Diminishing Returns Feedback

I think this is extremely well said and I want to highlight my thoughts with it as well. I do still have concerns as of now about perks that have lesser values becoming significantly less used and that the top meta perks will become even more common since specialized builds are being directly nerfed. But the overall effort that was put forth (to my understanding) was that perks are going to be adjusted afterwards if this goes live to increase values since worrying about busted perk builds will not be at the forefront of things (because unfortunately this is currently the primary concern whenever there is a new chapter introduced with new or adjusted perks) . There are so many perks in the game whose values are so minimal, or their activation requirements are so convoluted that running them on their own is a waste. With this system in place, we can actually get perks that are worth it on their own and won't break the game.

The numbers as of now feel aggressive. I agree with the poster here as well that those smaller values feel kind of unnecessary for this system to kick in. When running two healing perks together that don't even cross a 50% increase and there are individual perks that give you that base amount right off the bat, I don't feel this system should be kicking in. Having a threshold for when this system starts to apply I think would be good. That threshold I feel should be different depending on what is being increased or decreased. Like if it's healing speed, once it hits 100%, the system kicks in, as an example. And echoing their comment on the values, the actual diminishing return numbers could be adjusted. I think starting at 75% and going down to 50% and then 25% and then 12.5% would feel a lot better, but personally if there was a set threshold to trigger when this system would activate, leaving the totals as is wouldn't feel as aggressive.

Lastly, the devs said this was not intended to be a total meta shift. This is intended to reign in busted value builds. There are literally builds in the game right now on the survivor side that allows you to pick someone up off the ground that the killer just downed right in front of their face. This is definitely not a fun experience on the killer side. Inversely, though much more niche, there are killer builds that make healing virtually impossible and everyone is essentially turned into one hits the entire match with no counter. These builds are also boosted by A and S tier killers making that a very unfun experience on the survivor side. These values need desperately to be reigned in. I don't think this is a perfect system, but it is a very necessary one and as long as perks are buffed if this goes live, it could have a slew of positive effects for the game. It'll suck at the start but will eventually even itself out to make an overall more balanced game (not fully balanced, just more balanced than it was before).

When I played the ptb, I went in on my old speed healing builds to see how it felt and overall, the change didn't feel as aggressive as I thought. I also was extremely worried and not too happy when this was announced, but after testing and looking at the potential this will bring to the game. I am hoping this goes live with some adjustments.

Thrill of the hunt is going to be oppressive, not that it isnt already.

I definitely feel a system like this is needed at this point, but outside of haste specifically, this implementation feels too inflexible to deal with the issues it wants to solve.

Punishing perk stacking instead of putting a soft cap on action speed modifiers directly means that while certain strong combos do get nerfed, weaker perk combinations get hit just as harshly. If someone wants to run a repair speed build, why would they ever run Full Circuit and Soft Spoken when they offer weaker effects that are now diminished on top? Instead they can just run a toolbox, possibly with Built to Last on top, and get a stronger effect while avoiding diminishing returns entirely.

Like I've seen a few others suggest, the best solution would be implenting soft caps on action speeds, so that modifiers can be kept from getting too out of hand, without affecting non problematic combinations. Obviously the specific numbers would need to be tweaked to find the right spot, but it's easier to find where healing speed might start to become too much versus how much every combination of 2 perks should be reduced.

We all know that won‘t happen. I just noticed we have 0 perk changes this chapter, which is crazy

I'll be honest, i would weigh in more of how the stacked values felt if… i got to experience them

every killer i went against last night opted to play without stacking perks, deciding to use perks that did not have restrictions from the diminishing returns system: i think i saw more people devout to using corrupt intervention in one night than i did for most of 2025 (not to call corrupt bad, quote thee otz: its like your grandma, old but reliable).

this is actually the exact thing i have been afraid of with regards to the diminishing returns concept: since the game still does not encourage the player to diversify strategy to anything but the most efficient things possible, instead of accepting that their stacked values will be slightly lower these builds are now not being touched at all. most survivors i were playing with either sticked to popular skill check builds or mixed ones of popular perks (exhaustion, a heal perk, a gen perk, a swing perk). while i know this is the equalization effect bhvr wants, its causing an equalization in the direction of everyone playing a small handful of builds not effected by the system. i am not sure if this is an indication that the values of the diminishing returns are too strong, or if the player base is just being entirely resistant to the idea due to them not wanting their build potential altered (both feel valid)

I would also like to voice a concern for killer add ons and how they effect the returns, as i think the way it is implemented not only makes certain add ons feel worse, but it makes the recent work to clarify perk descriptions feel worse. according to matt on the live stream, killer add ons do not innately get the diminishing returns unless the add on is changing a value in the killers base kit, like trappers haste. i think this is a lazy implementation and to add a system like this an add on pass is required, because it is not super evident which of these add ons are effected and which are not.

from my own looking (and if im wrong, please, feel free to correct me!) if an add on states a value is increased/decreased, it will be effected by diminishing returns. If the add on says it grants/unlocks/permits a modifier, these are seemingly the add ons that do not get effected by diminishing returns

while i can understand why this was done from a coding/purely testing standpoint, it feels like certain add ons that do apply hefty effects are ignored on occasion and weak add ons that modify a base kit killer value are far more useless. it doesnt really combat stacking, it just makes things clunky and weird right now. its feels like the system was half done and everyone realized the ptb was next week and they didnt have any way to make the game feel better besides uh, this.

A feed back from the best Clown in the world on this topic:

Couldn"t agree more

I just found out that basekit haste certain killers have, unlike add ons, are not an exception from this system. If items are unaffected I absolutely feel like these should be too.

I really. really like the diminishing returns and I really hope it makes it to live. I feel like in the live game a lot of stuff can be stacked to be so incredibly high or fast that it's honestly too much. This feels like a good way to make sure perks can still be used together, but they just won't be as strong. I do hope that we'll some perks changes soon, because now we have no idea what kind of perks changes we can inspect with these changes.

Overall this is a good start and needed for the future of DBD and could lead to much better perk balancing down the line but could use a few small tweaks:

#1.) Balancing wise it needs to be expanded to include: bonus progress from a skill check (EX: stakeout, hyperfocus, etc.), status effect recovery speed (EX: vigil and ghost notes), and multiple survivors using the same perk (EX: multiple people running fast track or vigil) as well as increasing the 5th value and up to be 6.25% for the sake of consistency.

#2.) Some QoL such as: rounding the visual percentages of things like haste to the nearest whole number for easier readability and understanding (EX: if the true value of haste is 19.875% it should function as so but read as 20% on the indicator) and add the ability to see the value of perks at each level of diminishment under the extra info tab.

If the devs feel they can't make strong perks because of the risk of stacking making them OP, theres a simple fix- just make those specific perks unable to stack, and override any other similar perks.

That would make it even worse.  Instead of We'll Make It + Botany being 100% plus 25% (half of Botany's original value), you'll just get 100% plus 0 from Botany.  Then there'd really be no reason to bring Botany.  I would say just make it so that these action speeds can't be stacked or reduced beyond a certain value (say no more than 150% increased or reduced value).  But even that doesn't sound great, and will destroy specific builds.  I personally think the entire system should be scrapped, because I agree with you and everyone else that it'll just destroy build diversity.

That would make it even worse.

I think when @PinkPanther says 'specific perks' they mean that if (as an example) BHVR thinks Hope + MFT is too game breaking, just make it so those two perks can't ever work together. They could even set it up so that if a player selects two excluded perks a strikethrough and tooltip appear saying the perks can't be combined.

Not perks can never be combined, but rare situational exclusions.

I'm not sure if there's anything that meets that criteria, this would put slightly more work on BHVR's design team as I'm sure there would be countless calls to ban combos on both sides (which is why they would need to make clear that it would only be used in extreme situations), but it wouldn't destroy build diversity in the way they are currently planning.

Edit to Add: I feel weird that so many of these discussions are 'BHVR, the following would be a bad idea, but not as bad of an idea as what you are planning'.

On paper I like the idea of diminishing returns. However in practice, two major issues stand out to me.

1. As presented on the PTB, the diminishing returns mechanic does not affect skill check based perks. This means it has no affect on Stake-Out + Hyperfocus and does nothing to address the problematic Stake-Out/Hyperfocus/Deja Vu combo. Please find a way to let this system also include skill-check based perks.

2. In my opinion, diminishing returns should not affect killer powers at all. As it stands for any killer that gains haste or applies hindered as part of their basekit, they unnecessarily are affected by this mechanic. To the best of my knowledge this means Clown, Skull Merchant, Freddy, Knight, and even Trapper (to a lesser extent) suffer from this. Heck, I think even Houndmaster and Nemesis take a hit with this issue, and likely more killers I'm missing, none of which are the most top tier or even problematic at this point. [Edit] I believe the mechanic also hits vaulting and break speeds, and if so, that also hits Myers in Pursuer/Evil Incarnate. Again, why make this affect their basekit?

Fix those two issues, and I'm fully on board for diminishing returns.

Finally leaving a long comment on my thoughts on the matter.

I don't think diminishing returns is good for the game. It fails at the major thing it's attempting to fix, which is diversifying builds, while also harming some of the lower tier killers for no reason. You can see the harm it does to Clown all over this thread and in videos by Arinad and other Clown mains, and I've obviously gone to bat for the Shape and the Nightmare before in the past, so it should come to no surprise that I'm not a fan of changes that effect the base kit of some of the most beloved killers in the game.

When it comes to diversification, it should not come in a format of forcing players to have to play one specific way. Players who want to play efficiently already do so - healing builds already have diminishing returns built into them after 200% (which is usually We'll Make It + CoH or We'll Make It + Do No Harm on a death hook survivor), I know this because I run this build myself and there is very little benefit to running Botany in the first place once you get Orela's perks unlocked; and gen builds typically combine Deja Vu, Stake Out, Hyperfocus, and a fourth perk of choice, current meta dictates Fast Track for solo queue, while SWFs can benefit heavily from having one player run 1234 and another run Bardic Inspiration to get absurdly fast gen times. The gen build, which, mind you, is one of the major thing most killer players have been complaining about for years and has only gotten better with every patch, is completely unaffected by the changes to perk stacking due to the fact that skill check chances and great skill check bonus percent is not included in the list, despite the fact that there are multiple unstated points on the list such as unhook speed, totem cleansing, pallet breaking and vault speed.

All this does for the healing build that causes issues is that it opens up slots for gen perks such as the two big problem perks, and the gen build can drop the fourth perk, burn the toolbox on a non-highlighted gen, and run We'll Make It instead to make them all around efficient. Notice that this makes both builds functionally identical - heal builds now can safely run We'll Make It, Deja Vu, Stake Out, and Hyperfocus, and gen builds can now run We'll Make It, Deja Vu, Stake Out, and Hyperfocus!

This also doesn't touch upon the actual tightly woven setup for killer perks that can barely be diversified; my Shape build closely resembles my Hillbilly build, which resembles one of my Cenobite builds, and both of my Cenobite builds look exactly like my Dark Lord and Ghostface builds - the major through line for all of these is that the shared build for all killers is a gen regression build, which prioritizes a few perks and allows for minor flexibility for certain killers: Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance, Turn Back the Clock/Pop Goes the Weasel for F2P players, Dead Man's Switch, and a toss up between Corrupt Intervention (trap killers/stealth killers, allowing for setup), Surge (M1 killers/Ghoul), Thrilling Tremors (if you don't use the other two but need information more than anything), or Deadlock (F2P players who don't need Corrupt). This is a total of eight perks. Eight! None of which are effected by the diminishing returns changes, but all of which make killer players feel considerably more secure in their chances of winning when being faced with the threat of all players running the same incredibly fast generator focused builds. This will completely eliminate any non-regression builds on lower tier killers, and high tier killers are already aware of how to best use their efficiency to the limits of the game itself.

Finally, this also directly harms BHVR's actual monetary bottom line - why am I buying licensed killers who have perks I could use if I cannot use them to full effectiveness? This is a similar discussion to the TBTC vs PGTW or WoO vs FMA discussions, where one pretty much directly powercreeps another, but why would I ever buy characters like Yoichi Asakawa, who is one of the hardest to use characters in the game due to his higher than average injury noise level, larger frame, and bright yellow coat, if the perks he's coming with are not directly better than Orela Rose's? Why would I buy Trevor Belmont if I don't want to play him, when the only time he could have a perk that could have any type of use is if I'm running a flashlight build, which is ineffective and difficult to pull off as a newer player? Why would I ever buy Cheryl Mason if Thalita Lyra is free and has the exact same perk I want to buy Cheryl for? There is no reason to buy chapters that are not the RE 2 chapter bundle, SAW, or Stranger Things if you are not a chase player, and even then, chase players have a majority of those perks available for free with enough grinding.

I won't speak on exhaustion and Vigil/Ghost Notes being effected by diminishing returns due to the fact that Ghost Notes should not be a perk that exists in the current game state, and I will be repeating the same thing stated over and over again about how Vigil harms lower tier killers more than it does higher tier killers (this sounds familiar xdd). Further discussion on debuff removal should be a entirely different conversation taking place in the dev team, and should have been a discussion occurring as early as the Hemo/Mangled changes.

tl;dr: i would suggest reworking this idea as well and having a long and theraputic discussion about how to slow the game down for both sides without eliminating perk diversity

remember that downvoting does not subsitute making a argument against this post /comehere