Why does every useful survivor perk get gutted?
Adrenaline, Boil Over and Distortion nerfs were the last straw for me. Distortion has one single charge while killers get to wall hack all game with constant aura reading JFL. You can't even hide anymore in a game that was based on stealth. Survivors are just supposed to be playthings for a killer's ego and not allowed to have counterplay?
These devs don't understand how to make a game fun. I remember an interview with a dev in another game who said the aim should be to make all abilities feel powerful, because it's FUN and balance each other out. Gutting any useful perk to the point no one with any sense would take it is effectively removing it from the game.
Comments
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The word you are looking for is "balance".
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All we can do is pray one day all aura read add ons is gone and all aura reading perks get the 4 token use only like pain res did cause it's just pathetic and skilless being seen for everything you do.
Post edited by buggybug on4 -
Survivors still have counter play , it’s just not as easy as it was when the game gave them chance after chance after chance. They have to actually know how to loop now and not just throw down 3 pallets and chain strong loop into strong loop.
Distortion still works fine, you just can’t hide all game without interacting with the Killer. It shouldn’t be a problem since it was Survivors who kept exclaiming that the chase it the most enjoyable part of the game. The Devs are just promoting more interaction that Survivors asked for.
And don’t act as if Killer perks don’t get gutted. Only, it’s not just the perks but Killers themselves get demolished by the Devs for the sake of Survivors, just look at what they did to Skerchant.
Balance is generally fine. The most pressing thing Survivors need is a proper training mode that teaches them how to loop and an AI for each Killer so they can practice against them without having to worry about dealing with dumb teammates.14 -
Drsoontm is correct. This is what balance looks like in a game that fundamentally cant be balanced.
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Distortion has one single charge
Distortion starts with 1 token*, fixed for you.
You can get up to 2 tokens, but you must get into chases. Learn to escape chases, like you're supposed to as a Victim.
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The game is not built around survivors 'escaping' chases. You're expected to give up your position to the killer, then lead them on a long chase before you're eventually hooked.
With regards to the main topic: Boil Over is an atrocity that should never have had its original buff. It's incredibly bad for gameplay and should stay in a relatively unusable state, unless it gets a completely different function. The other two did not deserve nerfs though.
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30% escape rate in solo q. What balance are you speaking of?
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The game isn't built around Victims "escaping" chases
Correct, Mr. Strawmanner, it's built around Victims staying alive. Not being caught (i.e. escaping chases) is what the game is built around. Not being caught is one way to not die, not being found is another, but you cannot do just one or the other.
You're expected to give up your position to the Killer
Simply incorrect.
Post edited by A_T_E on4 -
*Survivor, not Victim. Even tho I know that some people just want Survivors to be victims.
@Topic:
Boil Over is a bad example. It was really unhealthy and in general it is still an unhealthy Perk. You will never see Boil Over in a regular Build, because it is bad. You will only see it in Builds which are supposed to be annoying. In fact, Boil Over would need a complete Rework to have the chance to become a viable Perk.
Adrenaline I would agree, the Perk got nerfed too hard. I think at least one of the Nerfs would have been fine to be reverted, the only real problem was that it wakes Survivors up against Freddy. The rest of the Perk was fine and not really complained about.
Distortion on the other hand was just whining about it. There was not really anything wrong with Distortion, Killers acted as if they cannot find Survivors anymore, which begged the question how Killers manage to do that who dont run any Aura Read-Perks. And the argument that Survivors are hiding with Distortion and teammates are dying due to that was also just bad - players who play THAT immersed will just use more lockers and be even less useful than before.
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How're you gonna call me a strawmanner when what I'm replying to is right there in your post?
Simply incorrect.
That was the exact and entire point of the Distortion nerf.
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People just toss strawman and whataboutism like its candy if they dont understand the conversation. Just let them complain momentarily and move on. When they reply to this, I'll give an example.
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I don't think those three are very good examples. Being healed off hook with adrenaline was silly and not fair to the killer, punishing them for picking up and hooking and rewarding them for waiting over downed survivors as gens pop to smack them and deny adren. It was bad game design. It also went from 5 seconds to 3 seconds but I think that's fine, it's still a very stong and top tier perk.
Boil Over got its wiggle strength and aura blocking range buffed, but also had a crazy wiggle progress bonus to drops added. That turned out to be too strong so they toned the wiggle bonus down to be based on current progress instead and now the perk is still better than it was before the changes.
And Distortion well I'll admit there's a ton of aura reading on killer, but Distortion is totally usable. The only difference is if you never take chase you can't hide forever. In fact, Distortion right now is actually even better as a perk to deny the killer aura reading in chase since you'll be regaining tokens during the chase. I like the rework, it incentivizes Distortion users to take chase instead of just hiding, while still helping their stealth outside of chase.
Also, you're glossing over lots of really nice buffs that survivor perks have gotten. Look at the last update! Blood Rush, Lucky Star, Inner Focus, Quick Gambit, Poised, all perks that were extremely low usage rate and overall pretty terrible are now sort of decent. I personally think the devs are doing a pretty good job balancing the game. Although soloq is pretty miserable right now.
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Adrenaline got nerfed the right amount, perks interacting with killer powers was bad, and the free unhook with heal, endurance and speed boost while also robbing the killer's pressure was ridiculous. It was too strong when survivors were in a winning position, and just flat out too beneficial with no counter play in a tied position which defaulted the situation into the survivors advantage.
There was alot wrong with distortion, and its pretty insane there's still people defending its over tuned, unhealthy previous version. You ignoring the issues it caused along with the logical arguments supporting it because they were "bad" (they weren't) is nonsense. It's just a fact that stealthy play is overall bad for everyone else unless you're in a coordinated group.
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I don't know if these graphs show what you want them to show, because these suggest the nerfs were undeserved.
Absolute most stacked survivor set-up is still sub-50%. Nerfing that further would be the opposite of balance.
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DBD was never intended to be a stealth game. Even back in the day, killers had perks like Spies from the Shadows and Whispers to counter sneaky survivors and encourage chasing. Over time, the game evolved, and now everyone plays with ten times the efficiency they used to, making "general location" perks like Whispers far less effective (even though Whispers itself was never changed). This led to the addition of more aura perks. There could be 200 aura perks, but a killer can still only equip four, so I'm not sure why it's an issue. Plus, only a few aura perks are even that useful, and figuring out which one the killer has is part of gameplay
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Now include games with a dc, exclude hatch escapes, exclude games where killer is afk, and solo q escape rate is probably around 20%.
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It's almost like that data (that would happen to negatively skew results towards your claims) is excluded because its flawed and irrelevant as it has too much of an impact on games.
What you want is to include data that suits you and remove data that disproves you. The bad faith is astounding honestly.
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Really they should include all data to the kill rates. Having the AFK killers in and leaving out DC's already shifts the %
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Weird choice of examples.
Boil Over was never a good perk. It's actually usable currently, but only in very degenerate strategies.
Adrenaline is pretty much the same perk as before minus healing off hook. You never should have been relying on the heal off of hook.
Distortion is now fair.
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Self-sabotage would make data unusable for any kind of analysis.
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Thing is they also left in deaths on first hook to the kill rate % and when they show the difference the largest was 3% on SM when she had a 71% Kill rate.
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Yes, and that's regrettable. But it's difficult to filter that kind of data.
Many have advocated to disable that option. I'm almost convinced it would be the right move even if the next step would be sore losers running to the killer instead.
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Each of those ‘buffed’ perks you listed still have low usage. I guess survivor players are too stupid to understand what good perks really are though, huh? After all survivor players keep sticking to the same 6-8 perks that have been meta for the last 5 years despite BHVR ‘buffing’ low-quality perks like Calm Spirit and Pharmacy.
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It can’t be that difficult. They told us flat out what it was with SM in a forum comment. They clearly have the means to parse data and do parse data regarding deaths on first hook (not always indicative of throwing by the way; three survivors could be slugged and one hooked who cycles through all hook stages without being rescued… on first hook) as they’ve shown us.
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And I must insist, the problem with the scenario you're laying out is that you assume that the killer is all-seeing. Most of my killer builds include 0-1 aura perks, because there's simply better stuff to use. The game has moved far beyond hide and seek; it's looping that shows skill and gets wins. But ironically, you still can play stealthy. Distortion is not the end-all be-all stealth perk. Shadowstep is infinite aura hiding (within range) for the whole team, Self-Preservation to hide scratch marks and sounds when a nearby teammate gets hit (helps against slugging), and Quick & Quiet/Dance With Me to disappear after a quick vault. Aura hiding isn't all there is to stealth. The chances that the killer's seeing your aura mid-chase, which is where it's most important, is pretty low. I haven't even tried that reworked Predator perk. Shows how excited the average killer player is for supposed "crazy killer perk buffs!" So it's not that survivors are the killer's playthings, boosting their ego. In fact, once you learn the game, and assuming you've got equally good teammates, it's quite the opposite when you're survivor.
The devs don't know what they're doing. On that, we agree. But killer's issue is that the game is imbalanced for him, which you don't see because matchmaking forces subpar survivors into many matches, which ties into survivor's issue. You can be as good as you want as survivor, but it oftentimes doesn't count for anything, because you've got 2-3 bad teammates destroying any momentum that you had. The killer may not even be that good, but because the devs have decided to hide bad balance behind forced mismatches, you pay the bill. That means losing matches you have no place losing, exactly the same feeling you get when playing killer. You don't have really good survivors as killer all the time, but when you go against them, no matter how good you are, you just lose. 1 DS, 1 chase at shack or a jungle gym where you don't get the pallet down, 1 body block, 1 gen done in your face when you were about to Pop it. Any one of these is game-ending for the killer. You just don't see it in solo, because your teammates are almost completely random skill levels.
In terms of "gutting" useful survivor perks, I don't see it. You could nerf the top 10 survivor meta perks (except Windows and Deja Vu, because they're 100% fair), and survivors would still have plenty useful stuff to work with. Any Means to reset dropped pallets is useful, as is Soul Guard for protection after a pick-up. It's just that the meta perks are so easy to activate and so insane in their effects.
Think about it: Get off hook, 80 seconds of an extra health state and silence, or 60 seconds to stun a killer and full stop their momentum. Killer downs all 4 survivors in 45 seconds, free self pick-up. All gens get done, move almost the same speed as the killer. OTR, DS, Unbreakable, Hope. You can run all 4 of those effects at once. Compared to killers meta perks: You see survivors a few seconds after hook. Block some gens at the start, until you down 1 person. Knock 25% off 1 gen, only if you use a special hook which is randomly placed, and is 1 use per survivor. After hooking a survivor, knock 20% off current* progress, which is usually 2% off a 10% done gen. Big whoop.
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Nah because not all data is relevant or accurate for proper parsing of results. I've still never seen an AFK killer, i can't imagine they make any discernible impact on the results. Games with AFK survivors arent removed either for that matter. But as you were discussing with drsoontm, self sabotage ruins the data and any results and unfortunately not all deaths on first hook are suicides so its hard to filter that out without knowing the exact circumstances behind each one to determine if it should be counted or not. DC's however are very simple to filter out and have a very obvious impact on the game.
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I'll address each of these scenarios:
- DCs - this is probably the only fair point you make here. We know that matches win DC's are excluded from the data. Matches with DC's probably have a lower escape rate, especially in solo queue. But to get to your "guess" that the real escape rate is ~20%, that would have to mean that a massive % of matches have DC's in them. Nobody has data to show if that's true. That's certainly not the case in my experience. I'd say it's maybe one out of 5 matches tops. And also we have no idea how much of an impact DC has on escape rate. Is it a 1% drop or 50% drop?
- Hatch escape - those don't count as escapes anymore? OK
- Killer AFK - extremely rare. I can't remember the last time I saw an AFK killer. Most likely a non-detectable impact on the stats.
The only thing we know for sure is the escape rate in match that "count" - so matches without a DC. If you're escaping far less than 40% of your "normal matches" (those without DC's), I don't know what else to tell you other than based on the stats you would be on the lower end of the skill curve. I'm not saying you need to "git gud", it's simply pointing out how you compare to the average stats.
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That's the problem with a lot of these posts. They assume that killers have every aura perk in the game on. You wouldn't even run more than 2 if you were smart; there's so many better options to choose from. And sure, killer complain about perks that aren't there, like DS, like Unbreakable, because there's so much to lose by getting hit by those, so you have respect it. What are survivors losing by being seen? They can still loop, and if survivors simply cannot loop, well then... we don't care. The game should be balanced around people who know how to play. This balancing strategy of prioritizing casuals over everything, and forcing draw games, is a death sentence for this game.
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Boil Over isn't a good example because that perk just makes the game miserable, especially if you play killer with a controller.
I don't think the nerfs to Distortion were as severe as some people say, but I don't think they were needed either. The perk could have been left as it was.
Adrenaline was overnerfed, no questions about it. The only thing that perk needed was the removal of the wake up effect against Freddy, because that should have never been a thing in the first place.
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Adrenaline got nerfed the right amount, perks interacting with killer powers was bad, and the free unhook with heal, endurance and speed boost while also robbing the killer's pressure was ridiculous. It was too strong when survivors were in a winning position, and just flat out too beneficial with no counter play in a tied position which defaulted the situation into the survivors advantage.
I said that the only part was that it lets the Survivor wake up against Freddy. So your point "Perks interacticting with Killer Powers was bad" is redundant. And for the rest - the Perk had a one time use and even that one itme use might have been nothing worthwile when the last Gen is finished while not being on the Hook, not in chase and not injured. This was a speedboost at this point. Plus the Survivor might not get ANY value from the Perk when they died before 5 Gens ore done.
"Counterplay"… Well, try to win before all Gens are done? Works amazing, no problem with Adrenaline at this point.
There was alot wrong with distortion, and its pretty insane there's still people defending its over tuned, unhealthy previous version. You ignoring the issues it caused along with the logical arguments supporting it because they were "bad" (they weren't) is nonsense. It's just a fact that stealthy play is overall bad for everyone else unless you're in a coordinated group.The main argument back then was that it leads to Survivors being overly stealthy and letting their teammates die. (Which was funnily mainly an argument by Killers, suddenly they care about Survivors gameplay experience, same with PTB-Reassurance, where suddenly the biggest problem was that Survivors could be held hostage…)
But as I said - if someone wants to play in a way that they survive and let their teammates die, they can still do it, are just even more useless then before. Then they spend more time in lockers and away from the Killer.
And even Killers with 0 Aura Reads were able to find and kill Survivors. It was just an overreaction from Killers about the Perk. (And I did not even run Distortion, if anything, I would have been at a disadvantage with overly stealthy Survivors when playing Survivor myself)
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The short answer to the title's question is simply and flatly "they don't".
Even in your examples we can see what I mean by that- we'll set aside Boil Over as others have pointed out it's a bad example due to never actually being strong, just unhealthy, so that leaves us with Adrenaline and Distortion.
Both of those perks were nerfed, no doubts about it, so what state are they in after the nerfs? Well, Adrenaline is still arguably the second best survivor perk in the entire game, and Distortion is a strong and viable pick for most kinds of stealthy play. That doesn't seem like gutting to me, it just seems like those two things got slightly weaker.
The same is true for most survivor perk nerfs, and indeed, most nerfs to killer perks too. There are exceptions, but by and large, the community immediately leaps to "This thing is worthless now" whenever they get nerfed at all, and I don't think that's fair or appropriate. There's no sense cutting off viable options from your builds just because they got nerfed at some point.
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40%? I can't believe the escape rate is 35%! How could the devs bring it down to 30%? Why are they balancing around 20%? 10% is simply unacceptable!
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Ironic how you call out skill issue with the zillion second chance perks you have
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Looks at the pile of murdered gen control perks for killer.....
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Killers have perks that are useful outside of gen control. Even then most of the current gen perks for killer are still effective.
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easy.
Most killers are bad.
The game dictates killers should win more than they don’t.
To achieve this they boost killer powers, addons, perks etc and nerf survivors.
Last patch is perfect example.
Gutted distortion because it was “too easy for survivors to try and survivor”
Changed predator from scratch marks to 6 second aura reveal if you have the audacity to escape a chase because escaping is forbidden.
If survivors are at 40% or above for success rate they have to gut them to keep killers happy because killers often have a false sense of how good they are due to how easy the game is made for them.
(I’m 70% killer btw, so not biased)5 -
Not gonna lie I'm anxious bout the upcoming scene Partner changes. I swapped out Distortion for it so if I lose that too I'll be sad
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I’ve never liked SP but if they go the way of Pharmacy…
I’m not even sure why they’re bothering the perk. Maybe they’ll prevent it from interfering with survivor actions. Doesn’t seem like that would need to be on the roadmap though.
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You mean ds and otr that is situational and easy counterable by simply not tunneling so they become useless? Conspicuous actions also being on them to them useless as well?
Your talking dead hard that has only 2 limited uses and is easily counter if you just learn to time when to swing and not just swing mindlessly?
You mean one time use unbreakable which is simply counter by picking up the survivor instead of slugging them?
You mean deliverance when your the first one that got unlucky and got chase and put on the hook first?
You mean mettle of mine that involves you taking 3 hits to gain its benefits?
Sure we do have a zillion second chance worthless perks indeed.
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- We'll Make It
- Off The Record
- Lightweight
- Sprint Burst
- Poised
- Adrenaline (was nerfed, still very powerful)
- Autodidact
- Hope
- Unbreakable
- Stake Out
- Resilience
- Built to Last
- Reassurance
- Boon: Exponential
- Deliverance
- Lithe
- Quick & Quiet
- Vigil
- Cut Loose
- Wiretap
- Object of Obsession
- All of Nicolas Cage's perks
- Trouble Shooter
- All of Steve Harrington's perks
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Adrenaline. A really fair nerf that is made worse by the lack of communication (which shouldnt mean it was immune to changes), Boil over… I don't even need to say anything for this one, Distortion was unhealthy for both sides as it has caused people to tunnel even more.
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No upvote farmer, the words we're looking for is "not appealing to entitled players", especially since Killers just got some nice aura reading perks, and Dracula's chest perk quickly blows through stacks with JUST it.
Get good, use your EYES, and start searching around gens, stop expecting Survivors to just run into you. Stop crying about stealth, you go down in 20 seconds, you're not better than those "grrrr bad stealth players!!!" and you know it.3 -
And if people don't want to run second chance perks?
Like, are you actually ENCOURAGING people spam meta more? Are you serious? Distortion's pick rate was less than top 10 iirc, it wasn't a massive problem, just mountains out of molehills by people who have never actually had a problem with Distortion personally.3 -
'Second chance perks'?
What year is this? Did we go back in time?
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(I’m 70% killer btw, so not biased)
Bias comes regardless. If you have to put up a sign like this, there's probably a reason. But for the record, I liked your post and mostly agree lol.
Distortion was unhealthy for both sides as it has caused people to tunnel even more.
Lets add some context. Distortion user isn't seen by killer aura, so killer tunnels others. Is this what you mean? If not, please help me lol.
Bringing up the past is a core foundation to many arguments here. We didn't go back in time, we're kinda stuck in a time loop? Stasis? Dammit, where's the doc'toor?
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distortion was only unhealthy for killers because they wasted bbq and lethal on it.. they are stuck if they have to work to find survivors
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Distortion has most certainly fallen from glory. Personally, I don't agree with the common assessment that this perk was just used to hide all game. As someone who commonly used Distortion, I wasn't playing that way. I don't mind the changes to recharging your tokens. Being in chase with the Killer is part of the game. They will eventually find you, it's just something to be expected. I do wish we could have up to our original 3 tokens though. While I do see the argument in Distortion "unfairly" countering bbq and lethal, so do lockers. There are other Killer perks that absolutely annihilate our tokens though, such as Gearhead or Hex: Undying. I feel starting with the original 3 tokens, being able to gain back a max of 3 tokens at a time and having your tokens recharge while in chase would balance this perk back into a useful perk for survivors.
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That’s fake news. Distortion has 2 charges and it got buffed to have its recharge timer cut in half.
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Survivor perks don't really get gutted often
DS and Iron will been brought back into the meta. DH and adrenaline still pretty solid. CO2 and mft got nerf heavy but that about it. I don't even know why you would bring up boil over.
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