The second iteration of 2v8 is now LIVE - find out more information here: https://forums.bhvr.com/dead-by-daylight/kb/articles/480-2v8-developer-update

Kill switch Skull Merchant until her rework

I have played a total of 10 games between yesterday and today, and 4 of them were Skull Merchants that just played with themselves in a 3 gen doing that strategy that we all know about. Most of the times even with map offerings that will place the game on a map with the strongest 3 gen RNGs. The games took around 30-35 minutes and was the most miserable experience ever.

2 of the games were in SWFs and we escaped, but the other 2 were solo and people just gave up and she just slugged or even made people wiggle out on purpose just to keep them hostage in the game. "Just DC!" can't even be a response, because it happens more than once a day and the penalties can go so high + that should never be the fix to an issue in the game to prevent you from having a 40 minutes game full of misery and boredom with nothing you can do (the solo ones I mean in particular).

Next week we will get the Alien chapter that will most likely bring loads of new players, and returning ones, and there will be people still doing this Skull Merchant gameplay, and those players will just uninstall the game right away after they meet these players more often than not.

I enjoy her chasing builds and I play her often, but even myself I want her to get kill switched until her issues get properly addressed and fixed. Her tome and rift are over, so those who want to complete the challenges and didn't do it before can just complete them afterwards.

Please, listen and take action faster with these kind of issues. There was a reason why Eruption got nerfed right before her release, it wasn't just a coincidence. This had to be expected to happen, yet the release could not be delayed for whatever reason and that's understandable, but now enough time has passed and it's time to take action as soon as possible before it hurts people who were brought into the game thanks to the last events, Nicolas Cage and now Alien + the future chapter coming next.

«1

Comments

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    Note: About the Eruption thing, it got nerfed alone with a buff to Any Means Necessary right before her release, and then they were followed by more perks that got changed in the coming update for the Mid Chapter.

  • BlueHorkew
    BlueHorkew Member Posts: 1,081

    I mean, i have only seen a few companies in general disabling content because of how toxic or disliked it is, but i have also never seen something that extends games to 4* or 5* regular match length on the level of SM, so she is a big failure.

    Still, some people paid for her, so i doubt bhvr would be happy to disable paid content or to even admit how much of a failure SM is.

    Since disabling SM would be basically admiting what a huge mistake she was.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    Calling it "not liking to play against her" is very naive to say. Some people don't even have the time of a day to have what can be up to 3 50 minute dbd games in a day. You can say that about versing Nurse or Blight, that the games most of the times and quick and that's that. But saying it like that comes out as very oblivious about the problem, or you just don't happen to verse this kind of players as often as others do (what I really love for you and even envy.)

    I hope you understand that eventually people, and most likely solo players, will tend to just bring builds based on distortion, sole survivor, wake up and left behind with a key and just hold the game hostage for killer by just hiding (which of course would be just as obnoxious and annoying, and should not be a thing and there should be a way to combat it even now that it's not an actual common thing, but if it happened I would want the problematic perks to get kill switched until a proper fix happens.) If Skull Merchant stays as is for longer before her rework, survivors will switch to builds to hold the killer hostage, and it's going to become a vicious cycle because it's always how this community has worked.

    I think nobody wants the meta to becoma the "holding hostage" meta, do they?

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    They already told it by saying the rework for her is already in the works. Of course they're are not going to say they messed up, but it's a way to say by making that statement since nothing that works properly and as intended needs a change less than a year from release.

    Most people don't even care about losing, they just don't want to play a 40 minutes game of Dead by Daylight every other game sometimes. Because if it happens once, they will DC, but it can happen all over again and the penalty will go so high.

    I liked that the famous video blew up to address the issue, but of course people used to be quirky and annoying on purse (I literally have screenshots of chats after the game stating that they did it to spit survivors and revenge for getting BMed by survivors before and that sort of comments.) It's really concerning the situation this is getting to, and I expect them to do something about it before it hurts the popularity of the game now that it really needs it the most and they are getting good content lately.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    I really hope you get 4 games to up to 50 minutes every day, or even every other day, and you tell us about your beautiful experience here! We will be here to listen to you. Cheers!

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    You clearly didn't even bother reading my text because you skipped the part of the holding the game hostage on purpose and refusing to kill the survivors by any means. Have a nice day! :)

  • Venusa
    Venusa Member Posts: 1,489

    I expect that she's going to get a whole rework considering what devs alluded to but looks like it's going to take some time and disabling her for that entire time would be unrealistic since there's going to be players that express the content they paid for shouldn't be taken away from them for months which is a valid argument.

    But I understand the frustration. Trust me I wouldn't say a word if Skull Merchant straight up disappeared some day.

  • Rizzo
    Rizzo Member, Administrator, Mod Posts: 17,849

    Let's keep the discussion civil and constructive, thank you.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    I call out gameplay styles that hold the game hostage and orbit around that idea, don't try leave the point I am trying to make here. I would also push for a mechanic to avoid survivors from just hiding without progressing the game in any way, shape or form, and that's why I made the example of the "what if" survivors push for a meta that they just hide and bring perks for hatch or opening gates and that becomes the normal for solo Q at least. Don't worry, mate, I am not the biased one! Again, have a nice day. :) (Will read but not reply again regardless, sorry)

  • Annso_x
    Annso_x Member Posts: 1,611

    If you're on a gen she has no choice but to either down you, in which case you'll bleed out at some point, hook you, in which case you'll die, or let you do the gen, in which case you'll escape. If you refuse to engage in chases, don't wiggle and literally just do gens she'll be forced to advance the game one way or the other. It's still a pain, and I encourage you to report her in the post game screen, but at least you won't be stuck for 30minutes.

    Also pro tip: your 1st DC has a 1min penalty and resets after 24h if you don't DC again, so use that information wisely ;)

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    I think that it's indeed a good one if anything. If there was the "just hide since the beginning and use sole survivor, left behind blablabla" mindset and it grew as popular as this Skull Merchant gameplay has grown, I'd wanted them to kill switch the problematic perks until a mechanic to fight it is addressed, or they changed the perks (honestly, I hope it even gets addressed already, because it's deadly annoying as well). Solo Q is expected to be hard, I know what I queue up for, but I think nobody deserves to sit through 40 minutes of torture of the game no progressing. Please, most of the players that copycat that style literally say they want to win via the server closing after an hour. If that doesn't say enough, I don't know what else can.

  • BlueHorkew
    BlueHorkew Member Posts: 1,081

    I am not opposed to disabling her until the rework comes. I don't see any good on having her roam around free making most matches horrible

    I just don't think bhvr wants to do it. It would be really embarrassing for them.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    I think it's more embarrassing to allow what's happening right now and will give such a bad impression to new players and returning ones now especially with the big licenses that are being added to the game and will bring their separated audiences with them.The equal thing from the survivor side is hiding at a extreme level of stealth and using perks that will give a "free escape" at the end without the need of any progress during the game. This, of couse, should be addressed as well. Always commented on it before on social media before I started to post here, but for some reason nobody cared as much as they do with Skull Merchant (maybe because it's literally too trendy.) I hope we don't enter a cycle of holding the other side hostage and mechanics / reworks come in as soon as possible.

  • Crowman
    Crowman Member Posts: 9,517

    It should not. It's meant for bugs. Not for personal dislikes.

  • sizzlingmario4
    sizzlingmario4 Member Posts: 6,913

    I mean, I agree with you that playing survivor that way is boring and I'm of the opinion that perks like that shouldn't be in the game. But while I agree they should change those perks, there's no need to disable them in the meantime either, even though it absolutely sucks to have teammates who play like that.

    Basically, if you start killswitching things that are problematic/bad design, it becomes a judgment call on BHVR’s part. Where do you draw the line between problematic and should be killswitched pending balance changes, and something that is problematic but not enough to be killswitched? You would have players on both sides complaining that A and B things got disabled but C and D weren’t. It may also act as an avenue for BHVR to put off needed updates to something when they can just killswitch it and forget about it. If for example, there’s a perk that is clearly overpowered and needs a nerf, instead of working to nerf it ASAP they killswitch the perk and no longer have as much of a sense of urgency to change it, meanwhile we have content disabled for an extended period of time.

  • DaddyMyers_Mori
    DaddyMyers_Mori Member Posts: 2,205

    People still didn't learn what holding the game hostage means?

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    I am not complaining because she is OP, I am complaining because the way that strategy works pushes the game to last an hour. That's why I am complaining about this and not about Nurse, Blight, MFT or any other of those things that are the every day topic of "omg this is OP". I don't care about that, I'd rather take a quick match winning or losing against a Blight with the strongest addons than being forced to play an hour game of somebody just spamming space bar on a generator and refusing to chase, kill and so on.

    That's why I also brought up that survivor gameplay of just hiding with hatch offerings, perks to push to hide for hatch / solo gates instantly being opened, because if you have people that start playing like that in your games and it becomes meta, you are not going to be able to find them at all and the game is going to just become "let's see who holds the other side hostage for longer".

    So again and to make it clear for the last time, I am reporting feedback on being held hostage in games (in this case as survivor against Skull Merchant that just kick gens, but can be applied to inmersed survivors that are just waiting for hatch since minute 1), and not only her rework should be coming as fast as possible, but to prevent these situations to happen again in the future a mechanic of some sort should be implemented (both for killer and survivors being held hostage in games for longer than x minutes).

  • DaddyMyers_Mori
    DaddyMyers_Mori Member Posts: 2,205

    You are being hostage if only way to get out of the game is disconnect.

    So typically it's either cheater or last survivor got trapped in corner. If there are two or more survivors, you can't be held hostage (other survivors can finish gens or you die to EGC).

    Alternative would be when killer is cooperative with other survivors to trap you, but that's super rare.


    If you can give up (die) during that game, it's not hostage situation. Both sides simply refuse to lose.

    She doesn't want to kill you? Well, then you can work on gen and ignore her drones....

    Best way to deal with this is actually stay injured, ignore drones and try to force gens (prerun when she gets nearby). Either you manage to break it, or die trying, but it definitely won't be hour long game.

  • CatnipLove
    CatnipLove Member Posts: 1,006

    Has BHVR made any comments other than, a rework is coming at some point in the future? It would be great to know if there is some temporary fix on the way, that will limit her ability to do what the OP is complaining about. Especially as it's extremely easy, and therefore appealing to trolls.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    I have also complained about the body blocking in a corner situation and people called me exagerated and that it's part of the game still, and doesn't happen often enough to make a fix to it (which could be something as simple as removing colision once the survivor gets crows.)

    If you want to make it from the killer POV, I bet you don't want to get into a cycle of facing survivors that get inmersed in a map big enough for them to just hide and you have to play hide and seek for an hour, right? It's the exact same situation, but just doesn't happen that often so people don't complain about it as much. But if now it becomes trendy just because somebody makes it popular because a video gets clout like the Skull Merchant one, get ready to face those teams (or even solos) just wanting to play hide and seek every other game.

    Making peace with being able to make games take up to an hour is insane to me. Because the reasoning behind most players that play this style is that they don't want to win via the intended way, they want the server to close and all survivors die if that happens, and they also said that they want to make survivors annoyed and feel miserable by wasting their time.

    Will see what the anti-3 gen update they're making will bring, because if it doesn't solve the problem from the root this same scenario will happen with a future release of a killer that has some kind of power to do the same she does.

  • DaddyMyers_Mori
    DaddyMyers_Mori Member Posts: 2,205

    I am not saying it's not an issue. Both sides making game way longer (hiding or protecting 3-gen from start). That's why I said I would be happy for give up button.

    I just don't like incorrect using of terms. Same for gen rush/tunneling/camping. It's overused and it didn't really happen in most cases.

    3-gen is not a bad thing unless killer goes for it from start of the game as a main plan.

    It's same for tunneling, or camping.

    I can say same for survivors. Game will be really bad (for killer) when you have group of 4 x headon build, refuse to work on gens and just try to get most stuns possible.

    Or having gen speed perks and trying to end game under 5 minutes.

    Or trying to play hide and seek from start until you get bored....

    On small scales those things are valid and have a place in specific situations. It becomes an issue when players make it main and only thing for whole game.

  • appleas
    appleas Member Posts: 1,128

    You’re thinking about it only from a gameplay perspective. The devs have other things to take into consideration before killswitching a Killer indefinitely for a non bug.

    The quickest way to your problem would be to acquire BHVR as a company, then you can delete whichever Killer you want.

  • Archael
    Archael Member Posts: 838

    Skull Merchant im current state should be removed from the game. Best to disable her and do a overhaul of her power.

    She should place some traps, and release Stones that will seek for survivors who interacted with traps. Those drones should give some debuffs for survivors and trigger killer instinct. But she should not have undetectable nor apply expose especially passively just by doing gens.

    At the very least, disabling drones by survs should NOT give them any downsides, and those drones should have longer recharge time (and maybe shorter deploy animation, new drone over limit should breake earliest placed drone).

  • CrypticGirl
    CrypticGirl Member Posts: 659

    Maybe they should disable DC penalties until her rework instead. It's simple to do, they've done it before, people can still play as Skull Merchant if they want, and no one would be punished for leaving the match.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    Asking to remove dc penalties in general is very naive to say, it’s always been. They can’t do that because not only survivors would dc (i don’t care there are bots, that’s not their purpose and they are still green), killers would dc left and right for the bare minimum without punishment and no game would go past 2 minutes most of the times. So please, stop shielding every problem behind “just remove DC penalty” because it’s not the good solution most people think it is and it needs deeper study than that (I’d like a forfeit poll past 10-15 minutes for example.)

  • CrypticGirl
    CrypticGirl Member Posts: 659

    Of course I wouldn't expect it to happen, though it would be nice. Though the suggestion can't be any more naive than asking to killswitch the Skull Merchant just because people don't like her design, and as others have already said, that's not what the killswitch is for.

    "Stop shielding every problem behind 'just remove DC penalty'?" Why would you say that when you want to shield the Skull Merchant problem by asking for her to be killswitched?

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    SM has been proven to be able to hold a 3 gen for over 50 minutes against the most switched on survivors you could ever meet. The whole idea that 90% of her players go for since that famous video is to make the game last for as long as possible until either the survivors just kill themselves and give up or get the servers to shut down after an hour (which also, should not be a thing and it should count as a draw for both sides regardless of the amount of survivors left when the server closes.) If that's not a reason to cut the problem from the source until properly addressed, I don't know what other thing is needed to understand it. Deactivating one character that is causing games of DbD to last an hour and give up out of boredom, and making it the next big priority for the development team to fix it is the most direct fix in my opinion.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    They already said they're working on her rework, alongside an anti stale 3-gen gameplay mechanic when they did the Reddit thingy months ago, that's a pretty and sweet way to say it actually in my opinion!

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    Again, please, try to learn the difference between something being OP and something making games last 50 minutes. If so I'd say to kill switch Blight until his addons get properly checked, and I didn't. The only survivor gameplay to make games last that long is hide and seek with hatch/gates perks and I already commented, complained and gave feedback about that before. So please, if you are not going to bother reading everything, don't bother commenting nonsense that have nothing to do with the point given here. Have a nice day!

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715
    edited August 2023

    Yes they talked about many upcoming things! I'm sure there are videos on youtube that sum the whole Reddit thread up, you can easily find it if you search "Ask Me Anything Reddit Dead by Daylight". I believe FW PaulieEsther uploaded one for example :)

    Post edited by adaw0ng on
  • Merciless_Killer
    Merciless_Killer Member Posts: 115

    No. If they start kill switching everything people don't like they'd have to kill switch everything.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    It's not something people don't like, it's something that makes people have +30 minute games on average. There are plenty of things I don't like from both sides, but that's just my taste. This is not a taste issue.

  • Merciless_Killer
    Merciless_Killer Member Posts: 115

    Nothing makes anyone have long games but themselves. At any point in a match if either side feels like it is taking too long they could let the other side finish their objective. Survivors could give up. The killer could give up. It is when neither side does this that you can have games last that long. It is very much a taste issue.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    Making one side give up out of boredom and tediousness should never be the fix to anything. You either didn’t face many of these, or you play her like that, but I just hope that you are not unlucky enough to face her as usually as others do. And if you play killer more, I hope you don’t get immersed survivors every other game with solo hatch/gate builds that choose to hide from the get go and there is nothing the killer can do to avoid it (a gameplay that is just as problematic, boring and tedious to go against but not as common, so people don’t call it out as much.) Not everybody has 1 hour to spare for every dbd game they play.

  • Merciless_Killer
    Merciless_Killer Member Posts: 115

    You know what else isn't a fix to anything? Removing something because some people use it in ways you don't like.

    I don't see anyone advocating for killswitching hatch and gate perks because some survivors use them to stealth out forever for the end game. And if you aren't going to advocate for that or for killswitching anything else people don't like such as Nurse, Blight, Twins, Pinhead, MFT+Hope, Toolboxes, etc.(the list goes on forever lol) then I see no reason whatsoever to take this suggestion seriously.

  • adaw0ng
    adaw0ng Member Posts: 715

    You clearly didn’t even bother reading the comments where I talk about that survivor strategy so I am not going to bother reading any of your next comments and will ignore your profile. Have a nice day!

  • KaTo1337
    KaTo1337 Member Posts: 550

    We should be grateful to finally having a 3rd S-Tier-Killer ;-)

  • Merciless_Killer
    Merciless_Killer Member Posts: 115

    Spoken like someone who knows they have been proven wrong

  • Skarlaxion
    Skarlaxion Member Posts: 50

    Just for you, today i will play as a Kris 3genner

  • Caiman
    Caiman Member Posts: 2,886

    It's one thing for Skull Merchant to guard a 3-gen, because her power is very effective it. I don't understand why they're also so obsessed with slugging, though. At this point Skull Merchant has the worst reputation of any killer in the game because not only is her power a completely design failure and her character a load of nonsense, even the people who play her are turning out to be extremely harmful to the game experience. At least Nurses and Blights kill you quickly without wasting time.