To those who complain about survivor queue times

We are right back to the famous moment, when Matthieu recommended killers to switch to survivor or play something else.

Well surprise! Killers did exactly that!

The Stream, where they explained, that they don´t see a problem with OoO, because their stats show, that it´s users don´t survive particuarly often, also didn´t help. Because it´s not about the survival rate of that perk. It´s about how it feels playing against it. Especially against SWF. Sure, a killer can win this. But a what cost? It´s a frustrating match, that sucks out all enjoyment and pleasure of playing a GAME.

The devs constantly balance around the gameplay experience of new survivors. Ruin was nerfed hard, because it was to frustrating for new survivors. They just looked at the stats, saw that Ruin was used to much and removed it. Without ever considering WHY so many killers felt the need to use this perk. Now, with it gone, the problem of gen speed became more obvious, as killers got gen rushed left and right. But instead of reversing the Ruin changes or doing something about the gen speeds, they gave us Undying in the hope, that it would force survivors to finally do their secondary objective: Totems. So far it works as intented. But survivors already complain about this "unfair and OP combo". So now it´s only a matter of time, before the devs will do something to appease the masses of survivors that can´t stand doing anything else than gens.

But lets be honest, the Undying + Ruin Combo didn´t really slow the gen speed down. At least not, where it matters. Because, Ruin isn´t really effective against SWF or people that are glued to the gens. So it´s only a psychological effect, and who knows how long it takes, before it wears off and survivors just ignore it like before. When this happens, even more killers will leave.

A few months ago, there was a tournament with a 15.000€ prizepool. Not a official tournament, but one where supposedly the best played against the best. That tournament made it painfully obvious, how strong the survivor role is. When survivors roflstomped the best killers.

Devs could and should hold regular matches with nice prices in order to draw conclusions about the balance. Treat it like a e-sports game. While also introduce a casual mode, which is more forgiving for both sides. That way, they could make the people happy, that just want a relaxing match as well as the people that want a more competitive gamemode.

Really? Shouldn't killers have long queues then?

I just leave this here @Tsulan ;)

Semi infinites still exist tho. I mean, I looped killers for ages during the bloodlust free weekend. So it's not about the infinites, but more about the differences in hitboxes. Make killers hitbox the same as survivors and you can remove bloodlust.

Did I say anywhere that Bloodlust WASN'T implemented to combat psudo infinites and infinites?

Well, in reality Bloodlust was implemented in response to the killer gameplay getting so bad that in 2017 killers were quitting en-mass, but part of it was those infinites.

However, there is a concept in game design called Emergent Behavior, and Bloodlust is a fantastic example of how a mechanic takes on new meaning once its in the game. Bloodlust is SUPER needed in 2020-2021 because despite its main reason for existing in the first place being gone (save for, you know, a lot of pseudo infinites still existing, but BHVR is getting better at that) it solves a major problem of DBD, mainly that the killer SHOULD be assumed to EVENTUALLY win a chase. Perfect looping play should not work indefinitely vs even a weak killer because what that means for the game is bad.

Its sorta like how in a fighting game you shouldn't be able to perfectly block or parry forever even vs a bad player. It makes the game really terrible to play when a single defensive option is overtuned. Specifically with looping, being looped a long time is frustrating, doesn't actually display that much survivor skill, and doesn't really have a 'solution' end game save for... giving up and letting the survivor win. Its the same problem as old hatches where the game can't continue until the experience gets so awful one side gives up.

Ergo, Bloodlust is an important quality of life feature. Again, it SHOULDN'T be affecting most of your games most of the time, but its a good 'emergency measure' to force the game to end by saying to the survivor "Ok we got it you can loop a long time to waste the killer's energy but that clearly isn't enough at this point to ensure you live. What else can you do?" and forcing the game to end if the survivor doesn't know how to do things like cleanly end chases.

Imagine what it would mean for the game if a really good survivor could loop for longer than 2+ minutes without spending any resources. That is just... bad. And its a big reason a lot of killers left during the test. Input leniency isn't needed in fighting games either, but its a critical QoL feature to ensure the game doesn't get stupid and physically unpleasant to play. Bloodlust is a similar feature, it exists for playability's sake, not for balance's sake.

The main purpose has BECOME to prevent an unpleasant unnecessary game state that doesn't serve to make the game better because the game is essentially already over at that point. Which is why removing it was a dumb idea that could only blow up in BHVR's face. Again, it isn't like Bloodlust was winning a ton of people games they should have lost: if your bloodlusting down every chase to force it you should lose unless survivors are so bad that your basically guarenteed a win. So the 'harm' of the mechanic is minor to non-existent, while its benefit is huge in terms of keeping the killer side in a playable state.

Ergo, very much an essential mechanic, I literally use Bloodlust as an example of a well designed anti-stalemate mechanic when talking about game design because its... kinda perfect at it? It feels good to know you can use it when you use it well, but it feels bad using it when you shouldn't, it helps smooth over other areas of the game and prevent unintended consequences of level design (ironically its intended purpose is now a side feature but still an important and necessary one), and it 'hooks into' the survivor emotional experience well by making longer and longer chases more stressful, encouraging survivors to do whatever they can to get out of chases or making them more likely to make mistakes.