THE SIMPLE AND MOST EFFECTIVE SOLUTION TO SOLO QUEUE

Solo Queue is a problem

Solo Queue right now is the weakest side of the game atm, originally you had to deal with incompetent survivors who are either new, or misguided players who may think they know or who may not know what they are doing.  Now however, you have to deal with the recent killer buffs stacked on top of that.

Many people (including Dowsey and Scottjund) have recently posted videos stating the fact that solo queue survivor in the state it's in right now is the biggest problem in Dead by Daylight, Dowsey gave his idea of what kind of buffs solo queue should get in order to fix this problem, which are his own idea, not gonna go into it, but the main takeaway that I 100% agree with is that the only way to fix this problem is to provide the same level of cooperation that you would get with a discord swf, and bring it to the game.

What if I told you there’s a simple change that could fix all of these problems with one single added mechanic?

Well… it exists, and it’s probably what you’d expect.

The Best solution to the Problem

The solution to this problem is a voice-chat system

Don’t click away just yet! I know it sounds foreign adding vc to DBD, However if you consider the hidden benefits the game would receive from this implementation, you might be on board with the idea.

Adding a vc would not only fix the problem with solo Q, it might also add to the health of the game in general. 

First of all, I just want to clarify that a vc like discord might be a bit overpowered for solo queue, I think the best solution to this is making a proximity chat instead. And also the Killer shouldn't be able to communicate or hear the survivors, THAT would be toxic, but maybe disable vc when in TR or something idk.

1. Think of how many times you’ve solo queued in dbd and come across a Claudette hiding in a bush, a David unhooking you when the killer is right next to you, or a Dwight who is completely clueless and doesn’t know what to do.

Not only would a proximity chat allow you to make the game more survivable, it would also help these new players get into the swing of things, and feel more comfortable playing the game, adding to the overall health of DBD.

1. When a trapper has set a trap near your hooked body and the Nea coming to rescue you is on a direct course to step on the trap

In this situation, the only thing you need to do is warn the survivor that there is a trap, but you simply cannot.  Adding a proximity chat would help survivors learn to be more aware of killers power within the game, and avoid stepping into a trap that would more than likely put the game in jeopardy.

1. Think of the times where you had a perk such as deliverance, or the “try to hook me build” (flip-flop, boil over, unbreakable), but the survivors you were playing with had no idea, so you try to use these perks against the killer, they try to unhook you when they could be doing a gen, they don’t body block for you because the hook seems too close. Ultimately, these perks become useless and get no value in many situations.

If you were able to just simply tell a survivor next to you, or while you’re on the hook, what build you are running, not only would new survivors be able to learn about different perks in the game and what they do, it would allow for a plethora of coordination where originally it would be absent.  Also the argument that you could tell people before the game is kind of dumb, as there are so many inconsistent variables, such as, they may be a console player, or they are afk and not looking at the screen.

The Immersion 

One problem with a vc that some people may have, is that it might ruin the “horror” aspect of the game, but here's the thing, players can choose to turn it off if they wish to experience the horror. The thing you also have to remember is that most of the time, people don’t want to deal with new players who don’t know what they’re doing, or players who are misguided or don’t know something, with this proximity chat, people can CHOOSE themselves if they want to keep dealing with infuriating clueless survivors, or not.

Also can we just be real for a sec and admit that no one who plays this game on the regular is ever immersed? Like EVER? 

Yea… no

Toxicity

If you play survivor you might tend to think that a prox chat would increase toxicity within games, I however, completely disagree and believe it would help reduce toxicity within games. Please read below to see what I mean.

First to clarify I want this to be addressed to a average survivor, you know the people who might be really good and nice survivors in one match, but also salty and toxic in another (you know, normal humans), as this is the majority of players in dbd. What you shouldn't do is compare what I'm about to say to players who are ALWAYS toxic and no matter what will always be unhappy and pissed off because they suck. On to my point.

First of all, I want to say that if a prox chat was added, a lot of people would already stop being toxic, because if you think about it, more people are comfortable talking ######### through line of text, rather than through actual word of mouth, with the addition of a prox chat, many people will be kinder to others purely because that's how people work socially.

Second and lastly, I want to address what causes toxicity in DBD, this toxicity imo is a lack of communication, in the game right now, when you have a couple teammates who are kind of bad and are a little lost on what to do, you have to deal with it. This alone causes infuriating games to play, and is what I believe to be the main cause of toxicity atm. Adding a vc would COMPLETELY change everything, because once survivors gain the ability to effectively communicate, they can get out what they need to say in the moment to tell survivors what to do, rather than having to bottle it up, watch the survivor go down, and add it the pile of rage they plan on unleashing at endgame chat.

Conclusion

I believe that many people are not for this change because it feels foreign to add something like to this to a game of dbd where the concept of a vc was never discussed, mostly because it was never needed. But now I'd like to say IT IS needed, and people need to start talking about implementing it. Dowsey gave his ideas about implementing a system that floods the screen with a bunch of text bubbles and hud changes, let me tell you, adding a vc is way more simple and way WAY more effective. It teaches new players how to play the game, some perks that were once useless on solo q will now have a purpose, and IMO will help reduce toxicity in games.

P.S.

Many of my friends who play on console played this game one time, they said it was fun and liked playing it, so I asked them, “Why don’t you keep playing it?”, the answer is always something along the lines of “oh, there's no way to talk to people” I truly believe that if players were able to talk to each other it would bring a surplus of new and interested players into the game.

Please comment below whether you agree or disagree with a proximity chat, I would love to hear different opinions on this and see if this idea can go anywhere.

Edit: Responses in the comments have changed my mind, and I believe it should be both a scroll wheel and a prox chat, Scroll wheel to help streamers who can't have a vc turned on, or people who have it turned off in general, and a prox chat to help the new players and whatever I said before.