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Why is Blight so hated?

Rauy556
Rauy556 Member Posts: 46
edited June 18 in General Discussions

(EDIT: This is not an Us vs Them post or rant just my personal opinions based on information I see with both the community and in-game, my comment regarding survivor skill is not a personal attack to survivors it was just the simplest way to say that it is simple)

Its always seemed very weird to me how blight is consistently regarded as one of the most hated killers by survivors. Blight is by far the hardest 'feature' to learn in the game due to how overly complex he is at base not even mentioning his map dependent interactions. As a result, it should be quite obvious that a good blight player has clearly devoted a large amount of time to learn and become good at the character, so why is it such a big problem that they are rewarded with one of the strongest killers in the game?

I personally suck at blight (PS5 things XD ) but do not have any hatred towards anyone who stomps me with him when I play survivor, instead I am quite amazed and respect the fact that they actually invested the time and had the patience to learn the hardest killer. I think it is perfectly fine that a character that is difficult to play and master is extremely strong, as why would someone want to dedicate all that effort to a killer relative in strength to a legion for example, that is very easy and quick to get good at. (Granted I do think his basekit is fine but his add-ons were 100% overtuned in the past and NEEDED nerfs, but there are still a lot of players that complain(ed) about base blight)

I also think it is quite odd that players complain about blight yet they mainly play survivor which is some of the easiest gameplay in a mainstream game, seriously the hardest thing is to learn how to loop which is a universal skill relevant to all killers, where as learning blight is not a universal skill. I think its fair to complain and voice your opinion when something is disproportionate in terms of input required and in-game results but that just seems so outrageous when it comes to a character like blight. Like if someone dedicated that much time to be able to stomp players on a regular basis, they've earned it and instead of being upset that you lost, it would be more productive to just get better and dedicate the same amount of time that those players did to become good at blight and then maybe you could go toe-to-toe with that same player.

Post edited by Rauy556 on
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Comments

  • Jbizius
    Jbizius Member Posts: 5
    edited June 17

    Blight is a pretty good scapegoat when it comes to being "sweaty", "op", "try-hard" etc. He's fine to play against for swfs and good players, but oppressive when against solo queue and new players. Besides, people will always blame something for their problems :/

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Or at least he was the hardest "feature", with how they massacred his collision, at least that part of his kit is really simple… What you now need to learn is basically only how to properly do bump logic and flicks, while before you also needed to learn some more techs and map specific collision, what you can slide on what you can't slide on and so on… They dumbed him down quite a bit.

    People in this game always expect they should be able to win the match they get thrown into, even if it is your average solo queue team against a literal comp player or some 10 k + hours Blight player who plays 80% Blight… And it would be fine to have the expectation to win a match, given that it should be balanced and both sides should be able to do so, but given how bad the matchmaking is I don't think it is fair to expect that, you will get demolished from time to time… better complain about matchmaking, because that is the real issue… On top of that there are very few killers that enable its player to outskill the other side in a way that would demolish the other side if they have no clue what they are doing, but can be played around when the other side is skilled, and once again since most players have no clue how to play the game above a certain level, that just means they get trashed when the other side is better, and then they blame it on the character instead of accepting, that they just need to get better (Which I admit won't help much if the rest of the team sucks as well, which brings us back to the matchmaking issue)… It is just a question of skill in the end.

  • I_CAME
    I_CAME Member Posts: 1,302
    edited June 17

    because there is no matchmaking in this game. Sweaty Blights aren't just isolated to some super secret top 1% matchmaking queue. They get matched with random solos too. I know because I got a 7000 hour comp Blight a few nights ago. It was about as fun as it sounds. Sweaty four man teams struggle against a sweaty blight and typically lose even in comp level gameplay. If this game had any real matchmaking that kept these players out of regular matches then it wouldn't be an issue. As it is now a sweaty Blight is basically a guaranteed loss for the overwhelming majority of teams. If you need a comp team to have a chance against something then it is overtuned. A streamsniping comp team with the most busted builds imaginable was literally the only thing that was able to stop the almost 2000 game blight winstreak. Even then they barely won.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    I think you are drawing the wrong conclusions... If a really good player is winning against really bad players that does not make the character he is playing overturned, that just puts even more focus on matchmaking being bad…

    Killers should enable players to get really good results if they are good enough, that would be the best case scenario, the issue is just that matchmaking puts the comp level Blight with a bunch of bad players together in one match. Blight is not overtuned.

  • TheArbiter
    TheArbiter Member Posts: 2,616

    I'm sorry but how is he the "hardest" one to learn when killers like Hillbilly exist which take a lot longer to learn how to curve at every tile

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Sooooo why exactly is it overtuned when a comp level player only gets beaten by comp level players? Is that not the result that is to be expected? Why should it be any different? Are we now blaming the character because the matchmaking is bad?

  • Volcz
    Volcz Member Posts: 1,183

    He's always been 1 of my favorites to go against, just b/c of his pinball style power.
    But he's also had some of the strongest addons that went unchecked for far too long, and when they were finally, some of them took multiple edits/changes and now were here.

    I do think good players didn't mind him as much. But the new players and a lot of solo que enjoyers found him crazy oppressive, not just b/c of his addons & all the techs but survivors were already going into the match solo, so having a teammate on your team who wasn't good in chase or didn't last long in chase vs Blight, was far more likely & that just resulted in even more games lost.

    It was like a stacked card against yours.

  • Devil_hit11
    Devil_hit11 Member Posts: 8,820

    sharp turns and geometry is his counter-play. why do you not enjoy said counter-play?

  • Yharwick
    Yharwick Member Posts: 521

    Because it's very binary, you are either in a part of the map that has the right geometry or you're not at which point the Blight has to actively mess up in order for you not to go down. Basically it feels up to the map and the Blight's skill and the survivor doesn't have a ton of input on the situation.

    Compare this to Xeno in which you can strategically put turrets in places either as an early warning system or at choke points to get them out of crawler mode or Huntress where you have to dodge and/or bait hatchets and pick up on the habits of each Huntress you go against and I feel like Blight is a snooze fest in comparison.

  • hermitkermit
    hermitkermit Member Posts: 427

    I understand your point about matchmaking, but I believe the issue is more complex than just player skill level. It's important to consider that not all characters are designed equally, nor are the roles survivor and killer. While skill is obviously important certain killers/perks may inherently have advantages that make them overpowering regardless of matchmaking. Blaming it all on matchmaking assumes that because a good player can beat other players with a killer/perk, the killer/perk is not overpowered or strong and that is not always the case. Nurse is a great example of this.

    Blight can feel extra oppresive because if the team isn't uniformly skilled,he can dominate the match easily. And when it comes to the survivor role where teamwork is crucial, blights ability doesn't allow for minor mistakes without severe consequences. "bad" usually means "mistakes" and to expect a group of strangers with no communicaiton to play perfectly without making mistakes is unrealistic and unfair and should never be the case for either side. There should always be some wiggle room.

    If majority of people struggle against a certain thing, I don't think it's unfair or unreasonable to believe that the thing itself is strong/difficult and may be in need of changes of some kind instead of blaming the majority for not being able to adapt/manage it. (personally i think blight is in a good spot right now aside from the bug but i mean this in more of a general way)

    I don't agree with the mentality of "it's not good you're all just bad." You can use this mentality to justify anything no matter how unfair it is simply by insisiting that whatver side is struggling just sucks, even if statistics, experiences, or majoirty opinions say otherwise. That's goes for both sides. Old MFT, twins ptb, Old sabo where the hooks never came back, infinites etc. All of those were unbalanced and matchmaking didn't change that.

  • Hex_Ignored
    Hex_Ignored Member Posts: 1,914

    Blights (and nurses) are mainly used by sweatlords with 4 slowdowns, a map offering and, of course, tunneling at 5 gens and a lot of slugging

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634
    edited June 18

    But Nurse is pretty much the same, beatable if the players know what to do...

    But then once again, if the survivor players don't match the killer players skill, should he not win? The issue is ofc that basically one weak link is enough to fairly easily get the advantage in a match, but that once again is a major issue with matchmaking, the players should be on the same level so that there is no weak link that is much easier to get rid of. I don't think Blight has no wiggle room, his chase interaction had a lot of variety and different things you could do, it is just that unlike other killers he can punish misplays, most killers just cannot in such a way and you can mess up way more without man consequences, the question is just how much are the players be able to mess up before the killer should be able to capitalize on that...

    I don't think that is an argument about the number of people, this fully depends of what is expected of them... The question should be is this too hard to achieve and not is it something people inherently do right... Sometimes counterplay is rather unintuitive and might need a few changes, but the question we need to ask in the first place is whether it is something the players are physically able to do, if so they can learn it, the question now is just about the appropriate amount of time it should take. So let's make this more practical... Let's say the killer has 4 types of skill layers and 4 types of counterplay to match those layers... Layer 1 for counterplay 1, layer 2 for counterplay 2 and so on. My point is that if the killer is capable to do skill level 1, then to match his skill you need to able to do counterplay 1. Of course people exaggerate when they say things like I only get matched with comp level blights but I don't really think there is an issue in the basic design when there is counterplay available that you just need to learn... The killer took the time to learn the killer, the survivors need to learn how to play against the killer, seems fair to me... The issue arises when one side has it way easier to learn it's part... But until now nobody brought up the point that mastering Blight is too easy but mastering his counterplay is too hard, or something similar...

    My argument was if one side has the more skilled player why should this side not win? The killer character is just the tool, and it should only translate the players skill into the game, the character should neither buff nor nerf the skill of the player... And all people said above is that they get trashed by Blight players with way more hours or that were quite experienced on Blight... If you get matched with a player more experienced than yourself you should expect a loss to be more reasonable than a win... The outcome should be around 50 50 with equal skill but in such cases this just cannot be expected. If I play chess against a chess grandmaster I cannot expect the same odds to win like when I play against someone on a more equal level of skill compared to mine.

    Post edited by Archol123 on
  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Fair, but how does the killer know he is facing solo q? He kind of needs to go all out at first until he can know.

  • Iron_Cutlass
    Iron_Cutlass Member Posts: 3,261
    edited June 18

    Blight WAS fun to play against. Then they made him boring.

    When you remove different ways to play a character, it also removes more interesting ways to counter-play said character; which has resulted in forcing Blight to effectively play all tiles the exact same, every single time, to get their confirmed hit, it's boring.

  • Sarrif
    Sarrif Member Posts: 192

    Because he's got too much going for him and him like a few other killers (nurse, billy, and spirit) are the main reason why killer perks can't be too strong or get nerfed. For example while stacking slowdown perks on say trapper is okay it's incredibly oppressive on killers like these.

  • LeFennecFox
    LeFennecFox Member Posts: 1,292

    Probably PTSD from blight when he had stuff like c33, alch ring, adren vial, blighted tag, and old double speed. Once killers get a reputation for being op/annoying to vs it never goes away no matter how many changes are made.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    I think double speed was fine, the rest not. Maybe somewhere in between current and old double speed even...

  • LeFennecFox
    LeFennecFox Member Posts: 1,292
    edited June 18

    They should just do old crow (6%) basekit and nerf/rework his speed addons that make him inconsistent to verse. Also opens up room to add speed reduction to strong addons w/o them making him unplayable.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    I guess, but messing around with his speed just pushes such addons back by alot... Quite a lot of Blight players tend to say that speed is everything on Blight, so using an addon that reduces speed would need a massive upside to be usable when it does reduce speed.

  • alpha5
    alpha5 Member Posts: 362

    The thing is the Blight player was 15h into his stream and made obvious mistakes he wouldn't have if he was a little more rested and the reason it is overtuned is because it required comp squad survivors and a series of Blight mistakes to get a 2man out in a game that doesn't even have a separate ranked playlist. About 1900 games, most of those with pre-nerf addons, were a waste of time for 4 people because they had no hope of escaping just alone for the fact that the most important skill survivors need against mobility killers, coordination, is not allowed by the game itself. On top of that the lack of knowledge that the killer will comp it out and survivors being encouraged by archives to essentially goof around though this is beside the point. You can bet it wasn't the first snipe attempt on his streak, it was just the only one that worked.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    I still don't really see where this is supposed to be over tuned?

    OK so the Blight player used the strongest stuff, just like the people trying to end his stream, both sides were really good, Blight made mistakes and lost because of that, sounds fine to me? I guess if the survivors were even better than those they might have gotten more people out, or broken streak earlier... Saying it required a comp squad when the killer player is basically also playing on comp level does not really add anything...

    The game has no unranked mode though, it has a ranked mode where it matches people according to their mmr... You fail to point where the issue is Blight as a character and not just matchmaking... Did the Blight face survivors on that level every single one of his 1900+ games so that it would have been reasonable to assume that he could lose the streak? If not then it is a matchmaking issue... If you put Serral against your friends plat 1 friend in Starcraft 2 he is going to win 10k games in a row, and nobody would say something about balance... It is just that Starcraft has proper matchmaking so dumb stuff like that does not happen, but dbds matchmaking is trash. That's why such streak have so little meaning, because the grounds are uneven because one side is just way more skilled then the other one for the majority of games.

    Well sure it must have felt like a waste of time for most survivors that went up against him, but once again, that is a matchmaking issue, because they were not of equal skill as the Blight player. And also an issue with the gap between solo and swf when it comes to the gap in information, obviously.

    But tome Quests also make killers goof around? I would not blame that one tome Quests... Both sides don't know how the opposing side will play, so if you want to make sure you win you need to play in a certain way, that goes for killer just like it goes for survivor... Ofc it sucks for those on the receiving end, but this is also not an issue with Blight, but with the general design of the game, because everyone is in the same queue you don't know what you will get. But once again, the issue is that matchmaking puts people against this guy that are a. Nowhere near his skill for the vast majority of the games (which gets further benefitted by the game not having communication) b. That don't take the match seriously, because their only goal is not to just escape for a streak. However none of this points towards Blight being overpowered... This all just goes back to matchmaking being unable to give the guy a 4 men comp squad every single game and the game itself limiting solo players in their coordination...

  • radiantHero23
    radiantHero23 Member Posts: 4,238

    Blights base power is unhealthy for a version of the game where 90% of the killers are more viable.

    Just look at the new hook feature. Absolutely fine on almost all killers. On blight? Pretty stupid because it makes his downtime after a successful down non-existant.

    Blight is, similarly to Nurse, pretty easy to get good results with. He has a really high skill ceiling, which is almost never necessary to reach in public lobbies.

    He's very fun to play, therefore often seen.

    He had the strongest set of addons almost any killer had for a very long time, making him very despised for that reason alone.

    Those are just some reasons to why Blight is not liked.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    But if you down someone using your power it will be on cooldown, so if you hook someone close by or instant hook, that does not make the cooldown go faster... He gets less out of it then for example Wraith who does not have a cooldown on his power?

  • Rauy556
    Rauy556 Member Posts: 46

    I think you completely hit the nail spot on as to what I was getting at with my discussion, I truly dont get why lower skill players complain about a character that requires considerably more dedication to be able to use and be proficient at as opposed to a low skill ceiling killer that should obviously weaker. I think Blight is the perfect killer and I wish they added more like him, strong but difficult to get good at and even harder to master on individual maps.

    Also as you mentioned, the issue is not Blight as a character, it is 1000% the horrible matchmaking system of dbd that makes lower skill players blame the character for their loss instead of realizing that the player they played against is simply better at the game and wants to win more. I think its very unreasonable that a team of 4 solo Q players not running meta builds and not being very good at the game have a chance to win against a competitive player running a meta build and playing optimally. It seems most players want to be handed free wins against clearly more skilled and dedicated opponents which sounds absurd if you consider the situation in any other video game scene, you would be clowned and told to get better, however within the dbd community it is baffling how widely accepted it is that worse players should be able to compete and maybe even win against considerably better and more skilled players.

  • Rauy556
    Rauy556 Member Posts: 46

    The new hook feature is not a talking point for balance, it is not in the core game and it is only there for 2 weeks in a separate queue.

    Also I think saying "Blight is pretty easy to get good results with" is extremely ignorant as he is by far the hardest character in the game to pick up and learn and also to master, yes I am also talking about survivor being easier to learn as opposed to blight.

  • NODD3RS
    NODD3RS Member Posts: 152

    probably bc almost every blight rn in pubs is using the pallet exploit

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Thanks man ^^

    Well I guess they just assume that the matchmaking will never work, so if the killer becomes worse they stand a chance when the other side is way better, which is quite unreasonable to want...

  • th3
    th3 Member Posts: 1,845

    I'm annoyed with blight players abusing his stun bug atm. It's gotten very pervasive every game with a blight just abusing tf out of it.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Well I would blame the devs for A. Creating that bug... B. Not kill switching Blight... And also kind of the players, in case the bug is something you need to specifically aim for...

  • radiantHero23
    radiantHero23 Member Posts: 4,238

    It immediately negates the time to walk to a hook. I'm not talking about his cooldown. I'm talking about the downtime where he needs to carry people to hooks. That is valuable downtime for the survivor team.

    A killer wastes a lot of time carrying survivors throughout a trial. You can find out how much time that is by slugging anybody and not hooking at all.

    By using autohook, killers can negate that downtime. This saves a lot of time. For most killers this is fine, but for the higher tier killers, like blight, that can apply pressure very fast, this can easily become too much.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    That is the exact same time for every killer though... And it is still a time limited event, all the other things also safe time.

  • radiantHero23
    radiantHero23 Member Posts: 4,238
    edited June 18

    Of course all other killers can do that. Blight and some others however, have base powers that strong, that a mechanic like this can easily make them too oppressive compared to other killers like Doctor for example. That's why I pointed out that Blight and some others will be a problem if the game becomes more oriented towards the lower tier killers in a form of basekit killer buffs.

    I know it's a time limited event. That's why I mentioned other aspects as well.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Ok, but when you basekit buff specific killers, how does that concern Blight at all? Nobody is talking about changing the pallet break time or basic attack cooldown or something like that? If you thought that you were completely missing the point. When people ask for basekit killer buffs for the lower end of the killers they want the basekit of those killers buffed… Not killer overall.

  • radiantHero23
    radiantHero23 Member Posts: 4,238

    I do think killer needs some sort of early game mechanic and a mechanic that discourages tunneling, rewarding hook spreading and punishing heavy tunneling.

    Making the game focus on the killer getting as many hooks as possible and keeping the 1v4 up as long as possible would result in a more fun experience all around. Obviously this would need heavy basekit changes for both sides.

    I'm fine with small changes for killers in the current version of the game. Blight is fine in our current version.

    But if the game would change for the healthier, killers like Blight could easily become a problem.

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Would be nice, but I don't see that coming any time soon…

  • LeFennecFox
    LeFennecFox Member Posts: 1,292

    I reported day 0 of ptb because it happened within 10s of testing out the supposed fix for him looking down after pallet break. It's clear they wanted to shove out the anniversary with new cosmetics over doing bug fixes.

  • hermitkermit
    hermitkermit Member Posts: 427

    In a perfect world, matchmaking would create more balanced matches, but that doesn't mean certain killers/perks aren't strong or overpowered. You mention Nurse, saying she's "beatable if players know what to do." This is surprising because many/most pepole in the game reagardless of killer main or survivor main agree that Nurse is fundamentally unfair and overpowered, because her power is basically a cheat. Just because people have won against her doesn't make her any less oppressive, as is the case with Blight. These killers have winstreaks in the thousands, and I feel it is unreasonable to say it is only because of facing unskilled survivors due to poor matchmaking. Assuming they only win because of bad matchmaking and not because they are just inherently strong shows a strong bias.

    The issue with survivor skill not matching killer skill is significant. To have a chance at winning, all four survivors need to be equally skilled to match one killer, which is inherently imbalanced. The game is designed for killers to be stronger to make the 1v4 dynamic work, so the killers "skill" is already higher by default. Expecting the entire opposing team to lose (excluding hatch) if even one of them is a "weak link" which again, just means a player who makes a mistake, is not indicative of a "balanced" or "fun" opponent.

    If your argument is that a more skilled player should win, it depends on what you mean by skill. In a 1v1, the killer always wins. In a 1v4 with no perks, items, or add-ons, the better skilled player(s) should win. However, this isn't always the case due to other factors in the game that can change outcomes drastically: maps, perks, add-ons, items, "playstyles" like slugging or tunneling, and perk synergy all impact game results. Combining these factors with a killer who is already strong without any of those things creates an oppressive opponent that can feel unfairly matched.

    Personally, I think Blight is in a decent spot, but that doesn't mean he isn't strong. He often tears apart teams rather than struggling against them, as shown by stats and winstreaks, and many players' experiences support this. This is why people may not enjoy facing a killer who feels very punishing. I usually like the challenge, but I'm not surprised other people may not.

    Basically to end this, your question was why people "hate going against blight" and your position seems to be that blight isn't that strong and it's just bad matchmaking. I disagree, I feel there is plently of evidence to support that he is strong regardless of matchmaking, and I was just explaining why I believe people don't enjoy going against him. You can disagree, that's completely fine. I'm not trying to sway minds here I'm just trying to give a little insight as to why people really struggle with this speedy boy.

    I wish you fun in your future matches! gliyn gamer

  • Archol123
    Archol123 Member Posts: 4,634

    Well it would show bias if such huge streaks were common for example in comp… Why does Nurse in comp not win every single game? I'm not saying those people win only because of matchmaking, I am saying the win that many games in a row because they are really really good at the killer and the matchmaking does not provide players of equal skill… I'm also not saying those killers are weak, but there is a difference between strong and overpowered… And I don't think neither Blight nor Nurse are overpowered, it is just matchmaking that makes them look like it in combination with facing players of superior skill.

    I mean if you want a balanced match the survivors skill and the skill of the killer need to be equal, the rest of what you say here is just personal preference.

    I mean ofc the killer is going to win eventually in a 1v1, because the ressources on the map will get used, so what? That is intended by the game. Skill is the ability to do something, in our case play the game, I don't really think there is much to argue about what skill is… Obviously the game has many random elements, but in the case we talked the outcome was fitting wasn't it? Both sides brought the strongest stuff they could think of and one side won, presumably because the other side made too many mistakes. Playstyles are also a form of skill, just like using a build order a macro playstyle in DBD is something you need to learn and execute when you deem it fit, just because something is unfun for the opposing side does not mean it cannot be effective, in the scenario we talked about it was basically about winning at all costs, so taking into account the fun of the other side is pretty much a non factor here.

    I never said he is not that strong, I said he is not overpowered, and such huge winstreaks are not a result of the killer being overpowered, but the killer being strong, the player being really good at the game and the matchmaking being absolutely terrible giving the Blight almost exclusively way worse players.

  • Bafugaboo
    Bafugaboo Member Posts: 406

    Easy answer speed buffs unballanced

  • GhostsCore
    GhostsCore Member Posts: 30

    This is a very unfortunate

    The fact you claim Blight takes skill but Survivor is "some of the easiest gameplay in the mainstream" is disheartening.

    You are completely dismissing that survivor can, arguably, take more skill than any single killer takes to learn. Not only do you have to learn how to optimally counter 36 killer powers in this game. But also learn a majority of the add-ons as they can drastically alter the killers power.

    Blight is hated simply for the fact he doesn't offer a whole lot in the way of counterplay. We can see this by the fact that Billy, a killer who requires skill comparable to Blight (if not even more since they get screwed over by map collisions more) is incredibly loved and respected.

    Just ask Survivors what 3 killers they hate the most and you'll see for yourself. Most people would answer at least one of the following: Skull Merchant, Knight, Clown, Blight, Nurse. All of them have either little to no meaningful counterplay. Or their counter play is incredibly boring (drop pallet or run to next tile till you get cornered and die)