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Regarding OoO's Design
TL;DR: OoO should not tell the survivor when the killer reads his/her aura--that should be a function of Sole Survivor if it has to be a function at all. OoO should not be on a timer if only because cooldowns (instead of drawbacks) are something the community generally dislikes, since arbitrarily limiting the problem is not solving it.
A somewhat decent solution would be to just take away survivor aura-reading and leave the rest of the perk as it is. I, however, would rather that OoO (when lit up) would decrease survivor movement speed by 7% and reduce action speed by 15%, also retaining everything it has currently. This effect lingers for 3 seconds after OoO deactivates.
Intro
Firstly, I've always appreciated when design ideas are presented to the community before the change is made behind the scenes. For example, I was thankful for the info about potential hatch/EGC changes and DS changes when those were first announced. I'm concerned, however, that it took this long to see anything like that again.
Moving on, this post is going to address the design of OoO, what makes it frustrating to face, and what the proposed dev changes make better or worse.
Object of Obsession's OG Design
This section details what OoO was designed to do and covers what redeeming qualities the perk has.
OoO was made to be, along with the other three perks from Laurie, perks that were incredibly risky to use since the benefits they gave could come at a high cost. This turned out not to be the case, but we'll focus on the intended use as well as beginner survivor usage before getting to the problems.
The benefit of OoO is evident: a survivor can detect a killer from incredibly far away and get out of a tricky situation significantly earlier than any other perk introduced at that time. This meant that if a survivor wanted to be stealthy, he/she could see the killer from afar, note the killer's direction, and take a path that would lead to not meeting up. This also meant that if a survivor wanted to have a head start in chase, he/she could get to a better position to do that.
The downside of OoO: The killer can see any survivor's aura who is using OoO when OoO is active. This means that any survivor with the intent to get to a better position before the killer arrives now has to contend with the knowledge that the killer also has a glimpse into the survivor's plans for movement. This could lead to the survivor getting caught out at times at which other survivors would not be caught out.
See the spoiler (below) for true stories of non-frustrating OoO usage from both killer and survivor perspectives
1 One of the first times I, as a survivor, used OoO was for Adept Laurie on Shelter Woods. I was against a Nurse (just before Pig was released, so this was the best kind of Nurse to face). I was constantly in terror as a yellow ranked survivor and could only bear to glance at the killer when she had just downed a survivor or she was far away in a chase. Needless to say, the perk gave me little information that I didn't already know, but it was fun to use since it got my heart racing with the knowledge that I was doing something extremely risky (and now I laugh at that, but it was true for me then). The OoO proposed rework does not allow for situations like this to happen, since I can't simply look away from the killer to avoid the perk from activating, and not having this experience would have lessened my enjoyment of DbD.
2 In a match as a tier-one Myers on The Game recently, I faced an Adam with OoO who clearly did not want to be chased. Any time I found him, he went down nearly instantly, and he could always be seen skirting the edges of the map whenever he looked at me. In that game, it honestly seemed like I was getting significantly more information out of him (partly due to Myers' stealth) than he was getting from me, and often he would start running at me, thinking I was farther away than I was, only to get smacked in the face. I was very glad he had brought the perk.
3 (killer match against an Adept Laurie: to be added)
Frustrations (to be fleshed out, because these are in abundance)
- SWF
- comms
- Set-up killers
- Strength of survivors in a chase
- looping with OoO
(TBA: telling the killer's position to others is not exclusive to OoO and is generally not cool. Set-up killers can have their whole plans revealed from the very start of the match, rendering a large part of what makes them strong null. Survivors can get to incredibly strong tiles quickly with the information from OoO so that the killer's benefit is essentially negated.)
Changes
1. This is very bad -> OoO users can now instantly find out certain perks a killer is trying to keep hidden because they know the distance and position of the killer and can eliminate many options.
- Various perks that might otherwise go unnoticed until the worst happens are 100% confirmed by survivors (eg. Territorial Imperative, Blood Warden).
- (A personal reason) Huntress trying to snipe across the map with Bitter Murmur is now revealed to have Bitter Murmur even against OoO users not originally looking her way.
- Wraith and Hag (among others: eg. Huntress & Glowing Concoction) have certain add-ons revealed when activated.
2. Arbitrary cooldowns generally do not bring about more fun gameplay. The more agency a player is given on whether to take a singular course of action or not and the more weight that decision is given, the more engaging that decision is.
3. Midwich with OoO is still a problem.
Solutions
OoO, when active, decreases survivor action speed by 15% and survivor movement speed by 7%. This effect lingers for 3 seconds after OoO deactivates. All other effects of OoO remain as they are now.
This post is a WIP, but I wanted to get it posted soon after the news.
Comments
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i don't see the new OoO being a problem if they want to run a perk that is just giving them away all game it honestly doesn't matter if they know i see them from my own perks or addons it's not like they will see me all game.
The new OoO isn't going to be used often in swf's the info it provides is too short and even with other info perks they have short durations as well. Besides the only good aura reading perk is bbq which is easily noticed if it is used and stealth killer arua's can't be revealed since they are undetectable which completely negates OoO now.
if there is any problem with it i would say that it would be that it works in a chase, if the timer paused on the perk during a chase it would solve any issues with it.
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Lets also not forget that if your just not running any aura reading this perk is simply only good for you since you see the survivor and that short window isn't enough for them to tell if you saw them.
also again stealth killers just not caring at all.
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The issue I have with the aura notification is that if I'm running Territorial and an OoO user goes into the basement to get an item, the survivor then sees me heading toward the basement. The survivor then says, "ah, territorial imperative and not whispers or hoarder".
With Bloodwarden: A survivor goes into the exit gate, his/her aura is revealed. The survivor then gets free information on me while knowing that he/she has to immediately get out if I hook a survivor near the end of the EGC.
With A Nurse's Calling: a survivor can start healing to know my position when I'm nearby.
I'm All Ears: survivor knows I can see him/her
For add-ons like Glowing Concoction, it suddenly becomes very apparent to the survivor what my plans are. For Hag's Willow Catkins it again tells survivors that they should not be stealthy.
Generally, it doesn't matter if survivors stare at a killer all game. What matters is the aura reading in key moments like above. OoO still gives an incredible amount of information on killers that have Undetectable, especially around areas with elevation since survivors can pinpoint where a killer is coming from. Furthermore, SWF groups were never really using OoO for the information on most non-stealth killers since comms always surpasses OoO in every way, so the point about SWF no longer using it is moot.
3 seconds of aura reading for survivors every so often will still be useful for survivors no matter that it's drastically different from how OoO works now.
And Stealth killers majorly care about OoO users because any good OoO user knows that OoO counters stealth almost absolutely. With camera maneuvering, survivors can easily determine the ray from themselves to where the killer is (as it stands now). With the changes, yes, stealth killers won't care at all about OoO, and I'm not sure that's a good thing.
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