Wanna get rid of camping ? Just remove the hooks :
Hello everyone, I've had an idea for quite some time and wanted to share it with the community. I would like to know what you guys think of it and in the off chance it catches BHVR attention I will make it as easy to implement that it can be. It will be a bit long, so, I'll put a TLDR at the end.
Introduction
I've played this game for some years now and always felt that there was quite the imbalance between the pace of each game. Sometimes, the killer gets someone in less than 40s in and is able to stop effectively 2 more gens after his hook, other time it's 60-80 seconds and 2-3 gens get done. Also, sometimes survivors spawn all together, and sometimes it's 2/2 or worst and you got the infamous 4 split spawn. So, these outcomes are partly due to rng and partly to the killer skill. That means, you can end up in one of the worst scenarios, mainly because of pure rng. However, the decisions the killer player can take vary greatly between each outcome.
If the killer catches someone early he has two choices, leave the hook and find someone else or camp/proxy the hook.
- If he decides to leave, he needs to gain in 60s : one hook state + something else (whether it be gen regression, STBFL stacks, map presence...) to be in a net positive than just camping that surv to second stage.
- If he decides to camp, at worst he loses 3,5-4 gen (with the infamous 4 split) or 1-2 best case scenarios. And that's for 3 health state and 1 surv dead. So, the only counter to a killer catching someone early and camping him is a perfect decision making from all the survivors involved (no suicide on the hook, no wasted time trying something). Basically, it can only be achieved by playing 4 men surv or kindred with competent players.
In that regards it seems that if you catches someone early it's almost always better to camp. To counter that, the survivor objective can be done really fast. But, the faster the gens are, the better value you will get from camping instead of controlling the map.
On the other hand, if the killer catches someone "late" (ranging from 1 min to 2-3 depending on the quality of the opponent), there are almost no choices, it's either camp or proxy camp/tunnel.
Therefore, in almost every match with survivors who can do gens, strategies that are anti-fun and uninteractives will be used. To counteract this, camping needs to be made less appealing (and pressuring gens more appealing).
Which leads us to my main point : Why not just...
REMOVE HOOKS
I've thought about it for some time now and came to the conclusion that the easier and healthier solution would be to remove hooks altogether, wich will just make the camping problem vanish because, well...no more...hooks...so..hum...yeah. Moving on... I would suggest switching the hook system to a simple respawn timer for survivors.
As if : they get down and the killer can perform a short action, as Pyramid Head, to get the survivor out for some time. It could be either scaling on the gen count ( like 40 base up to 1min20 at 1 gen) or the hook count (we could also implement ways for the other surv to speed up the process in exchange of their time). If making a new animation for it is too much for the studio, they can use the mori animation but keep it consistent between killers.
Then, after their time is up survs would respawn in a random locker (to prevent creating a new animation and respawn camping) and be injured or not depending on balance issues.
If this is their 3rd down, the killer can perform their mori to get them out of the game for good (another solution could be to have survs share the hook count but It would be mandatory to change gen time at the same time).
If the killer downs a survivor during the end game collapse with at least 6 downs, he can mori him disregarding the number of time the surv have been downed ( to prevent the situation where the surv will respawn in a random locker and the killer gets nothing from endgame downs, while preventing a 0 down turning into a 4 k by bypassing to many stages).
If the killer manages to down all four survivors before the first one respawn, they win (same as 4 man slug, but easier to prevent by keeping up in the chase). In a matter of fact, if we want to get rid of slugging at the same time, we can force the killer to do the "hooking" action automatically when they down a surv (so the only way to 4 men slug is to down the entire team in less than a minute).
The hooks related perks now are downs related perks.
These solutions come with many benefits:
- NO MORE CAMPING
- The killer doesn't need to waste time picking up and carrying too a hook, allowing him to gain 15-20s on average for each down, which should help them get to the gen quick enough to use gen regression.
- The killer will know exactly how much time he got before losing pressure. As of now, if you leave the hook, you don't know if someone is gonna save immediately and rush a gen in 44s or if the surv you caught will just rot in place for 2 mins.
- In the same spirit, a downed surv will know he won't be outed in one down because he's been matched with 2 urban evading, wall crawling ninjas.
- BT, DS and maybe unbreakable (if we force the killer to "pick up") will be rendered useless, shaking up the meta.
- Survivors could see their teammates pov while out of the game as the feature exists with the spectator mode, allowing solos to see their teammates build and position, and newer players to learn from others.
If this was implemented without any other changes we could see if the time the killer is not spending hooking is enough to pressure the map. Then, if it's enough and since the killer cannot cheese his objective anymore, we can tweak the survivors objective completion time to be more in line with the killer one.
TLDR : Camping and slugging is the bane of solo q existence because they are the most effective killer strat against uncoordinated teams.
One way I propose to get rid of them is to replace the hook system with a respawn system. When the killer down a survivor, the surv is out of the game for some time and will be respawned into a random locker once the timer is up.
This will force the killer to pressure the map instead and help him to do so by removing the time it takes to hook someone. Since, the killer objective can no longer be cheesed and is now more linear, then we can adjust the survivors objective completion time to be in line with it.
Comments
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I'd be all for a pyramid head cage style option for hooks (with built in mori option on 3rd down)
This would lessen camping & tunneling to an extent or at least give survivors a chance to get a save before the killer gets to the hook to camp it.
The biggest issue with your idea in my opinion (& only my opinion just like many don't like my solution) killers gain far more pressure from hooks than you seem to credit them with regardless if they camp or not.
Example - I'm a survivor in your scenario someone just went to time out the killer is free to search the map for the next down. But as a survivor fixing a gen I have no reason to do anything but carry on until the killer is on me likewise all other survivors still in the game.
If someone is on a hook I have to make a choice do I stay on the gen or go for the save? I run kindred so my choices are easier but I often see 2 people running for a save at the same time which is 2 less gens for the killer to worry about.
Also another issue what if all 4 survivors are slugged then put in time out at the same time what does the killer do?
& lastly I think you'd see a serious increase in Dc's from time out survivors a lot can't even handle being hooked for more than 5 seconds.
I always credit outside the box thinking & welcome new ideas & like I said my own system has its haters but removing hooks after 5 years would have way too many issues
But if it helps I don't camp in my games I'm good enough without it or i'm not it sucks to be camped but if people stopped rewarding them it wouldn't be such a good strategy.
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Give everyone Cage's of Atonement.
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This would require a total overhaul of a lot of gameplay mechanics.
For example, there are multiple perks that would be rendered useless and have to be reworked completely (Unbreakable, Make Your Choice, Knockout, Agitation, Deliverance, Devour Hope, BT, etc. etc… this list could keeping on going for a long time).
The balance of the game would be thrown totally out of whack because hooks are what pressure survivors. You talk about the killer “pressuring gens” if they don’t have to hook, but gen pressure doesn’t necessarily mean literally running to a gen and chasing a survivor off it, it means giving the survivors an important reason to leave. Three stacks of Devour Hope pressure survivors off gens. Survivors slugged or hooked pressure other survivors off gens. You get the idea. Either way, making survivors respawn when downed would throw this all out of the window.
So I don’t think it’s a terrible idea in its concept but I don’t think it would ever happen. It would make DBD a totally different game.
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I already play without hooks on some killers, much better experience.
You get more chases/chances, survivors can't suicide immediately, natural Gen slowdown, survivors are guaranteed indisposed for a set period, no time loss from pickup and travel, supports healthy teamwork in solos through altruism.
A good change for the play style would be to implement mori access when survivors bleed out to a certain point.
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but you do understand that defending a hook is a core gameplay element of playing killer, right?
by hooking someone, i force the other survivors away from their objective to come to a part of the map that might be more advantageous for me, in order to save their friend.
i can get a multitude of different hooks just by hooking someone in an strategically beneficial position and catching out those who seek to help their friend, forcing another survivor to come to the rescue, removing three people at once from the objective - and depending on how well i perform during this, i can snowball from that first hook onwards and ultimately win the game.
not to mention that a respawn system would be insanely busted in end game.
also, just to make this clear: defending a hook =/= camping someone to death.
if i see someone going for the rescue, there is absolutely nothing wrong with interrupting this.
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Could not have said it better myself.
Yeah, getting camped and tunneled in solo q is annoying, but playing a successful game as survivor is still considerably easier than playing a successful game as killer, survivors do not need even less objectives.
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To address time loss for the killer :
At first I would try a repair speed debuff or an action a surv as to do before being able to repair after respawning. Likewise, the killer gain good slowdown by downing. After that, I would make it so the Gen are closer to the center of the map in dead zones :
Imagine the same maps but with looping zone clustered in the center and some on the out skirt (a bit like the asylum) but the gens would be in the ring between those looping zone. Then, make the center stronger (as of now) and the outskirts weaker but not dead zones (so you need to decide if you loop closer to the gens and risk disrupting other surv or risk to loop risky area but far away from everything. Right now you can loop far away from others in great setupsyand that's bs.
We could also very well implant a new mechanic like gas can which have been brought up many times (which would be ok now since no more camping).
If we don't have the time for that then an other slowdown base mechanic. Maybe, when close to the killer your repair slower or smt like the new cenobite perk which block the most progress Gen after one pop. Because, in the end only one surv is disturb if you don't camp and two gens will pop no matter what with the hook system.
So, we mainly want the now useless "rescuing surv" to not to gens.
The point you brought about hoarding surv around the hook is very true but ultimately is just cheesy tactics which work only against bad surv and will be punished by 3-4 gens done just like camping at higher level.
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Deathgarden did this, the Hunter would perform a quick action on a downed Runner, then they would move on to the next Runner until they all eventually died (but in Deathgarden you could perform Mercies to continue the fun...oh what a concept)
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Hooking someone in a dead zone is indeed one of the better way to get a snowball going. I do this a lot when I want to win. But, in term of game play choice for survivors there is not much to do there, if you don't have the perks and info to overcome the killer strategie.
You just trade hooks with borrow or rush gens.
We want to have fun and the fun part off the trial is the chase and how we use the environment of the map. I don't think anybody like to run save your average Claudy who uses 5-10 pallets in her first chase and gets hooked in the middle of nowhere. From there 3 gens are done and the killer will get 1-2 kills by camping/proxy or will 4k because of altruism.
These cases should be outliners but as I stated in my post you'll end up 3 times out of 4 in a similar situation which is not good for the game health.
I cannot count the number of games where I play in less than 1/3rd of the map because the other gens are too far away to be interesting to protect and pallets are gone there, then, the better move is staying somewhat close to the hook.
That's my point, if we cannot defend the hook then it's always better to pressure by being close to the gens and allowing survs to use the map,rather than hoarding everyone and killing them in a dead zone (which demands no mechanical skill).
Obviously, some tweaking to surv objective will be needed but nothing major.
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I sometimes do this too (if the spawn allows it) and that's where the idea started. Indeed, when you can slug 2 survs and don't waste time hooking you end up quickly in a 3v1 (someone is always down) with nobody on gens and survs closer together, looping, helping teammates... Which is very interactive and makes for great games.
That's why I think we need to help the killer in the mandatory actions which take a fix number of time. Hooking, weapon cooldown, kicking, breaking and maybe vaulting.
Because when you minimise that you quickly get the time you need to get to the Gen before it pops.
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I thought about what you and Mister_xD said about the necessity of one surv to save and so not being on gens. I came up with some ideas on my response to Mister_xD, but it would only be some sort of repairing slowdown. What I thought off reading you would be to have an action /object the others survs can see and need to do in order to get the timer rolling for their teammate (with a 2min cap where you auto respawn I guess)
Because something some seems to forget is that right now you can be on a hook for 5s to 1 min which if it's the former, you as killer gained almost nothing pressure wise from that hook. Where, with a respawn system you got read of the survivor for a good chunk of time and are playing a 3v1 so you can cause way more pressure on the map.
Finally, for the 4 downed part, I adresed it in the post : if the killer down all 4 before the first one respawn he won and the match end. Moreover, I don't necessary think that we'll see an increas in Dc, the main frustration from beeing on the hook, I think, is that you're out of the game + you're stuck there and can only watch the game via auras. If you could see the pov of teamembers while on the hook, I'm sure it would lessen the burden of beeing left there for 1 min. Just watch a stream of swf and witness the streamer urging their partners to unhook them as quick as possible because they know there is nothing interesting to show while beeing hooked (just like when doing gens btw, but atleast you have some "tension" going on while you do them). It would be like if, while playing League, you'll be given a fix screen of the outskirt while dead...
Post edited by Flopiyutiop on0 -
Sorry I must have missed the 4 downed part my eyes & head have been fuzzy today to say the least.
Like I said I always welcome new ideas & everyone is entitled to an opinion but i've been playing dbd almost 4 years & over 5,000 hours multiple platforms if hooks were removed it would be a totally different game.
If all the hooks were as they are now but the killer hit an action button that called upon the entity to place the survivor on any random hook on the map the killer then has a choice run all the way over to camp them or get on with the game.
Of course there would have to be some kind of system to earn basement hooks too rather than leaving it to chance.
Anyway neither will happen so many other things take priority even if the devs did want to do something about it
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