Discussion about grabbing healthy survivors

TLDR:

Grabbing healthy survivors creates standoff-like situations that should not be in the game. But removing them as a whole requires some compensation buffs for killer gen defense.

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Hello people of the fog,

today I was thinking about grabs of healthy survivors, where they can occur and if they are fine or need adjustments. Beware, the post might get lengthy:

First of all, how can a killer grab a survivor and in which situations?

Grabbing a survivor is performed by the killer by using a quick attack (just tapping mouse, no lunging) on a survivor that is currently in an animation. The most common situations for grabs are the survivor vaulting, repairing a gen or unhooking, to a lesser degree when entering or exiting a locker or opening a gate. If I'm not mistaken, you can also be grabbed from cleansing or booning a totem or saboing a hook, but that would be pretty rare. You cannot be grabbed when healing someone or opening a chest (pls correct me if I'm wrong here).

Most of the grabs can be performed on healthy and injured people, only the vaulting grab can only be performed on injured people, and it may not be a fast vault.

Why/when can grabbing a survivor cause issues?

The possibility to be grabbed can create standoff situations, were both parties best approach is to do nothing to not give the other party an opening.

The most notorious of such standoffs was the infamous hatch standoff. Killers would be able to grab a survivor while they were jumping into the open hatch. So the survivors best approach was to not jump into the hatch when the killer was nearby. But the killer could also not hit the survivor with an attack, bc that would allow the survivor to jump into the hatch during the attack cooldown. Both sides were locked, the one doing it's first move would lose. Hatch standoffs were ultimately removed with the addition of End Game Collapse and the simultanious removel of hatch grabs.

The hatch standoff was special bc it prevailed even when injured. The other types of standoff situations that are still possible to this day due to grabs occur only then the survivor is still healthy, bc on injured ppl, the killer has no disadvantage to just down them.

Which other standoff-like situations are introduced by healthy grabs?

The possibility to be grabbed healthy comes into play most when repairing a generator or going for a rescue.

Unhook standoff:

For rescue attempts, the healthy grab creates a standoff-like situation where a survivor cannot unhook in front of a killer, bc that would make him vulnerable to the grab, and the killer wanting to prevent the unhook cannot hit the survivor, bc that would enable them to unhook during the hit cooldown animation. Of course the killer can usually secure a trade in this situation by just hitting the unhooker before the unhook and right after. But there may be situations where it's better for the killer to secure a second hook stage or a sacrifice, instead of a trade.

The time is on the killers side in this situation, so the unhooking survivor will usually try to bait an attack by rapidly starting the unhook animation and cancelling it. The closer the hooked survivor is to being sacrificed (timer being up) the more risky the unhooking survivor will have to bait. Either the killer times it right and gets the grab, or the survivor is hit and will proceed to unhook, forcing the killer to accept the trade or tunnel the unhooked. This unhook standoff happens often with killers camping aggressively, so consequently it was suggested multiple times to remove healthy hook grabs to make camping less effective.

Generator standoff:

For generator repairs, the healthy grab creates a standoff-like situation where a (single) survivor cannot finish repairing a generator in front of a killer, bc the killer could grab them than, and the killer cannot hit the survivor, bc that would enable them to finish the gen during the hit cooldown animation. The killer can likely trade the finished gen for a down, but preventing a gen from being done may be more valuable, esp. on the last gens.

This situation can be side-steped by the killer kicking the gen, which will apply the slight kick regression (2.5%). When the killer can do this two times, they are safe to hit one survivor and be ready again to hit before the gen can be finished by the (now injured) survivor. The survivor could also try to bait a hit similar to unhook standoff, to finish the gen during hit cooldown. This esp. comes into play when doing the last gen with Adrenaline ready.

The situation changes with multiple survivors doing the same gen, even a grab might lose the killer the gen, so it's not really a standoff anymore. Kicking the gen might also not be possible, since a gen can only be kicked when no surv works on them. Even if the killer gets a kick through, without having any way to add additional regression (Pop), they would need multiple kicks to be safe to hit a survivor afterwards without losing the gen during hit cooldown. With the surv. repairing aggressively, there's not much the killer can do to prevent it (seperate, but related issue).

Vault standoff (if vault grabs were possible on healthy survivors):

For demonstrating the strange impact on the game when grabbing healthy survivors is possible, lets imagine what would happen if healthy vault grabs where a thing: Grabbing a healthy survivor during a vault would be a great way to cut chase times in nearly half, so killers might feel incentived to chase a survivor around without hitting and building up blood lust 3. The survivor would be safe as long as they find safe pallets and strong vaults. But with weaker vaults or the killer already breathing in their neck, their only option to not get grabbed healthy would be to stand still at a vault and wait for the killer to hit them. Or straightout ignore vaults and the killer when being tailgated until being hit. The killer won't hit a healthy player near a vault, when they can afford it (in end game). Healthy vault grabs would introduce "anti-play tactics", so it's good we don't have that.

In summary, grabs of healthy survivors can create standoff-like situation and strange interactions between survivors and the killer, which break the "natural flow" of a trail. This situations force the players into utilizing the flaws / restrictions of the game mechanics itself instead of just playing the game "normally". It breaks the immersion or "logic" of the game: Why would a threatening, murdering psychopath have to wait for the survivor to do some action before they can strike?

So should healthy grabs be removed?

I would say yes. Not just for unhook grabs, which make camping more effective, but also gen grabs and all other grabs when being healthy. It would make the whole grab process more consistent, and prevent such "unnatural" situations. You could still be grabbed when injured, but when healthy, you have to be hit first.

But wouldn't that be a nerf to killer?

Yes. While we may be fine with removing healthy unhook grabs to make camping less effective, killers would have it harder to prevent a gen from the being completed with a single survivor working on it. So there should be some compensation changes/buffs if healthy grabs would get removed.

Two things I have in mind for this, which could come alone or in combination:

1) Make survivors incapacited for 3 seconds after being hit with normal or special attack

So essentially as long as the hit cooldown animation. That would prevent them to tank a hit and finish the gen in the killers face, as long as it's only one survivor. It would also prevent tanking a hit and then healing someone full / from the ground (another standoff-like interaction, but without a grab), but I would assume that happens way less than tanking a hit to finish a gen (esp. with the last one, into adre).

This change together with removed healthy grabs would be a net buff in gen defense, a single survivor won't be able to put a gen through by force anymore. But I think thats just reasonable in the context of the game (killer having the power role). And there wouldn't be healthy hook grabs anymore, so less effective camping.

2) Have killer actions take priority over survivor actions:

There are a few interactions where survivors can dictate what action a killer can perform, or moreover, what they can NOT do at a certain time:

• Kicking a gen while a survivor is repairing,
• Picking a survivor up while being healed (heal tech at the exits)
• Saboing when trying to hook (Is it? Or does hooking take prio over sabo? In my exp not).

These "jam tactics" do not make sense in the context of the game either, imo. A big, fierce, brutal killer would absolutely be able to shove a survivor aside to damage a generator or to pick someone up.

So by giving the killer actions prio over survivor actions, a killer could just walk straight to a nearly finished gen and apply the kick right away (possibly with pop), forcing repairing survivors off the gen (similar to being pushed away when gen lock perks like Deadlock trigger). This would also help against multiple survivors repairing. Only when there's no place left to apply the kick, the killer would have to hit a survivor (possibly with incap effect from 1.), so they could apply the kick imidiately after, if the gen was not finished during hit cooldown).

Both changes in combination with healthy grabs being removed would make the killer more fearsome in close interaction, making bold plays from the survivors more risky, and remove "unnatural" (standoff) situations. Camping would get less effective, survivors would have a better chance to at least secure a trade (excluding certain killer powers or exposed effects cough BUBBA cough ).

So, what do you think?

Is grabbing healthy survivors an issue at all?

Should it be changed as a whole, or only hook grabs?

What do you think of my suggestiongs? Are there problematic edge cases?

Do you have some improvements or other ideas?