The most effective way to play killer?
Assume the following scenario:
You are playing Trapper / Nurse / Spirit / Blight / Hag / Artist or maybe even Sadako, Hillbilly / Doctor or the Dredge.
You manage to get a down before the first generator is completed and proceed to hook the downed survivor, then head off to the middle of the map. After a few seconds, you notice the survivor is being rescued, by hearing your traps being disarmed, sensing them with a crow, spotting them trough doctor power or just getting the loud noise notification.
Now what's the best possible decision:
Either returning back to the hook (early if you had intel, like artist / Trapper or late if you have great mobility, like with blight, nurse, dredge, sadako etc.), where you know 2 survivors will be near for sure on which you can both apply pressure OR
Leaving the hook area to head off to a far end of the map to get a slight chance to scare 1 survivor from one gen, where they won't be as easy to find as say the hooked (and now injured = loud) survivor and can hide much more easily
and now, assuming you make the decision to go back to check on your hook, what kind of survivor would you rather chase down:
an already injured one, of which you (in most cases) already know the exhaustion perk they run and will be much easier to down, applying more pressure by threatening to get a kill quicker because they have already been on the hook and getting the opportunity to slug them to generate even more pressure and likely have the ability to directly chase and possibly hit the rescuing survivor, depending on how quick you were with the down and force them to heal or be more easily downed next time OR
a healthy survivor, whose exhaustion perk you don't know, who can take a hit and then run off wasting more time for you to get your next hook, who can lead you into a far off area, who isn't as pressured because he hasn't been hooked yet AND you can't slug as freely / easily to chase some other survivor because he will likely have ran off away from other survivors.
No, i do NOT tunnel every game, because i am often times confident to get kills without doing it, but it does seem to be a VERY effective strategy, because once 1 survivor is out of the game you can easily pressure survivors to death with oppressive killers like Twins, Artist or Spirit - but sometimes it is just the only way to secure 4Ks
and quick reminder to the survivor mains that think it's fine to just blatantly nerf every single effective killer strategy that gives them minor inconvenieces because they somehow don't wanna be good at looping but also want to escape every game (if you fail to loop the killer, you get killed - what's wrong with that? if looping isn't core part of gameplay then let's test how it looks with all pallets and vaults removed, that would be funny):
Killer is sometimes 10000x more stressful to play than survivor, and a lot less forgiving so if you aren't feeling confident tunneling is just an easy to do backup plan to get 1 survivor out, already have at least 1 kill secured to not leave the game completely empty handed (especially for unconfident killers i guess, thats why so many baby killers camp / tunnel a lot as well) and makes the games much more chill once you have 1 survivor out, so please respect that Killer players don't always want to make their games an immense struggle - sometimes you do this as well, when you just escape instead of rescueing that poor dude on the hook in endgame collapse. Getting tunneled may not be a lot of fun but neither is getting 0 kills with 8 hooks - one of the most unsatisfying things in the entire game. So sure, tunneling and camping can be discouraged, but why always ONLY take from killers when you could also just try to make patrolling and hooking everyone once a little bit more rewarding than it is. I haven't really got anything to suggest here, maybe buff kicks or add more good perks like grim embrace to reward killers for hooking every survivor once. (or bring back old BBQ lmfao, that was rewarding enough for me back then to always prioritize the 4 hooks on 4 players playstyle)
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I don't play any of those Killers so I can't help you, so uh... nod after every down, that's the most effective move in that scenario
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Hmmm... well, I'll choose artist since she is my main, (I've played most of the killers you listed). Usually in this scenario I would just be gone from the hook. Unless they insta hook or I see nothing on BBQ, I'm going to just leave the hook and apply pressure somewhere else.
Artist is oppressive enough that I don't need to worry about tunnelling someone out unless I'm down real bad because the survivors played well. Usually I won't tunnel someone out unless theres only 1-2 gens left and I know I need to.
I have to full on disagree with you when you said that 8 hooks and 0 kills is the most unsatisfying thing. To me, 0 hooks is literally the worst thing in this game, especially when you get really close but they just play too well. It doesn't happen often, but every blue moon you'll get a really good team that you just can't catch. I personally would rather get 8 hooks than get only 2-3 hooks on one survivor to get the kill. I care more about the blood points than getting a kill and "winning."
Tunneling isn't fun from the survivor side, but it definitely is an understandable tactic at some point in the game in certain scenarios. The only time I get annoyed with it is when the killer decided to do it at the start of the game where they're debatably throwing the game by doing so. The problem is they aren't always punished because the team tries to take hits when they should just sit on gens. There have been times where I "pretend" to tunnel someone just so I can get some easy hits from their teammates and I just immediately switch targets because usually that survivor is not in a good position by taking that hit.
Sometimes you must tunnel to get a kill and that's fair because it is a pvp game. As long as you aren't a bad sport about it, I don't see a problem.
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The most effective "strategy" in this game is as you said, hard tunnel the first player you hooked while very lightly checking only the closest gen(s) to that first hooked player.
Before the first hooked player enters second stage you must pretend to chase away survivors coming to save that hooked player. Never actually chase, of course. If they are solo, they will not be able to save because hook grabs are super easy if it is 1v1, and they know that.
It is sad that this skilless play style is rewarded so much.
I go for the 12 hooks every game. It means I don't 4k as much as I could, but honestly tunneling first hook is skilless, boring, and not fun. If killers must play that way because the 'win' is more important to them than the challange (even though match balance is thrown out the window if they play that way), I can't respect them.
What the devs should do: hard nerf that "strategy", hard nerf nurse and Blight, and then hard buff spreading hooks for all killers.
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You know what give away "loser" mentality? Phrases like "not leave the game completely empty handed" and "getting 0 kills with 8 hooks - one of the most unsatisfying things". This screaming "I'm not a killer, I'm beaten downtrodden creature and accept scraps from the floors". Camping and tunneling even more adds to it (first one doesn't work on skilled teams, second one is very dangerous roll dice), plus neither adds any skill to you and that's the most important things.
So, don't be that person. The most effective way for killer:
- Fix your mind. It's a computer game, nothing wrong is to lose, but it's very wrong not to learn and wrong to cling to "scraps from floor".
- Learn macroplay and strategize every your next move (when to drop chase, when to start, where to push survivor, when to use ability, etc). It will change your playstyle immensely.
I recommend RedsGamingGears channel for education, dude explain every his move and decision, I learned a lot from him.
Problem with killers is that at the start its easy mode. Killer just technically cannot lose. And when there is no challenge, no need to improve your skill. Suddenly, when MMR skyrockets, you meet decent teams without skill, and dynamically killer cannot comprehend that it's skill issue.
For me Killer is never stressed, because:
- as killer I always play. Win, lose, successful, not so much, I play still. From start to end. As a survivor it's never your decision and that is frustrating.
- I would 100 percent chose to go against strong and challenging opponent and lose that go against weak and win. Maybe it is my former sport experience talking, but still, I'd better be worst among the best than best among the worst. I never learn and won't improve from weak opponent. In short, again, make up your mind.
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This is way too broad to answer in one post. It really depends on your perks, the killer, and how important the gens near the hook are.
I can give you my perspective as someone who mainly plays a lot of dredge; but has also played every killer extensively at some point.
Typically I want to return to hook to interrupt the heal because I am running sloppy butcher, but ideally I am not camping the hook at all. So I usually teleport off immediately after hooking someone to go chase someone off a gen across the map somewhere (using information perks, discordance usually, to figure out where to go) and possibly score a hit.
From there I will return to hook a few seconds once the unhook happens, ideally coming in to interrupt a 70-80% heal and then hitting the healing survivor to spread damage and build more nightfall.
I would play opportunistically from here, going after the easiest target rather than going out of my way to tunnel. It might even be worth teleporting back to the generator across the map instead of going after either
Of course if it all falls apart, then I will try to tunnel someone to death but it doesn't play to dredges strengths at all and is a desperation move
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Tunneling and camping will work only against bad survivors. Focus on a 2v1 instead of a 4v1.
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Tunnel and camp
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Firstly:
getting 0 kills with 8 hooks - **one of the most** unsatisfying things in the entire game.
you failed to quote me right. one of the most unsatisfying things doesn't make it unrivaled, of course getting 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 or 0 Hooks with no kills may actually be even more unsatisfying. Glad we could figure that out.
As for Artist, i don't main her but i do feel like she excels at getting one survivor out quickly and then transitioning that into an easy win: good artist players play around the centre of the map a lot (at least thats the impression i got from streamers playing her), especially at the start of the match and when you get a hook near the centre of the map, preferably a scourge hook, why commit to a far off gen? You have everything you need, especially on smaller maps - you can harass every gen with your crows without needing to actually go there or by faking to go there and forcing people off with your crows, you can regularly line up hooks and gens to check on both at the same time, sometimes with one crow, so you can tunnel one out without much effort. I mean if straying far off works and you regularly catch survivors off of strong loops go for it, but i feel like one of the Artists main benefits is just that you DON'T have go to gens to actually pressure them and can thus defend hook and gens decently well at the same time. Have it your way tho - also i don't play BBQ on Artist but i def see why you would, maybe your general perk builds reward straying off the hook a lot more, idk - but i do doubling back to hooks is a very nice option you get on artist and wins a lot of games.
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I got just super tunneled by nemesis. I looped him first chase 2 gens. Second chase 1,5 gens and last chase 1 gen. So it's effective to get one or two kills stragedy. I had 2 health state with otr and even ds. But I had to purposely let him down me at 58s so he just picked me up so hit him with that. I think he chased me almost 10 minutes whole match but my teammates were not very effective with gens. With better team I would probably gotten out. They also managed to give him 2K at the end.
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not necesserily. its actually very good to annoy SWFs sometimes that really really don't wanna lose their friends early. also its not hard to do, especially not on nurse blight or spirit, with very decent anti looping and map pressure. Starstruck on Nurse makes it even harder to counterplay this especially when SWFs try to go for a mass rescue, so either they let their mate die quick making it a lot easier for the killer or they play risky and might all get downed and slugged, so that the tunneling applies just the pressure that the killer wanted to apply when tunneling in the first place...
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Thats just what I'm talking about: typically you have the opportunity to return to the hook, by a teleport, or blight rush or whatever, because you know that survivors will be there doing some kind of action, healing in this case and you get free pressure on both of them. and then you go after the easiest target - which is most likely and injured survivor over a healthy one. Thats just what i meant to explain with my post - that sometimes tunneling is just the easiest thing you can do (by your opportunistic decisionmaking) to get good games. Nothing about going out of your way to tunnel, but tunneling being a result of a killer making the least risk highest reward choices.
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If you're going to for a 4K, hard tunneling someone out right away is the most effective across the board strategy. If you get the game to a 3v1 with 3 or 4 gens left, you've pretty much won.
I don't play that way as killer, but it is clearly effective. In games I play as a surv where that has happened, the outcomes are almost always bad.
The caveat is that it has to be quick. If the it takes over five minutes to tunnel that one person out, it's not gonna be that effective.
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What are you talking about? Scraps on the Floor? I am not a greedy person, i just enjoy making the most out of my games, which is in Dead by Daylight killer games getting the most possible kills - whats wrong with that? Would you rather get 1 kill or no kill? That doesnt mean i'm not willing to reflect my mistakes - im just trying to make the best out of bad situation which may absolutely be my own fault which i also take into account. but there is nothing with my mental to be fixed - I stress myself, because i enjoy going in for rewards - what's wrong with that. If i wouldnt enjoy stressing and challenging myself long term then i wouldn't be playing this game would i? You talk about this game like about going to the gym: don't do it for quick fun but do it for long term improvement. Thats not my ambition however, i have very limited time to invest in the game, acknowledge that withoutenough time investment it will be harder for me to become insanely good at the game - so i just try to make the most out of my current skill level by figuring out effective strategies and ways to play. It's quick fun in the breaks of the rough days i'm having - if you can't respect that then i am really sorry for you.
Also good job with this whole "analyzing how he put the words to find out what kind of person he is" - spoiler, it's not convincing ;)
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You mention killers who don't have to tunnel when they win anyway 90% of time at least.
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Honestly? Getting a 12 hook game is skilless, or perhaps I should say the skill discrepancy between you and them was so large that a fair game was intrinsically impossible. It does not really matter you drag those games out for 8-10 minutes "playing fair" or just end them in 2 minutes because those survivors are BAAAAAD.
I am not trying to take anything away from you, I am just saying a 3-5 hook game on good survivors is WAAAAAY more impressive. Assuming most did not come from altruism during end game.
That being said, evaluating skill in a party game is kind of cringe to begin with. Even more cringe than judging how others play a game. So I do not really even know what you are getting at? A win only counts if mmr gifts it to you? Lol. Cool.
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I may be in the minority but I’ve never felt stressed playing as killer. Don’t get me wrong, some games are pretty tough and I main Demo/some Oni but I’ve never felt any stress. Maybe I just don’t care that much about winning in a video game (not implying that’s a bad thing). These days I feel a lot of stress playing survivor (I’m a killer main but can’t wait 10 minutes per queue), just waiting for the first dc/suicide and for everything to go downhill from there.
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i haven't read your text but generally:
the game is more fun if you don't take it seriously and just "play". There is no win condition. Some say (like in comp for example) it's hook stages, some say it's kills. Some try to get high BP. But there really is non except the one you're making for yourself.
If you play for kills, getting one surv out of the game is important because a 4v1 until endgame against a good team should be unwinnable (aka 3k-4k) if they don't make big mistakes. You should still try to pressure important gens but keep an eye at your hooks. There is a lot of decision making involved, but having your hook inside your 3 gen is always a good play. Sometimes you have to leave the tunnel to go for another survivor who is pressuring the important gens.
But i wouldn't mind too much if survivors escape. If i dominated in chases and get around 8-9 hook stages but still 3 man escape, then i'm not mad because i know i played well. Playing for kills can be incredibly boring because it involves a lot of proxy camping and going for weak links instead of chasing that one good survivor who is actually a challenge and fun to play against.
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except that no normal player really 4Ks 90% of their games... and playing strong killers doesnt guarantee a 90% winrate...
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"the game is more fun when... " is highly subjective, tho i agree on the hook near 3-gen thing. can play out amazing. Also, who doesn't like having played well? But wouldn't it be even more fun if you played well AND got the 4K xd? Anyways, some games are fun, others aren't really because of dcs or whatever. Just going on to the next one is the thing to then i guess.
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What do you think about the dms nerf as an artist main?
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not 4k but i generally 3-4k about 80%+ of my games as nurse. And i know im a below average killer and barely decent at nurse. Being decent at nurse is imo good enough to get really good results in this game.
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Unless it is a tournament level 4-man SWF sweat squad on Discord getting only 3-5 hooks, especially with this latest patch, is not impressive, though.
Maybe it is different at lower MMR, but killers have it so easy right now that if you aren't going for the 11-12 hook win you will basically just win. Maybe you can let me know?
Sounds I touched a nerve, though. Judging how others play is cringe? Compared to other games, this game has, and has had, SO many ways for either side to be toxic and unfair to the other side (old moris and keys to name a few). Party game or no, you should be judged for unfair play.
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