How do we buff solo survivors?

It's not just about solo survivors, even high MMR 4-man SWF has a 48% escape rate. The whole survivor role needs a slight buff. They can start small, like -10 seconds on gen. Or fixing vaults so the killer can't hit you when you're literally on the other side and running.

It has already been said, but scrapping the MMR system and fixing the matchmaking is the best thing that can be done for solo queue at this point.

People have an irrational dislike of basekit perks, in my opinion. The only perks that have become basekit recently - Borrowed Time and Shadowborn - never should've been perks to begin with.

Kindred should exist, but there's no denying that coordinating unhooks is a big flaw with solo queue. A brief showcase of where your team are, similar to how you're shown the hook survivor's aura and a slugged survivor's aura, is consistent and reasonable without being broken. Kindred would still be the perfect solo queue perk because it'd extend that aura reading and show you where the killer's going, making it partially basekit would just be alleviating the current problem.

There's a big big difference between being willing to adapt to solo queue by equipping one of a number of perks, and needing to run specific perks because their value is a huge gap in the basekit. Solo queue survivors should be willing to run useful perks like Bond or Empathy, but they shouldn't need to run Kindred specifically.

they made BT basekit and now zero people run BT despite the fact that it more than doubles the endurance. I Don't think survivor mains would be willing to equip it because in their eyes, they already have it so it's a wasted slot.

remove the ENTIRE progression system and all dailies and challenges. if the bloodweb, item counts, lost purple flashlights, need to get to P100, focusing on personal objectives, farming teammates, cleansing all 5 totems at the start, running to basement for a glyph, having to open a door with a character you dont like, playing a role or killer you dont like, i could go on for hours...

i have NEVER in 6 years played in a group of randoms in custom games and had a single person EVER, not even once get salty about losing or salty about ANYTHING for that matter. just saying. the game is supposed to be fun. endless grinds and incentive have no place in a game that is played for fun. nobody works at McDonalds all day cuz its fun only to donate their paycheck to charity.

also, let survivors see what their teammates perks are in he lobby and make an absolutely unmissable promt that tells survivors when ANY buff from their team is in play. No One Left Behind is useless in solo since nobody know you have it. thats just a single example. and when i say unmissable i mean when you are unhooked by someone with Well Make It a massive thunderstorm animation comes up and a voice sings in a heavy metal song DONT RUN TO CHINA THEY HEAL FAST AS ######### BOIIIII while playing a Metallica-esq guitar riff. Ok, a little extreme but you get the point.

Instead of ideas of just making Kindred base-kit, how about:

Let the Hooked Survivor look at another Survivors Aura(s) to give them a notification that they should come unhook them.

Makes being Hooked a little more engaging and doesn't require immersion breaking with wallhacks.

"The steadily waning gaze of a decaying survivor sends chills down the spine of those whom they look towards: Survivors looked at this way hear the Whispers of the Entity and the edges of their view share a similar fog" + Add Whispers sound/visual effect to Survivors on Hook as well

This could also be expanded upon for a new Perk type: Amp survivors you're looking at while Hooked. Not great while winning, but can help when losing.

Solo queue issues are directly tied to their benchmark of a 60% kill rate though. Most solo queue complaints are either about tunneling, proxy camping, bad teammates, or unwinnable matches. Most players complain about solo queue "feeling" bad, and it does feel bad when you escape on average 3 maybe 4 times out of every 10 matches.

I don't understand why we just have to accept that a 60-40 split is correct simply because bHVR says so. Hell, they're still talking about trying to make the game a "horror" game and because of that the killer should be the undisputed heavy hand. This games not a horror game past 40 hours of playtime (probably even less). It's a more and more competitive game where you can't just design the game for how you wanted it to be, you have to design it around how the game is actually played by the community. The game sucks from a "feel" perspective and that's never a healthy problem for a game to have.

The 60% kill rate is one of the biggest issues with solo queue and the survivor role in general.

So what you want is for BHVR telling people how to play correct? If so we're in disagreement. We like the freedom to an extent and player agency is something that's been in the game for as long as we can remember.

In addition, currently it's still the players making solo miserable for players. Whether the killer or other survivors, their behavior is not to be laid at the devs feet, that's lazy. Sure the devs can and should curb the extreme ends, but their job isn't too babysit the players.

To cut into that comparison to league, league actually has 2 teams, you all win or sink together. DBD is technically a 1 vs (1 v 1 v 1 v 1). Survivors are technically working towards a common goal but only needs to focus on them. They don't win or sink together.

And maybe that feng is in a corner for a good reason of "stay the f away from the (insert killer description) trying to kill her".

Statistically speaking a 60% kill rate actually means the game is balanced pretty well overall. Because of the nature of killer winning the 1v1, almost any killer can guarantee at least one kill if they play their cards right, either through hook trades, EGC, etc. On top of that, when the killer kills 3 people they tend to kill all 4, and hatch escapes aren't counted in the stats.

If you assume most games range from 1-4 kills, that creates an average of 2.5 kills per game, which rounds to 63%. Adding in the occasional 4 man escape, 60% sounds relatively fair IMO. I believe the devs have even stated this is around what their ideal goal is.

But there's nothing you can do about that 60% figure, realistically. If killer gets a 50% kill rate that generally means they are underpowered because killer is supposed to win the 1v1. See my above reply about why kill rates are the way that they are.

But frankly, I think if whether or not you "win" is the sole determining factor in whether or not you had fun that game, then maybe an asymmetrical game isn't your cup of tea to begin with. There will always be a power role to some extent, and the game will also never have a perfectly defined win condition. To some killers, a "win" is a 2k with 10 hooks. To others, nothing less than a 4k is victory. To some survivors, a "win" is them getting a solo escape. To others, their goal is getting the team out. Asking BHVR to balance around any particular percentage is going to be based on a subjective interpretation of what "victory" is.

1 teammates are only required for the doors. You don't need teammates to actually escape a trial. It's the nature of the game. In addition while it's nice to help others some don't care and sometimes the selfish play is the way to survive.

2 it allows toxicity, just like other games, but it doesn't create it. People create toxicity. What you consider fair is different than what we do, and what we consider fair is different from player 789, etc. Claiming "fair" isn't going to move us (especially when we've seen what others consider "fair").

3 they're responsible for the environment, not the people. We don't want to be told how to play, and can imagine others think so. If they started railroading, there'd be a cascade of effects that would need addressed to the point where it'd be a different game.

We're not going back into why we think splitting the que wouldn't work as you'd think for the topic of making solo better.

4 look at 1. You can attempt to escape all your own without teammates helping, just more likely to die.

5 we agree working together should be the best option (and currently kinda is for most normal matches) but we don't see much difference between the 2. Playing well allows survivors in both games to escape. Tell us, if one survivor didn't do much but hide in Texas but the other 3 did enough to make an opening to escape and the 4th got out, what is the difference if 1 survivor did nothing here but the other 3 carried? Or if 1 in Texas waiting for their team to die to try and stealth an escape and 1 here waiting for the team to die to escape hatch or doors? The only difference is one is easier due to the number of killers on the map.

6 think we've veired off the topic Abit.

I don't think escaping is the end all be all for fun as a survivor at all, but I do think it ties into my earlier point about one of solo queue players biggest complaints about matches feeling "unwinnable". A lot of people feel that what they do and their skill has zero impact on how a typical match plays out in solo queue. At the end of the day, their statistics point towards the game being very balanced (and in a sense it's probably the most balanced the game has ever been), but I still strongly believe that people care more about the "feeling" of a game compared to it's perceived balance, and that's why there's so many complaints about solo queue being a terrible experience.

Honestly we were the opposite until it felt like we're doing community service fighting the backfill.

Completely agree, I don't think this a problem that they can actually outright fix, but they can take steps towards making it less problematic. I like your suggestions as well, as it essentially only buffs solo queue instead of SWFs.