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I Think DBD As A Casual Game Is Dead
Comments
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While we could debate the first part (the or else part specifically), the players turning sweat lord's is again, on the players. We can have fun with a loss as long as it's an interesting loss, and I HAVE recently too. It's the people wanting a boring win no matter what, and sweating to get it, than risk an loss for a interesting win.
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I mean, there is losing and there is losing. Having nail-biting chase everyone all over the map with everyone on deathhook, but then they all escape game is one thing, but having 5 "3 gens pop after he first chase, in which you did nothing wrong and even won the last mindgame" games in a row, because that somehow became the norm, will leave you with a much smaller sense of satisfaction, despite the loss.
And now survivors are calling Leathal Pursuer op, because its used a lot, in order to turn that early game loss around.
Both sides are kinda backed against the wall from the start, because they know that they need to play this right or get humiliated. Sure, playing chill can still be done, but you will hardly ever drop down enough in MMR that you start having fun, again that way regularly. The casual game is dead and, let's pull some numbers out of my nose, some 75-85% of peeps now play efficient as a default mode and kinda sweat, so that's the expected route for every match nowadays.
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I think there should be a beginner mode which changes the dynamics of the game which can almost server as a live ‘tutorial’ for players. Something which allows for more leniency. I think the new survivor experience is particularly horrible as people need time to learn the basics of how to loop, learn what perks actually are in terms of furthering their objectives and what perks killers have that counter or hinder those.
maybe a live tutorial style system that initially means no perks for beginners - so at the very base level, they can gauge what their objectives are like without them, and then a progressive introduction of each perk style (for both sides) as the main objective:
Gen speed - Use perks for Gen speed/slow down
Healing - Use perks for healing/inflicting hindrance to healing
Chase - practice looping to evade killer/catch survivors
Powers/items/perks - Practice evading killer power using /hit survivors using powers
Maps
Familiarise with DBD maps
I appreciate these things might be incorporated in time challenges etc but, I’d they could be standalone game modes it could offer an opportunity for good practice for both sides. These modes can have matches that give a platform for improving specific elements
I’m sure there may be reasons why the above may not be totally practical etc but just throwing ideas into the ether.
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As casual as I am things are fine.
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I agree 100% with OP.
Let's get real too, most gamers are casual and the most successful games cater to the casual crowd.
The fact that this game can't be played casually made me step back from it for a bit, I don't have the mental energy right now to dedicate to it. It's not worth it.
I don't mind playing it hardcore sometimes but it's just not possible, my mental well being and RL things come first. I don't feel like sitting down for 8 hours playing match after match, dealing with toxicity non stop.
I've been playing something else lately, where I can idle in the game, turn it off whenever, don't have to deal with toxic play styles and it is multi-player as well :)
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Maybe it's just us but those types of games don't affect us. Especially since we only care about the doors and not a lick about what random people think. We generally throw chaos in the match because we look to entertain ourselves and generally it works.
As for lethal.... again that's just the players whining. It's not the games fault or devs for players saying this or that. They are the source of the problem (which is turning the game into a sweat fest)
We're kinda split on this last one. We agree that probably that number play "efficient" (even if we somehow get the last 25%) but you can be both efficient and casual (especially as survivor). We're unsure what"kinda sweat" entail but we're assuming your measure and ours are different so we're leaving that as is. We disagree that everyone is backed to a wall looking at everything through paranoid eyes.
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I think that is because mmr doesnt work the way we want or would expect it to work.
I would say, a good matchmaking would pair teams of close to equal skill against each other. The less you can predict the outcome, the better, because it depends on decisions in the match (and maybe a little rng).
However, from what i gathered from what the devs have told us over the years, it seems to be like this:
Their Matchmaking is very good at predicting the outcome of a match. And the goal of the devs is a certain kill/escape ratio.
And this is easiest achived with binary matches. You know before the match, that the killer is going to steamroll the survivor, or the other way around. You use the system to determin the outcome, and then give the player his intended results to get to the desired kill rates.
And that leads to more 4kill or 4 escape matches. (4 escapes are less comon, because the killer can still just camp a guy to death).
In my experience, those matches got more and more the last years. As killer, i either get a 3+k (i dont slug for a 4k), or i dont get anyone at all (again, the odd one out maybe, if i try hard).
As a solo survivor, its the same. Either i got a team that completly outmatches the killer (not that common), or most likly, you have a weak link in the team that gets out of the match first, either due to playstyle like camping, the survivor suiciding, or whatever.
The problem is, neither the wins nor the losses are very thrilling. One is tunneled out at 5 gens, the match is done. The thrilling matches are the close one, where the killer runs around getting hits and downs, while the gens get done too, and everyone progresses in the game, not just one side.
So basicly i belive the devs have the wrong priorities in matchmaking, because they just dont focus on matches with equaly skilled players.
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It's why we should have a separate casual and competitive playlist.
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A game has a few problems, because every video game is perfect.
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It is still their choice at the end of the day. If a whining child constantly screams to get its way and the parents give in. Who's fault is that? The parents of course. Simple. Anyone blaming the community is sorely mistaken. Blame the parents. Common sense. The parents are the gateway to the problem.
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Not sure I'd agree, but one thing which would support this and is a concern is the collection of perks available. There are currently so many that they are syncing too well with others, creating really powerful combinations which can be very frustrating to a lot of players.
I'd be all for an overhaul nerf of all perks and bring the game back down to skill of play and enjoyment in experimentation. Many players are scared of experimenting because of not being able to win or having a painful experience, so nerfing all strong perks to a certain level where people have perks for a marginal improvement than a game-destroying one may make people a little less choosey, experiment more and ultimately start to have fun again.
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The "parents" in this scenario created something for others to enjoy. The "children" are whining and causing trouble and will keep causing trouble regardless despite the fact that the thing they're whining about wouldn't exist without the parents. It would be more accurate to say that strangers are whining to the parents about their child for petty reasons. Blaming the parents seems to us like the easy (and false) way out.
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I'm of the belief its because the developers don't have good enough tutorials and a grading system to help people understand what they should be doing. As the developer I would let my community know through much better tutorials and grade system than we have now that it is PERFECTLY FINE to get 2 kills. You did good! You killed half of the team and that qualifies as a win for the Killer and win for the 2 Survivors that escaped. I see nothing wrong with that. Why can't both sides win? If it has to do with your ranking system and weird math... Well...just CHANGE the numbers until they meet the new goal.. Its not like they couldn't change the values of anything in the game to match what they wanted it to. They are limited by what they see as a "priority" in their daily list of chores, which unfortunately.. that priority list hasn't included a game health change since.....I can't even remember..tbh :/
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Honestly, I have to agree. These days I watch far more videos of games than I do participating in them. The other day I wanted to play a survivor game, and we encountered a Bubba who proceeded to slug everyone. He pick you up to think he was going to hook you, only to put you back down again. It was the most miserable four minutes.
Last week OhTofu uploaded a match where he played against a steam player that only had 190 hours in the game versus his 11,000 hour killer. Sweaty players are one thing, but SBMM is a miserable thing altogether.
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Yeah makes me think they're scared to put any new modes in the game as it would make a fresh divide in the already small amount of people still playing.. Like the number of people playing DBD daily is just too small for them to feel comfortable to make a new game mode perhaps.. (shrugs)
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Getting rid of those won't change the experience of not feeling like you can just play the game casually.
This game is nearly 10 years old and has been optimized greatly by players, but the game doesn't have an "off switch" where you can just kinda just play the game without caring about whether or not you're being optimal. DBD is suffering from a lack of ways to engage with the game and ways to separate the people who need that heavy competition feel from those who just want to goof around for a bit.
As long as DBD continues to have a singular catchall mode of play casual players aren't going to get as much out of it. Casual players often want a variety of things to in a game. Tomes could have been a great way to handle that if they were paired with a single player or co-op story mode component. Casual lore people could actually be getting the part of the game they care about through gameplay that engages them independent of the usual dbd experience. Right now casual lore players will kinda sorta play the game when it strikes them, but usually just watch youtube videos instead of doing tome challenges.
Casual players want and need casual spaces in games.
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We can agree to disagree.
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The game does have a casual 'do what you want' mode though.
Custom Games
It's just there's a requirement to organise your own party.
I've said before, that there should be some sort of queue filler or game listing for custom games that you can list for open play. You could choose between a closed lobby (how it is now) or an open lobby (open for random players to join).
Open custom lobbies could be searchable through a system similar to friend finder, have exclusions for blocked accounts, etc.
And while custom games shouldn't award challenges and dailies, XP, or effect MMR. I think they could award a reduced BP score. Maybe something simple like 5000 per game plus 5000 for escaping/1250 per kill.
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I guess I need to get an idea of what exactly a casual game means to you. I feel like I play pretty casually and have fun for the most part and am curious whether the difference is in our experience or our expectations.
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I don't think you can really come home from a long day at work and play a couple of games on either role without the game being more trouble than it's worth.
that is exactly how I play. I have fun.
Don't feel like I have to sink 6 hours to have fun, just to speed up the bp progress
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I don’t get what you want. The game is 7 years old and people have been playing for years, so obviously it is being optimized. I also don’t think anyone on this forum can really consider themselves “casual” since you have to be pretty dedicated to the game to want to post on here.
This is yet another example of how some of you don’t seem to play other games. ALL pvp games get optimized and have a meta. Dbd isn’t special.
It looks like someone might be agreeing that this is the least enjoyable the game has ever been ;)
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For most people, it might be.
For me personally, it's fine. I play very competitively and it works for me.
I'm able to remove myself from that mindset and look at it from a more reasonable perspective.
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It isn’t reasonable to assume dbd is a casual game when it’s as dense and knowledge-intensive as it is.
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The game was much more fun back in the day when nobody knew what they were doing, I miss those times
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in the case of fortnite. it's 100 players per match. they all have mixed skill levels. the matches are usually very quick.
no mater what, you'll do stuff and have some amount of fun with it.
I literally stole a win after a couple matches by happening to survive alone while everyone else killed each other.
I have no idea how people built as effectively or as fast and they did, but I can point a gun and shoot while jumping. and that was enough to play the game.
same applies for fallguys. just let the mini-games sort them out as they go. casuals who lost just go next, while the guys who learn all the mini-games usually win more consistently.
all of those games have people learning the better strategies and optimal ways of doing whatever.
fortnite having actual tournaments and stuff.
now for a fighting game for instance... if there was no mmr system, you would not be able to play online casually. including in casual. the disparity between someone who knows what they are doing and someone who doesn't is just too big.
and still exists even with mmr. it just eventually kinda works itself out.
but I don't really see people complaining that the online in fighting games is bad because the other players are too good sometimes. as a casual, it's expected that you need to learn your character "enough" in order to go online and not lose your entire health bar in 10 seconds.
I think that is the mentality we should have and promote in dbd. yeah you can just go online and play, nothing wrong with that, but you should expect you will likely get "combo'ed" to death if all you know is "jump kick".
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Custom Games do not necessarily equal casual content.
This is something that a lot of genres have had to learn and re-learn over the years.
Since I'm the most familiar with fighting games I use them as an example. Fighting games for the longest time no matter how much attention they got ultimately stayed extremely niche because they were often very content light. Casual players would play for a while and do their own things, but ultimately they weren't having good experience tailored towards them and wouldn't stick around.
It was until fighting games developers started actually pushing out features that catered towards the casual audience that they experienced huge growth outside of their hardcore fanbase. Things like story modes, minigames, and even detailed training and trial modes helped greatly with growth and retention.
A variety of content is ultimately what gives a game a longer shelf life. In order for custom games to fill that void in DBD players need the actual tools to change how the game plays. A lot of that support that commonplace in FPS games started out as mods that got popular enough to adopted officially by the devs. We don't have level of creative freedom in DBD so custom games in this game aren't going to address the issue.
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SBMM needs to be removed. It doesnt even work because on my new epic free account as killer, I am still put with teams of full teachable perks and my level is 5.
As a solo q player I am put with people who literally have less than 50 hours and I have 3000. As killer im put against seal team 6.
Go watch angry joe playing nic cage release. He is level 5, got 2 nurses in a row. We are suffering thru MMR and the noobs arent even getting the benefit.
I am DYING for a competitor to this game. VERY excited for TCM - you watch a BP event on august 18
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What an hypocrite take when you were the one replying to players, mostly killers saying the game is not fun anymore, that they should get good, spend time training for hours, reviewing their gameplay, learn about comp, ect…
And now you are saying that you don’t have fun anymore sweating ? LOL.
Everything that was fun has been removed in the sake of balance and comp, and you are surprised we end up with a sweaty boring game ?
Post edited by Murgleïs on4 -
Balance Update for "Fair Play", Competitive Gameplay or Player, Community Tournament ruin fun in this game
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As much as I hate to say it, you've got a point. DBD as a casual experience is pretty awful right now, regardless of which side you choose to play. The end result of BHVR not knowing what they want their game to be, resulting in the balancing/matchmaking nightmare we've had to deal with. The other side is unfortunately the community themselves. Far too many people take losses soooo seriously and far too many people cannot resist gloating after a dub. This isn't unique to a certain role, both are at fault here.
The only way I can see the casual scene recover is if two things happen: First, have BHVR crack down hard on toxicity. Instead of using the censor system (which functions about as well as a condom in a convent) start saving EG chats and ban the people who say disgusting things. Second, have them implement rewards for being positive. Maybe something similar to OW endorsement system, where you used to get a reward after enough positive reviews.
I'm not sure what the right thing to do is, but something needs to change
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Where in my post did I say that this applied to me personally? I did not.
I am capable of seeing things from different views. In fact, this started because I was doing the math on the Shard grind and found out you'd need around 1500 hours to unlock Killers with Shards.
Casual players hear that and leave, so that's what got ms thinking.
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Ranked would be executeable to a certain degree. Offer stuff exclusively limited to ranked and people should experience ranked games as a sort of "test" where they go up against a killer of their rank or a freshly promoted/demoted one and every 5-10 games is forced to be ranked otherwise it is casual.
But it definietly needs to be built/blended into casual play because people are willing to go for the throat in this game. Or just add rank based perks (ash IV gets +5% speed, +5% action speed for each survivor alive etc. [this needs actual balancing but you get my idea]) and maybe get handicaps based on rank difference/high ranks for balancing purposes so a new killer won't be face stomped by 4 man swfs as they step into the game.
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I couldn't agree more.
Finding the "fun" whenever I play DbD has never been more difficult. I often run dumb gimmick builds to try and make my games more interesting. But that doesn't fix the abysmal SBMM system and the regressive mindset that most players seems to have that makes them give up at the slightest inconvenience.
I really wish they brought back the Casual and Ranked ques. It wouldn't fix any of the core issues with the game. But at least people would have different expectations when going into a match. Because right now it really feels like no one is playing DbD with the intent to actually have fun.
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I think it really comes down to the streamers. They are the ones that come up with these crazy combos and game breaking plays whether they are killer or survivor mains, they really are the ones who set the standard on how to play. How many of us watch several of them on an every day basis and start picking up their playstyle and habits. Monkey see monkey do... (shoulder shrug)
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the crazy thing is I literally came here to say this. I just spent 2 hours playing survivor and didn't enjoy a single game because every killer wants to camp, slug, tunnel, sweat, and it's impossible to just open the game and have fun doing event quests.
Literally first game, the Singularity with iron grasp carries someone to the basement, puts pods all around and inside shack and then just goes into sleep mode right in front of the basement hook. Why do people have to make this game so damn boring and insufferable.
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Well, I can't speak for the average Fortnite player but my 8 year old daughter plays it to track down a dinosaur to ride 🤣 my 8 year old nephew though will berate himself and get very upset if he loses. One cares about the experience more than the outcome, the other just cares about the outcome.
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I had a suggestion in the feedback section awhile ago to make the thumbs-up in post-game screen mean something. For it to build up reputation points or something that can earn you exclusive stuff or even just bloodpoints. It won't eliminate bad manners but I'll bet it help limit it.
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I used to SWF with some awesome folks a few years ago, one of which whenever we got a Plague would spend the entire match chasing me around just to puke on me.
This player was a decent looper, knew what tf gens were, had good game sense, and possessed the uncanny ability to hide in plain sight & somehow get away with it. A definite plus to the overall team. Unless we faced a Plague.
Miss those days. 😕
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I’m at the point where I only play this game on my days off because after working a night shift this game is just infuriating and I’ll just chill on something else
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The game would be fun “competitively” if you were paired with and against people of equal MMR. Same goes for casual games.
The MMR quality is so bad it just gives you whoever at this point and you have no choice but to sweat because you cannot depend on the randoms with sub 500 total hours against an experienced killer when you have double to triple their hours. Even against newer killers my teammates still manage to die. That’s where it becomes boring because it’s basically a 1v1.
Same goes for killer, I’d love to go against people who actually want to initiate chases and such, not just bring the most busted crap to crank gens and hide & hold W key to waste time the whole game. It’s boring. I had to throw a gen slowdown build on and sweat because it’s the majority of my games now.
The game should be both casual and competitive but the current state of it is stale and boring. Big part of it is MMR balancing.
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The reason why matchmaking was stretched so much was because not enough people played Killer regularly.
It’s either fast queues and messy lobbies or slow queues and decent lobbies
I doubt that there are enough Killers now even if they reverted to pre 6.1.0 matchmaking. Give people more reason to play Killer and matchmaking can be reverted to have more balanced lobbies
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I agree. I hate how only escapes and kills are accepted as a win. It often feels really unfair and knowing you go lower in MMR because of a tunneler or because a "great" teammate (and depip then too) just feels not good. I really miss the old ranking system. I gave up playing this game, though I sometimes watch streamers playing it. I was really excited for the Alien chapter, but I feel how this game is affecting me mentally and I just have to stop. I hope the MMR and depip system will be gone someday, also kills and escapes not be counted as a win anymore... I'd try to play again then. The rest of you, I hope you have good games and fun in this game!
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Too many people blaming the community for being in this position when it’s entirely on the devs. Sure, the community can suck, what games doesn’t? I get that they’re trying to address some of these issues with the anti camp and 3 genning fixes but their lack of action on fixing these unhealthy mechanics when they’ve been complained about for years put this game in this spot.
I don’t want to sound too harsh but it’s became clear to me that they don’t play test their game enough. So many head scratching decisions that make it to live that wouldn’t if they simply thoroughly tested their ideas.
The game needs to be heavily rebalanced in a more enjoyable and healthy way for both sides but I dont think we’ll see that day for a long time.
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I do disagree with that. I'm having fun even if I know that what I'm doing is pointless, as long as I'm aware that what I've done was the best thing I could have done at that time, regardless of how pointless it was.
If the killer tries to take advantage of me being a bad player, I'm gonna be the one having easier times due to running Renewal, Lithe, and Off The Record to buy my team even more time than the game mechanics do intend, making the killer feeling all miserable and regret starting to tunnel me in the first place, as it's basically a receipt to guarantee the other two survivors an easy escape.
Although one sided matches aren't fun, I can be satisfied with knowing that I've made the match fun for the people who were involved within it. Losing or winning is very much irrelevant to me. I do prefer having balanced matches, having players pull out some ace cards during the match and completely turn it around, but those are very rare, indeed.
The casual mindset is that you don't care about losing or winning. Winning is just a bonus. You do play to have fun, and if you're not having fun the moment you're losing, you're no longer within the casual mindset, but leaning quite heavily onto the competitive mindset that causes you to treat it competitively and robbing you off all the entertainment that you could've had if you were to force yourself or think about it to see it in a different way. Like you have, however, mentioned within the past responses, you're a competitive player, so I don't really expect you to understand what I'm going on about, because our point of views do differ quite majorly from each other.
*Don't mind the edit, it was just a correction of grammar mistakes, like thinking too far ahead and typing „to“ instead of „do“, and so on..
Post edited by Neprašheart on2 -
Lots of people play casually and still have fun, I know I'm one of them and I play with a group of them.
DBD is still fun, I think you need to take a break. Its not as bad as you constantly make it out to be and if you are hating on it so much then maybe its time to step back for a while.
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The feel of the game has changed compared to 2-3 years ago but i'm not sure why that is, probably a combination of things:
- old rank system made the game more casual and surprising, as rank was more a sign of high playing time than "skill" (not that the current SBMM is based on skill, but it made both sides sweat for kills and escapes). Going for Emblems (as it was needed for the old rank system) doesn't require you to sweat as hell and play "unfun".
- the general level of knowledge amongst seasoned and mediocre players has gotten higher thanks to all those tutorials, streamers etc., you will see more and more optimal strategies and less casual players who just dumb around
- the playerbase naturally adapts and those new rules and the balance changes forced us to become more sweaty and to focus on kills and escapes, which means unfun strategies like tunneling, camping and an optimal survivor team strategy have become necessary. Otherwise you will have to deal with low MMR teammates and boring matches
Besides that, there is and always was a part of the playerbase who wants competitive matches with ladders, SBMM and all that stuff. Back then people complained about the casual party game-nature of the game.
I think the biggest problem is, they stopped midway, they didn't took it far enough. You either make the game casual or competitive. Right now we have something in the middle of it.
If you want a truly competitive and fair game, you have look at comp DBD and their rules. They barely allow items, they have a map pool for every killer, they ban overpowered perks or only allow them on low tier killers. If you want fair competition, you can only allow a small amount of randomness. I mean, right now you can play Coal Tower and either get a busted setup or you get L-T walls. Yes, the game would be a bit more predictable but right now skill doesn't matter that much when the odds are against you and the other side just brings better stuff.
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The games currently in its worst state since I started in 2017 for me.
The only good thing is I used to buy the highest auric cell pack every few months atleast. I havent spent a penny on the game in 1 year now.
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I didn't say this was about me.
I'm still having an acceptable time on the game, as I play very competitively, but all of my more casually-minded friends have quit.
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You didn't provide that as context, all you have here is a complaint about how the game isn't fun and how it has to change in order to be fun again.
Well lots of people still play and find it fun probably more so than than your small collection of friends who've quit.
There is plenty of fun to be had for the casual gamer and if a player is struggling to find it then walking away for a bit, as your group of friends has done, is the probably best idea.
"I don't think the game can be played at an average casual level anymore. I don't think you can really come home from a long day at work and play a couple of games on either role without the game being more trouble than it's worth." You're speaking on the behalf of others, that sounds like a personal view to me. Be honest with yourself if you aren't having fun stop for a while.
I don't think you play competitively, more lilkely you play too seriously, because you often gripe about competitive mechanics and strategies listing them as unfun.
Your complaints are incongruous with your stance on how you play, yet you said you're still having fun because of your competitive mindset err... ask yourself who are you trying to convince the forums or yourself?
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hey pulsar! happy to see you again
unfortunately i too agree with your statement, but not necessarily on a negative note. games evolve over the course of their lifespan, and what can be a simplistic game can easily turn out to be one of the most competitive pieces of media in the video game world (think: super smash bros. melee) due to player innovation and discovery.
because DBD has grown to become a very technical game, it forces a much different mindset beyond the goal of just hooking/killing and escaping. parts are constantly moving in the game, and it is up to the player to decide how they want to pursue the match since it is an ever-changing battlefield, similar to real life!
notwithstanding, i do feel that player attitude is primarily what discourages people from adopting a healthier mindset to these changes. i feel like that the persistent drive to win every game has poisoned some players' ability to differentiate between when they're having fun and when they are trying too hard to make something fun. it's very easy to lose sight of what's possible.
it's why i try so hard to talk to people and let them know that it's okay to step it down a notch and enjoy the game for what it is and what it has to offer, rather than constantly pushing themselves into burnout or an unhealthy relationship with the game.
i wish people would listen to me when i say these things. not as an ego thing, but rather just for the sake of them and the sake of this community. these forums reflect the very thing you talk about, and it makes me sad to see.
i hope one day people see what i'm talking about.
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