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stricter MMR is good but there are a few big problems!

Hello everyone and developers,

so today Mandy confirmed that the MMR Softcap has been indeed increased which means that players with similar skill ceiling will play against each other more often. In theory this is a good thing like a newer player won't meet a 10k player and destroies them in five seconds. However, in praxis my last few matches felt so awful and stressful. On the killerside: Don't get me wrong, I like to play against good players because you can learn from them, but having eight, ten, or twelve matches like this in a row feels so bad because every survivorteam used the best perks, items, addons, mapoffering and play like in a tornament. I adapted to it and this felt so awful because every game was like: "Ok play Nurse or Blight because the next match will be hard and find the weakest survivor and tunnel his ass out of the game asap". On the survivorside: Here I got to know the feeling that I gave survivor as a killer - Nurse and Blight with the best Addons and map offering that tunnels the weakest link out of the game. It feels like a vicious circle.

Overall, both experiences felt so awful and stressful because it felt the same over and over again. So I want to address the issues and how you, the developers, could solve these issues. Little sidenote: All of these points are not new or came up with the stricter MMR - they have always been there but are now much more noticeable - in my opinion.

Mainpoint in short: A stricter/better mmr is always good but the main point is due to the stricter mmr you feel the weaknesses and problems of this game strongly as you see/notice them more often.

On the killerside:

  • Experienced survivors like to use the strongest recources they have: My last games were survivors with builds like MFT, DH, DS, and Hope or FTP, Buckle Up with strong items and addons such as Medkit with Anti-Haemorrhagic Syringe or a strong Toolbox with good addons/BNP. These combinations/recources are very strong and actually unhealthy, especially against weaker killers.
  • Map Offerings: Good survivors know which map is the best map for them and how to prepair for it. As a result, they will send you to this map. This feels so bad because one side gets a huge advantage for free without any risc.
  • The goal for survivors is to do generators, open the gates and escape. Experienced survivors know this and they will always sit on generators when they are not in a chase or help someone. As a result, the game goes much quicker because these survivors does no sidequests like opening chests or cleansing totems. They also use good tools to do generators quicker. I understand this, because sitting on generators can be sometimes very underwhelming.

On the survivorside:

  • Experienced killerplayers know that Nurse and Blight are the strongest killer in the game and there is no reason not to use them for a good advantage. This feels so awful when you face the same killer(s) over and over again - knowing they are too strong for the game.
  • Map offering: Same thing for killers, they know which is the best map for them and they will use them.
  • Tunnling: Tunnling is a very strong and good tactic to win the game and killers have no reasons not to tunnel one person out of the game.

The solutions:

  • Broken combinations and addons need to be nerfed or reworked (e.g. toolboxes need a nerf, Syringes need a nerf, Buckle Up and FTP should not work together).
  • Buff weaker perks: Both sides have so many perks but both sides only use a handful of them. The reason is very simple: Many of these perks are bad or weak and need a buff to be better. Of cause some perks need a big buff or rework but there are some perks that only need a little tweak (e.g. give I'm All Ears and Thrilling Tremors a shorter cooldown).
  • Map offerings need to be removed or nerfed in some way so one side does not get a great advantage for no reasons. It feels so painful when the survivors send you to Badham, Eyrie of Crows ect. or the killer is a Blight and sends you to his best map.
  • In the same breath, some maps need a rework/tweak (e.g. Midwich and Hawkins are a very confusing for survivors and strong for killers, while Badham is very strong against many killers. Borgo is still too red and an accessibility issue for many players).
  • Tunnling: Killers should get rewarded for not tunneling so they have less reasons to tunnel one survivor out of the game (e.g. make Grim Embrace basekit with bonus BP when activating it). Some players suggest killers should get punished for tunnling but I think this is the wrong way - you should be rewarded for doing "the right" thing. In addition, tunneling is a fair strategy and sometimes the killers needs to tunnel (it's nothing personal) - the main issue is to tunnel a person five seconds after the start of the match out of the game/the missing reason not to tunnel.
  • Nurse and Blight need a big nerf/rework (e.g. give Nurse an unique counterplay like Xenomorph with Turrets or Singularity with EMP have or a greater cooldown for her power; Blight's addons need a rework and maybe a higher cooldown for his power).
  • Give survivors a little sidequest to slow them down with a good reward for doing it (e.g. I saw a post in which someone said make Hex: Ruin basekit for killers. This is a good idea and maybe give extra BP or a temporarily genbuff for cleansing this totem).
  • Extra BP or something like this for playing uncommon killers. Many killerplayers play the strongest killer in the game because there are no reasons to play the weaker ones. So it could be a good idea to rewarding a killerplayer for playing an uncommon killer. This would also give the survivors more variety.
  • Buffing weaker killers: Surprise! it feels better to play a killer when they are not weak or awful to play (e.g. Knight has a lot of bugs, his guards are pathetic easy to outplay and he is so addon dependent - overall awful to play; Dredge is map and addon-dependent while his power feels sometimes so bad and weak -> awful to play; Pig has no chasepower and every loop feels so painful -> awful to play).


As I mentioned earlier, nothing of these suggestions/issues are new or came up with the stricter MMR. Some of these solutions don't come directly from me but from other players - just check this forum and you will find many posts about these points.

I'm aware that some of these points need their time but you, the developers, should really take the time and care about them because they are important points because they are detrimental to the gaming experience on both sides.

Comments

  • Devil_hit11
    Devil_hit11 Member Posts: 8,819

    they are buffing killers. Look at recent Trickster rework. It is just that there is literal pushback on legit really good changes in that PTB. Casual survivors feedback are making it difficult to put killer in a good spot. Skull merchant rework is decent. All they need to improve few add-on's. Why did they nerf yellow low-powered mode? I am still hoping they buff Expired batteries, Supercharger and High-powered mode Add-on's for skull merchant.

    They're also improving perks such as New background player and Furtive chase. It is just that it is at such slow-rate that they need more perk changes. what would be ideal 5 unpopular perks on each side being improved.

    Map offering are not a problem. with enough game-time, you will play all the maps. Map offering just means that you will be playing on that map a bit more than usual.

  • Quizzy
    Quizzy Member Posts: 862

    I kinda laughed a bit only on the toolboxes and syringes need a nerf when they've already been nerfed in the past. They are honestly fine. I just wish we got some new items as survivors tbh

  • UndeddJester
    UndeddJester Member Posts: 3,361
    edited November 2023

    Can someone correct me if I'm wrong please, I was of the understanding that MMR is on a killer by killer basis...

    Doesn't that mean that the argument of having to pick Nurse or Blight doesn't make a difference, because your Trapper/Shape MMR will not pair you with the same level of survivors that your Nurse/Blight level will?

    If you want easier matches, shouldn't you actually play a killer you're not as good at?

  • Mooks
    Mooks Member Posts: 14,800

    Pretty much everyone thinks they are highest mmr and affected by this so.. gonna be fun (as in: already bored of it) that everyone will argue that their matches are totally affected by this.

    I do wonder if there is some number how many people actually hit the softcap before it was raised now?

  • canu
    canu Unconfirmed, Member Posts: 18

    could you guys at least start changing the way survivors gain mmr? i think everyone can agree that just because you escape doesn't necessarily mean you are skilled as a player

    mmr shouldn't increase purely based on escapes only

  • Mooks
    Mooks Member Posts: 14,800

    They have said they want to introduce new items. May be a little while longer but not entirely out of reach at this point.

    hopefully they will update us on this soon as well…

  • canu
    canu Unconfirmed, Member Posts: 18

    idk where you are going with this


    if i really wanted to i can just bring hatch offerings and hide for 5 gens and sit next to shack and i will escape 60 out of 100 games

  • KaTo1337
    KaTo1337 Member Posts: 550

    Im waiting for the day when I will be able to see my MMR and see what MMR in numbers from Top to Bottom is.

  • Mooks
    Mooks Member Posts: 14,800

    If you actually succeed with this ‚strategy‘ 60 out of 100 games then you indeed are going against very inexperienced killers and should get higher mmr score though? The killer can see the offering after all and deny an escape - you would need to bring at least a key with you for that.

    but even then…

    the devs directly confirmed that hatch escapes do not increase your MMR nor do they decrease the killers‘.

  • HolyDarky
    HolyDarky Member Posts: 747

    ah alright, thanks for explaining it. But then it will still effect players with many hours/games and more wins.

    Can you tell us why you, the developers, did this change and if you will do additionally changes to make the mmr better and/or whether you will make it more transparent for us?


    According to the game/developers, every killer has a bit of an unique mmr, but at some point you notice which killer is good or bad and this feels awful. Also, I'm not interested in easier games - never said that lol - I care about the balancing of the game.


    Year, the developers keep buffing/tweaking/reworking killers and other stuff, which is good and great - I appreciated it. However, it is so slow and feels sometimes so rushed - we waited for a Skull Merchant rework for like 7 months. I also remember how they buffed Executioner by giving him the ability to torment survivors via its M2, which was awful and never came live - thank god. In this case they said they take later a look at him. I get that they are busy with other stuff - DLCs - but it would be great if they focus more on the current content and then on the new content. Year, PTB feedback is a little bit shacky but there are also many Fog Whisperer that give competent feedback as well as other good players. They also started to make later changes like nerfing Xenomorph after the livefeedback or the addon/EMP changes on Singularity, which was pretty nice. Of cause, some perks are tricky to buff but some are easy to buff (e.g. Background Player by just buffing the speed to make it more useful and funny).

    Map offerings are an issue in the game. But it's okay to have different opinions on this.


    Year, by saying nerf nurse and blight, try to fina a solution for tunneling, and making maps balanced for both sides.

  • lucidlux
    lucidlux Member Posts: 56


    That is drinking the kool-aid, survivors who escape but contribute nothing to their team and did everything possible to avoid interaction with the killer should not be going against tougher opponents while the teammates who run the killer for half the game or actually do objectives face a weaker killer because of the inability to create a good ranking system.

    Survivor MMR should be based off some combo of the emblems/pips gained and hours played, someone who scores 12k pts in a game with 7k of that being for an escape does not deserve a bump in their MMR while their teammate who has a score of 24k loses mmr because they died but did everything they could to help the team escape.

    As a killer I don't want those players in my matches, they are the ones who get downed after a 15 second chase and give up because the killer is too hard for them when they actually have to play the game. They never got the chance to learn to play the game because somehow that Bill with 2 perks and 30 hours is matched against people with 2k+ hours.

    On the survivor side it causes frustration for players when they have those players on their team, if we are 2 minutes into the game without corrupt and I can see I have teammates who haven't touched a gen I"ll go throw myself at the killer, and try to get a good chase in and then kill myself on hook and move onto the next game. Not good for anyone in the match, but I have 2.6k hours in the game, 99% of the time I shouldn't have those players in my matches with a quality rating system.

  • Seraphor
    Seraphor Member Posts: 9,420
    edited November 2023

    If they're the players who go down easily and give up on hook, then they won't have high MMR will they? You're not thinking this through.

    You're not thinking about what's good for the game, you're only thinking about what's good for you, which is evident by your attitude to giving up when you deem your teammates to be beneath you.

    You may not want these types of survivors in your prestige 1% comp level games, but lower skilled survivors don't deserve to have them either. At higher MMR, their chances of succeeding with their one-dimensional strategy decreases, meaning they won't be as good at escaping this way. If they never gained MMR, they'd be stuck in low MMR, winning every single game, never actually learning how to play.

    Judging by the language you use, you treat MMR as a prize to be earned by those worthy of it. It's not, it's a corrective force, that's why it's hidden.

  • TheTom20
    TheTom20 Member Posts: 484

    I haven't seen so many killers give or dc in such a long time sad times :(

  • Emeal
    Emeal Member Posts: 5,167

    You can confirm, there has been no changes to the mmr algorithm other than its usual movements?

  • ownoka
    ownoka Member Posts: 44

    MMR doesn't exist after 5pm, on the weekends or during peak times at special events, such as the 14th of every month when all the insane sweaty good killers come and just decimate everyone playing. You can't convince me that MMR is even worth talking about when Quality of Life for players under 2,000 hours is just awful for the times that a majority play the game. BHVR Admins, can you explain why MMR doesn't seem to exist during popular gameplay hours?

  • Zenislev
    Zenislev Member Posts: 160

    These changes are trash. Absolute trash. I haven't had a good game since they went through.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    While I agree on some of those things, I have to disagree on two especially, because 1. Map offerings are not the issue, the issue is maps being so unbalanced sometimes that you get put at a huge disadvantage if the other side uses such a map against you... Maps should just overall be more balanced... You should not load into a map thinking oh boy here we go kicking 20 safe pallets again and what not, that's the real issue here.

    2. Nurse already has unique counterplay, breaking line of sight and taking unexpected patching only works against her, while against other killers that need line of sight like Trickster, Huntress deaths linger this only slows them down for a bit against Nurse you need to blink to catch up so your pathing has a much bigger impact on the distance gained than against the other 3 mentioned. On a side note, I think that killer specific items that just work with pressing a button are not a good idea unless they allow you to show skill in some way, because think about it, if you use an emp to make singularity take longer to being able to telepoet you are not really doing something skillfully you just pressed a button and got another 10-15 seconds or whatever for it... If we get such items for more killers it should in a way that offers a learning curve.

  • Annso_x
    Annso_x Member Posts: 1,611

    True, my games have felt a bit sweatier on the killer side but not enough that I think I was impacted by this at all, some days are just like that.

  • Annso_x
    Annso_x Member Posts: 1,611

    How so ? If you're in average MMR you're not getting matched against people with really high MMR anymore, and if you're in really high MMR your matchmaking is more accurate.

  • Cecaelia
    Cecaelia Member Posts: 79

    Or another thought - just remove the MMR system and go back to the BP system.


    If you walk through the exit gates is not an indicator if you are good or not.


    What about the guy that ran the killer for all five gens but died? He's the reason why the exit gates could even be powered but he doesn't gain MMR because he died? What about the person that did all five gens but died while your team is doing totems, chests, sitting in a corner, or just going down repeatedly? Suddenly you don't deserve MMR because you died even though you are the reason why the exit gates are powered in the first place? What about people that do a combo of the two - running the killer and doing 3 gens but they get hooked once and die? Do they suddenly not deserve MMR?


    MMR just rewards a braindead playstyle of people sitting in the corner, doing totems, doing portals, hiding in lockers until the exit gates are powered so they can walk out the door. I play as a solo survivor and I cannot tell you how many times I have been in a match and for 8+ minutes the icons on my teammates (showing where they are doing stuff) does not change at all, but they walk out the door. The BP system was better because only the people that actually did stuff (gens, ran the killer, saved people) would rank up and therefore the playstyle of sitting in a corner and doing nothing all game but walking out the doors would not make you rank up - you would have depip or safety'd at mid ranks or depipped at red.


    TLDR: Your mmr system rewards a braindead playstyle and punishes the people interacting with the game.

  • Seraphor
    Seraphor Member Posts: 9,420

    deserve MMR?

    MMR just rewards

    MMR is not a reward system, that's why it's hidden.

  • Cecaelia
    Cecaelia Member Posts: 79
    edited November 2023

    MMR is a reward because you get to go against better players and byproxy get better teammates. That's a reward.


    Also this isn't league, having an MMR system in the first place is such an L grindset

  • Seraphor
    Seraphor Member Posts: 9,420

    MMR is a corrective system that aims to pit players against other players that have a similar chance of winning. It exists purely to seperate newbies from pros.

    It's not designed to be a stand in for a ranking system.

  • Cecaelia
    Cecaelia Member Posts: 79
    edited November 2023

    There is no such thing as a "pro" dbd player, for one.


    Two. You are matched with people of similiar MMR if they deserve to be at that mmr or not, with me just explaining on how mmr is not an indicator of skill since walking out the exit gate, especially with killers giving it to the last survivor (often times the person that has been hiding in a corner doing nothing) is even more egregious.


    Three, the corrective behavior of people hiding and doing nothing the entire time but being rewarded for it? Working as intended I suppose?


    We aren't going to see eye to eye - so this is my last response to you.

  • Seraphor
    Seraphor Member Posts: 9,420
    edited November 2023

    Three, the corrective behavior of people hiding and doing nothing the entire time but being rewarded for it? Working as intended I suppose?

    Yes, because they're not being rewarded. They're being matched with opponents more capable of killing them, to correct for their tactics.

    People who escape by hiding all game don't deserve to be in low MMR where they would get easier games. They deserve for the game to recognise that they're finding it too easy to escape, qnd make it more difficult for them to escape, regardless of how they escape.

  • Azulra
    Azulra Member Posts: 504

    One thing that I do have to mention is that Nurse physically can't be nerfed- DBD is teetering on the edge between a "Pay-To-Not-Grind" (PTNG) game and a "Pay-To-Win" (PTW) game and Nurse is keeping it on the "PTNG" side because following her are licensed killers like Onryo and Cenobite which you have to pay for(there's also Skull Merchant having some of the highest killrates, but that's mainly due to the amount of survivors giving up against her).


    For the side quests for the survivors I think that they should do a minor rework for the gens where once a gen is completed for 33% of its progress the gen can't be progressed any further until a survivor goes and finds a part for the gen to unlock the next 33% of the gen. And, to balance this idea out, once the part is installed it'll lock the gen's current progress to prevent the killer from regressing it past that point. This would, naturally, encourage survivors to hop off of gens to go find parts from time to time which can lead to more interactions with the killer at times potentially. Also the parts can be considered as special items and the survivors can actually collect them before they're actually needed meaning it could open up some strategies like setup such as bringing gen parts back to certain gens and dropping them off at the start of the game so they'd be readily available, but this would come with the risk of the killer noticing your dropped gen parts meaning they'd know which gens you intend to work on. Plus this opens up the possibility of resolving the Brand-New Part toolbox addon problem(s) that still affect the game by turning it into a free gen part so you'd have to go looking for 1 less gen part.

    (P.S. The gen parts could be made to have specific spawn locations such as main buildings and shack where there's two separate piles of parts that spawn in every map so you don't have to go searching the entire map for them and having at least two separate piles means that the killer can't just camp a pile.)

  • Annso_x
    Annso_x Member Posts: 1,611

    BP gained mattering more than game outcome could be a good idea if the BP system was good, which isn't the case at least for survivors.

    You can run killer the entire game and not even get 15K BPs, the less people get hooked / hit the less BPs there are for unhooking and healing available, and these are split between 4 people...

  • WitchWalpurga
    WitchWalpurga Member Posts: 126

    Last days were absoluetly horrible. The number of unfun games definetly went up for me. Killers just started tunneling at 1 or 0 gens done. Am i constantly playing in a tournament?

  • MikaelaWantsYourBoon
    MikaelaWantsYourBoon Member Posts: 6,564

    I am getting hard matches, please nerf survivors more.

    And everything you asked nerf is just fine. Toolboxes are not strong as before. Syringe is not insta-heal, it still gives you room and time to hit survivor and decline value.

    If you are having hard matches, maybe your mmr is just so high and you are not belong here. At this point, you will need to adapt or you will take some loses and then you will face with people who close to your skill.

    I don't know when we will stop to ask survivor nerfs.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Toolboxes didn't get touched lately and still decrease the time to finish a Gen massively, and syringes still safe you a lot of time, you don't necessarily need to use it in chase, you can just use it and sit on a Gen... So nobody needs to use time to heal... To say they re both not strong is really not true.

  • MikaelaWantsYourBoon
    MikaelaWantsYourBoon Member Posts: 6,564

    I never said they are not strong. I said they don't need any nerf. Syringe is red add-on, so ofcourse it should be strong. But this does not make it busted. It's on good state.

    And toolboxes nerfed already before. They are fine now. And they nerfed BNP as well.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    If you look at a video otzdarva made about the toolbox nerf you will see that the nerf to BNP basically did really little... I think the whole rarity thing is a whole issue on itself because it somewhat justifies overly strong things to still exist... Just think about the huge amount of time a syringe safes you... 16-32 seconds of gen time if you think about it... That is really a lot. I just think in general items should not change the base values of things that much and should not safe such a huge amount of time.

    Also you literally said toolboxes are not strong as before, so you did exactly say that and it still is not true think about how much time you save by bringing a commodus with charge addons and tell me that is not strong, if you bring perks to help with it you can cut the Gen time in half. How exactly is that not strong? (btw I'm not even saying you need to bring 4 perks with it, you can to make it even more effective but just with 1 or 2 perks you already cut the Gen time down significantly more than without.

    We can argue about it for sure but you would need to explain me how it fine that items safe you like half the time of a Gen just like that... That is ridiculous. Not saying it was better before, it was even worse but that's not a reason to say it is fine now.

  • MikaelaWantsYourBoon
    MikaelaWantsYourBoon Member Posts: 6,564

    Yes toolboxes are not strong as before. Years ago, they were busted items to go against. I remember these days and right now, i don't have any problem with toolboxes.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634
    edited November 2023

    So cutting the time to do a Gen in half is not busted?? What is then? If you have a full squad that does that you will have 3 gens pop within the first minute, the game will be over within 3-4 minutes if they fully commit with their build to it and you are telling me this is fine and there is no problem with it?

  • Cecaelia
    Cecaelia Member Posts: 79

    That's because BP is capped, it should be uncapped so if you do all the gens you get all the gens worth of bp and if you run the killer for 5 gens you get all the boldness. Yes the BP system can use a lot of work, but the BP system was considerably better than the system that encourages people to hide and do nothing so they can walk out the doors at the deficit of their team.

  • First of all, I think the game needs a separate ranked mode and casual mode.

    For the ranked match-making, an MMR system modified by BP gain would be better than purely escaped-based. Pip ranking in its current form doesn't really work because you will always gain pip on average as long as you play normally so it's just a matter of how much time you played; also it resets every month meaning it's unstable and non-existent for the first few days after each reset.

  • Even before the skill rate cap increase, SWF was already rampant on the Asia server with all the items and offerings. Playing solo survivor makes me feel sorry for the opposite.


    Killers other than Nurse, Bright, Spirit and Cenobite are becoming harder to execute. What will happen in the future?