Predropping Pallets is like Tunneling: Works but is Stupid.

notyarbllewe
notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213
edited June 2023 in Feedback and Suggestions

Some survivors just keep holding W and drop pallets without looking at you, and others just sit and wait for you to come then slam the pallets right in front of your face. The strategies are a lot like tunneling but on the survivors' side: it can work well and greatly slow down the killer but is just annoying and unfun to face. And is often boring to do as well.

Comments

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    It'd obviously need a lot of work to be balance perfectly, but an idea I have to decrease the chance of these strategies is this: you have a cooldown from slamming pallets. It'd both prevent so much predropping as well as possibly help against pallet stuffed maps.

  • AssortedSorting
    AssortedSorting Member Posts: 1,326
    edited June 2023

    The downside to that is the sparser the Pallets are the faster Dead-zones get created when pallets are broken, allowing for greater snowball potential if they get broken early.

    Foliage and Stealth aspects might help in that regard though, and may usher in an environment where scratch mark/Grunts of pain suppression Perks/Items can shine better or be introduced.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Play survivor mostly? Pre-dropping is sometimes necessary, but when people just run and drop a pallet without even glancing behind, it's stupid. It practically is survivor tunneling, though: it can be helpful but is stupidly annoying to face.

  • mizark3
    mizark3 Member Posts: 2,253

    What exactly is everyone's definition of 'pre-dropping' pallets? I've rewatched Killer streamer VODs against me as Survivor, and they have said I 'pre-dropped' when I got the stun after I ran around a pallet 3 times while injured. I literally waited for the last possible moment to drop the pallet (and not go down), and people call that pre-dropping. I can't comprehend a pallet stun (not camping the pallet) in any reasonable world being pre-dropping, but that is the most common descriptor I've heard when watching those VODs.

    What I understand 'pre-dropping' to be, is a pallet thrown before injury is even a threat. Personally I love those players, because they are my little deadzone makers. I chase them for 2-3 pallets, go back around and chase someone else into the deadzone the other player made. To be fair this is hardly effective on the newest maps, as you just need to bloodlust Borgo/Garden weaker pallets for the most effective hit as an M1 Killer, but that is a map problem, not a player problem.

    As far as the pallet drop CD, I think it would be fine if only applied to the least hooked player(s) (including ties, only while everyone is alive). That way someone being tunneled can still spam pallets without a care, but also no one can burn all the pallets and make their team lose due to their pallet greed.

  • AMOGUS
    AMOGUS Member Posts: 489

    People comparing blowing pallets to tunneling is really showing how entitled people are becoming and how they can't counter even bad Survivor gameplay.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Look at all my discussions and you'll see, LOL. And yes, predropping is almost as bad as tunneling because the killers can't play chase at all. All the M1s can do is hold W. Wastes half the game for them, especially on pallet-filled maps.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Never play killer? What you said is showing the entitlement. If I pointed out how tunneling just sucks, it shows how I have faced that too. You are just going on one side of the problem, while I'm on both. There are multiple stupid strategies on both sides.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Not sure how much you fully agree with my argument, but thanks for not being one of the people like AMOGUS. Starting this discussion, I was literally planning on seeing people like him, LOL. No offense.

  • Spectralfx
    Spectralfx Member Posts: 605

    I am just trying to point out a logic fail in your claim that a tunneled survivor do not get to play the game they queued for.

    The fact is that, camped/tunneled or not...

    For either of these scenarios to happen...

    A survivor need to have been chased AND downed, hence they played the game.

    Now if they get downed instantly... that's on them, it's not the killer's fault if they are bad at the game.

    On the other end, if we accept that a tunneled survivor didn't get to play the game, we consequently also have to accept that bully squad and gen rush squads have denied the killer the game they queued for.


    It's ALWAYS a two way street

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Pre-dropping goes hand-in-hand with the genrushing problem. Yeah, you can break the pallets they wasted, but in that time, you'll get no injury as others are speeding through gens, making the situation horrid when facing people that often bring strong toolboxes (which I see WAY too often already).

    As someone said, breaking a bunch of the pallets increases the risk of snowballing (which you'd have to do at the end in order to get much pressure), and that isn't fun at all for survivor.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    I entirely agree with all of that! The pre-dropping also works as a great example of that, IMO; like all the survivor can do is hold W because they constantly get tunneled, all the killer can do is also hold W and break when everyone keeps slamming pallets early. Neither side gets the enjoyment from the chase in those two strategies, and people often say chase is the fun part of the game.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    And with what you said in your first comment, I think my idea on how to fix this stuff COULD help if planned well. What is your opinion on it?

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Not sure if I'm restating it because I can't see the comment, but really, check my discussions. I talk a lot about bad maps, as well as map offerings because of that.

    And yes, killers get as much of an effect from pre-dropping as survivors get from tunneling: all they can do is hold W or break like all the survivors can do is hold W and vault, with little enjoyment in chase. If they go to someone else, the survivor could just sprint away to pallets as well, doing the same thing.

  • Spectralfx
    Spectralfx Member Posts: 605

    Man I hate the chases so much right now.

    It's literally more "fun" to play killers people hate to face to see an early DC because THEN and only THEN do you feel like a chases becomes viable.

    I always make a basement play as early as possible for that reason too. Play lame, win game.

    Fighting 3 survivors feels good, fighting 4 feels like a waste of time, when none DC I afk or dc myself cuz why play?

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    It really depends on their strategy. I often bring Franklin's when the group is bringing a bunch of med kits and/or toolboxes. It often puts quite a lot of pressure on them because they based their game off of absurd items.

    All I try to do is balanced the game and make it fun and fair; I never care to win (unless I'm facing clear tryhards, then it honestly feels good to force them down). I never bring killer-hated stuff or survivor-hated stuff, and I never do frustrating things like tunneling or pre-dropping.

  • mizark3
    mizark3 Member Posts: 2,253

    What genrushing problem? I haven't ran into a SWF using juicy toolboxes and BTL in more than 3 months. Otherwise it is a Killer pressure problem. I typically have no problems as Ghosty even on the horrific maps like Borgo/Garden. Maybe 1/10 games I lose, but it was because I screwed up somewhere. That means all my loses are my fault alone, and up to me to improve to prevent them in the future.

  • Gandor
    Gandor Member Posts: 4,258
    edited June 2023

    I generally agree, but CD part is just stupid - it means CD is too long to do anything or you are just dead if you find yourself in window-scarce map like Gideon. You will have literally nothing to loop around in 80% of map.

    But otherwise full agree - once I see a survivor that heavy-predrops (and finds pallets easily - indicating windows of opportunity), I make a mental note about him. This survivor will most likely be the reason why I will win that killer game. Free deadzone/snowball for me. Just don't chase him for 5 gens until whole map is a deadzone (because by that time, survivors are out).

    BTW this is not map issue, this is issue of both sides playing braindead - survivor running from pallet to pallet and killer running from dropped pallet to dropped pallet always kicking it and never looking at bigger picture

  • TrueGuardian32
    TrueGuardian32 Member Posts: 133

    The difference between Pre Dropping and Tunneling is pretty simple. When tunneling you create a massive dead zone around the hook in most cases. That dead zone is almost inescapable most of the time and will often lead to the unhooked going down no matter how skilled they may be.


    Predropping can be frustrating though, especially when there are seven pallets in a row. Typically I drop chase after three pallets if I haven't injured the survivor and keep in mind the dead zone I made. Of course if I am just playing for the fun of it I don't do this and typically have dozens of pallets dropped in me. It doesn't help that bloodlust is completely unreliable and doesn't actually stay long enough on large loops with LOS blockers. Heck, the new reworks are painful with the shear amount of LOS blockers preventing Bloodlust. Making predropping a even more effective and annoying strategy. What I would like is for Bloodlust to be buffed slightly so it doesn't decay as quickly. Maybe add a lingering timer. Would definitely buff Beast of Prey. Would also make Made For This slightly less frustrating when paired with hope.

  • THE_Crazy_Hyena
    THE_Crazy_Hyena Member Posts: 349
  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    I'm sure we live different places, and so we face different people. Maybe people are more relaxed near you, but there are WAAAAAYYYY too many tryhards near me.

  • AMOGUS
    AMOGUS Member Posts: 489

    I've been awake for years, self-outed Killer main. lmao

    And so WHAT? That's COMP, that's 1% of the playerbase, they don't matter and 80% of Killers suck against them anyways. They always play in 4 man SWF and can make anything look broken, we're not balancing around them.

    The fact that you were upvoted 4 times... ugh.

    Nah, I actually play Killers and have 500 hours... on just PC. I've played since Clown on console, sorry to say that people who don't agree with your low MMR opinions are not "people who never play Killer".

    And tunneling is kinda meta because of fast gens as you go up the MMR bracket and M1 Killers atm. And I can say this as someone who has both DEALT and RECEIVED it. Not that this really matters and I'm not saying this specific thing to make my opinion more important than yours, I'm just shutting up your "SURVIVOR MAIN"-esque argument.

    Pre-dropping makes it easy to get rid of pallets before they can even be looped. If the Survivor isn't in a SWF, they're throwing the match by pre-dropping every single pallet and turning many tiles into deadzones.

  • DrDucky
    DrDucky Member Posts: 675

    Pallet stuffed maps is an issue with the maps themselves and not a fundamental game problem, these maps should have not have a dense amount of pallets to begin with (looking at you cowshed). Therefore the suggestion of a pallet cooldown just should not be needed. (in an ideal world).

  • tubalcane
    tubalcane Member Posts: 170

    You nailed it here - successive pallets should be less effected. Vaulting as well. Even if it's only a short cooldown. Survivors should be rewarded for effective and creative evasion, not just dropping every pallet or infinite loops.

  • nars
    nars Member Posts: 1,124

    its not like tunneling at all, tunneling is always a good idea unless they have stacked multiple anti tunnel perks or the entire team is taking hits. and even then its sometimes worth your while.

    w gaming is throwing, simple as that. It makes deadzones faster, wastes pallets that could have bled 20s or more from them, and just makes the game easier for the killer the longer it goes on. Yeah its super hard to catch the one guy but as long as hes wasting pallets catching everyone else is gonna be hella easy.

  • mizark3
    mizark3 Member Posts: 2,253

    I think if the CD concept is applied like I said, only against the least hooked Surv while all are alive, it could be a temporary fix. Just like the Deja Vu buff to be permanent is a temp fix for 3 genning. It would be a core mechanic, and people don't always pay attention to their HUD, so I understand it could be oppressive in lower levels with newbies. Just because of that non-universality though I can completely understand not implementing it in any form.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    You have 500... and I have 3K. I think I know a lot more about the game than you think I do, and with how high my MMR is, there are way more tryhards than you think. I hate tunneling, but I also hate stupid survivor strategies like predropping.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    I agree. I only mentioned my idea because maps just keep getting worse and worse, more survivor-sided with each one coming out. If maps weren't so pallet stuffed and loops were more balanced, dumb things like pre-dropping wouldn't work quite as well and the game would feel much more enjoyable for killers. Obviously tunneling should be fixed as well; I'm not a hardcore killer main.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Tunneling is a good idea??? Yes, it works well, but dang is it a stupid one. I never tunnel despite being a killer main, because I don't care that much about winning and I know how unfun it is. I only want to have fun in DbD, not win, and I hope you stop tunneling if that is what you do all the time.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    THANK YOU. If maps continue to get pallet stuffed, this idea could help decrease problems like pre-dropping and wasting. What I want most of all, though, is for maps to be fixed in the first place. I swear, they get more and more survivor-sided with each one that comes out. Borgo and Toba? Just horrid.

  • Dream_Whisper
    Dream_Whisper Member Posts: 750

    Every map should be balanced to be not so large or too small; but also should generate pallet spawn at a reasonable rate and distance away from each other; and if possible replace a pallet spawn with a ledge/window. Instead.... perfect example, The Gideon Meat Plant; has like 3-4 windows which are useless; and over like 30-40 pallets spawns locations/spawns possible. For a small map, it is pretty easy to predrop, as it not loop able and it encourages competitive surv. players to win this way.

    There needs to be reduce pallets spawns; maybe have a deadzone or two in between loops, and some diversity between safe (not infinite) pallets and unsafe pallets in map tiles generation; if they need to expand Gideon Meat plant to be less square and more rectangular like Leroy; that would be a slight quality of life improvement, even for a indoor map

  • tubalcane
    tubalcane Member Posts: 170

    That's because someone in charge of "game stats" or "game fun" at BHVR thinks 50:50 ratio of survivor to killer wins is what should happen. It should be fair, not tweaked to 50:50, even if it means skewing that ratio either way. It's just someone's simple way of making it easier for survivors. "Did we get to a 56% killer ratio? Lets just add 20 more pallets." Now killers have to run an anti-pallet perk rather than tell survivors, "it's time to try some new strategies, here's some suggestions."

    I think BVHR in general does an awesome job with this game, it's a lot of fun despite some my bits of whining around some mechanics faults. But the people that plan the overall direction of the game need to stop kowtowing to the survivors. Just because something is hard doesn't mean it shouldn't be in the game.

  • nars
    nars Member Posts: 1,124

    I never said that I tunneled. all I said was its a much more consistent way to win, I dont really think anyone would argue with that. Tunneling is ALWAYS a good idea from a meta standpoint. The only reasons people dont do it is because they know how boring it is for both sides (me included in that).

    I also dont think many would argue that predropping every pallet is a good idea. Tunneling and W gaming are far different because one is a strat for an easy win, and the other is a strat that stops you from going down early game but ends up causing way more downs later. predropping every single pallet, including ones at jungle gyms and shack and near easily chainable strong tiles, is just throwing. You could easily milk 10-20s out of each at minimum, but instead people choose to get 1 second out of one and move onto the next. Rapidly creating deadzones purposefully is not equal to eliminating 25% of power from the survivors.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    I entirely agree with you, and it's the same with Sadako, Trapper, and multiple others. Sadako and Trapper are two of the (very sadly, as I am an Onryō partial-main) weakest killers in the game, but they don't want to buff them as they have the "proper" or strong kill rates. Sadako is one of the top killers in most MMR as they probably all use the nearly-OP and very unfun condemn slugging build (unlike me), while Trapper is also a decent killer likely because of the basement strategy, and both have to use very strong add-ons.

    The Devs have to buff the killers' basekits while finding ways to nerf their absurd strategies, as well as edit the add-ons around these changes.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    On the worst of maps that are highly pallet-stuffed, pre-dropping can really be a very big problem for killers. If they try to burn through the many pallets wasted, the other survivors would just speed through the gens as the killer does so. If they break most pallets by the time the gens are finished, they'd have to slug everyone to get a reward from that, and that would just be unfun and not easy at all. It's nearly impossible to win if there are still 4 survivors as the exit gates are powered.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    Not sure if I posted it a second time (editing my comment then saving it possibly deletes it, and it's quite stupid), but I entirely agree with you. Sadako and Trapper are two examples of this, as, despite being two of the weakest killers in the game, they are not getting fair buffs due to their kill rates. With Sadako being a top killer likely due to her condemn build and Trapper having the "proper" kill rate probably from the basement strategy, they seem stronger than they are in BHVR's point of view.

    They have to buff their basekits while nerfing their strategies.

  • DrDucky
    DrDucky Member Posts: 675

    Tunnelling is a hard problem to fix since if a killer wants to tunnel even if we had old DS they are still going to do it. The best we can do is make sure they at least throw the match to do it, which if a killer does hardcore focus a guy down non strategically then he will most likely lose. Also yh maps are bad but we can just hope that someday they realise the error of their ways. Honestly the base game loops are fine its just some maps having too many god pallets or chaining tiles together is the main issue there. A jungle jim by itself is fine, but a jungle gym into a 4 lane into shack is not.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    I think they should pause their work for a bit or at least slow it down, switching a lot of their people to talking with us more to learn how to actually make fair maps, among other fair things. Focusing more on balancing everything would make the game feel much smoother, having to worry less about tunneling as well as genrushing, things like the Brand New Part reworked.

  • DrDucky
    DrDucky Member Posts: 675

    They do have "boots on the ground" but I think they are just too selective about what feedback they take unless its completely unanimous.

  • notyarbllewe
    notyarbllewe Member Posts: 213

    With the maps, I've honestly gave up with them being balanced.

    With the Q&A thing, someone asked about maps, and they said they are learning more and more as they make them, and, funny enough, the maps keep getting worse and worse IMO.

    Another thing, in one of the anniversary quotes, one said something similar to this: "Always go for the beauty points."

    It makes total sense as some of the maps look super cool nowadays, but their balance....