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The Problem With Balancing In Dead By Daylight (and How to Fix It)
The difficulty of balancing DBD lies within one key factor: the gap between solo queue survivors and SWF groups.
When killer mains argue for increased generator repair time, they focus primarily on the SWF aspect of the game while completely ignoring the solo queue survivors who would be significantly impacted by such as game. There is no generator related balance change that could negatively impact SWF groups without also negatively impacting solo queue survivors. More moderate players argue that SWF should be penalized for being in a group while solo survivors are not. This comes with multiple questions. How would this penalty work with 2 or 3 man SWF groups who match with a solo queue survivor? Furthermore, how would this impact SWF groups who simply want to play with friends and not necessarily play at the most competitive level? These questions clearly indicate that exclusively penalizing SWF groups would be difficult and create more problems at the same time. This difficulty in balancing and numerous debates reveals one important fact: The difference in the performance of SWF groups and solo survivors significantly hinders many potential universal changes to the game.
Therefore, we must look at closing the gap between SWF and solo survivors. What do SWF groups have that solo queue survivors do not? The primary answer is information. SWF groups are able to communicate information much more readily and actively than solo survivors. Examples include but are not limited to the identity of the killer once a single survivor spots the killer, the relative location of the killer, who the killer is chasing/what they are occupied with, and perks that survivors notice the killer has. Once one survivor knows a bit of information, the entire survivor team knows. Well how can we make changes to accommodate either SWF or solo survivors? It is impractical to hinder communication between survivors in a SWF. Any changes here would most likely result in a decline in the player base. Instead, it's more logical to focus changes that positively affect solo survivors while SWF remain unaffected.
One example would be to provide the Kindred effect without the killer aura reveal universally. SWF groups typically are able to precisely communicate where they in relation to other objects on the map such as Killer Shack, main building, or other map specific details. Therefore, having the primary effect of Kindred becoming a universal mechanic will have little to no effect on SWF groups while directly increasing the amount of information that solo survivors will have. Since the primary effect of Kindred would become universal, the secondary effect of Kindred (proximity killer aura reveal) should be enhanced in some form. Even though this change will close the gap between SWF and solo survivors, this is not enough to create a large enough impact to allow for further balance.
As a result, more changes should be implemented. For example, survivor icons should have some indicator revealing if they are being chased or not. This effect would be similar to the Obsession indicator when being chased. With this change, solo survivors will be able to have more information that SWF groups already have.
Another important change should be a screen before the match starts that reveals the perks that other survivors are using after the offering are burnt. This is a feature already implemented into Dead By Daylight Mobile in which all survivors can see all survivor perks, items, and addons while the killer can only see the items and the number of perks and addons. This is something that would greatly assist solo survivors for information such as a survivor running a Head-On build, Chest build, or other perks that other survivors should know about. More importantly, however, is that this has zero effect on 4 man SWF groups and will solely benefit solo queue survivors.
Through changes similar to those mentioned, the gap between SWF and solo survivors will close. Although no number of changes will be able to 100% close the gap between SWF and survivors, these changes are the step in the right direction. However, these changes are obviously flat out buffs to survivors. As a result, it makes sense that further changes to nerf survivors or buff killers are necessary in order to compensate for the additional information solo queue survivors have. However, additional testing is necessary to determine what changes should be made.
Comments
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In terms of SWF vs SoloQ i can understand the arguments but i don't think making SoloQ stronger akin to SWF's is the way to go. BHVR would have to Rebalance the entire game from ground up to give killers a chance and we're 5 years in and the game has never been Balanced. MMR tests clearly show that at high level MMR SoloQ is comparable to SWF because you're talking about Survivor players with enough experience and understanding of the game. Those guys don't even need to be an SWF. At high MMR Survivors dominate the game, there's very little killers can do besides gen regression builds and heavy slugging. You can't have a chance at winning as killer by playing NICE. We can't have all the things, we can't buff SoloQ, we can't have MMR and we can't have killers not being sweaty. Plus with MMR if there isn't a close enough MMR for killer then the system has to pick a weaker killer so the lobby is setup so you're already facing high MMR survivors against weaker killers, the system works but there's no enough killer players.
Buffing SoloQ makes killer weaker, MMR makes killer weak, SWF makes killer weak. Clearly the fundamentals of the game are broken in Survivor's favor. The only reason killers can 3k or 4k now is because Matchmaking is including Potato Survivors in the matches so killers can creature pressure by hooking the weak links but if there are no weak links then the killer experience is horrible. The killer role is completly countered by Shift W, by Map design, by Spawns, by the 4v1 aspect, the game needs to be redesigned from the ground up if we wanna bring MMR or buff SoloQ
My preferered Solution is to first of make a goddamn proper Tutorial, cause what we have is Shift W + Gens, that's all Survivor and Tutorial teaches.Then make the Rank up process in the first 10 Ranks more difficult so people spend more time practicing and training and learning in the easy stages thus we diminishe the number of weak players in high ranks thus SoloQ after rank 10 is fixed, might make queues longer but at least SoloQ is fixed and since there's no Potatoes influencing high ranks you eliminate the need for SWF's aswell, so SoloQ is not plagued and doesn't need to rival SWF at all. All that is left is make the killer rolebetter by fixing Map design, survivor spawns and all that already mentioned.
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Being able to know what perks your teammates are using will probably never be a thing for the regular game, people will start lobby dodging and queue times will be horrendous, why do you think they removed the ability to check your teammates ranks in the lobby? (there was a time when you could see your teammates ranks in the lobby) people started dodging a lot (because they didnt want to get matched with a low rank) and what was the fix? they removed them, that's why you don't know if you are being matched with a rank 20 or 8 nowadays. Same for perks, a lot of players dont want to get matched with people running urban evasion or self care, showing perks will give them the ability to dodge thus making queue times longer for some unlucky survivors who want to play with specific (but overall hated) perks.
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A totem counter for survivors without having to run a perk would also be really damn nice as well as a little icon that shows if a survivor is in a chase. Bringing solo queue closer to swf will not only bring the game to a better state but will also show what killers are strong and which ones are weak much more accurately.
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I really like the idea that survivors will have information on the build that each one of them is running so they know what to expect from each other. Sometimes when I'm in solo queue, people will dodge my healing while I'm trying to stack autodidact in a healer build, or they won't understand when I only let them 99% my healing to do a gen because I'm running resilience and keep insisting on finish healing me, so that would help solo queue a lot.
I was watching a Dowsey stream another day when he said that a pin system in DbD could be used to balance solo queue (like, you could pin a hex totem you found, or a gen, or the location where you're getting chased) to get it to a closer level to the information that swfs with comms get, and only then we could the balance the other aspects of the game (like the gen speeds that everyone talks about). I really love this idea. For example, I play Valorant in solo queue and with friends a lot and the pin system there really helps because I can get information on where enemies are, where to get better weapons in the ground, where the spike was last spotted and so on... I know that these are very different games because DbD is asymmetrical and Valorant isn't, but having this extra information really enhances my solo queue experience and makes it so I don't even feel a big discrepancy when I'm playing in a full team or in solo queue. In my opinion, balacing around solo queue is definitely key to improve the overall experience of the game.
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But that would only happen after the offerings were burnt (like, in the loading screen). People used to dodge lobbies back then because they could see the rank of their teammates even before they readied up for the match. In this case, survivors wouldn't be able to lobby dodge because at the time they would see the perks, the match would be about to start. Furthermore, this would also help the team identify who could be the "weak link" that is most likely to be targeted by the killer so they could get an advantage, because the players would be able to identify who is a new or more experienced player, who has better perks, which people may have a better chase advantage, who is better focusing on gens and rescues and so on...
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They can disconnect as soon as the match starts, that's why you can't see their ranks until the match ends, to make sure no one will disconnect until the very end.
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Its’s an asymmetrical game. If you buff a killer, it directly affects the survivors and makes an aspect unfair (possibly). Overwatch is different, you can play 6v6, but there’s a meta that both teams will most often play. Nerfing a hero or two directly affects both teams.
In DBD, one side gets buffed, the other gets indirectly or directly nerfed. What I’m saying is that it’s really impossible to balance a game like DBD, especially when there’s two sides to balance that have little-to-no relationship with one another.
Some changes the devs do are horrible, legit bad, but I don’t think I could do better. There’s things you could suggest, but I at least find this game much harder to balance than people make it out to be.
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