Should sadako even be buffed?
I mean, she's performing very well and is pretty fun to verse and play as long as they aren't doing the boring slugging cheese. She's got insane mobility and stealth, pretty decent chase without being OP or oppressive with her flickering mindgames, crazy perk synergy with exposed, aura reading, slowdown and chase perks, and even has a passive slowdown mechanic that if not handled makes her able to kill someone who hasn't even been hooked! She's amazingly versatile and although she's a bit weaker when against the mythical 4 man tournament SWF that nobody ever sees, on almost all levels of play she's more than just okay, she's actually pretty dang strong! Even at high MMR (top 5%!) she's still one of the best killers statistically. And this is just anecdotal, but sadakos seem to do pretty well in my games.
I don't mean to be inflammatory, but part of me wonders if the reason why killer mains are so negative about her, putting her even as low as D tier, is just that they're used to antiloop killers with chase powers that practically win the chase for them or ignore key aspects of gameplay, such as nurse, blight, spirit, trickster, artist, nemesis, etc. Sadako actually requires skill to do well with as she is entirely macro game and relies on good chasing fundamentals and mindgames with her flickering and midchase teleports. If you're used to cheesing loops of course you won't do well with her, but with practice, I think she's WAY better than people give her credit for. And way more healthy and fun for the game than zoners like knight and artist or loop ignorers like nurse and blight.
What do you think? Are killers being too harsh? Or does her chase power being meh really overshadow her mobility, stealth, perk synergy, built in slowdown and potential to 0 hook kill survivors? All I'm saying is that I see why they're being careful before any changes to her are made, if they're even needed.
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"Part of me wonders if the reason why killer mains are so negative about her, putting her even as low as D tier, is just that they're used to antiloop killers with chase powers that practically win the chase for them or ignore key aspects of gameplay"
Bingo.
She can definitely use some fine-tuning buffs, but she's far from the abysmal killer people on the forums make her out to be.
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I will say the reason I was so drawn to Sadako is bevause she reminded me of 2018/2019 DBD. Before every killer became anti-loop no mobility (which is ironic considering I main Pyramid Head and have done since he first came out, who is anti-loop no mobility) I was a hardcore Wraith and Freddy main and absolutely loved the M1 killer gameplay loop.
And Sadako just... Reminds me of the good times. She's so fun and feels smooth to play and I adore everything about her kit, even if the TV cooldown could do with being reduced and swapped (A survivor turning off a TV shuts it down for 80 seconds, while teleporting shuts it down for 50). I have a massive list of buffs I'd give her just to be funny but they'd probably break the game (my attitude towards changes is that something can always be quickly toned down if it releases too strong, but it's better to have something be remembered for breaking the game than forgotten for mediocrity).
So, while I don't know if the reason is because of what you stated, the reason why I'm so drawn to playing her is because her design is so reminiscent of the good old days. And being able to shake off that M1 rust after so long of playing only small amounts of Wraith and Speed Limiter Bubba just to make sure I never forgot anything felt so, so good.
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Dbd's Killers have problems, but its not bHVR's fault. See everyone of us is at a MMR level and we have to preform at that level, but when a new Killer comes out we cant necessarily perform that. its easier for Survivors, all survivors play the same way.
So balance need to be taken with a huge spoon of salt and remember the skill it takes too.
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There's this too, yeah! I feel like the game is moving away from more traditional killers in favour of killers that just don't engage in looping, whether through zoning or get-hit/drop and get hit projectiles, or cheese like blight and nurse. Sure these are technically stronger than standard killers, but they're very repetitive, usually not too skill-intensive and aren't fun for anyone, especially zoning killers. I think the game should focus on more killers like billy, demo, bubba, myers, wesker - killers with chase powers, but chase powers that are interactive, fun and counterable, for the most part.
I hoped sadako and wesker would be a step back in the right direction after the nightmare of every killer from oni to sadako being an uninteractive antiloop killer without much counterplay if played right, but knight is like the culmination of everything awful with this design philosophy. :(
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I don't know if it's necessarily a buff, but she needs some sort of QoL pass on the actual teleport side of her powers. Super long cooldowns if you use them, facing away from the objectives, Survivors can create a huge deadzone if they care (and honestly, I only ever see them do that when there's a big open space between the gen they're working on and the TV) and don't want to just have you use them up yourself, etc.
And I really don't get why she has a lullaby.
Oh, and all the addons that are fixated on Survivors interacting with TVs, which they really don't. There needs to be more incentive to do that aside from the occasional teleport shutdown. Slugging and ring drawing tactics aren't a good way to have condemned come into play.
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I wouldn't mind if they changed up condemned a little bit, because it's definitely the weakest part of her power, but I've seen so many people suggest outrageous buffs to it that honestly I wonder if it's worth the hassle. Like, people suggesting you should gain a stack of condemned after getting hit when sadako manifests, or that you get status effects like exhausted and exposed for having even a few condemned stacks, or the worst of all, letting her SEE your stacks and know when to TV-tunnel you out by spamming teleports when you're close to being condemned. It's a volatile mechanic.
Not so sure about the other aspects of her kit though. You buff her teleport cooldowns and not only does she instantly become incredibly oppressive and the best mobility killer in the game by far, but her ability to spam teleports to force condemned becomes almost unstoppable. And the lullaby is barely audible anyway over gen sounds, never understood why people make such a fuss over it. It's there because she enters stealth instantly with no cooldown of limitations, unlike ghostface, with no speed penalty, unlike pig, and has no loud sound cue, like wraith. She needs some limitation on it or she's the best stealth killer on top of all her other strengths.
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Cooldown of "longer than it takes to do a gen from 0 with no speed boosts" is way too far on the other side of cooldown problems. And ties in to why Condemned only normally comes into play when built around with weird healing builds.
It's supposed to be a slowdown effect and only rarely lead to kills, but it just seems to exist in a land of being totally ignored because the best way to stop Sadako from teleporting is to let her teleport and be screwed by her own power. Except for the iri addon, which would be a great incentive for hit and run if the TVs didn't also lean so much into "actually better for intercepting in chase than getting over to gens".
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They should nerf the condemned strat/slug specifically, and buff her in other areas (like chase). I have a number of ideas how, but I'm not going to rehash them here.
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Ring drawing should be reworked to instead build condemned when gens pop
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yes but stats say no.
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I think the community has a hard time accepting that:
A: they aren't playing against top level survivors consistently
B: even if they were, it doesn't mean they themselves are a top level killer
C: it's unrealistic to balance a killer for viability in a hypothetical scenario that doesn't occur at any level (perfect survivor vs perfect killer)
It's entirely possible that Sadako isn't underperforming by any observable metric on BHVR's end, hence her lack of changes up to this point. Hidden MMR and lack of competitive ranks hurts the discourse in this instance. Every balance discussion we have is mostly educated guesswork and conjecture based on personal experience. But we can't see opponent level relative to our own. It's how you end up with the community opinion being so far off from the top 5% kill rate.
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Tbf you are right sadako manages to even get a high killrate at 5% top mmr, but it baffles me, its a stealth killer that tells you when she is near you, the flicker mindgame can be countered by hearing or the static effect, condemned can be ignored until you get like 6 stacks, and she has a 100 second cooldown on teleport, like I know most people die to her, but HOW? She literally has a list of instructions telling you how to beat her taped on her back.
And regarding your argument, yes antiloop is boring but with current map design, im sorry to sound mean but anyone who can't last at least a minute or more in chase against an m1 killer is just bad at the game, maybe if its shelter woods they get a pass.
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I agree with you. I would change a few things, such as tv's being turned off longer when using them to teleport and having a shorter cooldown when survivors take a tape. I think that should be switched to stop weird scenarios where you can't go back to a tv for about 2 minutes. Would also incentivize taking tapes. As well as making her invisiblity more frequent since the add-ons for it give you a pretty good mind game power. But I really don't think an entire rework is in order. There's some missed potential with the condemn mechanic but it isn't a huge deal.
She really is an underrated gem. Obviously not god tier, but she has so much versatility in her power. Putting on Dragons Grip + Overcharge is something I like to do. You can act like you left and they'll either let it regress or give a down. Anyways, I think killer players focus way too much on anti-loop. For good reason, as most killers powers give them that edge in chase, as well as allowing you to pressure better.
Unrelated but I've found most of the "trash" killers aren't really that horrible. I've been having some success with Trickster recently and it's actually really fun.
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The passive phasing is a bit underrated as a chase tool. A Sadako that has the timing down can reduce a rock tile to a guessing game. And she's extremely short. It's not like Trapper trying to mindgame a tile where you can see his head above it.
And I think there's something to be said for simplicity. There's not a lot to mess up in her kit. You can have a Huntress game where you don't hit your shots. Heck, you can have a Nurse game where your blink logic sucks and your mechanics are off that day. It happens to every Nurse.
But I've never played a Sadako game and missed the easy ones, because you can't really. If a killer is extremely experienced and in the top 5% of MMR on M1 killers, they'll win most of the 50/50s and quickly deal with the nastier tiles. Take Bamboozle and that takes care of the worst offenders. Then it's just basic M1 killer play with passive phasing and great mobility. I can see her win rate.
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I'm doubtful anytime I see "insane" next to anything killer oriented. Kind of like how "you get insane value from Corrupt!" when it goes away after 1 down when it used to be for 2 minutes.
She doesn't have much going for her. Teleports alone have almost never made a killer strong (Freddy, Demogorgon, Dredge), except for Hag but that was before everyone knew how to play against her. Sadako also is really loud while invisible and has to tp to someone 7 times to condemn them, that is if she even can teleport, since people can turn off her TVs for like a minute. There's so many killers that do what she can do but better.
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Yes, people will lose to trappers. It's little about how good the killer is, it's about how enjoyable it is to play that killer.
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That's the opposite of a bingo! "Win the chase for them"? It's true, but the phrasing obviously has a negative connotation to it when it really shouldn't. This is what I mean when I argue against people saying you can "spam" Hillbilly's or Clown's power, or that Spirit and Blight have "no" cooldown to their powers. I mean... if you're not playing the killer to use their power, because that's the "wrong" way to play them or whatnot, then what are you playing them for? You just arbitrarily pick a killer and do whatever? That's not how it works. Killers need to actually get the survivors to win, and so when their power doesn't help them in that, you're just playing a 110 or 115% M1 killer and think you're gonna win?
This all reeks of either, "I don't care about winning when playing killer" or "I care more about the survivors' fun than winning as killer."
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I've been wracking my brain for weeks and months like, "What DO these people want out of a killer?" Because I honestly don't know.
It's easier for me to criticize, I'll admit, because I don't really put out ideas, but I do critique the designs the devs do release... so maybe I'm more similar to everyone else than I initially thought.
At the very least, I try my best to visualize what the killer can actually do against the survivors using their power, at their smoothest and at their most janky. But I don't think most others do; theirs is a very survivor-centric mindset. And because of that they always end up thinking, "What can I do as survivor to trump what the killer's doing?" They use the lighter word "counter," but I can read between the lines. The problem with that way of thinking is it leaves no opportunity for the killer to do really anything proactive without being criticized for it. The killer needs to be the initiator of the interaction AND be able to come out on top, not one or the other. If the killer's simply waiting for a survivor to make a mistake, what happens when they don't make one? 2 minute chase or something like that, because that's the fastest the M1 killer or whatever it is could possibly have ended the chase. And I don't need to explain why a single survivor having that much power is a problem. It's a 1v4, not a 1v1.
Examples of this are Wesker and Demogorgon's linear powers. Even at linear loops like a TL or shack, the survivor can simply deny the option select by not being so predictable with their movement, making the killer think they're gonna do the obvious but then going for the unexpected, or vice versa. So what happens at round loops? The killer really can't do anything other than brute force the loop, take the pallet stun, break it, and the chase resets. All that time wasted. And those are your anti-loop killer right there. The chase was interactive, because both players are making plays, but only the survivor could make proactive plays which advanced their position.
Then there's things that are given to survivors, for little or no reason, that just deny the killer's power to an unreasonable degree. Wesker has a lot of cures for his power. A lot. People are afraid they'll run out of them and they'll have Hindered the whole game. That's a worst case scenario if ever I've heard one. If the game has gone on that long to where all cures were used, the survivors should have already had the gens done and been out, easily. So while I think Wesker should have cures, I think survivors get far too many. He'd have to successfully use his power in every single chase, which is a slim chance, and the survivors would probably still be able to do all gens and cure themselves just enough. Then there's the more obvious ones of Wraith's cloak and Hag's traps being flashlight burned. I thought the devs explicitly said they removed sabotaging (not disarming) Trapper's traps because "We don't want items specifically countering certain killers"? So why are those interactions still in?
Finally, thinking from the survivor's perspective, there's actually loads of counterplay for every killer. Wraith can't hit you or start getting Bloodlust without uncloaking, and he gets slowdown from uncloaking, so all you have to do is vault windows and run to the next loop whenever he starts uncloaking near a pallet. He won't be able to catch up, especially with his nerfed lunge. Pre- or post-nerf Freddy, you just play against him like the M1 that he is. If he plays snares at a loop, drop the pallet early like you would against Clown, or run away to the next loop. Doesn't matter if the game takes long because he tp'd to a gen about to be done. He had to drop chase with you to do that, and kick the gen, therefore giving the person he pushed off a huge lead. With Spirit, whether you're injured or healthy, you can go for all kinds of sound mindgames, baits, and double backs. With Blight, he's like Oni to where he can only turn so hard with his rush attack, so you can dead angle him at a loop. He may be fast, but he can't account for every angle you can run to.
Longwinded, I know, but this stuff has got to be shared, because I honestly don't think people have thought of most of this on their own. So what you have is a community with a bunch of ideas about what killer should be... without even knowing what killer currently is. When designing killers, we must look at the game from, not both killer and survivor perspectives equally, but dare I say mostly the killer's perspective.
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the issue is that there is 0 reason to use sadako over dredge, who has better mobility, antiloop, and more. sadako releasing before dredge was a mistake. the only thing that makes sadako better is condemned which you need to use a whole build to make even remotely threatening, and even then survivors can just put the tape in in your face
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Her kit needs a both a good buff and some reworking
That slugging playstyle shouldn't be a thing, imo.
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shh
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