Possible Solution for SWF Teams (Killer-Buff)
As a player of DBD for quite a few years now and a fan for much longer, I’ve often pondered possible solutions for killers on how to effectively play against full/partial SWF groups that are running coms as I climbed up the ranks into red. With the lack of in-game methods of communication between players its been clear that such a feature would give survivors a strong advantage over the killer in terms of organization and the ability to call out the killer’s movements to the entire team. With the use of Discord and other console based chat rooms it has never been easier to run a SWF team to gain this natural advantage.
To counter this common strategy I propose that the implementation of a passive killer perk be introduced that is similar to but an inversion of BBQ-Chili with regards to the aura reading visual which ONLY shows the players that have a consistent record of teaming with the survivor that has been currently hooked. The system in which a survivor’s record is tracked could be based upon multiple previous games within the span of a few days/weeks/months with the same players (Other factors would be taken into account such as the amount of games between each repeated team up to account for poor matchmaking).
-Auras of teamed survivors ONLY revealed to killer upon a hook within less than 40 meters
-Lasts 4-5 seconds
-Provides a risk factor to survivors that consistently SWF
-Killer receives a partial advantage in locating players similar to a SWF survivor’s call outs in a voice chat lobby
-Passive perk that does not take the place of a perk slot that is given to all killers
Comments
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Just don't let a rank 4 play with a rank 17 friend and face a rank 20 killer. If you are rank 1 and play with a rank 15 friend then you should play games against a red rank killer
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This could be solved with a casual mode (rainbow ranks/swfs) and ranked mode (limited ranks/swfs need to be closer in rank).
Ranked mode just restricts ranks in the party (which would result in longer queues). Red ranks only match with 1 rank up/down. Purple within 2 ranks. Green, Yellow, Gray within 3 ranks.
Casual mode gets half BP. Ranked mode gets full BP. That way, at least people who want to swf with rainbow rank friends and still progress their characters can have their fun games, ranked can be left to sweaty players.
That's just my opinion, anyway.
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Oh definitely! Don’t get me wrong the matchmaking needs a lot of work at the moment, but this specific solution would (if done right) try to bring some balance to a game where a survivor team has the advantage of a third party voice channel.
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I do really like the idea of having a ranked/unraked/casual type of system set in place. I played a lot of R6 before DBD and it was easy to use although for many killer mains they may avoid the ranked altogether knowing that the majority of the teams are SWF and that won’t be fun for both sides.
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Maybe. Maybe not, though. Queues either way would be longer in ranked mode. But I think a lot of killers get tired of playing against gray ranks. Plus, the bp boost could be used as an incentive to play (especially if they bring in the bp bonus for people switching sides to help queue times, like they asked about in the survey - they could limit this bonus to ranked games).
I don't know, I'm just spitballing ideas out because matchmaking in its current state is ridiculous.
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I rather they just limit the perk usage of a combined DH, Unbreakable, DS, and BT. If there's SWF involved no two "friends" get to perk up with two of the same as the other "friends" 🤦♂️
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Yeah the BP boost would be really nice I definitely upvoted that idea.
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Ok so punish people for having friends?
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Except this is denying someone the full functionality of the game just because they want to play with friends. That's not fair, either.
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But killer’s are doing fine against SWF now?
I don’t get why there needs to be a “solution”.
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Most SWF issues can be fixed by tweaking OoO. If a SWF is using it, all teamed survivors should have auras shown. Any decent SWF team I’ve ever faced brought it and once they learn that being super altruistic won’t work against me because I’ll just slug them all and they get 1 hooked to death, comms are used to coordinate the gen rush instead.
SWF is NOT a major threat. Yes, you’ll still lose the majority of SWF games on comms, but OoO is the only real problem here.
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So. It's fair they all get those perks AND communication benefits while a decent killer gets none of the equality?
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I wouldn’t say they’re doing fine objectively speaking, there is still a huge advantage of having that voice channel and that was never intended to be in the game to begin with.
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Instead of buffing killer or nerfing SWF we should be buffing solo queue.
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How about then they make SWF have to fix ALL Gens instead of just 5 ?
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That’s exaclty what the solution I’m proposing would hopefully counter is that third party communication aspect that most SWF teams use. The killer has nothing really as beneficial to balance that.
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Ok, but is it enough to warrant a buff? Because objectively speaking certain killers are border lining being OP. Freddy and Spirit come to mind.
Im not denying there isn’t a slight advantage but I really don’t see it as a huge problem IMO. I play against red ranks and the only thing that bothers me personally is hex totems, since they can give each other that info. But for me that’s a separate issue because totem spawns locations have been an issue for a while.
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I think that if a team is using a third party voice channel to constantly give updates on a killer’s movement that’s pretty OP. There was a reason that voice chat was never an option from the start.
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The whole reason that there are 2 extra gens is so that the killer can't just camp the one gen and snowball at the end. It's also why good survivors will do what they can to avoid the 3-gen at the end. Killers still have perks that let them snowball at endgame.
Your logic is removing features from the game and punishing people for having friends. Meanwhile, a killer will have their full game functionality. Yes, sweaty swfs are hard af. But not every swf is SEAL Team 6. They can and do go down, usually due to altruism. And the flipside, there are a lot of good survivors who don't need comms to still bully a killer. That's just good players knowing what to do to counter a killer.
But the reverse can be said about good killers. Yes, their games are sweaty, but they can still get 4k against swfs that make mistakes.
Most of the things that makes someone lose a game comes down to someone making a mistake and the other side capitalizing on it.
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This is true.
But they can't really do anything about that short of having borderline malware that disables a game for running a 100% legit program in the background (I don't lump anticheat in with this, because cheats are not legit).
I still don't think punishing people for having friends is the right thing to do.
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Yeah limiting perks and all that definitely isn’t fair, I think if we can get the numbers of how often dedicated teams will use third party apps to communicate it may be the right balance to give the killer something similar to seeing a survivor’s location.
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There was. But many things have changed. Like the array of tracking perks you have at your disposal. The addition of the oblivious effect. Map reworks. Etc.
they always meant for the game to have SWF.
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All things said, simplistic ideas that shouldnt be punishing, right then?.
I still just say folks who are grouped should at the very least have "SWF" next to their gamertag. It would at least give an unbiased indication what the killer is dealing with. (Also "disable", for lack of a better word, the killer to DC because of this information)
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I wouldn't mind a swf indicator. At least like a line linking the people in a swf. If two groups of 2-man, you'd see 2 lines linking them together. This honestly isn't a bad idea.
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Or in pre-game lobby those SWF, would be standing next to each other somehow. ( I'm now imagining animating SWFs in "bring our heads together" animation "talking" strategies lmao
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No, they are not. A good killer playing anything besides nurse / spirit (maybe Freddy) will almost never win against a good SWF team. You'll get an odd game here and there where the SWF team makes a blunder, but that's it really. Killers are at the mercy of the team they face making mistakes. They cannot themselves consistently force mistakes (unless again they're playing nurse / spirit or Freddy).
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Punishment with fair balance.
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Ok, well I’m not sure which game you’re playing but that hasn’t been my experience at all.
I am constantly faced with red rank SWF teams that yes are strong, but that don’t always adapt to how I play. I main Plague and Michael. Two killers which are really way more forgiving than the ones you mentioned. My experience playing as them, is that SWF teams expect things out of me, that in the end when I don’t give in ends up costing them the game.
On the other end of the spectrum, I have also played with 3-4man groups with people who not only are able to be chased longer than 5 seconds but also make logical choices when it comes to different actions. Meaning that even without comms (in the right scenarios) we could dominate. Even with that there are red rank killers who know how to play killer well and watch for how the group is playing... and have 4k’d us.
It’s very simple science. Just because you are facing a SWF does not mean they automatically inherit some kind of skill. If you rely on survivors to make mistakes to win, then that tells me that you do that even if the team isn’t a SWF. Which is why you are probably losing. You are letting a team dictate your choices.
It reminds me of the killers that get so triggered when I loop them and then end up throwing the game because they chose not to brake chase.
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maybe color-coded names? if its all solo-queue ppl, everybody has their name displayed in a different color, and everybody who has the same color, is in a SWF. Easy =P
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Unpopular opinion and I play survivor normally. Remove coms. It is a survival horror game.
If you are across the map you shouldn't be able to call out via coms to other survivors. That's just my opinion. I always run solo que because I hate the chatter over coms.
I guess if you want info, run info perks?
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There is legit no reason to punish people for playing with each other period
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Balance has to come from somewhere, no?
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You sure about that? You can pretty much determine the perks used in swf group especially if they are red ranks. Most of them are way to altruistic as well as follow you. If one is down to the last hook the other will attempt to save them. Don't get me wrong Swf pretty much can waste more time for killer.
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There's a reason it's a fairly unpopular opinion, it's simply impossible to enforce in a way that wouldn't be considered unacceptably intrusive.
And all the ways that might actually be considered seriously by any game dev could easily be circumvented, again defeating the entire point of it.
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You could go to Friday the 13th game then. If Jason is outside the cabin he is able to hear you. The campers can only use close proximity or use a walkie for long distances.
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Played it sometime ago. Didn't like all the people dropping racial slurs or swearing it you if they didn't like the way you played.
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Yes because revealing the auras of anyone with friends is balance
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Last time i played i had squeakers talking about Pennywise.
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That's bSh just fix ranked system
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One of the most problematic issues of SWF is what you said. Your idea is fine, i would be touching it a bit to:
"Survive with friends: Your rank can't be +5/-5 higher than your friend(s) to initiate a game".
And using your idea too so if you're rank 20 and im rank 15, killer must be rank 15 too. This is the most balanced idea so far to be honest. Why would people play with a friend -10 ranks lower?
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What constitutes a SWF then? 2 people partied? 3? 4? You guys really need to stop vilifying players for playing a "Multiplayer" game, with their friends.
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If there is a ranked mode, I pray they never allow any SWFs in. Even duos would be iffy. Make it purely a solo experience.
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They should just make it so that there is a penalty for queueing up with more people. Like make gen progress slower depending on the number of people in your SWF and make it extremely discouraging to 4 stack. A duo? -5% Trio? -15% 4-stack? -30%. But don't punish two SWF duos for getting paired together. If that happens, it should still just be -5%
This way, it gives the killer a chance to make stuff happen while encouraging SWF will big parties to communicate to overcome the penalty.
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I didn't necessarily say that OP's idea was balanced. But there has to be a way to balance things in the areas where there is clearly imbalance. And one of the areas that suffers the hardest under this is SWF.
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I know, it's not rly appropriate here, but neither killer nor solo queue survivors rly like swf
The biggest advantage of swf is the gained information.
To make the game more fun for both (killers and solo queue) i'd suggest a buff for all killers like 5% higher base speed, or something similar, to make killers string enough to take on 4 man swf, and implement an ingame voice chat (would be useful for crossplay) or kindred as a base kit
In that case killers would always face "full swf squads" but gain a better chance of winning thanks to the buff
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I'm under the opinion sfw should be reserved only for a casual mode and ranked mode shouldn't allow sfw. Sfw is extremely unfair, it's as if you were using wall hacks in an fps. There's no reason something so op should be available in a ranked mode.
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Why? Are you telling me sfw doesn't give you an insane advantage? The only way I could see Sfw being fair remaining the way it is, is if voice chat was a bannable offence. Sadly that's not possible
If you're unwilling to see how op and unfair sfw Is, it's probably all you play.
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What and you think sfw is more balanced than that? Sfw with voice chat is literally the most op thing in the game.
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Sfw players are normally the most toxic of all players too. I get playing with friends is fun but it really shouldn't be allowed in this type of game if it's a ranked mode.
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@mentalpopcorn I am a killer and solo que main there is no reason to punish players for playing the game at all how about instead of everyone saying nerf nerf nerf we say hmm maybe we should buff solo que and killer instead the way op and others want is not a fair change adding auras and bans to anyone playing a literal option in game
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