Sprint Burst can encourage tunneling
Yes, I know, it's 2026 and I'm actually complaining about Exhaustion—specifically Sprint Burst—but hear me out. I'm on the record as being pretty anti-tunnel and I'd like to see some basekit protections in that area. But I've been maining Henry, a 4.4 killer, these last couple months and if there's one thing that'll send me back to the hook, it's Sprint Burst. Consider this scenario:
Chase starts, World Breaker goes up. Survivor goes down, gets hooked, I use aura or add-ons to go into Undergate and find my next [distant] target. I get there and I recognize them. It's the Lara with SB, Finesse, and Vigil that already zoomed away at match start, and she's standing there looking at me, waiting for me to initiate my slow exit so she can hurl herself to shack or a strong tile, away from key gens and all my pressure. But the unhook notification goes off and I decide I don't have time for that, so I go back to the hook. And if the unhooker decided to farm and slowly walked away from the hook instead of taking aggro, the blood trail is what I'm following. It's not what I want to do—it really, really isn't—but I've already wasted too much time on the standing SBer.
Sounds specific but it's pretty common for me. I actively avoid SB users in my killer matches, which increases pressure on the other non-SBers. Perks like SB, especially combined with other synergistic perks, are selfish perks that don't help your team if the killer doesn't have the mobility to deal with them. Being selfish is allowed, but these perks are likely to make many killers break chase with you. And that puts your team at risk, which also puts your personal outcome at risk. Lithe, at least, you can botch and is RNG dependent. Same with Balanced Landing. Dramaturgy has ups and downs and limited haste. Smash Hit requires a successful action. All these perks are also more likely to activate during an already started chase, but SB is a way to avoid chase entirely. It has basically no depth, almost no way to screw it up, and no conditions. If we're ever going to have a meta shake up, this is the first perk that needs attention.
Comments
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Bro, if you are using this thin of an excuse you were going to tunnel anyway.
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The problem is that SB is unconditional, it only require you to not run. Unlike ANY other exhaustion perk, which has a requirement for activation.
That is the entire reason why we are having this discussion in the first place.3 -
Talk about something I never thought I'd hear as someone who was openly advocating for the anti-tunnel ptb going live.
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Its a harsh truth. A lot of what survivors can actively encourage tunneling without them realizing it. Tunneling can be a reactionary action. Let's say I hook someone across the map and come back to near where the previous unhook was and found a survivor near a dead zone on a gen but just sprint bursts away to a strong setup by pre-running. What incentive do I have to go for that person when there's a survivor closer to death hook who I also know the general location of? At that point it's just better to let that gen go. This is especially the case on weaker killers and I'm not even talking about Ghost Face I'm talking a solid B tier like nemesis.
That's where I find it funny when people use the "if you tunnel you wont get much better" when it can be quite the opposite in terms of improving your macro gameplay because its either go through guaranteed two health states in a strong setup with less hook stages or go for the person thats at least 1 hook stage in which would cause way more pressure for the team.3 -
Exactly.
It's the same logic behind those types of survivors who'll unhook you then let you eat dirt if the Killer comes back. What's the Killer logically gonna do, press their advantage or 'be nice' and look for someone else?? Answer's pretty obvious.
It's kinda why I always run stuff like babysitter + we'll make it. Both scenarios are covered then.
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Yep. It's the only one I have a big issue with. Haste perks overall are fine, but SB is too free of a way to cheese you way out of chase against much of the roster, especially with other perks that help with that goal. Had this one yesterday:
Maximum chase avoidance. And that's up to him, but it sure didn't help him in the end.
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id prefer to be equally violent towards everybody and spread pain to everybody but these kind of builds force you to cut corners.
I hate these super safe play styles that are boring for everybody. bring back 150% WGLF so people get back in my face again
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Main objective of survivors is to repair 5 gens and survive. Does sprint burst help with that? Definitely. Exhaustion perks are all about buying surv more time without(mostly) much effort.
There are survivor perks that straight up punish you for not tunneling like resurgence or deliverance. Those are far more problematic if we talk about tunneling encouragement.-1 -
Eh perks like sprint burst and lithe encourage it just as much. Imagine someone sprint bursting to a strong part of the map where you'll undoubtedly spend more time chasing than you gain back in pressure as most of the killer roster. Pair that with most of the popular exhaustion being no earning requirement and it goes into other areas of unhealthy game design.
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I understand the need for Deliverance and Resurgence more than SB. There's been plenty of times where I've gone to second or even been left to die on one hook and would have loved to have been able to unhook myself. If anything, I just wish it didn't work with DS. Same for Wicked. I don't love how quickly Resurgence gets people back on a gen, but it can be a good tunnel deterrent against a killer that automatically swerves from chase when they hear the unhook notification.
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For real. People complain about aggressive players, but I love them. They're interacting with me and they're not just prerunning or sitting on gens. Send me all the bully squads, sabo teams, and flashlight-wielding chase-shadowers.
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I wouldnt say only sprintburst but more like killers accesibility to down that particular survivor in manageable time. Like if someone is hard to get killer who has good sence in predicting will drop chase and focus more on other survivors which in common sence mean they get more attention from killer and this highly ends with them dieing faster then survivors that are hard to get for the killer so he focuses less on them.
Same can be with one survivor hiding well he is evading killer but this can lead to killer focusing more on the ones he sees and they get killed faster, I mentioned it in rat playstyle where too much hiding can a tualy be bad for the team especialy teammates that dont do it and get killers attention.
Slower killers especialy go after the ones they can get so sprint+vigil user (usualy its this combo because vigil is great perk and helps not with only cooldown but with dealing with effects like exposed,hinder etc.) will be less targeted by slow killer.
To this isnt some less of a skill more like good use of criticalnand tactical thinking from ecperience in judging the situation same as killer knowing when to slug who or when to drop chase because its not worth it etc.
For survivor applyes same as for wild gazel in africe he doesnt need to outrun the lion just be faster then other gazel which will lion get, this is whole situation of your case I guess that someone faster/harder to get wint get tunneled or more focus from killer but this isnt issue because this will always be this way even without sprintburst killer with good experience will always pick easy chases first if he wants to win or have better chance to win.
Thats it like it or not, if you are bog challange for the killer and he sees it he will mostly leave you for later when he has time or better chance to get you instead of tryharding and loosing because of it. I dont think this is something hard to understand its quite simple and its been in this game since start and it will be there hill the end. Sprint can cause this tl happen yes that perks whole purpose it to get you far from the killer anc the slower the killer the better it eill work.
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Okay, then you don't see them use Sprint Burst immediately in chase. Since Exhaustion perks are so common, you can safely assume that they're just waiting to use Lithe, Balanced, Dead Hard, or whatever. Now you once again have your rationale that the chase will take somewhat longer because they DON'T have Sprint Burst, and convenient excuse for abandoning it to return to the hook. All roads once again lead to tunnelling, because there is nothing stopping you.
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distortion was reworked because people here on the forums said it caused more tunneling if you were the one who didn't have distortion.
that's what's going on with sprint burst.
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People don't need "excuses" to tunnel, you can do it whenever you want for whatever reason you want
What OP and some others are saying is they believe Sprint Burst more so than other exhaustion perks encourages Killers to go "damn, not chasing that guy he's on the other side of the map where all the pallets are now" and then going after a more logical target instead.
I know that tunnelling is considered a cheap path to victory for some but people should acknowledge it's sometimes what you have to do to win. If you take every chase, you will lose as Killer. You have to choose your battles.
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No, all roads don't lead to tunneling. I'm pretty damn anti-tunnel. But a part of survivor macro is knowing that hook states are a shared resource and that you have to know when to take aggro, or more. I regularly throw myself into the killers arms to save teammates or to distract them away from gens being worked on if I have no hooks and a match has progressed nicely.
I don't really use haste perks myself but I don't mind the others. SB is the only problematic one, with no activation conditions and no real downside. People complain about ratting with stealth. Cheesing away from a killer for free at the first hint of engagement isn't that much different if the killer knows they're being dragged away into a losing sitiation, but people don't want to accept that they're part of the problem. It's not logical for a killer to waste a ton of time on a person that's taking them away from the activity.
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I sentence you to 100 1v4 games against 2v8 sprint burst on demand
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I actually don't mind it there. It's a goofy mode, and killers have buffs.
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Couldn't agree more, though I'm sad to say it.
As a religious Huntress player, with her 4.4 and map-broken anti-loop, I simply cannot afford to waste time. If I see Feng has SB and the others don't, I start ignoring Feng even if she's plainly in sight. If I notice that every time I go for Sable her scratch marks disappear, I'll stop going for what I believe to be Sable. It's not a matter of wanting to tunnel, it's just a realistic assessment of what I can accomplish in that window of time. I establish the weakest link and if the weakest link is the only one I can down or find, then that's the only one I'm going to down or chase.
People love to call it an excuse to tunnel, but the reality of the matter is I couldn't care less about tunneling. I'm not pro or against when I queue into a game, it's just a tactic. Sure it's annoying to do and will probably cost me the match, but I'm not going to run around the same loop thirteen times and chase Dwight for a three-gen stretch just because I have some moral quandry against tunneling. Whether people enjoy that or not doesn't matter to me, because at that point I'm no longer enjoying myself either ; enjoyment has been removed as a factor of calculus for the rest of that given match.
There are alot of perks like this, most of them exhaustion perks. SB is the worst offender by far and away, however.1 -
But on the flipside, if the unhooked has SB then it'll help direct you towards the unhooker, thus saving them from tunnelling
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Killers will use any excuse to justify tunneling, and it's never their fault.
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I mean, I do have a moral quandary with it, and I do my best to always spread hooks, and also will still try not to three-hook in these situations. But if every target holds W against my 4.4 killer before I can engage with any of them, I'm going back to the hook. And hopefully the unhooker takes aggro. I don't have enough time to do anything else without throwing. I lose matches all the time because I spread hooks. I regularly have 8-hook matches with 1 or 0 kills because of it. But at least engagement occured there. Zooming away at the first indication of my presence is not engaging, and doesn't help your team. But it's big picture stuff and no one wants to hear that.
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No they all dont have good buffs because in 2v8 the cooldown for sprint on command is lower and it gives sprint to other survivors afound so only killers with mobility that can catch up like powered oni,blight,wraith etc. can deal with it but others cant and even some mobility killers get screwed by indoor maps like larrys killers like billy, wesker or blight so not everyone is buffed to deal with it like it or not.
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People? More like survivor only players that play killers few times and only mobility ones like ghoul.
As killer especialy slower or none mobility one you cant waste time and you chase who is easy target to get downs into hooks to preasure others but everyone knows kills are more inportant then hooks having 3 from 4 survivors dead on next hook in 1 gen situation is way worse then having 1 dead survivor from 4 in 1 gen situation sessoned players know it.
Only fools denny it and yap about no skill in tunneling but facts arent so faulty like feelings.
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Werent the one calling tunneling skilless thing that only noobs do?
I think you did somewhere but that was maybe someone else, well now you see picture why I disliked rat like stealth with distortion it creates same problem. Makes few survivors targets and killer has less options so some double hooking of one guy happens because killer has no one other to chase or has to waste 20 seconds to get to them which isnt for role with very limited time that cant be wasted very productive and possible.
Personaly I go for everyobe I can get and I try to leave bad chases like the ones that could drag for very long or are bad as catching up guy with sprint as huntress instead going against his normal run speed with huntress and I will do it every I can there isnt time to be wasted as killer because sll gam is on your shoulders and no one will carry you or help you, you are alone in this.
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Im like pretty sure cogs is extremely anti tunnel but alright
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I mean as a killer it's your job to go after the easiest prey, it's just the nature of the game. If your chase target has an exhaustion or a build that's wasting a lot of time, it's best to go for those who will get you the most pressure, as 9 times out of 10 the well equipped survivor will give away health states/resources for the easier one.
I don't think the issue is with builds, the issue is with the base game, that I don't mean "We need anti-tunnel" etc. We are already taking toys from both sides bit by bit that make the game fun for people in the name of balance. I feel like the fresh hook incentives was a wonderful idea.
Maps are smaller now, Killers have lots of mobility and newer killers have good anti loop, the fresh hook incentives was a great idea to help killers who didn't have mobility, say like furitive chase + Friends til the end would go a long way.
I don't think taking away one of the only options survivors have against High tiers is a good answer for this.5 -
Best part is he doesnt have problem with 2v8 busted sprintburst version but hates the 1v4 balanced version like you cant make this up.
And reason? Because one guy he wants to chase gets away his 4,4 killer he must tunnel.
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Playing as a Survivor can encourage tunneling at this point
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I think the point was kinda lost here. I'd just like people to recognize that the use of certain perks in certain ways can put a killer into a tight spot. I don't ever load in looking to tunnel, but if I have people using SB to try to run me to shack where no gens are being worked on and I have no pressure, I'm going to turn around and go back to the unhook notification I just got because I know there are two people out of position over there. Some perks, even ones that don't seem like they're chase avoidance perks, can be used in a way that's detrimental to your team. And SB is a very free and easy way to frustrate a killer into swerving. I don't think people want to accept that their actions can lead to their teammates getting tunneled.
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Agreed. Fear not, as someone who converses with you often enough on here I do recognize you're not pro-tunnelling. Your position makes it all the more abundantly clear to me that perhaps SB really is a bigger issue.
It is however enlightening to see people accusing you of all people with the standard ' Any excuse to tunnel ' replies. I'm beginning to suspect that anything but self-flaggellation would be unacceptable to some of these posters.0 -
Knowing when to drop chase is an important skill to learn in this game. If Cogsturning finds it more beneficial to drop chase because of SB then so be it, that's an assessment they've made. That doesn't mean they're necessarily going to tunnel. They're just presenting a scenario in which they return to where they know a different chase is (unhooker) but only find the recently unhooked. Which leaves them with a conundrum. As usual, you're missing the point.
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That's the thing. Killers always tunnel when they are loosing and if you tunnel against people running sprint burst and other very basic perks then your mmr will go up because you aren't skilled enough to win without tunneling and the cycle repeats. It does not matter if you are loading into a game looking to tunnel or not but the simple fact that by heavily inflating your mmr you are guaranteed to go against better opponents than your skill level and then when you are forced to tunnel because of a lack of pressure the cycle repeats.
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As someone who has spent much of their time in the forum being labeled an entitled survivor main It's kinda funny to be on the other side of it. It shows how knee-jerky this community is. I don't expect everyone to know who I am and what my takes are or anything, but I'm saying I'm anti-tunnel so maybe consider what I'm telling you? Feeling boxed into tunneling as my only option makes me very unhappy.
It's not just SB itself, it's often how people choose to use it, like that one Gabriel I posted. That's basically a rat build in disguise. As someone who uses stealth perks and tactics on survivor, I know when it's time for me to stop doing that and take aggro so the killer thinks they still have the upperhand, even when they don't.
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Interesting to have my own often-used MMR inflation argument used against me. If I'm tunneling intentionally (which is rare) I've probably already lost, so my MMR is going down whether I get that one kill or not. On the flipside, I regularly give hatch or let two or three people go because of DCs or throws, so those are free escapes that would have raised my MMR. Tunneling will excessively inflate your MMR if you do it constantly, and subsequently win constantly because of it. That's not what is being discussed. A standing SBer waiting for my approach is not a more skillful opponent. There's little skill being displayed there.
This isn't even solely about tunneling, it's about tunneling as an incidental result of people using perks to cheese out of chases. Returning to the hook is almost always the more time saving and efficient option than pursing the SB/Vigil user, and that's not good.
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There's a lot that encourages tunneling. Taking an endurance protection hit off of hook is basically begging the killer to tunnel you.
And sometimes surviors are just too good in chase. If you juice chase with killer and they can't catch you, if they have a brain, they'll start to straight up ignore and not engage in chase. They'll opt to tunnel the easier options instead. Sometimes to prevent tunneling you have to be catchable and even be willing to throw yourself on hook to prevent the tunnel.
Anything that makes you harder to catch is going to encourage killer to apply pressure to someone else. Sprint burst is definitely a major culprit of this, an uninjured surv hauling ass away with an sb prerun is basically a non starter for chase. Any smart killer won't engage.
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I think its being done intentionally, or people just genuinely don't play both sides.
I had this issue running Scene Partner I was simply too awesome and untouchable that all my friends just die painfully that I had to acknowledge that and start running Shoulder the Burden
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Sometimes to prevent tunneling you have to be catchable and even be willing to throw yourself on hook to prevent the tunnel.
I wish more people understood how significant of a macro power move this can be. It feels really nice as survivor to have three gens pop right as the killer gets their first hook, but I also know how that stress spike feels for that killer, and that someone who wasn't going to be nasty might kick it into overdrive. I often fake a bad chase and get downed to lower their stress levels and distract them, and since I run perks that make me almost untunnelable, they're not likely to catch me if they come back to the hook, and then, we have the advantage. The most important thing I think there is to know about survivor gameplay is that hook states are a shared resource.
Sprint burst is definitely a major culprit of this, an uninjured surv hauling ass away with an sb prerun is basically a non starter for chase. Any smart killer won't engage.
And that's exactly why I think it's a harmful perk for survivors overall, unless it's a 4man and they're all running it.
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I wish this was the case for me. I love Scene Partner for its hilarity but it go me killed a lot. So now I have a zero-fun build.
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Like I would be against droping chase? SB or lythe,overcome all these perks can make you or even force too switch targets so I dont what is this discovery at tenth aniverdary of the game.
Tunneling when you cant go other way because you would loose isnt bad thing. Going sfter one you find as only one or who runs into you even when he was hooked last isnt bad thing either thats like as survivor leaving 99 gen when killer has active ruin a stupid choice so Idk whats problem here if he want to be no no tunnel hero then he can but its not realistic especialy not on all killers like slower or none mobility ones.
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One of my favourite macro moves is when I can see my teammates are on the last gen, I'll do something dumb in the killers face and run them in the completely opposite direction of that gen, by the time I'm downed and hooked the gen is usually done
It's risky but it's very rewarding and satisfying when done right.
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Tunneling is disliked. There have been efforts to cut it down. One survivor's actions or perks can cause a non-tunnneling killer to tunnel, and SB prerunners contribute heavily to that. That's the point.
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Exactly. And not enough people think this way. I think it's partially an experience thing, and partially a SWF vs solo thing. People don't trust the other solos to not just open the gates and leave, even when you did an intentional thing to win the game.
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That I dont oppose that it can be forced ny perks or some actions like body blocks or sabbo.
Its disliked because it effects bigger half of player base which are survivors but thing is sometimes its necessery or inevitable like killer in one gen left situation having no kills without tunnel (kill which is fastest optained by tunnel on majority of characters) or huge slugging is impossible to win without it almost (only if you got very lucky at endgame while survivor try to save the hooked guy).
Tunneling is part of the game even if you like it or not.
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Tunneling is part of the game even if you like it or not.
Yet THAT is not the point is it?
The point that is being made is that some perks such as Sprint burst indirectly encourage the killer to tunnel.
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They did since 2016 and it wont change, what got next.
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The argument here is that Sprint Burst + Pre-running makes it too much of a burden to chase, even through an area you know gens are being worked on.
But Sprint Burst + Pre-running + Unhook protections + Anti-tunnel perks is not a burden at all, even though you're just walking back and forth through an area devoid of survivors.
Therefore, nerf Sprint Burst.
If Sprint Burst + Pre-running truly was that much of an obstacle, then it's equally as much a protection from being tunnelled. And yet, it's apparently not one at all. It's not even thought of as any kind of protection from being tunnelled to immediately relocate to a safer part of the map in the opposite direction of the killer.
And we can extend this to any number of other perks. Resurgence? Heal fast off hook to make tunnelling more difficult. Oh wait, if you want to counter that, you camp and hit immediately off unhooke, therefore it indirectly encourages killers to camp tunnel. We'll Make It? Same deal. Off the Record? Again, hit immediately off hook to instantly counter it, therefore indirectly encourages tunnelling.
The issue is not with Sprint Burst or Pre-running. It's with the ability of survivors to protect themselves or teammates from being tunnelled being completely insubstantial, and most of them countered simply by tunnelling even more aggressively. Anything that protects someone from being tunneled can simultaneously be seen as an indirect encouragement to tunnel someone else.
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Therefore, nerf Sprint Burst.
I didn't say nerf. I think it should be changed. It's got no activation requirements and with Vigil it's way too available through the match. If anything needs a nerf, it's Vigil. I also said if we have a meta shakeup. It shouldn't be changed in a vacuum. If I had it my way, the 10 most popular perks for both roles would be deleted from the game.
If you want to argue SB as an anti-tunnel option, then it could have a brief period of being lengtier haste after you're unhooked, but some other downside every other time.
The issue is not with Sprint Burst or Pre-running. It's with the ability of survivors to protect themselves or teammates from being tunnelled being completely insubstantial, and most of them countered simply by tunnelling even more aggressively
This isn't really true though. You just have to be cautious with unhooks. That's how you protect teammates. If the killer isn't in chase with anyone, I don't unhook. If possible, I generally wait by the hook until another person is in chase (and preferably injured) and the TR is fully away. Killers come back to the hook when options aren't as viable. This is just a fact. Accept it or don't.
Anything that protects someone from being tunneled can simultaneously be seen as an indirect encouragement to tunnel someone else.
Again, not even remotely what I'm saying. If I keep seeing walking SBers staring at me, waiting to run away when I get closer, they're not getting tunneled. They're not even getting hooked. I'm ignoring them until two other people are dead. And they would never think to blame their own actions, despite seeing me ignore them multiple times. No, its just a villainous tunneler. Can't possibly be shared responsibility.
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This. A thousand times this. The 'Stares at you, gets away, accuses of tunneling.' Every damn time.
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