Ghoul shouldn't lock you in place when attacking you

daily nerf ghoul thread

Maybe he's played so much because every survivor has an exhaustion perk that forces killers to hold W longer every single chase and he largely ignores that. Shocking, I know. People actually want to engage with the videogame instead of passively losing to pre-running.

I agree this would make the interaction feel janky and more "What just happened" but I think you missed part of the post. OP specifically states that the animation (referred to as cooldown) should be shortened in order to keep the distance once both are back to full movement speed the same. All this would accomplish in reality is allow for less mental reset time for Ghoul, which a nerf to the player rather than the character, and slightly faster chase times due to a second saved on that animation, which is technically a buff but so small it doesn't matter.

Also when Ghoul injures me Shack should immediately spawn on top of us both. /s

Fully yes. I do think sometimes people let presentation get lost in the weeds of balance discussion. It would kinda kill the aesthetic to be too far away to hear Ghoul scream like he's in a CS:GO lobby.

I can also understand the mentality of people wanting it changed, though. People feel salty enough about the free injury already, tying said free injury to a stunlock feels almost like the game is thumbing its nose at you, even though the stun doesn't provide either party an advantage. So really it comes down to which is the higher priority; are enough survivors annoyed by this to warrant a change to the aesthetic vision of the character?

Based on what I've seen, probably not. People's issues with Ghoul come from the value/effort ratio. He's high-A possibly S-tier strength, and is only slightly harder to pick up than Wraith, the easiest killer in the game. I think people would be more forgiving of the forced animation if Ghoul had to earn it through reasonable skill expression.

how do you think the Ghoul feels just standing there watching? I don't see what the deal is. where else is a flesh eating cannibal gonna eat your flesh? put it in a doggy bag and eat it back home by popping it in the microwave?

I've seen you drop this opinion in both active Ghoul threads, although your wording here is much harsher and illustrates that your statement in the other thread about "very bias and emotional replies" from other people should not exclude yourself. Be fair here.

Turn his LoS-based free hit into a skill shot, hell, even reduce how long he is locked in animation after landing it, and he'll remain high-tier for good players, but stop being an annoyance at middling MMR when clearly sloppy players are able to get unearned downs.

Just want to clarify, I am fully aware that good Ghouls can do some insane stuff that is very much skill based. Ghoul needs the skill floor increasing, but the skill ceiling and power at the top to be untouched imo.

I'm fully aware people do respond with bias, but the comment that highlighted this as well as this one very much culminate in a dismissal of any concerns people have as purely based on emotion. Perhaps not your intent, but you must see how adding this kind of comment to the discussion reads this way.

Plus, I think it's important to remember that this is a game. We could make a perfectly balanced competitive spreadsheet, but that wouldn't be fun. I don't think even Ghoul players feel rewarded when they get their cheeky injury in, it's just optimal to start a chase with a pre-injured survivor so why wouldn't you do it?

I know he cannot down with his free hit, but his free hit puts you into an immediate disadvantage when looping, regardless of how good you are, you are left with fewer options unless you run DH (which is even stronger against other killers as that's 2 hits you can take instead of 1). Compare this to Legion's free injury. Legion has to either run a lap of the entire map to get a down with their power, or switch to a completely powerless M1 killer. People are more forgiving of that because Legion hits are less likely to translate to game progress for them. And I'm not here defending Legion getting free hits either! I'm just pontificating on why Ghoul specifically gets ire for this.

If it is a case of the way the ability is coded preventing it being a skill shot of some form, then either the ability needs to be rebuilt so it does function like that, or reworked so its impact isn't just removing a health state without effort or thought.

For one last bit of context, I prefer playing killer, and feel survivors have plenty of tools already to perform well. There are balance issues with free value that survivors can get, but that is not the topic of this discussion.

If you took it away he'd just plain suck having to get two m1 hits tbh. That simply takes too long nowadays.

True, which is why my only real suggestion is to adjust the free injury to requiring more active input. Any other suggestions have been under the proviso that this change is not possible, based on you mentioning that trying to make it a skill shot failed during development.

Deep wound so you can't,

Yeah my mistake, I run DH so little that I forget. I tend to prefer non-exhaustion perks, and if I am gonna run one it's usually lithe.

Wasting time reworking a popular, fun, perfectly fine and functioning killer that has average stats is completely pointless and a waste of time. He is not a problem. He is a modern designed killer for modern DBD, frankly he fits how the game has been balanced and changed for faster paced games than practically every killer in the game

I've said I don't think Ghoul is OP. I think he's decidedly unfun. The perception I'm seeing, and correct me if I'm wrong, is this is fine, because balancing around the fun of survivor players is ultimately what is placing the game in a state where something like this is needed. I don't think that necessitates free, ranged, gap-closing injuries that deep wound as a bonus. We shouldn't be immediately throwing away the fun of survivors because being overly concerned with that has caused problems before (which I do not deny it has, see recently walked back PTB changes). Playing as Ghoul, I do not find it fun to get hits like this either, it's just an animation I gotta wait through so I can have my regular chase.

This conversation has been stretched out, but it all boils down to the same thing, Ghoul should earn that initial pressure, not take it for free. That's the only real stance I have. I'd even buff him elsewhere to compensate if it tanks his performance enough.

since suriviors can 99 heal against him since some ghoul see biting suriviors as over kill . despite the fact that biting them stop their healing progress, which you cant see unless you watched them heal in your face.

medkit , sprint burst are counters to ghoul , since ghouls try to cut you off instead of going for the bite. when you're injured .

A very high skill cieling with his movement? He would still have very good distance denial, resulting in lots of htis after pallet breaks. At stronger loops hed be able to more effectively use his power to bodyblock and cut off the survivors.

Yeah this is like my least favourite thing about facing ghoul, I don't want to listen to an anime kid screeching in my ear for longer than I have to. Wow such horror. I'm sure standing still for that long isn't even fun for the person playing them either.

Also the animation during the stand still is REALLY bad. lmao

I feel like most of the survivor animations recently can be chalked up to that, like the springtrap axe etc.

They really need to be more consistent with their quality lol

Yeah exactly, that's what bothers me about it, they are really talented and very capable!