomit being spewed all over the map with a 70% chance of getting hit.
Sure, you can always stun her to end it quickly - I've done it before. But what are the chances of you finding a pallet in time to stun her, or finding a locker and hiding in there for an entire minute for a very slight chance of her walking towards your locker?
I'm not saying that she needs a nerf, hell no. I'm not saying that she needs a mandatory buff. To all the Plague mains who might tell me that she's fine the way she is, you're just bad at dealing with her, just hear me out. She's a good killer in terms of ending chases quickly and a decent killer when it comes to finding survivors and hopefully stalling the game. However, all of this is taken into account of people cleanse. She's still a good killer in terms of ending chases quickly, but she will get genrushed the moment people stop cleansing. Sure, you could run perks like Thanatophobia, Dying Light, Bloodhound and Sloppy Butcher to punish those who don't cleanse. But that's a lot of bloodpoints and time devoted for just one Killer and for one scenario.
I've been wanting to write this for a while, but I wasn't sure how well people would react. However, after studying her and how effective she can be and the sort, I wrote down her layout - along with almost all the characters, as some need a little bit of fine-tuning so they can be effective.
At first, I was hoping that the longer survivors kept their sickness, they would eventually fall into the dying state. But after thinking about it, it would be kind of broken as it would promote survivors to start cleansing more often. If they don't, then they will always enter the dying state, even after they get off of the hook. So, instead, this is what I thought of:
- The Plague now makes her own Corrupt Purge over 120 seconds. (However, this isn't as potent or as dangerous as gaining Corrupt Purge from the Pool of Devotion).
- Charging your Vile Purge while churning up Corrupt Purge will pause the progress of it.
- Ingesting the corruption from a Pool of Devotion will pause and reduce the progression of the Plague's personal Corrupt Purge by 50%. Using the corruption from a Pool of Devotion will still take place of Vile Purge and be used for the 60 seconds.
- The Corrupt Purge from the Plague will increase the progression speed by 20% for every Survivor that is fully sick.
- After releasing the Corrupt Purge from the Plague, the ability has a 30 second cooldown. You can still vomit Vile Purge and Corrupt Purge from the Pool of Devotion however.
Sure, it needs a lot of testing, but this is what I had in mind to make her more viable and more lethal in most, if not, all situations.
That's my thoughts on the Plague. I'm not a game developer, but I feel like I've played the game long enough to think of balanced changes to some aspects in the game. I think she's a fun killer to play as, but the need to use specific perks for a situation that may or may not happen makes the experience not as entertaining and more stressful than it needs to be.
Comments
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the whole thing is a cringe fest if you ask me ,
vommiting is lame an it could have been something else,
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Can I just
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I hate playing against her, she is a decent killer but she is just so unfun to go against.
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I've see very little Plague OP/ Plague needs buff discussions.
My attention is really short atm so I didn't read all of that.
The debate right now, as far as I'm aware, is do you cleanse or not cleanse.
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"Usually, you'll find the people saying that the Plague is overpowered tend to be around Rank 20 to 12; and vice versa with Rank 8 to 1 saying she's underpowered."
Basically yeah. If you know how to loop well (high ranks) she's weak. If you don't know how to loop well (low ranks) she's strong.
"but she will get genrushed the moment people stop cleansing"
Yeah this is her issue at high ranks. No one cleanses which means no time wasted healing which means you are getting gen rushed faster than all the other killers who already get gen rushed fast as hell.
I like your idea but I think we could simplify that by just making 1 random pool auto corrupt every 2min. I'd also like if there was a little more incentive to cleanse as well. Maybe add Oblivious while infected and broken.
I also like this because I think it's just bad design that a killer can simply be denied from using their power the entire match by the survivors and this is what happens regularly at high ranks.
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She's easy to play and super powerful. You don't even have to touch people to get them to half state, completely free damage if you see them.
Then her power is borderline broken if you can use it, and if nobody cleanses then you are basically perma tier 3 myers all game.
Add in her ability is a hard counter to:
-instaheals
-iron will
-adrenaline
......and she is honestly right up there as one of the best killers in the game, no debating.
If you think she is bad you just need to lay off the OP killers for a bit because she is probably like #6 or #7 overall.
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I honestly thought about making one random pool of devotion become corrupt, but then the two add-ons that already make a pool corrupt might have to be reworked. I don’t know.
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I don't think that would be too much at all.
Corrupted Vomit is very strong, but I think people understate the heavy negatives attached with it.
Firstly, you have to go way out of your way to pick it up. This wastes a lot of time on a killer that already has less time than all other killers.
Secondly, because you are going out of your way to pick it up that means you aren't getting it mid chase AND the survivors are getting a loud warning, letting them know you have it and to play more passive to wait it out. Quite easily counter played by not even letting you use it IF you got it.
Third, this will roughly also give them an idea as to your current location because they know where they cleansed at to know if they are safe for rescues or continuing on a gen.
Lastly, the obvious free heal you gave them to get the pool corrupted in the first place.
Like I said, it is extremely strong. It just has many, many downsides already attached to it that I don't think getting extra pools would be too much.
People also downplay juking her Corrupted Vomit a lot. You can quite easily loop a Plague with it because of its slow arc speed if you're good enough. Not to mention making them lose it entirely if you stun them.
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I’m not saying she’s bad. I’m saying that she’s a good killer in some aspects, and decent in others. But that kind of dies down when people don’t cleanse.
Again, she can be one of the most powerful killers in the game - like you said - but that’s if everyone cleanses. And the people who cleanse are either people who don’t play against her as much or newcomers. But that can completely turn against her when against experienced players. Just because insta-heals and Adrenaline doesn’t work against her, that’s only if you remain Injured. If you’re in the Dying State and you’re broken, you can still be picked back up to Injured with Adrenaline or from an insta-heal. Broken just means you can’t heal fully back to Healthy. You can still be healed from Dying to Injured.
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See now I would be happy if I could just play her xD She looks like she would be fin to play yet I'm having a incredibly hard time getting her vomit down.
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You’re not wrong. Like I said, it would just need a lot of testing.
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If people don't cleanse, they are just a 1 shot all game. Ghostface and myers entire kits involve them having to sneak around stalking people to get the 1 shots and plague just swings her mouse back and forth at each survivor once and it's permanent exposed and they are super loud to boot. It's also easy 4 stack thantophobia. That alone makes her better than like 70% of the killers.
Her corrupt puke is legit broken and there's a reason nobody ever cleanses. It's that OP.
If you are having trouble hitting survivors once after they are already broken.....that's not a problem with plague. That's you as a killer needing to get better.
Try running monitor and abuse so you get closer before they start running, or play with your food for an easy 3x set of down after building stacks, or just run good old enduring + spirit fury for literally free downs.
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"Ghostface and myers entire kits involve them having to sneak around stalking people to get the 1 shots and plague just swings her mouse back and forth at each survivor once and it's permanent exposed and they are super loud to boot."
Keep in mind that 1 shottable with Plague isn't even remotely close to 1 shottable with Ghostface or Myers. She has a MUCH larger TR and size which is extremely significant.
"If you are having trouble hitting survivors once after they are already broken.....that's not a problem with plague."
This isn't a true statement. If an M1 killer plays perfectly and a survivor plays perfectly you will not be getting a hit. When you are an M1 killer you rely on survivor mistakes to win.
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