Lethal Pursuer is unhealthy for the game in its current state
I get that this perk was originally added during a period of DBD when gen rushing was at an all time high, killers werent overperforming, and loop adjustments were being made to balance some of the really crazy loops on certain maps. However, we are 3 years out from that period and the game is incredibly different now. Most loops have been rendered useless by overpowered anti-loop killer mechanics, gen speeds are slower than ever, healing is almost pointless unless another survivor has a med kit or it wastes too much time. Why has this perk not been reworked?
Mostly used on fast or ranged killers, it gives the killer knowledge of every survivors location at the start of a match unless they are running distortion. Distortion is a bad counter to this because killers have so many aura reading perks and add-ons now that no survivor should run distortion, ever, because it will eat up your stacks. Fast. On killers like Blight or Nurse, they are gonna get to their first survivor within seconds of the match starting. With most loops rendered useless, survivors dont even have time to start their first generator without someone being downed. Then youve got ranged killers like Huntress that can get their first down before survivors have even had a chance to look for a generator. Thats crazy.
Doesnt it also defeats the purpose of the game? The killer should be spawning in and have to find survivors on their own. Its literally part of the killer experience and just giving it to them is kinda…dumb. Id be OK with the perk as is in terms of aura reading if it came at some type of cost, but right now its just a free 100% aura read at the start of the match. With no downside. In fact, it even buffs other perks and aura-reading add ons! I think this perk deserves a second glance and its time for a rework of some type.
Comments
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100%
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If youve memorized survivor spawn locations that just makes you a good killer and I dont really have anything negative to say about that. Lol. However, while agree with your second point, gen slow down IS being looked at and fixed, but this perk still exists in its current state. It shouldnt.
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Seeing Lethal on killers like Billy has gotten rather old, especially since it's most likely that the 1st person chased is going to have a miserable time. Killers can deny it but current Lethal Meta +Nowhere to Hide is what has caused this Distortion Era
Still, I'd rather see Lethal than Corrupt. It's annoying af when the only unblocked gens are the ones that will create a future 3 gen, which makes some killers on certain levels impossible to deal with so survivors are encouraged to afk and wait out the Corrupt
I stoppedusing Corrupt precisely because my survivors were camping out the entire Corrupt duration before playing.
I don't think it's a problem to have an early game focused perk, as perks come in all flavours and work at various points in the game. We can choose what works best for us
At this point, I just recommend bringing OoO and tbag/point at killers who run Lethal. They will 100% chase you so your team will be safe and you can game with a few seconds of head start :)
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Wrong. Lethal Pursuer is a healthy perk in its current state. Every perk the killer uses for information is a perk they can't use for slowdown and info perks do absolutely nothing by themselves. They only become useful when the killer actually does something with that information like using it to find and chase survivors.
The killer can only chase survivors they can find and the less information they have, the more they will rely on what little information they do have, which means camping becomes more prevalent as does tunneling as a logical consequence. You cannot expect killers to walk around the map and look for survivors anymore. That doesn't work.
The pace of the game does not allow for that. Survivors spread on gens and progress the game so fast, that the killer has no time to lose. Walking across the map without actually finding someone is easily 10-20 seconds of free gen time for up to 4 survivors. That is a total of 80/450 charges, which is about 1/6 of the progress needed. Keep in mind, that could happen multiple times per match.
Lethal Pursuer is a perk that helps the killer get into the game faster than they otherwise would. I fail to see how that is a problem. It doesn't work in chase and it doesn't directly affect the survivor experience. It does however help greatly with inconsistent spawns and it allows the killer to play smart because they can see all 4 survivors at the start of the match, which serves as an indication of their position after the first chase.
Lastly, I want to point out that all killer perks can be divided in 3 categories. Info, slowdown and chase tools. Slowdown got nerfed and is also complained about, chase tools are unfun to play against because the only interactive part of the game becomes very one-sided and now info perks are complained about as well. What is left? Distressing?
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”Gen speeds are slower than ever”
Yep of course you’ll say this when all slowdown perks are nerfed THIS patch.
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When so many Survivors use Distortion, is it really that good?
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If you run any other aura reading then Lethal takes on the role of being a vibe check. Seeing 4 Distortions at the start at the trial at least warns youthat your intel may be faulty and adjust accordingly.
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Theyre still slower than they ever have been. Find me any other time in DBD where gen speeds were slower. Lol. You cant. They were always faster.
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Literally nobody runs distortion.
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I run Distortion.
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Ever since Vecna came out I've been consistently getting 2+ with maybe anOff The Record
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Huh. Maybe I havent played enough recently? But I know before Vecna came out I never saw it.
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First we nerf slowdowns for the 4th time and now we want aura reading gutted next? What perks do you want me to use? Why does my fun not matter? Am I allowed to use 4 vault speed perks or is that too strong?
You know what happens when you get rid of Lethal Pursuer? Corrupt intervention happens. And you’ll see it every. single. game. And then that will get complained about and nerfed AGAIN.
There are NOT enough good or fun perks in this game to keep nerfing them. Not to mention I play Huntress who ALREADY can’t use 1/5th the perks in the game because M1 perks are trash on her and stealth perks are also garbage on her.
If aura reading gets nerfed I’m gonna have to go back to 4 slowdowns and idk if I can actually handle that. I don’t even know why I’m trying to stop it, it’s gonna happen regardless.
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Of course I can, Ruin Undying meta... Combine it with Infinite tinkerer and we were playing for a while.
Gen kick meta? That was also way longer games.
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Yet its used all the time. Lol. Dont be disingenuous.
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I'm just sharing my personal anecdotal experience. Maybe folks around me are feeling naked after coming back from Chaos Shuffle...or perhaps Weave Attunement is scaring people.
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I dunno, man. Id love to get rid of Off the Record and Decisive Strike in favour of other perks, but despite being the most powerful killers have ever been, theyre still resorting to tunneling which forces me to use those two perks. The meta changes constantly. You either adapt or dont.
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Im referring to the actual gen speeds. Not additional perks. I should have specified. The base time it takes to complete a generator is longer than it ever has been, excluding slowdown perks. But this post isnt about that. I can work through gen slow down, but giving killers 100% aura reading right at the start of the match, without any downside, is kind of unfair.
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6.1.0. When we had that whole gen kick meta and Thanatophobia on top of that. Why do you think we have the anti 3gen mechanic now? Because it was possible to hold the game hostage. That was way worse than what we have now. Also, @OmegaXII is correct. The most popular slowdown perks were nerfed this patch. So gen speeds are higher than they were in the last patch. Objectively speaking.
Unfortunately this is a problem with both sides. Whatever category of perks it is, someone will always have an issue and complain. At this point, we need a game mode with no perks for these people. Though they probably wouldn't play that since it means they can't use their favorite meta perks either.
Lethal Pursuer is definitely a good perk. I use it pretty often and not having to worry about spawning in the middle of the map with nothing to help you guess where the survivors could have spawned is a great quality of life improvement. It's also good on killers like Nemesis and Doctor, that want to hit multiple survivors with their power.
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Its not a random perk. Its literally #4 in usage rates. Lol
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Xernoton already made very good points and I agree with this.
Lethal Pursuer is a healthy perk for the metagame. The start of the match is the weakest moment for every killer and this perks helps with it like Corrupt. In addition, just because the killer knows where you are, doesn't mean they can hook you. When you hear the terrorradius, you can still go to a safe loop to give the killer not an easy down. If you're in a chase, this means the other survivor are able to work on a generator and it's up to you how long these survivors can work on a generator.
Distortion is a bad counter to this because killers have so many aura
reading perks and add-ons now that no survivor should run distortion,
ever, because it will eat up your stacks. Fast.This doesn't change the fact that it still counters Lethal Pursuer. If the killer runs a full aura build, they deserve it that one perk runs out of token faster than it gets them back (4perks vs. 1perk out of 16perks should be fine?)
Doesnt it also defeats the purpose of the game? The killer should be
spawning in and have to find survivors on their own. Its literally part
of the killer experience and just giving it to them is kinda…dumb.After using, LP the killer has to do this. The player also uses a perkslot for an early help which should be fine. So it's not dumb it's an exchange.
According to nightlight.gg Distortion is in 10th place of most used survivor perks. I think this statistic is more trustworthy than a feeling or what is your source?
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I like how you say, "these people" yet you just made a post back in March suggesting changes to the perk WoO. If you arent the pope, dont preach.
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Perhaps at lower MMRs. I dunno. I just never see it. But I think #10 is way different than #4, right? Also I like how you failed to mention that even though distortion is #10, the escape rate while using it has declined steadily in the past year. So while it may be #10, its clearly not providing any advantage. Lets not use stats unfairly.
Source: https://nightlight.gg/perks/Distortion0 -
I dislike Lethal Pursuer because I’m bad at looping and prefer more of a stealth play style unless I need to take a hook for someone. Not because it’s unhealthy or poorly balanced. It’s actually a well designed perk because the community have repeatedly told BHVR that the best part of the game is “the chase” and this perk lets the Killer start chases rather than run around looking for survivors hiding behind rocks.
This is really a case of “git gud”. All of a maps resources are available at the start of the match, no one worth their salt should be going down before at least one gen gets completed. I’d argue two gen’s should be done to be honest. And if you really struggle, Distortion is an option.
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Gen speeds are actually potentially faster than ever, stake out + hyperfocus + commodius can get you a 45 second gen , back in the day the only way to get a faster gen was BNP (for instant gens) BNP (for constant skillchecks) BNP (for 25%), old toolboxes were near permanent but gave less skillchecks so even though you could repair at 150% for a full gen the skillchecks are what grant most the progress now granting 2% to 3.8% with the right perks (maybe 5.2% but im not sure if they are additive or multiplicative) them having a 40% chance to occur takes the cake, and even gen speed perks are better, leader and prove thyself could give big bonuses, but overzealous, hyperfocus, deadline, and kindred all give benefits without grouping up
Now in regular matches still just bringing a perk like hyperfocus can immensely speed up gen time for skilled survivors but its just not as free as it used to be, which would be a fair argument that standard gens with no perks are slower but the perks and items are better for single gens.
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Oh and lethal pursuer is a good perk and its in a good spot, needs no changes
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So i watched JRM earlier today, and uhh yeah, Stakeout, Bardic, Hyperfocus and Fast Track equals like 40 Sec Gen Times, and that was without a toolbox. Granted, means you dont have any defensive or exhaust perks, but still, if Survivors want to go for Pure Gen Rush, that might be the build for it now
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Im not bad at looping, however, Im no Ayrun either. That being said though, I dont disagree with you that killer interaction is what makes the game fun. Even though I was my former competitive teams gen jockey and I have no issues sitting on gens and completing the objective, its still fun to loop when I get the opportunity. What isnt fun, however, is having that chase start too early and the killer getting a down before survivors have even had the opportunity to spread out and start on generators. And weve already discussed distortion and how it doesnt actually provide any benefit.
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WIth Lethal, I Dont think it's super unhealthy, but with how popular it is, id say as survivor not running Distortion, you do need to take a good look of whats around you (Or use Windows) to get a quick exit strategy if the killer gets on you early.
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Lethal is only problem with Blight or Nurse can start chase in 4 seconds, then the remaining 5 seconds used as wall hack to hit a survivor. Other than that, its fine.
I think killers should have 3 seconds of killer instinct at the start of the game ase basekit to get the general spawning of survivor.
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Nurse is no faster than 4.6 killers in average speed nowadays, you are objectively incorrect
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Wesker, Spirit, Vecna, Twins, Billy, Huntress, Legion, Artist (w/ crows, kinda)…
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Nurse with Lethal Pursuer is whatever, LOS blockers exist
Nurse with Nowhere to Hide? especially on a indoor map like the game? wooooof
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I can guarantee that for myself, but not the rest of my solo Q teammates. Its just not a fair perk, man. Killers (rightfully so) didnt like survivors getting huge chunks off their first generator done with BNPs and so that was nerfed. Why should killers get part of their objective done at the start of the match? I think we can all agree that just giving players parts of their objective at the start of the match, with no downsides, is unhealthy for the game. Killers should have to find the survivors on their own at the start of the match. I dont think thats an unreasonable ask when killers are overperforming.
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Low MMR is (from what I know) beginner MMR and I doubt the first thing new players do is to go to nightlightgg and track their matches. Rather average and experience players with a good amount of hours use nightlightgg or give the websitethe information. However, this does not change the fact that this is a more reliable source than "I don't see the perk so nobody uses this perk". From my experience I see this perk quite often.
You said that nobody use Distortion and I gave you a source that proofs that players use Distortion. And currently this is a more trustworthy source. Nothing more. You should have been more precise beforehand that you also want to know the escape rate of the perk. Thus, I doubt it that Distortion is the reason why players with this perk have a low espace rate. If we take away the random stuff (bad match, someone gave up ect) it's because the team played bad or the killer played better.
Just because Lethal pursuer has a high pickrate doesn't mean it's unhealthy but it's strong which is nobody denying. But a strong perk is not automatically unhealthy and the topic is about the point that LP is unhealthy.
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Distortion is a perk that exists.
Also Id prefer if Killers ran Lethal Pursuer, since Killers running it are running 1 less slowdown perk minimum. Since it increases the duration of other Aura Reading effects, people often run it with other Aura Reading perks, which means less slowdown.
The Killer is opting to replace regression with perks that help them gain more pressure or make smarter micro/macro-game decisions, and I think it is a fair trade-off.
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Just run Distortion, it counters it and any perks that the killer likely uses together with it.
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Yes, you did. But you didnt really do much beyond that. I literally never see it in my matches though. Its pointless to discuss my anecdotal experience now because youve brought the actual statistics into the argument. My original argument wasnt about statistics though. Its just about the nature of the game. Killers should, at the start of the match, have to find the first survivor on their own unless LP offers some type of drawback. We have a survivor perk that gives us 15% off all of our objectives (Gens) at the cost of one survivor becoming broken. Killers are rewarded for using LP on the other hand.
And if you wanna discuss statistics, fine. Can you really argue that its providing any actual benefit when the escape rate for survivors using it has declined repeatedly over the last year despite its usage increasing? Even if we factor all of the changes to killer and the game in general, its still not providing any benefit if its usage is increasing. This is opposed to Lethal Pursuer that has seen its usage only increase with its win rate remaining the same. So that means more killers are using it and the fact that the win rate remains constant should be a major red flag. Its too powerful. Its not healthy for the game. Its only perk-equivelant counter on the other hand is not providing any benefit as per your stats. Whats there to argue about that?0 -
Starting chases early is not fun for you but that isn’t true for others. Again, if a Killer gets a down before one or two gens are completed or it’s a skill issue on the Survivors part and not a problem with Lethal Pursuer. Survivors have plenty of opportunity to spread out and get on gens. Killer can only be chasing one person at a time and everyone is notified when someone is being chased. It’s not the perks fault if Survivors choose to take their time to even start working on gens or if the first Survivor is bad. That’s a problem with matchmaking.
And yes, Distortion provides plenty of benefit, especially to people who can’t loop. It wouldn’t be so popular if it didn’t.
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Im not getting into another distortion discussion. Its already been discussed in both my original post and further down the line in comments. So please refer to those as to why Distortion is a bad idea.
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Would someone be kind enough to tell us why info perks are being so hated lately?
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I don’t use aura to guarantee win games, I use them for fun. If I wanted to win I would use 4 slowdowns. It’s honestly ridiculous. If they gut aura reading every single Huntress will switch to 4 slowdowns because what other options does she have?
116 killer perks in the game, 21 Basic Attack perks, 8 Undetectable perks, 6 Perks that rely on terror radius size, 15 Hex related perks. 48 perks that are bad to use on Huntress. That’s not including the 11 haste perks that make her 115% for like 10 seconds. Almost half the perks in this game are below average on her.
Her top 5 most used builds are all full aura reading builds, and guess what’s after that? Gen slowdown. Pain Rez, Pop, Corrupt Intervention and NoEd in that order.
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I stand my what i said, if you refuse to run perks because you dont want to "waste a perk slot on it"
- then you choose to run the risk that the killer sees you with aura reading perks.. eod.
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Ive never really liked the, "Just because its not fun for you doesnt mean…" kinda arguments. Well, it just so happens that seeing my teammates getting downed a few seconds into the match isnt fun for me. Everyones fun is subjective. I dont get your point here and why that first part is even relevant to the discussion.
I never said that survivors have to pop one or two gens before the first down. I said that its unfair when the killer has the first down before survivors have had an opportunity to start gens which is an issue that Lethal Pursuer creates when used on high mobility killers.
I would love to agree with you on distortion but since everyone wants to discuss stats, Ill just refer you to the same stats everyone else wants to talk about.
https://nightlight.gg/perks/Distortion
Distortion isnt providing any benefit when its win rates are steadily declining.0 -
Its moreso that my other perk slots are dedicated to perks that I have no choice but to run because despite killers overperforming, they still like to tunnel. Distortion isnt going to help much with that.
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Do you see me arguing against gen slowdown? All Ive said in regards to that is an observation that gen rates are the slowest they ever have been (And I meant at base, not with perks). I dont care about gen slow down. Its been in the game since Ive started and Ive learned to adapt. Aura reading is fine in other circumstances, but it shouldnt be provided to the killer at the start of the match without any consequences.
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We all struggle with tunneling, can i ask what perks you run?
Distortion is so much value for me, if the killer cant find me they cant tunnel me.
But stealth can me many things, this is not my main build, i rarely use any of the perks here except for distortion. I needed to cleanse 8 totems, that was lucky for me, what you cant see is that the killer had NOED and actually hits me once i get the door open. - but this killer tunneled everyone out, distortion saved me.
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Killers literally have to waste 1 perk slot on the perk that deactivates for the rest of the game after the first 10 seconds of the game…
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Because slowdown already nerfed over the board, chase perks are joke and very killer dependent, hexes are joke. What's left? Aura reading, even with keeping in mind that distortion was buffed from 4 to endless, it doesn't matter, because all I want is winning games with sitting on a gen without killer bothering me at all, listening some music on background and don't even remember that killer's perk exist, while stacking my 10 second chances and gen speed perks, which can be allowed only for us, survivors. Once every single thing beggin to bother me, I go on forum, add to it my favourite buzz word "unhealthy" and that's it.
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Seems weird to complain about this now when it's been like this for 2 years already. As far as Lethal goes I'd actually argue it's a healthy perk, it fixes games where survivor just spawn on top of gens and killers can't really do anything about it. The actual problem is with killers like Nurse, Blight, Billy that can act on the info so quickly that you're basically in chase 5 seconds into the game. So the perk itself is hypothetically fine on most killers it's just a problem on stronger killers but you can't ban perks on certain killers. It's a problem we've had for years tbh but for some reason BHVR refuses to balance Nurse.
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