Underrated perks.
What's one perk on either side that you think has a lot of potential but not many people use it?
Survivor side: Diversion. This perk has saved my ass multiple times, specially at the end when you're the last survivor and need to open a gate. A lot of the times the killer will just go to the notif location, giving you more time to open one of the gates, which otherwise it's quite rare to be possible.
Killer side: Hex: Third Seal. I rarely see people using this perk, and sure it can be quite useless when totem spots are quite garbage on a lot of the maps, and 4men swf in voice chat can just bypass it, but it is really good against everyone else, which is the majority. It's one of the things I hate going against in solo q since I do use a lot of aura perks, including kindred and bond.
Comments
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I rarely see Hope being used, and I think it's a pretty good perk.
I think it's just so difficult to move away from the meta perks because they're either 1. very strong or 2. they're good to deal with other issues that occur in games - ie DS and being tunnelled.
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Totally agree. A lot of people use DS and BT not because they are strong, but they do prevent tunneling/camping so it feels like a necessity. If there was something in the base game that would prevent both tunneling/camping, you'd see way less DS and BT users and see more perk variety.
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For Survivors: Fixated. Absolute best stealth perk, IMO. It massively increases your action radius and opens up a ton of extra hiding spots that you can reach without leaving scratch marks. I've had multiple matches where the killer comes to check on the gen I'm working on and I'm a distance away, watching them from a hiding place they don't check because they think I can't reach it without running. It's a phenomenal perk.
For Killers: I think a lot of killer perks are pretty adequately estimated on their value, but I think Surge/Jolt might be getting a bit worse of a rap than it deserves. It's just nice being able to put a gen into regression on a down, not having to spend another couple of seconds kicking it.
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i feel like those perks that almost feel like they are necessary to run should get some smaller version but making it base game (BT, DS, Kindred for solos, PGTW/Gen Regression in general, BBQ); the perks will then just be stronger versions of those base mechanics
some strong perks just need a little bit of balancing/nerfing (exhaustion perks)
that way those other perks will directly get more interesting to use as not running the current meta won’t feel like you are at a disadvantage
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Survivor: Pharmacy. Unfortunately it's been overshadowed as of late by basically every single other healing perk but I thought it was crazy underrated for a long time. The fact that you get a free super fast heal whenever you want was awesome (before the boons I guess).
Killer: Gearhead. I don't think this perk is top tier by any means but honestly I got better use out of it than BBQ in some scenarios. If it was tweaked a little bit I could see it being a great perk I would genuinely run.
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For Survivor; Aftercare.
I used to run Bond but the information is not at its full potential.
With Aftercare we can see each other at all times, they can see if I'm going for the save, working on a gen etc. It's really helpful when one of us need a heal and we have to group up.
Auras on both sides is a really good way to "communicate".
I don't play Killer much and I'm still having the weak perks on them.
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Hex: thrill is pretty underrated. People kinda wrote it off after it lost it's notification but it slows cleansing and blessing by quite a lot. Nobody is going to bless a hex with thrill up without throwing the game in the process
Honorable mention to Dark Devotion. Not really underrated in terms of power but very underrated in terms of fun. You can do some fun mindshenanigans with this perk.
For survivor windows of oppertunity, kindred and just aura reading perks in general. Too many solo's just copy paste the meta and go down easy cause they don't have the experience to support it. If you are not good at looping then windows will buy you way more time then a DS would.
Even "bad" ones like visionary should be run more often. Too often you get hooked after a long chase just to see everybody derping around doing nothing. If those people ran visionary even just for the reminder of "hey, you should be doing gens" a lot of solo games wouldn't be so depressing
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Deception really underrated the no scratch mark and pools of blood for 3 seconds is really great in just disappearing while in chases.
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For survivor: Detectives hunch is a borderline meta perk imo and one I always use to find Noed or boons spots as well as stopping 3 gens
For killer: Oppression barring it’s long cooldown is still pretty good info/regression
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I like Bloodhound more than a lot of people I think. It makes it very difficult for an injured survivor to stay hidden from you or juke you for very long in a chase, and it helps even when the survivor is crouching or dives into a locker, etc. Unlike Nurse’s the survivors still leave trails even when they’re not actively healing, and it’s also not impacted by Shadowstep. I find it’s just a handy quality of life perk to help find injured people to get them down.
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Survivor.
WOO - just a great perk for me with my memory problems. I look around while at gens to have escape plan but after that WOO shines.
Potential - Fast track/Stake out I run these perks and enjoy them but they need something and it's too early for me to figure out what.
Killer.
Surge/Jolt - Basic atk, 40 sec CD, and range keeps this perk out of my loadout. It's just 8% which may or may not even hit a gen. It's outclassed heavily by SHPR, Pop, etc. It's almost 2022 please give it the Third seal treatment and allow any atks please.
Oppression - This perks has great potential. The issue is the 80 sec CD is not justified due to the effect. I recommend at the very least reduce to 60 (40 best) and add overcharge to it. So kick, fail, 5% regression on possible 3 gens....would be better but still outclassed. Re-work overcharge to do something else.
Agitation - This perk is so underrated. I know some Doc's use it but with the new SHPR this perk should get some more love. I can take 15% off a gen every hook with agitation.
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Killer: Fearmonger (Exhaustion perks counter).
Survivor: Alert (indirectly buffed now because most of the maps are reworked and have breakable walls).
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Fearmonger is also good because it inflicts Blindness while working on a gen, which is another somewhat underappreciated effect, especially against solo queue survivors.
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I agree I have been using jolt alot. It's a good perk to have if you dont have Pop.
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Agitation.
The thing about Agitation is that it allows you to weaponize the part of the game when you're carrying people. Normally that's the point where you as the Killer are at your most vulnerable. The fact that this perk flips the script on that is honestly fantastic. I can't tell you how many times a game has started going south for Survivors because they tried to do something fancy and Agitation shut them down. Seriously this perk has a permanent spot in like... all my builds even without Scourge Hooks or Starstruck because I find it just that nice.
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Yeah, I like Agitiation too for similar reasons. Although I still get stressed actually swinging at a survivor while carrying someone with it simply because it bumps up their timer.
I still haven’t tried the “Carrying the Game” combo though: Agitation, Mad Grit, Thrilling Tremors, and Scourge Hook Pain Resonance. Down someone, pick them up, see a red generator with Thrilling, and carry them to it, hitting other survivors along the way. Then proc Pain Resonance.
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Oh I've done a similar build to that one. I nicknamed it The Koolaid Man build. Thrilling, Agitation, Starstruck, Pop. Pick somebody up, rush the not blocked generator while carrying, hook, pop, insta down. It's pretty fun ngl. Especially as somebody with a difficult to avoid M1 like old Slinger.
I had a variant of that build before I had Starstruck too but I don't remember what I replaced it with.
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Yeah same, Aftercare
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Oh yeah, forgot about Starstruck, that’s a good choice!
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I use Starstruck like a mofo.
Um...this is going to sound dumb but for survivor I'm going to say Urban Evasion because that's actually got me out of quite a few pickles.
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Makes sense, pickles and pizza sauce sound horrible together.
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For survivor, Alert. It can give useful information at the right time.
For killer, Oppression. Despite the unnecessary cool down, this perk is actually good.
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I disagree. I think any chest looting perk is way over-rated. I've tried running builds with them an always end up losing more than I win. I think the extra time you are wasting searching chests ends up causing you to throw the game.
I felt like Boon totems were causing about the same issue for a while. Now I'm kind of torn on them. If you place them far enough away from the Killer and the Killer starts searching for it, then it wastes enough of the Killers time to help win games. If the Killer is finding it over and over again, quickly, then you end up losing the game. I think on large maps, boon totems are a plus and small maps they're a negative.
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Vigil- I started to run this perk on my Leon along with Sprintburst, Hope, and Resilience. Really good recovery time that has gotten me out of some tight spots and it also reduces exposed status effects which is just an awesome bonus. With the plethora of perks and killer powers that cause status effects you almost always get more than one value in a match. Another bonus is that it is one of the few perks that benefit everyone.
Built to last- hardly see this one and a good thing too because I think it would be nerfed with the amount of value you can get out of toolbox and flashlight.
Spies From the Shadow- survivors just never expect this perk and especially for inexperienced/oblivious survivors who like to hang around the outskirts of the maps where there is likely to be rocks or walls with crows on them. When they are found there is nowhere to run.
Forced Penance- rarely see this one, but when it does show up in games I always see it take effect. I want to try it out myself, since survivors usually spawn together or near each other, a discovery of three or four survivors in close proximity could result in early game pressure with them being unable to heal, loud, and bleeding. For survivors who are scared to do gens until they are healed, they waste time waiting for the status effect to go away.
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For survivor it has to be shadowstep, I think when people think about boons being op they just think of CoH and while Shadowstep is not even close to the same power (literally countered by headphones lmao) it has saved me so many times. Being able to move at full speed and not leave scratchmarks is so incredibly helpful. Is it good when the killer is actually good? probably not lol but I really enjoy it
For Killer I really enjoy Thrill of the Hunt, you'd think it wouldn't be so underrated right now with all the moaning about boons, but no one uses it? It is so weird and it makes boons take FOREVER to be blessed. I sometimes even just use it as my only hex now, maybe combined with Undying so even trying to get rid of it takes way longer. Since boons also dont destroy totems, if they never cleanse thrill, it keeps all 5 stacks and makes blessing stay awful all match.
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It's situational for solo players. That's why no one is using it like most of survivor perks. They either should work only on yourself and not anyone for example: BT should only work when someone is unhooking so you're the only who gains endurance status and guardian needs to work also on yourself so you can get rewarded for saving people.
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Definitely Distortion. Its greater than the sum of its parts. Too many people I think fixate on the "3 tokens" aspect of it.
The fact is, it doesnt really matter. You can either let your stacks be eaten or save them, either is good for you. Some situations it's nice to choose.
Being able to sit on a gen in peace is nice, as is scrying the killers loadout.
It's even better in SWF as you can make callouts.
Even if my tokens burn super fast because of say, All Seeing Wraith, at least I can play with that fact in mind.
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For Survivors: Distortion. This works well as both a stealth perk and an intel perk. Someone get's hooked and you lose a token of Distortion? You know for a fact that they have BBQ and Chili. Do a fast vault while in a chase and lose a token? Congrats, your scratch marks are hidden for a solid 10 seconds and you know they have I'm all ears. The match starts and you've already lost a token? Congrats, you've completely evaded Lethal Pursuer. Obviously the perk does nothing if the killer has no aura reading potential, but the intel it can give you can be very useful.
For Killers: Spies From The Shadows. A lot of the value from this perk is that no one every expects you to be running it. I'll just be walking along with no clue that a survivor is near me, and then all of a sudden I know more or less the exact location of a survivor. I always run this on Huntress because it helps me use LoS blockers to my advantage. They can't see where I am for a moment, but because of Spies From The Shadows, I have a general idea of where they're running to, which allows me to wind up my shot in advance.
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Survivor:
Lithe.
Killer:
Spies from the Shadows.
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I too, am a great appreciator of Aftercare. Excellent perk for solo que.
For Killer, it's kind of hard to decide. However, if I had to commit to a favourite, then it'd probably be save the best for last. Not even because it's a good perk (although it definitely is on many killers). I just like it because it's a great feel good perk. Feels super satisfying on many killers to hit and recover almost immediately.
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Power struggle has saved my ass sometimes and it's very unexpected for the killer, I already created a habit of not walking through pallets when carrying a survivor but most killers don't do that. In the killer side, Trail of Torment is a perk which I think doesn't get the love I deserves, basically on-demand undetectable as long as there is an unkicked gen
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I agree.
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Will definitely echo the people that said survivor aura perks are underrated. Not only can even the most coordinated players and those with the most game sense and awareness still benefit greatly from them, but indeed the top meta has been set by SWFs and yet people adopt it into solo games where they could regularly benefit much more from utility perks. Bond, Kindred, Windows Of Opportunity, Aftercare, Detective's Hunch - all great perks. I think WOO has seen a drastic increase in usage with its recent QoL buff though, so that's good. Honorable mentions for Object Of Obsession, which may be a shadow of its former self but can still provide a lot of useful information, and Any Means Necessary, which is still mostly a meme perk but now at least pretty reliably informs its user of where chases are taking place and pallets are being used up. Spine Chill can be mentioned along this same vein, but I wouldn't say it's underrated anymore.
Vigil, Hope, Fixated, Alert, Lucky Break, Botany Knowledge, Desperate Measures, Quick & Quiet, Dance With Me, Renewal - there are various underrated perks that can work to great effect with certain builds and playstyles, but if I had to go with one that stands out, I would say Self-Care. In the Western meta this perk is notoriously ill-reputed, yet in the Asian meta it has always been and continues to be a core staple. I won't open this can of worms here again, especially now that Circle Of Healing exists (which you however don't even have to use yourself to benefit from, so this is only half an argument), but it has always been true that SC in the hands of a good player is a good perk and this as well is particularly true for solo queue.
For killer there's a variety of pretty underrated perks as well, such as the aforementioned Third Seal, Thrill Of The Hunt, Agitation, Oppression, Fearmonger, but also Enduring, Whispers, Butcher, Knock Out, Surveillance. With newer perks like Pentimento and Pursuer it's harder to say if they are really underrated, they don't see that much use but a fair few people are aware that they're good. Anyway, the stand-out underrated killer perk in my opinion is Play With Your Food. It's actually pretty broken on certain killers, and it gets increasingly more worthwhile the better your opponents are at the game, since it will be much easier to catch them than it would otherwise be. Particularly Plague and Myers can make good use of the perk, but also Clown (particularly with Pinky Finger), Wraith and Pinhead. Twins and Deathslinger as well as Leatherface used to benefit from it as well, but they (un)fortunately don't anymore.
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Survivor: Windows of Opportunity. It's the 2nd best perk for solo queue after Kindred. People still call it a newbie perk, but no way in hell you can know which pallets the Meghead dropped on her first chase. It also helps dealing with RNG-heavy maps like Azarov's.
Killer: Monitor and Abuse. It's one of the best perks to counter "holding W". It reduces your TR area from 3215m² to 1808m², so almost a 50% reduction, which is huge imo (that on 32m TR killers, it is actually more significant on 24m ones and Myers). Survivors start running later and on some killers you can even get free hits. It also has a very nice synergy with killers with custom TR (Demo, Oni, Slinger, Nemesis, Pyramid, etc) because most of them have very subtle songs. The increased TR in chase also helps in scaring survivors off gens and it pairs well with Infectious Fright.
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The thing about M&A is that it doesn't increase your TR...
Think about it this way if I play a 32m TR Killer then my TR at the start of the match is 24m.... Start a chase and it goes from 24m to 32m
Anyway... on topic
Killer- Surveillance: Makes sounds of Gen repair louder by 8m, And highlights regressing Gen White and if a Survivor touches that Gen then it turns Yellow
Survivor- Leader: Makes Healing, Cleansing, Unhooking, Opening exit gates 25% faster while within 8m (give or take) of another Survivor
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I honestly think the newbie perk comments regarding Windows fails to take into account resource usage.
Being a DbD God and knowing every possible pallet spawn and variation means nothing when Meg dropped them all to kill zombies.
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