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Dev Update - January 2024 #2
Developer Update | January 2024 PTB - BHVR
Developer Update | January 2024 PTB
By PeanitsLast Updated: 3:58 pm
We’re a few weeks into the new year, and that can only mean two things: 1) Most of us have broken our resolutions already, and 2) It’s time for us to recap our first PTB of the year. In this Developer Update, we’ll discuss the feedback we’ve received from the most recent Public Test Build (PTB) and the changes we’ll be making before the update goes live.
The Onryō
In this update, we aimed to restore the gameplay longtime Onryō players missed while also maintaining some of the more recent quality of life improvements. We were glad to see such a positive reaction to these changes on the PTB. However, there are a few rough edges we’d like to iron out before this update releases.
Locked-In Condemned
With your current Condemned progress becoming permanent when you were hooked, Survivors who were hooked with several stacks became a clear target for The Onryō; it would only take a few more stacks of Condemned to secure a quick and early kill. This indirectly encouraged the Killer to seek out and chase the same Survivor after they were unhooked (or “tunnelling” for short).
To tone this down, hooking a Survivor will now lock in a maximum of 2 stacks of Condemned. Any additional Condemned will remain but can be removed by the Survivor as normal. This can happen again when the Survivor is hooked for a second time for a maximum of 4 locked-in stacks.
This will give Survivors an opportunity to remove some of their Condemned after they are unhooked while keeping Condemned kills as a far more prominent threat later in the match.
Projection Spamming
One of the awkward playstyles we wanted to address with this update was the dominant strategy of teleporting as much as possible to quickly spread Condemned. We had hoped that limiting the range of Condemned to powered TVs would address this and allow us to remove the projection cooldown. However, some crafty Onryō players discovered that they could intentionally teleport to the wrong TVs first in order to spread more than one stack of Condemned to Survivors near/heading towards a powered one. Clever!
We’ve read a lot of positive comments saying that she feels better to play without a cooldown on teleporting, so we do not want to bring it back. Instead, we have made the following change.
The power meter recharges over the course of 10 seconds.
- If the power meter is full, projecting will inflict one stack of Condemned to any Survivor near a powered TV and empty the power meter.
- If the power meter is not full, projecting will not inflict Condemned and the power meter will not be reset.
This will allow The Onryō to move around the map freely (so long as there are powered TVs to project to) but prevent quickly building Condemned by repeatedly teleporting to multiple TVs.
The Blight
The Blight received a bunch of Add-On changes during the PTB. After watching them closely and reviewing feedback, we’ve identified a few troublemaking Add-Ons which we’d like to address before the update releases.
Compound Thirty-Three
On the PTB, this Add-On increased The Blight’s turn rate by 33% for each consecutive rush. This effect ended up being stronger than we’d like and made rush attacks very difficult for Survivors to avoid.
We have reduced the turn rate bonus to 11% per consecutive rush (was 33%). We have also reduced the required rush distance to 3 meters (was 4 meters). This effect can stack up to 3 times.
Iridescent Blight Tag
On the PTB, this Add-On gave The Blight an endless supply of rushes in exchange for putting his Power on cooldown after a successful Rush attack. It turned out this downside was not enough to keep this Add-On under control, so we’ve made a few adjustments.
A Rush attack (successful or missed), failing to slam, or breaking a pallet with Iridescent Blight Tag equipped will now cause The Blight’s Power to be put on cooldown for 20 seconds.
This will cause the Power to go on cooldown more often, creating more opportunities for the Survivors to evade the Killer.
Adrenaline Vial
Originally, this Add-On provided many positive effects, making it a “jack of all trades”. On the PTB, we simplified the Add-On by removing some of the effects. This left the Add-On weaker than we’d like, so we’ve made the following changes.
We have removed the turn rate penalty (was -55%). We have also reintroduced a 5% Rush speed bonus (was 10%).
The Hillbilly
Start your chainsaws! We were pleased to see such a positive response to The Hillbilly on the PTB. For the release, we’d like to take the opportunity to improve a few more Add-Ons and offer as many viable choices as possible.
Greased Throttle & The Thompson’s Mix
On the PTB, these Add-Ons reduced the recovery time for successful Chainsaw hits. This understandably didn’t provide much benefit in most cases.
They now reduce recovery time after using the Chainsaw- not just successful hits- by 8% and 12% respectively (was 10% and 15%).
Thermal Casing & Ragged Engine
Simple number tweaks for these: Thermal Casing & Ragged Engine now decreases the speed at which heat dissipates when not using the Chainsaw by 20% and 30% respectively (was 10% and 15%). Keep it warm!
Discarded Air Filter & High-Speed Idler Screw
These two Add-Ons increase the time it takes before Overdrive starts dissipating. We’ve also increased the numbers on these to 20% and 30% respectively (was 15% and 20%).
Perks
Lastly, we’ve got a pair of tweaks for two of the Perks which were updated in this past PTB.
Save the Best for Last (STBFL)
During the PTB, STBFL would lose tokens whenever the Obsession lost a health state by any means. This allowed the Obsession to do silly things, such as intentionally allowing themselves to bleed out from Deep Wounds, in order to reduce the Killer’s STBFL tokens.
Save the Best for Last will now lose 2 tokens whenever the Obsession is hit by a Basic Attack or a Special Attack.
This way, the Obsession will need to put themselves in harms way in order to reduce the Killer’s accumulated tokens.
Quick Gambit
The PTB featured a change for Quick Gambit which increased its effective range and simultaneously lowered the repair speed bonus. Many felt as if this lowered repair speed bonus was not worth the added risk of potentially leading the Killer to your repairing teammates. Therefore, we have reverted the repair bonus: Quick Gambit now provides a 6/7/8% repair speed bonus to Survivors within 36m.
Watch List
Before we leave off, we wanted to try something new: The Watch List.
We do our best to make informed decisions with each update. Sometimes we need to take a closer look and see how something plays out in a real setting before we commit to making changes. However, we don’t want to leave you in the dark in the meantime. This is where the Watch List comes in. The items on this list are things we’ll be keeping an extra close eye on once the update goes live before determining if further changes are necessary.
Please note: Just because something is featured on this list does not guarantee that it will be changed. Likewise, things not on this list are also subject to change as needed. The purpose of this list is to provide visibility on what we’re monitoring and acknowledge the feedback we’ve been given.
Grim Embrace + Dead Man’s Switch
This Perk combo was reported to be potentially problematic on the PTB. When Grim Embrace activates, Survivors are forced to stop repairing the Generator, causing Dead Man’s Switch to activate and block the Generator for an even longer period of time. This gives the Killer a consistent way to activate Dead Man’s Switch on all Generators and take advantage of nearly the entire duration.
Though this combo requires two Perk slots, this can cause the Generators to be blocked for quite a while. We will keep an eye on this build and make sure it does not get out of hand.
Generator Changes
Generators are at the core of every trial, so any changes we make to them must be monitored closely. Unfortunately, due to an error, this system was temporarily disabled when the PTB went live, limiting the amount of feedback we were able to collect. We’d like to gather more info on how this system plays out in real matches before drawing any conclusions.
The regression event system is not intended to impact a typical match, but instead to help bring an end to excessively long stalemates. We’ve received some concerns that the system may in fact impact matches where several regression Perks are used at once. This didn’t seem to happen often on the PTB, but it’s possible this may be more common on the live game where matches are much closer.
The Onryō
The Onryō has gone through quite a few changes lately, and that can make it difficult to predict where she’ll fall in terms of strength. We feel pretty confident with this version, but we will be watching carefully to see if any dominant strategies or shortcomings emerge and reassess as needed.
The Hillbilly
The Hillbilly has a lot of potential, but a steep learning curve. A good Hillbilly can be scary as is, but the Overdrive mechanic can make them ever scarier. It may take some time for Hillbilly players to get used to the way the Chainsaw controls during Overdrive and manage their heat effectively. We will continue to watch The Hillbilly as players master the Chainsaw (or shake off the rust) to determine if some fine tuning is needed down the line.
With that, we’ve reached the end of this Developer Update. Each of the changes mentioned in this post will be available when the update goes live January 30th. We look forward to hearing what you think!
Until next time…
The Dead by Daylight team
Comments
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what´s the point of the onryo nerf? she looks really weak ngl
15 -
So Ruin and Boon: Illumination are left forgotten. That's sad.
And I still demand to revert STBFL's 5%->4% nerf
4 -
No tweaks for Alan Wake's perks is disappointing.
12 -
Re-buffing Vial and nerfing C33 into the ground. I don't understand.. but at least they listened about Iri Tag and added a cooldown between missed attacks, fatiguing and breaking pallets
1 -
And The Onryō is back to being one of the worst killers in the game...
16 -
I feel sorry for Alan Wake...
4 -
Im really slow can you explan why she's bad now
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I dont understand the Onryo-Change.
While the Stacks are not logged in (except for two), they are still present unless you bring a Tape to a TV. So if an Onryo wants to tunnel, they will still be able to do so.
It is worse for Onryos who are not tunneling.
15 -
It's always got to be give-and-take when it comes to Blight, huh? "Nerf" his insanely OP addons but replace some of them with even more broken ones, nerf those, but re-buff something that was actually nerfed before. We know who the favorite child is here, sorry Onryo!
11 -
What is this obsession with blight being unfun to play against? I don't really get it. I wonder if they just fear people would quit playing the game if blight was actually in a balanced place.
3 -
Main thing is Blight has one of the strongest base kits in the game. (Maybe only Nurse beats him). But on top of this he has like 6 crazy add-ons. And then you look at all the other 30 or so killers who have a weaker basekit and maybe 2 add-ons (sometimes even mandatory ones! Like Bubba's award winning chili and beast marks) or not a single good one, like with Nemesis
1 -
Onryo change doesn't help against players that tunnel off the hook. It only helps against killers that seek out unhooked survivors after moving away from the hook. It encourages you to not give unhooked survivors that chance. I don't like the change. Condemned cooldown didn't feel necessary to me, because if you teleport to every TV for codemned, you turn them all off and the less map you cover with each one you turn off so on the PTB this didn't feel like something worth doing.
The cooldown add-ons for hillbilly seem very bad too me. On the ptb his miss cooldown penalties already got reduced a lot, it's shorter and his movement speed is not as slow when missing. There was a lot of complaints that dodging his attack didn't feel rewarding and this change is only going to make those concerns worse. So i feel like they weren't listening in regards to that. In regards to the other add-ons. The common feedback i saw was that the function of the add-ons weren't appealing, not the fact their numbers were low. Maybe this change will make them more appealing anyways but it still feels like they missed the mark there.
I am personally fine with everything else though. Perk changes seem fine. I think the blight add-on changes seem fine.
I am surprised about them keeping the grim embrace and dead mans switch combo, but they do bring up a good point, you do have to bring 2/4 perks for it. I think them waiting to see is a smart but unpopular move.
Looking forward to playing the update.
4 -
I want to cry. Im so sad right now.
4 -
This is a horrible day for all of us.....
3 -
Im surprised in the same patch that billy finally restores his former glory and then some. Onryo replaces him with the dumbest punishments for using your power. They even call out the players for being clever. What? But seriously as someone whos had their main done in (back in 2020 with overheat) hopefully you don't have to wait as long as we did. They backpedal quickly i hope.
8 -
We fought for 8 months to get here. Now this is the outcome. My hopes are exeptionally low friend.
But im glad that your struggle is over.
3 -
Looks at STBFL changes, sees that basically nothing problematic was really fixed and that the perk is still just as powerful as before when camping/tunnelling but is weaker in chase and lost synergy with weaker Killers.
Well, rip to Trapper and other weaker/slower M1 Killers that used STBFL to compensate for their weaker chases, now STBFL is literally only good for camping and tunnelling since there's no way to preserve stacks alongside being weaker in chase, SWF teams will be able to counter STBFL with more ease than before and it will do little for SoloQ.
Looks at "Anti-3-gen system", nothing is said except that it's being watched.
Assuming nothing is changed, well rip Trail of Torment, Nowhere To Hide, Surveillance, Machine Learning and gen regression outside of Pop and Pain Res. Good Survivors will be able to 3-gen themselves and have at least one gen that can't be regressed a lot, forcing the Killer to focus defense on that gen even if they didn't mean to 3-gen.
Hopefully the future will smile upon those things and adjustments will be made.
At least the rest is pretty nice, infinite-turn Blight is gone, Hillbilly remained largely untouched from PTB and Quick Gambit is now semi-viable in a SWF in vertical maps.
4 -
They should of buffed Boon: Illumination
6 -
So Adren Vial will: increase maximum Rush tokens by 2, increase Rush look angle by 20 degrees, and increase Rush speed by 5%, without any downside.
Not only does this make it a "jack of all trades" again, but how do you not understand that the strongest killer in the game does not need an add-on to make him 40% stronger (+2 rushes), without any downside? Let alone coming with additional upsides.
I'm glad Blight Tag is getting addressed, although I still can't quite fathom how "infinite rushes" was something you thought should be in the game. Blight Tag in its original state was a perfectly fine, well-designed add-on. In this form however, there will still be a lot of instances of "well, guess I'll die" because there is no way to avoid Blight with infinite rushes unless you have an actual god pallet, and those are few and far between.
Next, having two add-ons that reduce Billy's post-chainsaw cooldown even further on top of the base and Overdrive cooldown reductions will prove to be problematic. In Overdrive, his cooldown is already such that even if you do manage to dodge the chainsaw, you can still get chainsawed if there isn't a pallet or window basically right next to you, and if there is you will at least still get M1'd. You should tone down base cooldowns on missed chainsaws to compensate for these add-ons. Billy will be comparably as oppressive as he used to be in his heyday, and although I am excited for that and know that he is mechanically not easy to play and therefore won't be too much of an issue in many matches, it is especially the lack of punishment for not converting saws that can make him too much of a threat even in an average player's hands, especially so with the existence of Lopro now.
There's much more to say, about Sadako and perks being painfully underwhelming or at least not optimally designed (Grim Embrace) and so forth, but it won't make a difference anyway, so I will stick to just pointing out these two egregious issues I see because these two killers have been a long time coming to receive changes, and you might still be open to adjusting them.
1 -
Annnnnnnnd Onryo is gutted again, yay
9 -
The nerfs to Sadoko just really saddens me so much. To start off when I saw the rework I was one of those who thought she was going to be to weak and really hard to play for a average player but I slowly changed my mind after having a really nice conversation with @radiantHero23 and reading the other Sadoko mains feedback. After all that I got really excited to play her again in this upcoming update since I do find current version of her way to easy and boring.l and don't play her. Now after reading this update my excitement is almost completely gone and now I'm feeling the way I was before I had my conversations with RadiantHero. Like why did you nerf a killer who, said by most of her mains, was balance and was in a good place in the PTB. I feel these changes was just unwarranted and unnecessary. Who was spamming thier TP to spread condemn in the PTB? From what I seen any Sadoko who used this method was punished more than rewarded because it would turn off all your TVs. I just don't understand any of this.
Finally I just wanted to say I feel bad for Sadoko mains who was excited for this rework. RadiantHero especially since it seems they was so happy for this rework and now sadden by these nerfs. Please devs reconsider these changes before next week's update.
2 -
Hillbilly has too many overdrive addons. Also can we change the downside of Tuned Carburetor to something else or remove it and shorten the charge bonus to 5-10%, or even a crazier idea disables overdrive.
0 -
Im so sad.
2 -
Im so sorry for you. I tried.
1 -
I would be very scared if I was a Freddy main right now considering he is being changed later this year...
1 -
These Sadako updates have completely destroyed any excitement I had for the update next week...
8 -
They overnerfed iri tag to the point where theres no reason to use it 20s cooldown if forced to break something or even funnier if you slide off something is a joke
a 10s cooldown for anything but a successful hit would have been a perfect change but they took the easy path and attached it all to the one cooldown so its never going to see use except for testing the new addon when the update drops realizing that 20s cooldown which can be incurred by janky collision is terrible and promptly canned
1 -
missed attacks and pallet breaks need a shorter cd on iri tag, like 10 secs.
sadako nerfs are awful and very unnecessary, if people don't want to be condemn spammed near a powered tv they can simply turn it off, the action only costs 1 stack. i can't understand why devs are trying their hardest to cater to players that refuse to learn playing against a specific killer, she is already super weak these nerfs are simply unwarranted. at least compensate by punishing turning tvs off with a tape in hand or make carrying a tape more dangerous? nope. just straight nerfs. MASSIVE nerfs.
5 -
I'm legitimately just not playing.
Off to Outlast Trials I go.
6 -
So, one of the most obnoxious and unhealthiest killers is getting nerfed? I would say rare BHVR double you, but after all the salt they are going to buff her condemned back to the point that people will DC against her more often than SM, so that's a wash.
And I see STBFL is getting buffed to its tunneling potential.
Niiiice.
1 -
We've already showed on the ptb the 3 gen changes are affecting normal matches (not extended, not camping 3 gens and never chasing). While I appreciate BHVR acknowledging this even if saying it happened only occasionally and that they would keep an eye on it, the last time we heard that, it took half a year of m1 killers enduring the problem for BHVR to fix it (MFT). M1 killers already have a frustrating time. We don't want to wait another half a year of pain. It's mostly affecting surge (literally designed to hit multiple times in succession to take advantage of survivors out of position) and eruption (since it uses x2 charges). For context, m1 killers are more likely to play centralized in the map since they cant effectively travel to far out gens on large maps. The time it takes get to far gens means a lot of free gen progress for survivors and lack of pressure. This means their surge use and kicks are far more likely to hit repeatedly on gens more in the middle of the map.
If the whole point is indeed to stop extended matches from continuing indefinitely, then it should only apply to extended matches. Reduce the allowed regression to 4 and only start once 3 gens are left and the game has gone long enough without any hooks.
1 -
I have a new PC. I built it myself and got it to work just 3 weeks ago. Im currently using all its power on DBD (runs smooth as butter on highest settings) and Elden Ring. If this goes live, i see myself playing Elden Ring 90% and DBD 10% at most.
2 -
She hasn't just been nerfed, she's been gutted to complete irrelevancy.
This is not a W.
2 -
Did you even take a short look in the feedback section on Sadako?
2 -
Yeah...STBFL wasn't even a problem outside of it's camping and tunnelling potential and they nerfed everything but that.
Literally all it needed was to deactivate near hooked Survivors and not work on the basekit BT. That's it, weak Killers keep a good chase perk, strong Killers don't care, tunnelling and camping is less efficient, everybody wins.
So many people asked for something like this...
3 -
Adren Vial buffed, Onryo nerfed. There are people people being remunerated for making such decisions, let that sink in.
2 -
I don't even think STBFL was a problem when it came to tunneling or camping. With the anti-facecamp system, the killer is forced to have distance from the hook meaning it's possible for survivors to get a rescue before the killer can hit them with a M1.
Tunneling isn't a real issue given DBD is a 1v4 asymm.
3 -
They should make blights iri tag so if you miss/ don't swing you get a 10 sec cd and if you break a wall/pallet you get a 15 sec cd but keep to 20 sec for hitting a surv. Maybe also make it so you don't go on 20 sec cool down until you get past your stackable rushes (i think is 3 with the addon and 5 without)
1 -
Sadako got like a few moments of being usable and is immediately tossed back in her well, but blight gets one of his add-ons nerfed cause its sheer idea is op and that means he needs a compensation buff
Something isn’t connecting like how are we getting any of these as solutions to a problem
2 -
Onryo was miserable to go against, especially against players who abused her most annoying and OP playstyles. This is a welcome change to me.
1 -
Hey y’all, thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts. It’s clear that the changes we’re making to The Onryo didn’t live up to expectations, so we’re preparing a series of follow-up adjustments to address the feedback we’ve received. These adjustments are planned to release as part of the minor updates in the weeks following the Mid-Chapter. We’ll be sure to share more details once we have a plan locked in.
11 -
Thank you! @radiantHero23 theres hope! Hope billy and onryo can eventually both run off together in the future for the better of both of them!
1 -
What about changes to Alan Wake's perks? Any buffs to Boon: Illumination and Deadline?
Please tell me you guys are gonna make changes to them that wasn't featured in the developer blog but will be included in the patch note itself.
6 -
Very good news!
1 -
Would have rather seen an interesting downside to C33 rather than just gutting it to brown addon tier, like disabling the lunge. Aren't Iri's supposed to change up playstyles?
Post edited by Haddix on0 -
This is welcome news but this shouldn’t have been necessary in the first place.
Now we’re going to have to wait potentially weeks just for Onryō to be playable because the PTB feedback was, for some reason, discounted.
Unnecessary and unwanted changes like this just add pointless work to an already long backlog…
9 -
Right! I hate having an iri addon I try to avoid in the bloodweb bc I don't want to waste my blood points
0 -
Amazing news!
0 -
Thank you for being open about it. Please REALLY FINALLY look at the feedback, we worked so hard on. I assure you guys, its well though out.
2 -
Perk changes are fine, Quick Gambit is actually pretty respectable, and will work for 3 gens and small / 2 floor maps. STBFL is the healthy change, anti tunnel would be better, but at least it isn't gutted.
Billy fine, Blight... not sure about adrenaline vial... I'll leave that to more knowledgeable players.
Onryõ... I'll wait until I see it, but my thoughts have been shared in other threads... I don't have a crystal ball, but I think these latest changes crucify her against any group of survivors smart enough to grab a tape before they work on a gen, especially if they work in pairs.
I could see the original PTB Sadako being a threat, but also being counterable. This new Sadako... I struggle to see why I should care about condemn. She has to hook me to lock condemn in, and as long as I disable her TV and occasionally deposit a tape, I fail to see what she can do to kill me outside normal hooks.
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