Hillbilly NEEDS a change, and here is WHY...

Now what is this guy talking about saying old Hillbilly needs a change - obviously he's got no clue. Well let me start of by stating I am NOT AT ALL in favour with the current overheat mechanic and will share my ideas on a possible solution to the problem at the end of this thread. However, to fully understand HOW Hillbilly needs to be changed, one must first look at the issue at hand, which most people fail to see for the simple reason that the devs either didn't care to admit it or just found it unnecessary to do so.

THE THEORY

Source citation: https://forum.deadbydaylight.com/en/discussion/167809/developer-update-july-2020#latest

So among all the big changes currently tested in the PTB the Hillbilly power rework is the only thing that came completely out of nowhere with the Developer Update July 2020 (apart from minor fixes and teachable perks reworks). The obvious question is: Why did they change him?

Well they actually answered to that upon announcement: "The goal behind this change is to add a small drawback to misusing the chainsaw, and to add a bit more depth to the chainsaw with resource management.". However, besides the fact that their message seemed a little contradictory to some extend ("For the most part, we are happy with the way The Hillbilly performs."), I am very sure that THIS is not the entire reasoning behind it.

It was planned long ago to enhance Bubba's power and bring the rarity of chainsaw addons in line with the others. Additionally there have been complaints from parts of the community about things like insta-chainsaw, useless addons such as the yellow, green or purple chain and engravings as a must-have. Now some of these issues were rather controversial, but the amount of such feedback after the announcement of upcoming addon changes let to believe that people were not entirely happy with the current state of Hillbilly's meta gameplay and addon variety. As a result, the devs were rather limited in their options to design unique and useful addons, which emphasize with the Hillbilly's power. However, they were "happy with the way The Hillbilly performs", so they didn't plan on touching his main power for the sake of the addon rarity rework. Instead, they would add the overheat mechanic, which is somewhat well in line with Bubba's chainsaw power, in order to "add a bit more depth do the chainsaw". This now would allow them to design fresh addons with a unique use, having an impact on the Killer's power while still not staying in conflict with existing problems (such as insta-chainsaw, etc).

THE MAIN ISSUE

The overheat mechanic however, is nothing more than a bandaid fix. It exists for the sake of addon rarity accordance only. It is not an enjoyable mechanic on its own (cause that would turn the addons useless). This is not a new problem, we've seen such things like Bloodlust (to prevent long chases), Bamboozled (to avoid infinites/timewasters) and recently the Executioner's cage of atonement change, which make the cage respawn once Pyramid Head is too close, cause he could just facecamp a survivor to death otherwise. This list could go on and on. The problem with bandaid fixes is that they don't entirely remove an issue. They merely create situations in which they don't have as hard of an impact. Bloodlust is lost after a pallet destruction, Bamboozled only works with the perk equipped and whenever I play Pyramid Head, I almost enjoy those five seconds next to a survivor until they get sent to the other side of the map, where their friends are neverever gonna reach them in time (jk but it's kinda silly).

So as a conclusion, there definetely is a reason why the devs want to modify the Hillbilly's power. If they want to bring his addons in line, there must be some room for ideas. You can see them very well testing plenty of different addon types in order to see how people feel about them. Nevertheless, it's unlikely we'll see half of them on the live servers.

THE SOLUTION

However, the current overheat mechanic is awful and I highly doubt that simply tweaking it a little will do much good for it. Instead of making it an annoyance to killer players, why don't we give it a different function than the standard chainsaw? For example, don't let the chainsaw stop when overheated, but make it so the next hit only applies the Deep Wound Timer status effect on a survivor. Like that, players are not at all limited in the duration and amount of uses of the chainsaw sprints. There is a "small drawback to misusing the chainsaw" however, and the mechanic would still add more "depth" to the game and could be comboed with a bunch of different addon ideas. This is just a personal suggestion and I don't expect it to be perfect, but I'm trying to find a reasonable change that fixes the addon issue while still not affecting the overall performance of Hillbilly as much as the current overheat mechanic.

Feel free to add your own ideas and vote up your favourites, so the devs may find a better solution. Cause one thing's for certain: noone wants a billy who can't use his chainsaw!