Map variants have been removed.
This somehow escaped the patch notes (probably should've been included there) but as was mentioned on today's livestream, map variants have been removed from the game in today's update. This includes all the 2nd variants of Macmillan maps, the 2nd variants of the Yamaoka maps, Ormond 2 and 3 (not Ormond Lake Mine though), and all Badham maps except for Badham 1.
How do we feel about this? I always felt like most of the map variants weren't very good (except for Suffo Pit 2 being better than 1 imo), so overall I'm okay with this change.
Comments
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Thank god
6 -
Lfg!! I hated map variants so much especially since it made the new player experience horrible thinking you got a rough idea of a map’s layout only for you to be on a completely different version of the map next time you play on it.
16 -
A bit sad about it.
I know why they did it and I can understand the decision to help new players or balance. However I personally am going to miss the variety. Probably in the minority here but I like the Badham variants, just wish they were a bit more balanced.
3 -
everybody cheered! a badly executed idea that we didn't need and gave more varients to realms that didn't need them while leaving the empty realms still empty.
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This is a huge W for me. I hated the variants with passion, especially the ones on MacMillan and Ormond. For MacMillan, it is one of the most balanced Realms in the game and yet they decided to add a variant to each map which was not that well balanced and also really, really ugly to look at.
Same for Ormond - they added two variants, which again, were badly balanced and ugly and then added the Ormond Lake Mine, a map which is very good to play on for both sides (seriously, I never had a bad game on it) and looks stunning - yet it was super rare since Ormond hat 3 other Maps which could spawn.
It was clear that they did not really put that much time and effort into the variants, so I am glad that they scrapped them. I would rather see expansions of Realms with new and interesting maps instead of maps where they shuffle a few tiles around.
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It's kind of irrelevant as far as Badham since its variants were barely distinguishable to begin with, but a massive improvement otherwise. All the other ones were literally just worse versions of the defaults.
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I am pretty sure that the new player experience and an influx of new players with FNAF were a reason for that. It makes the game just more confusing than it has to be.
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Sounds great, honestly I was never a fan of those variations, partly because they added very little to the gameplay and seemed to be done far too loosely and without real purpose, only risking further confusion among even the most experienced players.
However, I didn't understand whether they were removed indefinitely, and also why this decision was made?7 -
Is there only one RPD now? And if so which one is it?
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My honest reaction: YAY!
Really, all these ever did was take up space, confuse people and in case of Ormond, make the new map hard to get.
2 -
all that work to delete it again?
4 -
RPD East Wing and RPD West Wing are distinct maps. The maps that were removed are the ones that are just remixes of the original.
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Not gonna lie, I never had the map knowledge to be able to tell the variants apart anyway, so I doubt I'll be missing them much (especially not the Badham variants).
I get the idea behind them, to keep things feeling fresh for players, but to be honest there are already a lot of maps in DBD even before considering the extra variants. Things were in danger of becoming unwieldy and difficult to maintain, so I totally get why they've done this.
3 -
let's not pretend that they put that much work into them, they were badly-balanced and reused assets
9 -
You know, @MechWarrior3 and I just spoke about the dumb Badham Variants the other day.
Rather funny that they get removed less than a week later lmao
5 -
Is there still two eyrie of crow maps on the latest update?
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No, RPD is not included in this change. East Wing and West Wing are both still in the game.
2 -
OK, thanks. That could have been extremely annoying depending on which side you are playing at the time!
Won't be sad to see the back of a lot of the varients. I hated the Family Residence second version!
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Yes there is Eyrie of Crows (which got some changes in this update) and the new map Dead Sands, which is a new map within the same realm but it's not a "variant" map, they are different maps (Dead Sands has no main building, just the killer shack)
3 -
I'm cool with this as well. Honestly, one good variation of each map gives them more wiggle room to make better new maps more often now.
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I liked the Ormand map so I'm disappointed. They could have removed the Badham variants and left the others. We can't look forward to new map variants any more, so there goes my hopes for some atmospheric night time variants of Coldwind and Eerie.
-2 -
Thank god. Hate those 46 variants of ormond and coldwind
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So they're adding a new variant to the Eyrie of Cows, and removing variants at the same time?
-1 -
L change
I like the variants, they were making things fresh for once
-9 -
That is too funny! 😂
This pleases me very much 🤣
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How about they take out Perk variants next? Make all of the a single tier?
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Can someone please explain this change to me like im a 5 year old? I am at work and i cannot for the life of me figure out what exactly this means lol. I know on badham there's like 600 versions but like does this mean they are getting rid of all realms except one within MacMillans, Coldwind etc? for example they are keeping ironworks and thompson house but getting rid of the others?
3 -
so classic maps like auto haven are gone?
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I wish
-1 -
There's five variants of Badham for instance, and this change eliminates four of them. So no more Badham IV or II for example.
1 -
A map variant is any map which had one or more additional versions with the same name, and solely re-used assets from the original map (not adding anything new) but with a different layout/different map shape.
For example: Coal Tower had 2 variants, Coal Tower I and Coal Tower II. Both maps had the same fixed landmarks such as their main building, but the map assets were arranged differently and the shape of the map was different in each. This is NOT the same as different maps within the same realm (for example, Coal Tower and Groaning Storehouse are different maps, but they both exist within the MacMillan Estate).
So for example in today's update, Coal Tower II was removed from the game. Coal Tower I is now the only Coal Tower map.
This is a list of maps that were removed:
- Ironworks of Misery II
- Groaning Storehouse II
- Suffocation Pit II
- Coal Tower II
- Shelter Woods II
- Family Residence II
- Sanctum of Wrath II
- Mount Ormond Resort II
- Mount Ormond Resort III
- Badham Preschool II
- Badham Preschool III
- Badham Preschool IV
- Badham Preschool V
There's been no change to Autohaven maps, that realm did not have map variants.
11 -
Thanks king! you literally explained it exactly how i needed it.
3 -
Huge, huge improvement. Most variants were not that fun, especially Ormond's new variants, which both deeply suffered from subpar gen placement logic.
Hopefully if they do ever return they'll recieve some more care for quality.
3 -
This is probably the worst patch in a long time, we lost 13 maps and your all laughing.
BHVR could have retired the worst map variants and remade them, but no, we lost so many good maps and why?
No good Official reason given.-9 -
Are those good maps we lost in this room right now?
5 -
What do you mean the corpses on the ground? Yeah, if you didnt ask BHVR to shoot them, they would still be good.
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Map Variant feedback has been inherently negative, with the majority of players disliking them, finding them not as good as the original maps and then bloating out the original map. It's why we made the decision to remove them.
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That's actually not a variant - me nerding out for a minute here, that's a particular kind of map - it doesn't have the same main building and it's based around just a shack, so very different than a variant which has the same main landpoints (main building, structures etc).
10 -
I love you guys so much for getting rid of the Badham preschool variants. I hate that map with a passion both survivor and killer side.
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The maps did not really add much value and IMO some of them even removed value. E.g. having 5 Badham-Maps which really do not differ that much from each other was just bloating the map pool. The second variants of the MacMillan-Maps were not as good designed (balance-wise and visually) as their original parts - and they were not even needed, nobody complained about MacMillan before, they just added them without anyone asking for them.
And Ormond is probably the worst example - they added two variants to Mount Ormond Resort, just to release the Ormond Lake-Map shortly afterwards and you never got this map, because there are 3 others maps (instead of 1 other map) which would be choosen from this Realm. And the Ormond Lake-Map was far better balanced and visually appealing compared to the two variants of Ormond Resort.
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Omg am so happy beyond words, I am just speechless. This is amazing, as I HATED map variants specially when they did them on Ormond.
I barely ever could know the variant diffences in 95% of them specially badham almost has no kind of difference to me. Everyone let's give a shoutout @SoGo because they was the one that voice this the most. Good job friend 👏
6 -
[to Mandy and BHVR.]
I get the logic of “players don’t like this, so let’s remove it.” But surely, the decision to remove content should be based on more than just general dislike—it should be rooted in strong, causal reasons. What exactly made these variants bad? Was there clear data showing they led to significantly worse gameplay experiences? Were they unbalanced in a measurable way?
From my perspective, map design in DBD has always had some level of procedural generation, and part of the challenge is navigating an unpredictable space. If maps are being removed simply because players "dislike" them, rather than because they fundamentally break the game, then this is a massive departure from the original philosophy of Dead by Daylight, even if it is just a slight reduction in unpredictability. And let’s be honest—this is happening at a time when many in the community are already saying that the game isn’t scary anymore. Making every match more predictable isn’t going to fix that, it will make it much worse.
I made a thread about this (link), and the main complaint I’ve seen is about the Badham variants being too similar, which is fair. But Ormond 2? That’s a perfectly fine variant, and I haven’t seen a single solid argument justifying its removal.
BHVR, I hope you have real, objective reasons for removing 13 maps because “they don’t like it” seens like an incredibly shallow justification for such a major decision. If you do have those reasons, I would love to hear them—because from where I’m standing, this feels like a massive mistake.
To me, from the responses I have gotten people seem to have much bigger problem with realm repeating, which is unrelated but come Ormond.. what are the reasons that the B and C Ormond experiences are so much worse than A. If you ask me, they are the same, but the slight differences make the game much better for me. But now I feel weird because I don't blame the map for not downing survivors as fast and as far as I can see, everyone else is blaming them maps for it.
-5 -
good, thank you Mandy.
one of the coal tower maps was so small that i remember spawning with the killers terror radius music playing. Those variants were just awful3 -
I'd be lying if I said I won't miss the Suffocation Pit II variant a bunch, that was a map variation done right. However, this is an overall good change I think, a lot of the map variations were not all that fun to play on.
It also means more Ormond Lake Mine, which is a W. Love that map and I'm glad it won't be crowded out of the realm by the Resort variants.
3 -
The maps are going to become even more boring and predictable than they already are. Unless they’re going to massively improve RNG, which I doubt, we are now just going to end up with a load of maps where everyone knows where everything is all the time.
-1 -
accidental post
-2 -
Map RNG still stays, whilst it will be 1 map, there's many different random spawns within that map, slightly different tiles, pallet locations etc.
7 -
Exactly how I feel about this as well, I think they should remove Suffocation Pit 1 and put Suffocation Pit 2 back in, but other than that keep the variants gone. Pretty much every original map version was better except for that one.
2 -
Fantastic change that I have wanted for a long time. Good work.
3 -
Honestly, both are good maps. I'd hate to see Suffocation Pit 1 to go considering how iconic it is.
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