AFK Crows & What I think would fix them.

firstly, i think the reworked afk crows is a step in the right direction. but i think that the problem is that the afk crows system is only evaluating each survivor's objective progress, rather than including the killer's objective progress. i think a simple shift in perspective / goals for the afk crows system would make the system a lot more pleasant for everyone, killer and survivor.

right now, the developers have built the afk crow system in a way that basically only pops up to directly call the survivor cringe. it feels bad to get a crow, and a lot of people are complaining about crows, because their gameplay has been evaluated to be subpar, and the game is telling them that they aren't good enough.

this might motivate some people to do something to fix their crow, but it's not a pleasant kind of motivation. additionally, it trivialises the game down to being about clearing objectives as rapidly as possible, and penalises both cautious gameplay and some strategies that are known and intended.

my suggestion is just one additional rule:

when a survivor is hooked, wipe all crow progress from all survivors.

crows are an aid to finding survivors who are sneaking around, but a hooked survivor forces quick response from the survivors or else a teammate will die, and the game will get much harder.

truly taking advantage of the time someone is spent on the hook involves either powering through generators, or stalking the killer and waiting for an opportunity to unhook.

repairing generators already removes your crows. it's the second case i'm worried about. a survivor creeping around waiting for the perfect chance to unhook, either to get their quests done or because they have a build that makes them ideal for unhooking or both, might get a crow at the worst possible moment.

furthermore, since the killer has taken a step towards ending the game, and has created a shining beacon of "other survivors need to come here quickly", in addition to a shining beacon of "return to this location to find survivors easily", the killer no longer needs the help of afk crows. the survivors must act, or else somebody will die.

the side-effect of this new rule is what would be the main draw of making the game feel better and protect new players from having a crow calling them bad at the game. let's say you're new, and lost. or you're cautious. and you spend a lot of time walking and crouching around, either struggling to find a gen, or not getting much progress on a gen you did find because of the terror radius making you back off.

MMR makes it likely that your teammates are doing something similar. in the event that even one of them is found and hooked, the way the crows work presently means that every other survivor is now easier to find. it's likely that everyone on your team at this point has a crow, and the only way to get rid of that crow is repairing generators. so in a game of overly cautious, less knowledgeable, or new survivors, nobody can go for the unhook (run directly towards the killer's last pubicly known location) without a crow circling, flapping, and squawking, giving away their position completely. MMR's goal is to put these survivors together.

the afk system is now working against them, removing their options while simultaneously calling them bad at the game. on the flipside, it's also artificially improving the killer's lethality, when the killer should be a similar match for these survivors.

i think that as long as the killer is taking steps towards their goal of ending the game, OR the survivors are taking steps towards their goal of the game (by repairing generators), the crows aren't necessary. the crows should be a gentle nudge from the entity that helps the killer when they need extra information. they should not be coming up when a game is moving normally, regardless of what each individual survivor is doing. they should also not be coming up during hatch phase, or endgame collapse, because those are both situations where inaction from a survivor will lead to their imminent death, so they don't also need a crow to watch.

yes, this does make it possible for one survivor to throw their teammates' lives away and wait for the hatch to try and escape. unfortunately, the game has achievements and quests that reward this, and the developers have acknowledged this as being a valid way of interacting with the game. in my point of view, this is a different situation that deserves being tackled in its own way. the crows are great for when neither team is making enough progress, but shouldn't be an extra help for a killer that's already winning against survivors that aren't playing well.