Upcoming Mastermind Tuning - Suggestions (Great Changes, but lacking)
First off, I'd like to say I love Wesker. Mastermind is in my top 3 favorite killers to play and verse, so my opinions/feedback below are solely based off of what I think would make him healthier and more enjoyable overall.
Most actual Wesker mains (myself included) hate the Hinder mechanic from his power. We know it doesn't feel good to verse, and we know it makes hard tunneling very easy with him. With that in mind, I want to say, that I'm very happy you guys are finally changing it.
However, you're kind of just overall nerfing Mastermind without giving anything to compensate. Like I said, I'm happy the hinder mechanic is getting adjusted, but it would have been nice if the infection could have been reworked / he also got some small QoL buffs in general.
One of the most annoying things right now is how often (shockingly) people don't spray and they just slam gens. I try not to run a crazy amount of slow down - 2 max and that's if I really want to just "Chill". Wesker's built in slow down is survivors taking the time to spray, so they aren't hindered. The thing is, if you aren't a back to hook Andy/hard tunneler, stealth is so common now people just play very stealthy and push gens without spraying. This would be like having Pig traps, but they have no timer at all / urgency, so you can ignore them till the game is almost over.
With this in mind, below is my suggestion on how to REWORK Infection to make it a more helpful mechanic to Mastermind, without feeling unfair for Survivors that are having a good chase. The values of my suggestion would have to be tested/tweaked, but I definitely think it's something to consider.
Full Infection
- One hit down if slammed by the Mastermind (This doesn't change)
- Gen Repair Speed is reduced by 20%
Infection Rate
- Infection is gained at the same rate it currently is
- Speed of infection is increased by 50% if working on objectives (Does not effect healing)
- Infection resets to 10% after being hooked
Obtaining Sprays
- Unlocking spray chests is now 15% faster
- Spray Cans can now be scavenged infinitely
- First Aid Sprays per can reduced to 1
Non-Infection Related QoL (Base-kit adjustments)
Leather Gloves Basekit : Wesker is extremely fun to vs and that is because his chase power can be very fun to outplay, but it's also lethal if used well. Unfortunately it often feels like I'm permanently tied to running "Leather Gloves", because his base power recovery is just overly punishing. Especially if you run other add-ons such as Egg, your C/D can take absolute ages. There are plenty of M1 killers in the game, Wesker should be given the liberty to use his power more, but not an insane amount. Leather Gloves reduces the c/d enough that it feels less punishing when versing good players.
Terror Radius : I don't know if it's ever been explained why Wesker's Terror Radius is the biggest in the game. Perhaps, because it's thematic for Albert Wesker, but it's a major pain. I partially feel it's because of the speed he can approach people, but both Billy and Blight have smaller Terror Radius sizes and they are much more lethal if they manage to sneak up on you. Reducing Mastermind's terror radius to 32 meters would be a small, but appreciated buff. Especially with the way that Distortion currently works, the TR is so big that I cannot run aura perks, since players permanently charge Distortion without ever making contact with me. Not just that, but people are able to pre-leave so early with the size of his TR that you almost feel like you're silly for not dashing for distance to get to them before they pre-leave, but you can't do that, since his base C/D is so long, you MUST walk to them unless it's completely cross map, or you're punishing yourself with the C/D.
Thoughts (Possible Issues)
I've had people mention they'd be worried the spray system could be stacked with multiple slowdowns. The reality is, killers already do this with just about everything in the game. HOWEVER, if we wanted to give this some sort of "diminishing" returns, so it's not to crazy, you could always add an "Immune" status into his kit. Once you have inoculated 4 times, you can no longer be infected. Having to spray at least 4 times + open the chest 4 times + any sort of slow down you experienced before spraying would be quite a bit of slow down in general.
I didn't want this to mess with healing speeds, so it didn't lead to nasty play styles of making it impossible to heal, so you can save people, etc. Simply gen speeds, so it could be an actual "fair" part of his kit that is useful.
I felt sprays should be infinite, since it is possible to run certain builds right now that could cause survivors to run out of sprays rather fast, and if that became popular, this would be miserable.
The speed up while doing objectives was inspired by Plague, and I felt that it was fair, because if a survivor chooses to just slam a gen out instead of spraying, even if just off hook, they made that decision and should have to deal with possibly becoming a "One Shot Down", since they played in a risky manner. However, it would also allow survivors to get unhooked and quickly pop a gen that is 5-10% from finishing, if the pressure is currently needed, but they wouldn't be able to just sit and slam gens permanently. I was conservative saying 50% speed increase on infection, but honestly with it resetting to 10% after unhook, you could honestly make it 100%, since it wouldn't help with tunneling anymore. I also didn't want them to just quickly be 1 shot down if they do get tunneled off hook, but managed to get a heal off, so the speed up only happens if pushing the objective. However, the one hit slam has a lot of counter play, even just forcing a hit while vaulting, etc.
There are obviously other things that Mastermind players would like, but these Non-Infection Related QoL changes would be a much appreciated adjustment without being overbearing / overly buffing him.
Besides all of the bugs he's been experiencing since the UE5 update, Wesker is an almost perfectly balanced killer, especially with changing Hinder, but not giving him something to compensate is just punishing those that didn't use the mechanic for more than just a bit of slow down, since NOBODY will spray now.
Comments
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I like the infection changes, whether it is 1% or 10% after unhook does not matter too much I guess so both should be fine.
The limit to 1 charge per can in combination to unlimited sprays is Allright, although I would prefer it if I could stack at least of them, so you have the same slowdown by needing to rummage it again and waste time on that, but that way it is easier to be able to cleanse someone else after unhooking and maybe yourself, without needing to run back and forth between the crates.
I guess smaller terrorradius and faster CD are Allright, but at least to me they never felt like an issue. I agree however that stealth and distortion are generally annoying to face.
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I wouldn't mind you being able to rummage one "extra" spray to carry on you, but perhaps a small c/d on opening the same crate, so you can't just spam both at the start when the infection isn't any sort of threat.
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I mean even in that case it would be slowdown, so I wouldn't mind that, but up for debate I guess.
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Gen Repair Speed is reduced by 20%
No, bye
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Very eloquent and with that much reason, Truly the highest point of debating culture has been reached here. I hope you soon honor as again with that amount of knowledge and insight.
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You know what happened when devs made gens 90 seconds instead of 80?
All of the killers brought Thana to increase this time EVEN MORE.
Wesker is already high mobility killer and I don't know why one of the best killers with already built-in high mobility should also have basekit slowdown.
Also, -20%? 😂
That would mean that gens would take 112 seconds instead of 90.
Inb4 "yes but it gives pressure to survivors to remove infection >:(", then let's make it -50%, why not?
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So you are telling me a person is just gonna sit through a full Gen while being infected and takes the additional 20% reduction instead of just using a spray... Also 112? 20% of 90 is 18 + 90 is 108,why 112 seconds?
If you only run Thana because of those additional 10 seconds... Wow…you get 2 seconds more slowdown than before with all 4 survivors being injured... That's really not much...
High mobility? Because he has a dash that moves him quickly over a distance of 20 m with like 12 seconds cooldown and you call this high mobility? ^^
I doubt people will do a gen while fully infected, at least not for the full duration, and when it only kicks in at like the last 20% that is really not too bad... So I think you are overreacting quite a lot here.
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Also 112? 20% of 90 is 18 + 90 is 108,why 112 seconds?
90 charges per gen → 1cps as base, add -20% penalty → 0.8cps as base.
90/0.8 = 112.5 seconds, not 108.
If you only run Thana
Let's not pretend that for half a year base build for Wesker isn't POP+PR+Grim/Barbecue+Lethal, okay?
High mobility? Because he has a dash that moves him quickly over a distance of 20 m with like 12 seconds cooldown
Yes, because he can quickly traverse through map, and during that cooldown he is r u n n i n g, not standing still.
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This game seriously needs to be more clear about how efficiency and reduction in efficiency work because this is just ridiculous.
Why did you bring Thana even up then?? Ofc most people will run meta builds, so what?
If that is your condition for high mobility... Overall Clown probably has higher mobility when it is only about traversing the map once. Slow down while charging and after using it compared to reloading... If we count Wesker as a high mobility killer he would only be slightly above 115% killers in general.
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Ofc most people will run meta builds, so what?
I gave you and example, if dbd devs center killer power around some aspect (healing, doing gens) it's very likely that killers would bring perks that even more punishes other side in said aspect.
For example:
- Legion and Thana, when it worked on Healing.
- Thana high usage after +10 seconds to gen.
- Hag and Monitor and Abuse.
By making basekit slowdown to gens, Weskers would still bring gen regression perks, making it more obnoxious.
Wesker don't need gen slowdown in his basekit as he is high-mobility killer.0 -
People brought Ghana because they thought it was a good idea, which it was not really.
Thana on Legion was annoying and dragged the game out even more but even then it was debatable whether you should heal or not.
I guess Hag and monitor is fine, but the perk is also not really her number one choice... Killers with smaller terror radius tend to get more out of monitor, despite it still not being meta.
People don't do a full Gen while fully infected, that would be a terrible play, so the 20% only come into account for parts of it, where it usually does not really matter... And even then the best play is to get rid of infection beforehand anyway...
Wesker is not a high mobility killer... He is slightly above a 115% one...
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People brought Ghana because they thought it was a good idea, which it was not really.
So BHVR nerfed thana in hotfix for no reason?
People don't do a full Gen while fully infected, that would be a terrible play, so the 20% only come into account for parts of it, where it usually does not really matter...
So if you assume that all survivors would surely not do entire gen with that -20%, and also you are saying that it would "only come into account for parts of it, where it usually does not really matter", then idk what is the reason for that buff, if survivors aren't going to be affected and it would not matter.
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They wanted to nerf Billy's engravings... Them nerfing something really says nothing. I don't think Thana was an issue back then, the current version is just trash on 98% of killers...
Simply to give survivors a reason to not work on gens while infected but to cleanse... Because with the decrease in speed the incentive to do so has been weakened.
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People would seriously rather be 4% hindered instead of have a 20% gen speed penalty AT FULL INFECTION that after 4 sprays cannot come back no matter what? That's honestly kinda bonkers to me.
I loathe being hindered in chase and as Wesker I don't feel I won a chase if I got them while hindered.
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I don't know...this rework helps a bit but also exacerbate the issue that the devs are going to create if their nerfs goes to live: lack of built-in slowdown and Survivor incentive to interact with Killer power while creating another issue in the form of his power eventually becoming little more than a cooler-looking Demo Shred but more punishing on a miss. An example of this is one of Myers's main issue is that (barring certain add-ons) he has a strict limit on his power which means failure to kill Survivors quickly will result in being a permanent M1 Killer with no power, making infection not working after X amount of cleansing (especially if sprays are infinite) would create a similar problem on Wesker.
Quite frankly I think the two nerfs together are too much. Wesker's infection is part of the reason why he's less stressful to play than the average Killer since Survivors don't wan't to be slowed down (even if it took ages) because being at risk of being insta-downed is...well pretty common and doesn't make much difference to decent Survivors (Billy, Bubba, Oni, Myers, half-decent Plague and Legion players effectively keep people injured 90% of the game, dozens of perks and add-ons causing Exposed etc.) but being hindered is a threat even to good Survivors since previously near-infinite tiles are now far weaker and holding W isn't as efficient, making even good players take the time to cleanse (even then, some would rather take the risk if they are in a SWF and aware of the Killer's status).
Tunnelling is indeed an issue (although Wesker is by no means the best at it, he's just more common to face than the Killers that are better at it) but it could have easily been fixed by making the infection post-unhook start progressing only after a conspicuous action (or a certain amount of time has passed).
Literally all they have to do to fix tunnelling off hook with Wesker is treat the infection like DS/OTR.
The hindered strength should stay at 8% (after ages) to still be a threat and give some slight slowdown even against good players. I however wouldn't be against infection going back lower than 50% (hell, even though it's still a considerable nerf, I don't mind the infection going to 1% post-hook. Although it does give a ridiculous amount of time).
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