Clown and other low tiers discussion

Ok so recently in the Q&A I asked a question going straight to the Dev who on stream called clown "Underrated" it got a crap ton of downvotes but also some upvotes. You can check my profile discussions go see what I said.


So what do you guys believe? Does he need buffs? Is he "Underrated" as the guy said?


Even though the really really good Clown mains said he was weak who arguably have way more experience then the balance team because let's be honest, they haven't been doing that great. With the billy base rework. I personally believe all he needed was an Add-On rework. Hell most killers need that!

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Comments

  • OllieHellhunter
    OllieHellhunter Member Posts: 703

    I would agree for the most part, I dont think hes quite as bad as some say hence why I do myself think that he is underated but he is definitely one of if not the weakest killer in the game.

  • Dabihwow
    Dabihwow Member Posts: 3,409

    The problem with clown is he is very perk and map reliant and you need ti give him good add-ons or he won't do well

  • sad_killer_main
    sad_killer_main Member Posts: 785

    Clown need buffs yes, it's pretty underwhelming.

  • Primalux135
    Primalux135 Member Posts: 1,045

    Thank you thats my point of view maybe other fellow killers have other points of view.

  • dugman
    dugman Member Posts: 9,713

    Clown is in the same general bucket of most killers who can win if you outplay the survivors but don't have the extended map presence to make up for errors and respond quickly to situations that aren't near him. The top killers (Spirit, Nurse, Freddy, and to a lesser extent Hag and Billy) all have ways to respond to survivors across the map quickly and an ability that makes chases more time efficient. (Hag doesn't actually chase per se but she instead gets hits primarily by trap triggers which are time efficient once the survivors need to start going into her web of traps to do gens.)

    In terms of chases, Clown is maybe the best chaser out of the 115% movement speed killers. The newly buffed Bubba is also extremely dangerous in a chase now. The killers who I would say are better than Clown in chases are not 115% movement speed (Spirit, Nurse and Huntress. Deathslinger is about on par with Clown, he's better than Clown in the open but Clown is stronger at loops.) Clown's issue is that being excellent at a chase is all he has. He's slightly better at the chase than, say, Doctor or Freddy but both of them have other abilities that more than make up the difference overall (Doctor's tracking is amazing while Freddy can teleport around the map).


    P.S. And before someone replies that "Freddy is better in chases than Clown", he's not. Freddy and Clown slow survivors by the same amount and Clown can beat survivors using gas at virtually the exact same loops that Freddy can beat survivors using snares. And as of the Silent Hill patch Clown moves full speed while throwing bottles just like Freddy moves full speed while dropping snares. But Freddy's snares only work on sleeping survivors while Clown's gas works on everyone, and Clown can throw gas in front of survivors during a chase to cut them off from getting to loops in the first place while Freddy has to drop snares right next to himself. As I mentioned above, what makes Freddy better than Clown isn't chases, it's that Freddy can teleport across the map and also doesn't have to reload his snares between chases while Clown has to spend 5 seconds reloading after every chase or two.

  • Primalux135
    Primalux135 Member Posts: 1,045
    edited September 2020

    I cant deny clown is better chaser than most killers due he can slow down but whats the sense of it if a survivor have a pallet. Wraith can reach fast to a surv position but then what? A pallets is between surv and killer. If you meant that clown punish better being outpositioned you are right but so do that all killers.

    The first hit doesnt mind its the last hit that matters and when you do the first hit you got:

    Cooldown of your weapon.

    Surv a sprint burst to a pallet

    So then what?

    You can try mindgame but you know much structures are just mindgaming to drop pallet asap while other killers like Freddy or doctor have some sort of control over pallets thing that doesnt have Wraith or clown to some loops.

  • Blueberry
    Blueberry Member Posts: 13,590

    He's pretty awful. Freddy is everything Clown has and lots more. They kinda took his identity away as well with the Freddy rework.

    Killers either need high map mobility/pressure or extremely strong in 1v1. One of these gets them just to around mid-upper mid tier depending on how good their other features are. All the high tier killers actually have both of these features.

    Clown doesn't have map mobility or pressure and while his 1v1 is strong, it's not nearly as strong as it needs to be for it being his only one strength.

  • Alexmon70
    Alexmon70 Member Posts: 92

    I personally think Pre nerf Billy was better then Freddy. He has everything you'd ever want in a killer and then some. Even now I still think he's better. Freddy may have slowdowns but he doesn't have one shot downs. He still has to do what any other m1 killer does. In a perfect scenario the hillbilly will curve to perfection and consistently get one show downs and have enough info to traverse the map.


    Of all the 115% killers I believe it goes to Billy because of his high skill gap and ability to shred through pallets like they're nothing.

  • Alexmon70
    Alexmon70 Member Posts: 92

    What if they gave him some sort of buff in his own gas? What if while in the gas he moves faster, or removes his red light for better movement mind games. There's so many things you can do to rework his entire ability and still keep his title as best anti looper. That's what I want clown to be. Sure he won't be able to traverse the map fast, sure he can't one shot down but he will not get looped to hell and back. That's what I want.

  • IIITweedleIII
    IIITweedleIII Member Posts: 1,013

    I honestly just wish him and Huntress had better aiming when throwing. Clown's in paticular, his arm says swoop while his bottle says WEEEEEEEE!

  • dugman
    dugman Member Posts: 9,713

    Clown is better at dropped pallets than most killers. Any pallet loop that Freddy can easily beat Clown can also beat, he just starts going around the loop and puts gas on both sides the same as Freddy would putting down snares and looping. Or, if the pallet is safe, he can throw gas across the pallet to slow the survivor right before he breaks the pallet, which slows them down in their attempt to gain distance while the pallet breaks.

    There are some killers who are better at dropped pallets than Clown: Spirit, Nurse and Huntress in particular. But all three of those are only 110% movement killers so Clown has the edge in terms of general movement speed outside of that.

    I'm not sure why you mentioned Wraith here but I agree that Wraith is weak at pallets. His strength is doing hit and run tactics to ambush survivors and get quick hits from short distance before a proper chase can get underway.

  • gibblywibblywoo
    gibblywibblywoo Member Posts: 3,772

    I love Clown but being able to force early pallet drops is pretty much all he can do. No mobility. No real map pressure. Safe pallets are that are dropped pretty much counter him because chances are he used all his bottles already anyway.

  • seki23
    seki23 Member Posts: 833
    edited September 2020

    he has decent 1 v 1 yes but nothing against 4 v 1 he is terrible against decent coordinated survivors but he is gonna beat most solos with ease because tehre are a lot of bad players playing the game.

  • Blueberry
    Blueberry Member Posts: 13,590

    The only thing I'm hesitant about in that is making his 1v1 even stronger makes him less fun from the survivor side. I'd honestly rather them give him a secondary ability to help with his map pressure.

    I also think they could do more with the blurred vision from his gas as that kinda feels like his trademark thing. Maybe like getting hit by additional gas makes the blurryness stack so it steadily gets worse and worse. Maybe the blurryness stays until you find a teammate to shake you out of it (this would slow the game down a little for him).

  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278

    I totally agree with the devs. Clown absolutely is underrated. Once it’s properly understood HOW to use bottles to control the chase and shut down loops (rather than mindlessly always throwing them at survivors and wasting them), Clown ends chases ridiculously fast.

    Clown is for players that already have really good tracking ability, able to quickly find survivors after successfully ending a recent chase.

    Quickly downing one survivor after another by severely limiting a survivors mobility and escape options is where Clowns pressure lays.

  • gibblywibblywoo
    gibblywibblywoo Member Posts: 3,772

    I see this thrown around a lot and would consider myself pretty good at herding and zoning the survivors as Clown. He sucks. Ending the chase fast doesn't mean much with the slow base reload and total lack of mobility or pressure. The fastest down a base clown could get (which would require the survivor to be a literal potato) is still longer than Leatherface or Billy.

  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278

    He only needs very minor tweaks to be perfect.

    My suggestions are either

    • slightly expand the spread of gas clouds at base, and make them linger for 2 seconds longer at base
    • or....
    • Have the lingering hindered and intoxication that lasts 2.5 seconds at base outside of the gas AoE increased to 3.5 seconds at base.
  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278

    It’s entirely possible to end most chases in 16 seconds with only 2 bottles, mitigating the downsides of reloading and making Clowns movement speed a non issue.

  • mistar_z
    mistar_z Member Posts: 857
    edited September 2020

    He's not "completely" garbage to play as, I don't believe we have any killers like that in the game anymore other than legion. Most people don't actually want a rework and would be happy with just a few quality of life improvements and number changes. he is alright, just very monotous. He's got the demogorgon problem, in that he's okay ish in chase, but he doesn't do much of anything outside of that. He's strong 1v1, but the game is much much more than that. He has a ton of down time in between chases that keeps him from being able to compete with the other killers.

    But saying that he's underrated and people need to learn how to play him is to put it midly, tone deaf on his part. Clown has been around for years, its not like people haven't learned how to use him. People used to say spirit was weak and she got buffed a few times, it took a month or two for people to realize just how strong she was. The clown's been out since before her, trust me people have tried to make him work.


    A game balanced by clowns.

    Mcclean did some great work in his run that improved quality of life and with the killer reworks trapper, bubba and billy main babies that he really worked on spear heading (afaik), because he actually played the game. The newer people in charge wouldn't know anything about the game if it hit them in the face and sounds like an awful lot like the only concern is with churning out as many in game purchases as they can to fill their fat pockets to look good to the board.

    Post edited by mistar_z on
  • RakimSockem
    RakimSockem Member Posts: 1,995

    Hot take. Clown isn't low tier. There's just a lot of low tier players who can't/don't use the character correctly.

    Same thing for Wraith, new Bubba, Trapper, and a lot of killers people consider "low tier"

  • Tactless_Ninja
    Tactless_Ninja Member Posts: 1,791

    Gas simply needs to do more. It's a great mechanic but needs more. A build up mechanic from consecutive exposure would be good.

  • KingFrost
    KingFrost Member Posts: 3,014

    Give all the lower tier killers fake pallets. Maybe I just like fake pallets too much >_>

  • MadLordJack
    MadLordJack Member Posts: 8,814

    When you use "low tier" killers against a decent team, it becomes pretty obvious why they're considered "low tier." There's a difference between making them sweat for it, and being a complete plaything whose skill literally doesn't matter because running from an m1 killer really isn't that difficult.

  • Canas
    Canas Member Posts: 1,021

    "Underrated" is just an euphemism for "unpopular" really.

  • HollowsGrief
    HollowsGrief Member Posts: 1,497

    The problem with killers like Clown isn't their power it's map size. Most maps (even after the changes) are still way to large for killers like Clown to manage. You are suppose to patrol gens and push people off them but that is impossible when it takes almost 40s to get from one gen to another. Maps need to be made much smaller across the board, large maps are not okay with current gen speed.

  • Nemmy_Wemmy
    Nemmy_Wemmy Member Posts: 800

    Pls recomend me a clown build with bbq. I'll love you almost as much as I love bp.

    Hell if you are lucky i may give ya a dang cookie. Seriously tho, I love messing around with builds on killers and theres not many clown mains on the forums to talk to xD

    I also think hes underrated but needing of buffs. Hes not as bad as everyone says (hes no top tier or anything just not trash)

  • Toybasher
    Toybasher Member Posts: 922

    Clown used to be worse than Pre-Rework Freddy in my opinion.


    The removal of his slowdown when throwing a bottle was a MUCH needed buff since before his power actually worked against him outside of loops. (You throw a bottle ahead of survivor, you slow down about as much as the survivor does)


    Currently I still think clown needs improvements or a whole new secondary power. His mobility is non-existent and his power can be countered by camping or dropping pallets early.

  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278

    Did you see what I put on your wall?

    Just use BBQ instead of Distressing or Deerstalker

  • edgarpoop
    edgarpoop Member Posts: 8,343

    Clown is a little underrated, but still really bad. A killer can't be both non-lethal and immobile in the current meta. He does have some advantages in the 1v1 over killers like Freddy, Doctor, LF, etc., but there's no reason you would ever take him over them.

    Doctor does 80% of what Clown can do at loops, and you get the best tracking in the game without having to devote perks to it.

    Freddy does 90% of what Clown can do at loops, and you get good mobility, game stall, some stealth with his lullaby, and some anti-stealth due to the outline of dream state survivors.

    LF has a very easy to use instadown and chews through map resources like crazy.

    There's nothing Clown does that is so much better than the other M1 killers that you would take Clown.

  • Nemmy_Wemmy
    Nemmy_Wemmy Member Posts: 800
    edited September 2020

    Sorry mate that doesnt give you notifications for wall posts so i didnt see it till much later lol.

    Much love.

  • Captain_AAhab
    Captain_AAhab Member Posts: 37

    Clown is fun to play, IMO, but also incredibly frustrating. If I were to rework him one of the first things I would start with is a faster reload time. His current reload is way too slow.

    Maybe make his gas cause exhaustion as a stock effect, not an add-on. Just a thought.

    Gen defense, on the other hand, I have no idea how to fix that.

  • StibbityStabbity
    StibbityStabbity Member Posts: 1,839

    So, this is probably a TERRIBLE idea, but what if he went faster as he used more of his bottles? Each one used gives a 1% speed boost or something. The longer he is in a chase and using bottles, the faster he gets. Rather than try to work on the things he's bad at, it would boost what he is good at.

    To keep people from just blowing through his bottles for speed, make it so that on hook or reload, he loses the speed boost.

  • Primalux135
    Primalux135 Member Posts: 1,045

    Thats true but unless you have broken the next pallet its useless and I think all killers get the survivor.

  • adsads123123123123
    adsads123123123123 Member Posts: 1,132

    I genuinely hate this game when I am playing Clown. I've played 30 straight Clown games in the last 2 days and now I want to kill myself.

  • HittingOnHook
    HittingOnHook Member Posts: 486

    for me Clown is the most fun to play, he is near top tier cuz he destroys the looping, ofc better than the Cannibal

    with the pinky finger and exhaustion bottle he is a beast

  • dugman
    dugman Member Posts: 9,713

    Well all killers can eventually get the survivor by breaking the pallet, the questions are how long does it take them to catch the survivor if they do that and can they catch the survivor more quickly by looping or mindgaming the dropped pallet? Clown’s edge at a pallet is he can either loop/mindgame with the gas or gas and break the pallet and in both cases catches the survivor more quickly than without a similar ability. (And of course he can gas in transition before the survivor even gets to a pallet to potentially avoid the pallet dropin the first place.)

  • dugman
    dugman Member Posts: 9,713

    If you hate playing Clown that much why did you play 30 games in a row with them? Are you just trying to grind out one of his perks or something?

  • adsads123123123123
    adsads123123123123 Member Posts: 1,132

    I've been able to make every killer I play work. I thought I could do the same with Clown but this killer is just unredeemable trash.

  • Nemmy_Wemmy
    Nemmy_Wemmy Member Posts: 800

    Ok one last thing, the matches i bring Sulphuric Acid Vial instead of Sloppy, guessing I should just swap it (sloppy) for deerstalker/distressing for that match? Again thanks so much for your time.

  • Dabihwow
    Dabihwow Member Posts: 3,409

    They did clown dirty like that when I first started understand what snares were back during the ptb I was kinda mad because this just killed clown. Devs just based freddys snares off aof clown but made clown look like garbage compared to that. Its jsut sad but I think he will get a potential rework in the mid-chapter

  • Dabihwow
    Dabihwow Member Posts: 3,409

    He has to be, clown was treated like ######### for the past two years now. Its time he got some loving and make people play him more again and appreciate him more, plus I'll be excited for chase music

  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278

    Yeah, where possible use Sulphuric Vial instead of Sloppy where possible (Thana is great stacked with mangled and Coulrophobia in a slug build). 2 minutes of Mangled each and every time someone is gassed is a long time.

  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278

    Freddy can’t throw Snares ahead of a survivor (if it’s a location he hadnt already trapped)

  • Dabihwow
    Dabihwow Member Posts: 3,409

    true though but snares are more effective at times and result in a longer slowdown if you don't have the flask of bleach add-on for clown

  • TheClownIsKing
    TheClownIsKing Member Posts: 6,278