http://dbd.game/killswitch
Why Trying To Balance An Asymmetrical Game
Doesn't that defeat the purpose of it being Asymmetrical? I am sure most people go into Dead by Daylight because it looks fun, not because they want a sweaty competitive game where Survivors are on par and able to 1v1 Killer.
So can we stop looking for Balance and just make the Killer the power role again. Where if the Killer does their job perfectly they always 4k, and it's the Survivors who need to stress out the most to win.
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Killer has never been the power role. Once survivors figured out their hitboxes were smaller and they could loop around objects on the map it was game over. You either had to put a trap down, sneak up on them, or run at them real fast with a chainsaw. No Entity blocking vaults, and double pallets were everywhere.
I like that they fidget with stuff, but the more I think about it, the moment something becomes really effective everyone is going to use it regardless of how many other options there are.
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It needs to be balanced enough to a point where the match results vary frequently, because that's what makes the game fun, being surprised.
In Friday The 13th The Game jason is absolutely the power role. The problem with this is that counsellor gameplay is just not fun because dying seems inevitable most of the time. So, that's why they made jason a random chance. Because if you could select them, no one would play counsellor.
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Um... Balance is balance? That has nothing to do with asymmetry. Unless their goal was for asymmetrical balance which, well, congratulations.
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Asymmetry is not balance. That's the point of it.
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No, it is not. That might be the point of DBD. I wouldn't know, but you can have a balanced asymmetrical game.
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I dunno, i don't think that could ever be agreed upon.
Whereas something like a 1vs1 street fighting game, with the same character, on a regular stage, is factually balanced
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I don't think the two are mutually exclusive, actually.
I'd love to see a bit of help for killers at higher MMR (specifically by adjusting the MMR of SWF groups significantly upwards - queue times be damned), as at present, not only are you forced to bring a handful of specific perks, but on the majority of killers, you will need to camp and slug your evil little heart out to avoid getting looped forever while gens pop in the distance.
However, I also don't want to see a situation where killers are balanced around facing high tier SWFs completely, as that would make solo que, especially at lower MMR, an absolute nightmare for survivors.
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This is what I hate about asymmetrical games:
“Survivor” players think having fun means you should win (escape) every game without trouble. Maybe they hope for just enough of a challenge so they don’t feel bad about it being a curbstomp.
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If people want to play casual and don't want to sweat, why do they care for the balance changes? It's an oxymoron.
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The exact same could be sad about killer players. I dont know why people like complaining about one side doing something while the other side wants the exact same thing
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What you mean it defeats the purpose of being asymettrical?
Asymettrical means that the two roles are different (not symmetric), nothing more.
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Speak for yourself. I really feel that counselor is much more fun than being a DbD survivor. First, on Friday, Jason is actually a threat, so you get really immersed on the feeling that you are in a horror movie. Second, the counselors have a lot of ways to escape from the trial, whether it is by going for the police ending, by driving a car or a boat or even killing Jason in itself, so it really felt that your decisions on that game mattered and the experience kept fresh as every game could have different activities and a different outcome. On DbD, you only have to do gens, so survivor gameplay gets really repetitive, and what ends up killing this repetitiveness is the variety of killers in the cast, which nowadays doesn't change much because of MMR. Also, Friday is much more of a individualistic game. Ofc, you have to have some teamwork, but at the end, you are only trying to save yourself and you can easily get betrayed by the others if it is convenient, which I think is a positive point.
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I think that's the wrong way of looking at asymmetry. I think the better way of looking at it is, think of the killer as a block of copper, and think of the survivors as 4 blocks of lead on a balance. Despite the block of Copper being much bigger in size and asymmetrical to the 4 small blocks of lead, they hold the same amount of weight. This game is just trying to find that balance where the 1 copper block = 4 lead blocks.
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Just get back to the good ol luck of the draw matchmaking. Stop trying to get 50% winrate. I want variety in matches, sometimes little babies and sometimes 4man elite groups. I'm sorry if you are a bad killer/survivor but after a lot of games you will eventually get good.
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You do realise that it isn't called an asymmetrical game because one side is supposed to be stronger than the other, right? Both sides are supposed to be equal in strength despite being different in number.
Side note: To imply that you don't need to stress out in order to win as survivor is naive, it isn't exactly fun to be forced to rely on your teammates in order to win. Also, implying that the killer's skill should be the only thing that matters shows an astonishing amount of bias, everyone's input should matter in a match, unless you actually do just want easy 4Ks every match, in which case, be prepared for people to never play survivor.
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you still need to balance the power role side as if they are too oppressive outside and inside chase that would be problematic
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It doesn’t make sense for the side with one player (killer) to be outmatched by the side with more players (survivors). Just makes for dull gameplay.
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Asymmetrical is a synonym of unbalanced.
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not really. like, You can have a scalene triangle that isn't symmetrical about any line, but it can still be balanced on it's center of mass/gravity. Asymmetrical just means that both sides aren't played the same like you would in an FPS or even a MOBA.
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It's really not. In this context, "asymmetrical" means that the two teams have different goals, not that they're fundamentally unbalanced. A game like this absolutely can be balanced, and DBD really isn't that far off- survivors should absolutely have the ability to escape if they play well and evade the killer.
Even looking to the game's inspiration, characters aren't always killed in horror movies- the Final Girl is a trope to reflect this exact concept, after all. There's absolutely no reason it should be a given that the killer 4Ks, that just sounds unfun for everyone involved once the novelty wears off for killer.
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Why doesnt it make sense that the game should be balanced. Tell me then.
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The problem is that a bit of balance adds more fun to the game.
If a Killer would be able to insta down you with a shotgun over 36 meters it would make him a pretty heavy power role. However that would be no fun for the survivors as they have no ability to counter that or get away from the killer. In oder to balance this game the survivor has to have a chance to escape the Killer.
Think about Horror movies, just like @jesterkind said. They are after all the scource for DbD and its content. The Killers there are only interesting because you never know who gets killed and who survives. This keeps you on the edge and makes the movie interesting. DbD need to reflect that aspect.
Now how to balance DbD?
Thats the hard part. Because you can not just balance for a 1 vs 4, you need to consider 1 vs 2-2, 1 vs 1-3 and so on. Not to mention soloQ of course. Take the new Killer Cenobite as an example: As soon as survivor know that they can manipulate his teleport spawn, do not need to solve the box right away and how to evade chains he becomes quit a bit weaker. On the other hand he can pretty much stomp uncoordinated teams where nobody ever gets the box and chainhunt is on forever. At least here you can hope that survivors are capable of learning (or listening to streamers like True, Otz and so on)...
Deathslinger as an example was never a problem for a coordinated team, just like Hag and Trickster are nothing against 4 man teams. Even a facecamping Bubba is laughable against a team with a plan. However when you let them against soloQ the chances of survival get slimmer and slimmer, thus reducing the fun by reducing the tension of the match.
On the other hand a Killer like Trapper or Legion emits no tension for the survivors at all. Even against soloQ players they are quit bad and get beaten very quick. This reduces the tension for survivors too, because they know they have a very good chance at escaping. This is like watching a horror movie while the poster for the next part already spoilers you that the two main characts will survive.
And this is why we need some balance. To not spiler the ending.
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Movies are terrible example. And unless u are 8 years old child u always know MC is going to win/escape cause experience. I don't remember any movie where villains won in the end. It's all full of cliche where villains suddenly become dumb when MC arrives.
If u want to balance around that, it's already boring.
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Then maybe you watched the wrong movies.
I know quit a few where the villain wins, especialy if it is a horror movie or a slasher. How about Saw where Jigsaw wins, Silence of the lambs where Hannibal escapes, Midsommar (not going to spoiler it), The Omen or Nightmare on Elmstreet (the original)?
Most horror movies that are good also do not show you who is the main character in order to avoid that effect. They interduce you to the "cast" and you can build a few sympathies but then some characters will get killed. A good example of this play with expectations would be the "new" Friday the 13th from 2009.
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(insert dying sound)
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Asymmetry doesn't means unbalance, it just represents the team numbers are not equal, game can be perfectly balanced even if its asymmetrical, thats the most bullshit topic i've ever seen.
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Balance is a necessity in any multiplayer game, it doesn't matter whether it is asymmetrical or not. Almost every game isn't 100% balanced even chess has that white has a slight advantage over black just because they start first. A large majority of games always tinker and keep working on balance, adjusting characters, weapons, maps, etc. To get as close as possible to equally balanced and yes you can do the same for this game, because a killer is not a survivor they are quicker, have a power, have a different objective etc.
Anyone that claims just give up on balancing shows no understanding of games. Nobody wants to play a game they have no chance of winning. The game might be survivor sided, but it isn't 100% one way. When people talk about making it balanced they state to make it closer
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Because they are balancing the game that a Survivor can 1v1 the Killer in a 1v4, turning the Killer role to be too stressful, and more like a job than an actual game.
Which is why this game was so successful earlier on when they understood it was an asymmetrical game and made changes so it would be fun for both sides. Now they want it only to be fun for one side for the sake of "balance" and being able to 1v1 the killer.
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The balance is not meant to be between individual characters; it's supposed to be balanced between teams. One Killer is supposed to be balanced against four Survivors, not one Survivor.
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Doesn't it defeat the purpose of having a competitive game if one side is way over-powered compared to another side. Who would want to play survivor is Killers are guaranteed 4ks? Every competitive game is balanced so both sides have an equal chance of winning.
What you want to play is a game verses bots, not humans.
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The whole point of making structures closer, and increase the amount of pallets on the map was so that Survivor could 1v1 the Killer, because to solo players it didn't make sense that 1 player be punished for having bad teammates, so they wanted to be able to 1v1 the Killer and run them for 5 gens. Which the only counter for that was bloodlust, but testing removing bloodlust they saw a big dive in Killer players so kept it to keep the game afloat. I will not be surprised if bloodlust get's removed soon just to fully move the game towards 1v1 instead of 1v4.
The current gen speed, perks, and map layouts are made so Survivors can 1v1 the Killer that's why the role is so stressful.
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We call balancing around the invidual players and not the team as a whole "bad balancing."
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Yes. In a 1v4 Asymmetrical casual game based on famous slasher films as a party game.
Yeah. This is not league of legends, and Killers don't get paid to play the game.
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Except they're not lol. If you can't see that no point arguing with you. And if you think the game was better at release, it's either nostalgia or you didn't play it. Simple as that.
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What if they made survivors first person instead of 3rd? Removing that advantage would be a start. Its kinda like playing 1v8 as each character effectively has eyes in the sky whilst they can hide at a corner or behind a gen at the same time. Survivors also have items, killers don't.
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Let me clarify:
Killer should be the Power Role, no question. However, it should still be balanced enough so survivors have methods to counter them. As it stands today, survivors still have too many strong tools to counter the killer which makes playing survivor the Power Role because THEY dictate how the match goes - not the killer.
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I feel the opposite (unless 4 man swf). Most matches as killer i am the one choosing who to chase, who to slug and who to hook. And yeah sometimes i'll lose a gen, but thats how the game is supposed to work. If my chase is longer than 50 seconds, i did something wrong or the survivor is a god player, neither of which make me not feel like the power role
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Really simple answer, an imbalanced competitive game is not fun.
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