Let's talk about Killer Free perks

Hello everyone.

In the light of the Stranger Things perks leaving the collection of general perks and the devs AMA seeming to not get why the general and free perks need a tune up, I thought I would go through every general Killer perk and the ones available for free (steam version) and explain if they need changed, why they need changed and give a potential set of changes for them if necessary. If people want me to, I can do this for the Survivor free perks as well.

Bitter Murmur

Honestly, Bitter Murmur has always felt very underwhelming to me. I believe the reason is that information is primarily useful for preventing the Survivors from successfully doing something. This perk only gives you the info *after* they've done the thing. It isn't useless, especially paired with NOED, but it is still kind of underwhelming. I'm not sure this would fix it, but I think the duration of the aura reading should be buffed to 10 seconds, and the endgame aura reading to 10/12/15 seconds. This would also help immensely with the annoyance of the black bubble blocking the aura.

Deerstalker

Honestly I'm not sure this perk should even be a general perk. Newbie killers probably shouldn't be slugging because they will probably do it wrong and lose hooks for no gain. That said, this perk does do a passable job of allowing killers to track their slugs, but could use a tune up in the form of also helping the killer know when they might be losing a slug. In that vein... I think it should also do the following: Any survivors healing a revealed survivor will also be revealed, and the color of the aura changes depending on the Survivor’s recovery meter.

Distressing

In theory this perk could be good via enhancing perks that weaponize the Terror Radius. In practice, none of the current TR weaponization perks are good and the only decent one isn't either general or free. Also I personally feel that combo pieces have no business existing in the general perk set because new players could easily not have the perks necessary to combo with them. So… I think this perk should gain a 3/4/5% repair speed penalty for survivors inside the killers Terror Radius. I think that will be enough to be helpful, but not so much that it’s suffocating since countering this effect would be difficult. Also we should add Ruin’s “this effect ends once a Survivor is killed by any means” just to the repair speed penalty.

Hex: No One Escapes Death

Honestly, I think this is possibly one of the best perks to have in the general set. Newbie killers are going to have times where they just get bodied for one reason or another. This gives them a much needed safety net. This perk should not see any changes.

Hex: Thrill of the Hunt

This used to be an OK stand alone perk because you could get extra value out of it by contesting the cleanse and either getting a hit or deleting the cleanse progress or sometimes both. Now it is just bad partially because the Killer has next to no feedback that it's actually helping at all. So, to fix it just bring back the Cleansing notification, and maybe nerf the slowdown if necessary.

Insidious

Let’s be honest, no healthy game play ever happens due to this perk. This perk is completely useless outside of camping and we probably don't want to encourage that. Camping basement Bubba can be funny occasionally, but I think that's a loss that will make the game overall better. So, I think it should be reworked.

Hex: Insidious

Starts deactivated.

Activated by manually lighting a dull totem. This action is a retooled version of the snuff action.

While active, grants the Undetectable status effect.

Deactivates when you damage a Survivor by any means.

If cleansed while active, it gets permanently deactivated.

Yes, I just smooshed Hex: Face the Darkness and an old version of Trail of Torment together to make this rework.

Iron Grasp

This is good for what it does. However, it has a problem of accomplishing exactly nothing if no one contests the hook and the hook the killer goes to is nearby and in the open, but the effect itself isn't really strong enough to be that conditional. So I think it needs to gain a small additional effect on top of what it currently does that will pretty much always be useful. Gain an action speed bonus of 10/15/20% when picking up, dropping, or hooking Survivors.

Scourge Hook: Monstrous Shrine

The effect this perk gives is too weak to matter, and would be incredibly obnoxious to face if it was stronger. Currently its best use is basically just a combo piece with the other Scourge Hooks to make the basement be Scourge Hooks, but that’s useless to a new player because they won’t have Pain Res or Gift of Pain yet. So… I think this should get a partial rework as well.

Keep the turning the basement hooks into Scourge Hooks.

Whenever a Survivor is hooked onto a Scourge Hook, the following effects applies while the Survivor remains on the hook.

Increases the Action speed of breaking Pallets, Walls and Generators by 20/25/30%

Increases vault speed by 5/10/15%

Shattered Hope

Shattered Hope has one simple issue. You never know when you will need this because it exists solely to counter a small subsection of Survivor perks. If there isn't one in the game, this perk is a dead slot. Also it is my opinion that Killer Hexes are way too all or nothing to be pickable. I believe that this perk can get buffed to kill 2 birds with 1 stone so to speak. To both those ends, I think it should gain the following effect: When a totem is broken by any means, gain a token. Gain a 1/2/3% Action Speed bonus to pick up, drop, pallet break, generator damage, and vaults per token. (max of 5/10/15%). This way you gain small amounts of additional power from successfully kicking boons and you can use it as a bit of a backup plan for Hexes.

Sloppy Butcher

I'll be honest, I have no idea why this perk is on the Developer road map. It has a job of making healing more difficult and it does that job well in a not overbearing way. It's currently either the best or second best non tracking perk in the Killer's free set. This perk shouldn't get changed.

Spies from the Shadows

This isn't a bad perk. However, currently this perk fights with Whispers a lot over the niche of “short range detection perk” and it loses badly. I think this perk would be improved greatly by changing its numbers to set it apart from Whispers. Something like range increased to 64m while cooldown increased to 20-30s.

Unrelenting

This is another perk where it is very easy to go the entire game without gaining even a lick of value from it. It having a small neat thing where lunging into a drop to go a tiny bit faster is cool, but no newbie will know to do that. I am aware that just flat buffing the effect can't happen because at some number most killers will just start lunging across the trials, so I think that it should get buffed in a different way. Let its swing cool down reduction applies to obstructed hits as well. I don’t know if this will be enough to make it decent, but at least this way it’ll help when you go for a window/pallet hit and don’t get it.

Whispers

This perk is a little tricky to get used to using, but it is arguably the best info perk among all the general and free killer perks. This doesn't need any changes.

Now, on to the teachables on the killers who are free in the Steam version.

Trapper:

Agitation

Honestly a pretty great perk. It does a little something every time it activates, and is occasionally completely amazing. This needs no changes.

Brutal Strength

If there was ever a perk that basically embodies a cozy blanket, it's this one. Nothing it does is amazing but it's just quietly there making things feel better for the Killer. This perk needs no changes.

Unnerving Presence

The biggest issue with this perk is that it can cause absolute mayhem against other newbies, but it can also actively make the generators faster against good survivors. It needs a partial rework.

Survivors repairing or healing within your Terror Radius suffer from the following effects:

Increases the Trigger odds of Skill Checks by 10%

Good Skill Checks result in 1/2/3% regression on the Generator/Heal

Great Skill Checks grant 0% bonus progression on the Generator/Heal

Success Zones are no longer made smaller.

This effect ends once a Survivor is killed by any means.

If you’re wondering, yes this is a weakened form of old Ruin, with current Ruin's

Hillbilly:

Enduring

This is in a similar boat as Brutal Strength. It's a slightly more powerful but more unreliable boat, but still a very similar boat. This needs no changes.

Lightborn

In contrast to Shattered Hope, Lightborn is primarily here to counter flashlights, which the Killer is warned when they are going to be facing them, so it works. This perk needs no changes.

Tinkerer

This perk doesn't strictly need changes. However, I personally think it could use a small tune up after it’s nerf to only go off once per generator. Something like lower the activation % to 60% and increase the undetectable duration to 16/18/20 seconds. Mostly to make it a bit easier to use for immobile killers.

Wraith:

Blood Hound

Gameplay wise, this perk just doesn't come off as particularly strong because usually all it does is make the blood of the person you're already chasing brighter. I think a really cool and thematic buff tho this would be that it reveals the auras of pools of blood within… 8/10/12m of the killer. The perk is supposedly based on scent… so… if you’re close enough you can “smell” them.

Predator

As this perk stands, it’s currently arguably weaker than base kit scratch marks because it basically makes it impossible for scratch marks to splash up onto walls or trees so they’re visible from significantly further away. A perk that is worse than base kit obviously not a good thing. So I thought… what if we flipped that on it’s head and made that a thing Predator caused on purpose? Sounds potentially great to me. So... add a new effect. If a running Survivor is within 1 meter of a wall, tree, or other vertical barrier, a normal set of scratch marks will appear on that object. This effect has a cool down of 5 seconds per Survivor.

Shadowborn

This is getting a rework anyway because an FoV slider is coming. So here we go!

You are at home slinking through the shadows unseen and unheard.

While undetectable and at least 16 meters away from a survivor, gain 3/4/5% haste. This won’t reactivate until you’ve been at least 16m from all survivors for 3s.

That last bit is mostly so killers can’t constantly use it like a stronger version of Whispers. Also this has some nifty synergy with my new Hex: Insidious.

Huntress:

Beast of Prey

This perk is just flawed. Bloodlust forcing Survivors to eventually use resources or take hits is good. However a perk dedicated to strengthening Bloodlust while it is active just isn't it because it's very easy for survivors to make it so a killer can never get value out of the perk. To fix it... I think it should be disconnected completely from the Bloodlust system. So... after being in chase for 25/20/15 seconds gain undetectable. This lasts until you damage a Survivor by any means or 10 seconds after losing chase. This is NOT reset by all of the things that reset Bloodlust and is also cumulative like Diversion is.

Hex: Huntress Lullaby

This perk isn't great, but it can't really be directly buffed because it has a much stronger effect on new survivors than vets. I’d be interested to see what happens if it was made less all or nothing. Say, the extra regression on failed skill check was permanent but maybe cut in half post cleansing.

Territorial Imperative

This isn't a particularly good perk, mostly because the survivors really don't have any reason to go into the basement as it is. Also I don't know why it has any restrictions really. I can see two ways forward with this perk. First way is this, remove both it's restrictions, so whenever you are farther than 24 meters from the basement, the Aura of any Survivor in the basement is revealed to you. Second way, I was also thinking of reworking it into a totem defense perk… The Auras of Survivors within 2/3/4 meters of any Hex Totem are revealed to you. And yes this is Undying’s aura read for Hexes instead of Dulls. It also synergizes with Huntress Lullaby.

Nurse:

A Nurse’s Calling

Simple perk with a simple goal and does it well. This needs no changes.

Stridor

I personally don't love how it doesn't help much against healthy survivors but there's nothing wrong with this perk as it is. Also it's current effect does fit with Nurse's theme of interacting with injured survivors. So while I personally don't like it, I don't think it really needs to be changed.

Thanatophobia

Backloading the slowdown on this perk was not the way to go. This made the perk roughly the same for Legion or Plague but hot garbage for everyone else. Ideally this would get changed to be frontloaded but less total slowdown at 4 stacks. According to the wiki at one point this thing gave 6% for the first stack, then 3% for the rest for a total of 15%. That would honestly be fantastic.

In summary, I think I listed around 9-10 perks out of 28 that don't need changes. That is not even remotely close to a good ratio. Give these perks some love Behavior.