Hillbilly is a Brainless Killer

@Crizpen said:
I'd disagree for the simple fact that Billy is highly effective in a limited number of maps, without a decent amount of skill.

In the Corn Fields, sure, he's incredible at applying pressure anywhere he wants and jumping all over the map with no hesitation or worry. In most other maps, this isn't the case. Lery's is obviously the worst, since there are almost no straight lines that don't have all sorts of crap filling them, but the resort, The Game, Family Residence, etc... aren't all that much better. And good survivors know how to loop small objects, such as trees, to make using the chainsaw a waste of time for Billy.

Learning how and when to use the chainsaw makes Billy one of the harder killers to learn to be effective with in the red ranks, since nearly every survivor knows how to take advantage of an inexperienced or unskilled one. Like the Nurse, Billy has to be able to predict where the survivors will move when they hear the chainsaw behind them, since it is relatively easy to juke.

On the other hand, Spirit is able to travel much of the map extremely quickly, and between her ability and her animations, makes mind gaming her almost impossible. She requires two hits to down, but they aren't exceptionally difficult hits to land. Or, she can throw on Prayer Beads and grab survivors off generators without ever needing to swing her sword. And, she works on every map.

Legion, who can down with 3 strikes with Frank's Mix Tape and Stab Wound Study, or 2 with Cold Dirt and Joey's Mix Tape, and has almost no counter-play, as he's able to completely ignore pallets and windows. He requires less skill to make his kills than does Billy, and doesn't suffer from stuns or even a cooldown if he misses a swing while in Frenzy. And, he works on every map.

So, while I'd generally agree that Billy is very powerful, I would disagree with the idea that he doesn't require a deal of practice to be effective with in the red ranks, unless you have enough map offerings to always get the fields.

Spot the Billy main!

Look, I play Clown and Trapper so I know what's hard to play and what isn't, and once you learn that turning is slow on Billy you've learnt the whole character and are free to rocket around. I'll agree with you on Lery's and The Game, MAYBE Haddonfield but Haddonfield is hard for every killer, but otherwise, EZ character.

I agree, he doesn't need much skill to be used and he's basically Leatherface on steroids, but he's balanced by the fact that he is loopable just as any other killer.
Funnily enough, I find his chainsaw way more menacing at close range than LF's because it has a big hitbox, it's fast and while revving it he doesn't loose ground, not counting that bumping into objects is not so punishing. Against Bubba you just need to hug a tree or a rock and he's done for, with HB if he's right behind you you're dead unless he ######### up.

@Mrrgle_the_Mediocre said:

@Crizpen said:
I'd disagree for the simple fact that Billy is highly effective in a limited number of maps, without a decent amount of skill.

In the Corn Fields, sure, he's incredible at applying pressure anywhere he wants and jumping all over the map with no hesitation or worry. In most other maps, this isn't the case. Lery's is obviously the worst, since there are almost no straight lines that don't have all sorts of crap filling them, but the resort, The Game, Family Residence, etc... aren't all that much better. And good survivors know how to loop small objects, such as trees, to make using the chainsaw a waste of time for Billy.

Learning how and when to use the chainsaw makes Billy one of the harder killers to learn to be effective with in the red ranks, since nearly every survivor knows how to take advantage of an inexperienced or unskilled one. Like the Nurse, Billy has to be able to predict where the survivors will move when they hear the chainsaw behind them, since it is relatively easy to juke.

On the other hand, Spirit is able to travel much of the map extremely quickly, and between her ability and her animations, makes mind gaming her almost impossible. She requires two hits to down, but they aren't exceptionally difficult hits to land. Or, she can throw on Prayer Beads and grab survivors off generators without ever needing to swing her sword. And, she works on every map.

Legion, who can down with 3 strikes with Frank's Mix Tape and Stab Wound Study, or 2 with Cold Dirt and Joey's Mix Tape, and has almost no counter-play, as he's able to completely ignore pallets and windows. He requires less skill to make his kills than does Billy, and doesn't suffer from stuns or even a cooldown if he misses a swing while in Frenzy. And, he works on every map.

So, while I'd generally agree that Billy is very powerful, I would disagree with the idea that he doesn't require a deal of practice to be effective with in the red ranks, unless you have enough map offerings to always get the fields.

Spot the Billy main!

Look, I play Clown and Trapper so I know what's hard to play and what isn't, and once you learn that turning is slow on Billy you've learnt the whole character and are free to rocket around. I'll agree with you on Lery's and The Game, MAYBE Haddonfield but Haddonfield is hard for every killer, but otherwise, EZ character.

Billy is just Leatherface, but with the ability to move from point A to point B fast on some maps(not all of them) learn how to loop him and he is just another M1 killer that runs at 115% speed.

Btw if you break a pallet with the chainsaw(without charge addons), it takes the same amount of time that if you break it normally.

Billy is pretty balanced. He is very powerful but he is the second best killer in the game, what do you expect? If I want to compete with SWF groups I only have about three choices and those are Nurse, Billy, and Spirit. Since I play on console, Nurse is a no-go. Billy is one of the only killers that really deal damage to SWF groups. Although I’m not the best with him so I use Spirit.

Unlike legion or spirit he has reduced freedom of movement, to get that "godlike" map pressure you require a lot of experience, luck and ... le gasp... skill.
Also he does get slowed by revving the chainsaw, which somehow most people against him in this thread simply seemed to miss.



God beware all those older killers arent as redtricted with their abilities as are the newer ones. Hillbilly stilll has cooldowns (which are longer than the animation and block BOTH ability and melee attack)
Cannot wait till devs make some basic scratchmarks or vision perk only....  /rant

Billy can still get looped easily. TBH the biggest thing he gets is when that one potato survivor throws every pallet the second they see him, then there are none left for the rest of the match. Even then, windows can be used to force him to m1 a lot of the time, which when paired with a good dead hard can make loops pretty annoying and time consuming for him.

Its not to say that every saw down is the players fault, but they're pretty avoidable unless you led yourself into an area where you robbed yourself of obstacles.

I think the bottom line is the entry level on Billy is very low. While there is some interesting stuff you can do, to play him effectively vs. playing someone like Nurse, Huntress, Trapper, he takes a lot less knowledge. You just zoom. Being bad on a map doesn't balance a killer because it is a small chance for it to be that map. It's 1/26 for it to be Lery's. 3.85%. That's assuming no one takes an offering, because it's very rare survivors WANT to go to Lery's. He's the go-to beginner killer, more-so than Wraith.

Plus, the highest his skill ceiling goes is learning that chainsaw almost always beats window, don't chainsaw at every pallet because that gets you looped more, and you can turn. Though this part is a lot more opinionated which is why I put it in italics.

@Mister_Holdout said:
This post couldn't be further from the truth. Billy in my opinion is one of the most difficult killers to play effectively.

And let me emphasize that word: effectively

If you're only interested in playing Billy at a mediocre level, then yes, he's not that hard to play.

But if you want to play Billy at a high level (which means being able to compete with skilled survivors), then that will require a significant amount of skill and experience.

The reason for this is because Billy requires quite a bit of mechanical skill. If you want to beat good survivors, then you will have to pull off some difficult chainsaws.

You'll need to know how to chainsaw at loops, such as the killer shack. Map knowledge pretty much ties in with this.

You'll also need to know how to land chainsaws against survivors that 360. This is also can be very difficult depending on the survivor. And of course, some survivors are just good at faking out the saw in general.

Q and E (which is what I use) can make these tasks easier, but even still, those controls take a long time to master.

This whole idea that Billy is an easy killer is simply false. Try playing Billy against survivors like Noob3 or Vooshy and watch what happens. I'm willing to bet most Billy players get wrecked.

I would agree with everything here. Playing billy at rank 15 is very different from playing him at rank 1, and it's not without a significant amount of skill.

You can say Legion is brainless, since he can bypass all survivor defenses without much skill. But not Billy, who still has to deal with windows and pallets before he lands a hit. Regardless of rank, he's good at map pressure, but that means little if you can't seal the deal and earn hooks.

Take the survivor who dodges and weaves every time you prep your chainsaw: an unskilled player will wiff every time. A skilled Billy will be able to track and anticipate their movements for the down. Saving a few seconds, maybe, but earning incredible pressure in the meantime.

For the record, I avoid playing Billy whenever I can: it's sad how bad I am with him as compared with Nurse and Spirit, who I have practiced significantly and am at least mediocre at playing. I have no problem admitting I'm a weak Billy killer. By the same token, I would strongly deny he's a brainless killer, or one needed to make kills without significant practice when you're talking about the red ranks.

Billy is most fun killer to face against. Strong killer that punishes survivor from misplaying while still gets pallet looped like any other m1 killer.

@The_Trapper said:

@White_Owl said:
I agree, he doesn't need much skill to be used and he's basically Leatherface on steroids, but he's balanced by the fact that he is loopable just as any other killer.
Funnily enough, I find his chainsaw way more menacing at close range than LF's because it has a big hitbox, it's fast and while revving it he doesn't loose ground, not counting that bumping into objects is not so punishing. Against Bubba you just need to hug a tree or a rock and he's done for, with HB if he's right behind you you're dead unless he [BAD WORD] up.

I would say you have those killers mixed up. I would rather 360 a HB than a LF because LF doesn't go charge of. It depends on the killer, survivor and where the two are at close range. Could be opinion I suppose.

With LF you just need to hug an obstacle and run in a circle, he will inevitably get the stun or if he's smart he'll give up and use m1. If the Hillbilly is exierienced that and 360s won't work.