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A perfect quote response to those saying "good" on skull merchant being destroyed

supersonic853
supersonic853 Member Posts: 5,542
edited September 15 in General Discussions

"Just know, if your praising the philosophy of a character being destroyed with nerfs until a rework in over a year. Keep that same energy if it happens to one of your characters or perks. Keep the positive energy going"

Because I doubt this will be the last time they do this approach. They did it with Freddy. Now SM. What happens if another killer or perk is fundamentally problematic? Do we just need to obliterate it with 5 nerfs until a rework comes whenever BHVR sees fit? If that's the approach we want to take, so be it I guess. I feel that's why this is more than just SM overall. It's letting BHVR set a precedent on how they do characters or perks until a rework. Though they already set it with Freddy over 3 years ago. And noone fought then. We will get his rework eventually I'm sure. Twins rework did great right?

Comments

  • crogers271
    crogers271 Member Posts: 1,821

    What happens if another killer or perk is fundamentally problematic? Do we just need to obliterate it with 5 nerfs until a rework comes whenever BHVR sees fit?

    If it's actually problematic? Yes. Ideally you would rework something, or change if its overtuned, but obliterating something is preferable to it ruining the game.

    Twins like 3? And they still messed up the rework. Onryo they reworked and even the mains said it was a mistake to the point they had to take her back.

    Twins and Sadako were different issues.

    Twins was being reworked because of complaints from both survivors and killers (though for survivors nothing on the level of skull merchant). They failed at the rework pretty spectacularly, but it had a different origin.

    Sadako is a tough case. A playstyle emerged that caused problems and instead of an addon nerf they did a character overhaul. I'd disagree with the idea though that the mains disliked her versions. Some people really liked it, and some players hated it. People seem to have differing opinions on her various iterations.

  • Langweilg
    Langweilg Member Posts: 1,268

    I wished they just reverted the Onryo rework completely, she is still extremely unfun to play, because survivors have far too much control over her. I would even say her first rework was better than this version, but the original was still the best. They completely nuked her with the last rework. She is only good against people who have no clue what to do now and everyone else has a super easy time.

  • radiantHero23
    radiantHero23 Member Posts: 4,240

    OG Sadako main here. Stopped playing her when version 2.0 hit. Then started the #bringbackSadako - movement which helped to create version 3.0. Sure, you will always find people that like certain versions more than the last, but from what I seen many other OG players express is, that the second version was despised by a majority of them. I had pretty big support back then.

  • tippy2k2
    tippy2k2 Member Posts: 5,204

    BHVR has always felt like it has a bit of a heavy hand when it comes to stuff like this but yeah, I 100% agree that this sets a really bad precedent and leaves a really bad taste in my mouth. Maybe it's only because this time it was outright admitted it was happening or maybe it's because usually stuff that gets nerfed to the ground STARTED super strong and/or overpowered and needed the nerf but something about this go around really hurts BHVRs reputation in my eyes.

    The character was free for me (and I imagine many others) and she was not a character well liked so people don't seem to be super bothered about it but as you stated, I hope people remember this if BHVR decides to take a sledgehammer to their favorite thing in the game…

  • Langweilg
    Langweilg Member Posts: 1,268

    I hope people remember this if BHVR decides to take a sledgehammer to their favorite thing in the game…

    They already did this to sadako. I enjoyed and loved playing as her first/original version and they removed the whole playstile I liked about her.

  • adam1233467
    adam1233467 Member Posts: 1,107

    Did you forgot that legion received the same treatment some years ago as well?

  • Kaitsja
    Kaitsja Member Posts: 1,833

    They've been doing this sort of thing for years. The only reason people are kicking up a stink is because SM is a niche killer, and this treatment is usually reserved for overperforming popular picks (be they perks, or killers).

    BHVR isn't doing this to spite SM enjoyers. They have the data. They know there are people disconnecting and giving up on hook vs SM. They're aware that people are not enjoying playing against her.

  • GeneralV
    GeneralV Member Posts: 11,294

    Though they already set it with Freddy over 3 years ago. And noone fought then. We will get his rework eventually I'm sure. Twins rework did great right?

    The silver lining here, my friend, is that they don't have to come up with something new, as they did with Twins.

    Revert Freddy back to his original 2017 iteration and give him the Incapacitated status effect during the Dream Transition. Problem solved.

    And after the changes to Billy and Onryo, I think there is hope.

  • Kaitsja
    Kaitsja Member Posts: 1,833

    Given that the intention of these changes is to alleviate the frustration of playing against her in the meantime until her rework, I don't see them caving to any demands.

  • supersonic853
    supersonic853 Member Posts: 5,542
    edited September 15

    To be fair this can happen to anything. Say you have a perk or killer you really like. Then they are updated to a insane amount (as happens overtime in this game when a perk or killers time comes to be updated). Then nerfed to the point it's weaker than when you originally played them. It's happened before.

  • TieBreaker
    TieBreaker Member Posts: 982
    edited September 15

    When I started playing survivor about four years ago, I already knew that killers hated DH and flashlights. So I never used them. Even now I can't aim a flashlight for a save lmao.

  • dwight444
    dwight444 Member Posts: 435

    you know they have data they likely use to assess potential changes? Even if the data supports the wrong changes; I don’t think they come to this forum and read the whining to make decisions

  • GonnaBlameTheMovies
    GonnaBlameTheMovies Member Posts: 682

    I agree with everything except MFT.

    That perk can rot in the ground and should never ever come back into the meta. Just delete it from the game.

  • MrMori
    MrMori Member Posts: 1,619
    edited September 16

    Adren and DH are all perfectly viable after their nerfs, those were warranted. MFT is niche but I don't think it's "bad", just mediocre.

    Ultimate Weapon needed a nerf too, but the current version is lackluster. Ruin is still usable. STBFL nerf was stupid and pretty much just made it unusable on a large portion of the roster while solving nothing that made the perk problematic on basic M1 killers.

    But the Skull Merchant nerfs aren't just a toning her down a bit, they're effectively going to make her a bottom 3 killer. Against players that know how her power works she might be the worst killer in the game now. Maybe it's for the best, I don't know. I'll still play her after the nerfs. It'll be funny.

  • BlightedDolphin
    BlightedDolphin Member Posts: 1,875

    They didn't do this to Freddy though, if anything they did the opposite.

    His OG design received NO changes after his initial nerfs. Rather than give him some temporary buffs until his rework they ignored him because they didn't feel there was any point in updating him when a rework was coming. His original nerfs weren't to kill him off until his rework either since they weren't planning a rework at the time, they just overreacted and nerfed him into the ground.

    His current power was not nerfed to make him tolerable until his next rework, in fact they haven't even said if they are reworking him again. He was nerfed because 'The Stats™' showed he was over-performing, they never intended to rework him or buff him again after his nerfs. One of the devs even said they were nerfing his Dream Pallets simply because the stats showed they were 'overpowered but we don't know why'. And they still aren't giving Freddy any 'in the meantime' changes until his upcoming changes (which have been in the works for over a year now).

    I do agree though that Skull Merchant's nerfs are way too much. Some nerfs in the meantime are fair, but making her completely useless is unnecessary.

  • legiondoctor
    legiondoctor Member Posts: 223

    You also forgot sadako she was weak then super weak then very weak cause survivors dont know how tape works

  • HexHuntressThighs
    HexHuntressThighs Member Posts: 1,245

    LMAO! Yeah right! hahahaha, Condemned only sadako was on the same level as 3 gen merchant. Being slugged all game was horrendous. It was at a point she was an instant DC for a lot of people just like skulls. At least with Skully you could actually play the game still.

  • caipt
    caipt Unconfirmed, Member Posts: 689

    This is just not true. People sure hated condemn sadako, but she has never brought a match to the one hour mark. I'd be willing to bet they didn't go too far past half of that. To imply that sadako has ever brought the same level of boredom and time wasting to dbd that skully did is ludicrous and near disingenuous.

  • caipt
    caipt Unconfirmed, Member Posts: 689

    I have no idea how she ever made it past the conceptual stage. They should have never released her.

  • Caiman
    Caiman Member Posts: 2,886

    Everything I like has either already been nerfed, or has been buffed. I fear nothing anymore. Goodbye Skull Merchant, I hope you do not return with your dumb drones and terrible lore and goofy bedazzled gas mask that doesn't even do anything.

  • BlackRose89
    BlackRose89 Member Posts: 424
    edited September 16

    The thing is most of us arent saying not nerf her, just don't completely destroy her. The current nerf plan will do that. The better short term plan would be actually try to balance her, increase her skill floor, remove some of the status effects, and promote more healthy play styles that require skill. Also we not talking about a year here...we all know at minimum it'll take BHVR 2 years or even more to rework her. Look how long twins rework took or even better look at Freddy. Like her or not she doesn't deserve to be completely gutted and left in the trashcan for 2+ years.

  • ChaosWam
    ChaosWam Member Posts: 1,842
    edited September 16

    To most of us, I hope, that want the game in a healthier spot we agree with this.

    Problem is people will always bring up a nerf on their side to justify it, even if the thing changed for them made sense as to why it was changed. And I would have been fine with some SM nerfs if they also made sense and had other areas of her kit adjusted for compensation.

    We didn't get that, we got a massive nerf to appease survivors until the next rework, making her even worse for both sides. I'd be equally mad if they took Sprint Burst, changed the haste to 25% for 2 seconds and call it a day until it gets reworked because some killers don't like SB.