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Those skull merchant changes are awful
4 nerfs and her only buff doesn’t do anything if the survivors know what they are doing.
literally my favourite killer has been absolutely butchered because 70% of this community is too lazy to play against her cause ya’ll will not remove hookicides
WHY ARE WE NERFING AN AT MOST B TIER KILLER BUT NOT NURSE, BLIGHT ETC ETC.
SPIRIT IS STILL IN THE GAME SOMEHOW!? LITERALLY I CANNOT COUNTER HER CAUSE I’M HARD OF HEARING IN MY LEFT EAR BUT NOOOOOOO TOTALLY FINE!!! Let’s nerf the killer that only has the highest kill rate cause hookicides are still in the game.
was it so hard to just remove the haste and hinder and give her small compensation buffs. I don’t hate the idea of one scan beam for example if it got improved but no no.
i’m genuinely so sad rn cause i love Skull Merchant and want her to be liked, but these changes are not the way to go.
Please don’t go through with these changes thank you <3
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I agree these changes are gonna make her useless, BHVR needs to rework her to make her fun for both sides.
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Undo the scanline nerf and she'll be fine I think.
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I don't think I eve saw so one sided changes in a long time, even the Knight rework that was for sure aimed towards pleasing Survivors, this one is the most one-sided, biased, overkill I witness from patch notes on any killer in a loooooong time, if ever.
If devs want to just remove her from game, you tell be honest, just tell us.
I knew why I stopped buying skins and didn't level her up for cakes for a very good reason. But even this is just insane. Shamefull.
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i think that and also give her another small compensation and she’ll be fine.
Since the hinder is only 5% and she has no more haste, she’s just legion but worse. Give her some better stealth or improve the trapping playstyle in some way.
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These are definitely terrible changes, I'll be sure to check it out myself on the PTB so I can write a more detailed post in the PTB section once it's live but based just on this text… yeah, this is almost all awful.
It's like the devs think she IS too strong just sort of directionlessly, and not that her problems are a combination of unclear counterplay and general + unfair community bias.
The part that gets me is that they're pitching removing Haste from her power, and toning down the Hindered. Two of the only necessary parts of her kit. Why on Earth would survivors ever bother dodging drones - y'know, the interactive gameplay of her power - if they don't do anything now?
The only worthwhile thing is removing the stealth mode from drones, that's a nice way of making her counterplay more accessible and intuitive. That should've come with more changes like it and buffs, though, not this nuclear sledgehammer aimed squarely and exclusively at her not problematic areas.
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"Improve the trapping playstyle" This would be so hot omg. I loved the haste but if they somehow replaced the haste with something to trap better and be more lethal I think (as long as its effective) I would LOVE that too. What draws me to SM is the area denial/trap set up playstyle
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i would LOVE trap focused skull merchant so much, i want them to focus on it cause it works with her lore wise and it’s so sexy pulling it off
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chill on blight he’s gutted already shell of his former self
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It may be an unpopular opinion, but I think if something is not fun or engaging it should not be strong.
She should have never gotten the Haste or Hindered in the first place. I'm glad the Haste will be gone gone, and we'll see how the 5% Hindered feels when this hits PTB. I don't think she should get "compensation buffs" because they undid a mistake.
Not sure what the Drone changes are really doing but as long as the scan progress isn't reversible or removable it's probably still not enough to make people enjoy playing against her, honestly. If you lost some scan progress whenever you disabled a drone maybe it would feel more like a mini-game.
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Genuine question, I'm asking this in good faith: If the skill expression of actively dodging drone beams isn't engaging, what exactly could be for her?
And if dodging drone beams isn't engaging, but dodging other killer powers is, what's the difference?
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It is engaging and fun. I don't mind playing against SM and find the green light red light enjoyable. There's tons of stuff in the game that's less engaging. Some people want every killer to throw themselves or something at the survivor so they can dodge and throw a tantrum when they do something else.
However people are obdurate. They have a hard time changing their opinions and speaking out against the meme tide of skull merchant bad is futile.
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They gutted her. This isn’t balance.
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But when are you really dodging it? If you are on a generator you don't have to. If you're in chase with her you won't be able to. Currently it's only when you're approaching an objective or leaving one, you just have to play an annoying game of red light green light. I don't think her current power has the built-in levers that would make it engaging, it's just not well designed enough. During her PTB the only part of playing against her I thought was interesting was the little mini game you get for disabling the drones, but doing that is so pointless I can't imagine how they could rework the power to make that more prominent in a way that matters.
Dodging other killer's powers is generally a direct interaction with the killer. The drone is just a prop. Even other trap setting killers like Trapper, Hag and Nightmare require killer input to truly benefit from their traps. The drone can just take a health state in a way that doesn't offer too much counterplay outside of the red light green light since you can't remove the scan progress. There really isn't a lot of choice when trying to play against her power, which makes the gameplay very dull.
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I mean, you are doing it in chase?
Leveraging line of sight and stopping to let a beam pass over you are absolutely things you're able to do in chase, and absolutely things you should be doing in chase. Otherwise you're just letting her injure you for no effort, you really should not be assuming you're powerless to prevent scans in chase.
That's the part of her that's engaging. The in-chase counterplay, which is both meaningful and extremely viable to do.
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In chase you're just making the choice of taking the hit from her or from the drone. Most loops DON'T offer line of sight blocks for the scan, and her invisible, variable speed means you're not going to have the opportunity to stop for the beams and still loop.
That's not engaging or meaningful. It's a lose-lose.
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That's just flat out not true.
I'm not the greatest survivor in the world, and in the rare instance I see Skull Merchant, I can dodge beams pretty reliably. You are not making the choice of who hits you, you're just avoiding the hit entirely. Sometimes you're caught out, obviously, but that's true against all killers, especially those with ranged damage.
The only thing I partially agree with is that it's pretty meaningfully hard (but still very doable, to be clear) to dodge beams in scouting mode, which is why the only change BHVR have pitched here that I agree with is removing scouting mode entirely. Beams being visible all the time makes the counterplay more approachable without actually making it easier.
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