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Regarding the Ghost Face Nerfs
For those who don't know who I am, I am reputed to be quite critical of BHVR at times, and am incontrovertibly a Killer main. On the PTB, I was equally outraged at the egregious lack of strength Ghost Face initially had. Lastly, I agreed that Ghost Face did not need any nerfs.
With all of that said, a Killer's power should NOT derive from the impossibility of utilizing their counterplay, such as staring at Ghost Face doing absolutely nothing when it's intended to work. Ignoring the shifts in power and buffs, these were the negative changes:
· Pallet stuns will now break Ghost Face out of stealth.
· Marked Survivors may no longer be stalked.
· Detection area of screen slightly increased for Survivors attempting to reveal Ghost Face.
- Pallet stuns are indicative of the Survivor's knowledge that you're there, and this is frankly a rare occurrence anyhow. This change is no cause for widespread outrage.
- This was an unintended mechanic to artificially inflate the Exposed duration, would only work on Survivors whom don't simply look at you to boot you out of your power, and was almost certainly an oversight.
- This is a 4% increase to the size; there are times a survivor can be staring directly at you out in the open and it won't kick you out. We'll see if it's too large when it hits live, but at first glance this seems fine.
I'll end with this before I'm accused of being an apologist; all of these changes promote healthy gameplay, but the somber reality is that Ghost Face will NOT be viable, but it isn't because his power sucks or is poorly designed, it's because the context of the game is completely skewed. Map design and the Emblem System will be the death of Ghost Face, and it's important that we not see the forest for the trees.
Killers shouldn't need to be as strong as Nurse or Hillbilly to be viable, they should have ample counterplay and still be strong. The complaints we should be making are that mid tier killers aren't viable, not that killers aren't designed to be top tier.
Comments
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This is very well said. I will just add to the detection area bit: This does not necessarily make him easier to detect like some may thing, this just makes the area of the screen that is checked to see if you are looking at the killer a tiny bit larger. This is mostly to help people who have a hard time keeping their camera on the killer during a chase, which as you've mentioned, is not meant to be the case.
Your points about level design and emblem scoring are definitely valid and I'll be sure to bring those up with the team. The latter isn't necessarily a Ghost Face specific issue, killers that instantly down survivors can have a rough time with emblems. It's definitely worth discussing.
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To be blunt, Nurse is the only killer who is viable without add ons. The only reason she is viable is her ability to ignore game mechanics. There isn’t anything they could do to fix this without a drastic change in direction we are unlikely to see. So it would at least be nice to get a new Hillbilly more than once a year for varieties sake at red ranks.
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Thanks for the reply! My intention wasn't to take snipes at BHVR, I just wanted to elucidate the problems plaguing Ghost Face because they're far from unique to him. I just don't want to see a game where every Killer's power has to have limited counterplay and constrains the viable Killer list by being overly effective in every capacity, which is currently what it takes to be viable in light of loops that can take 40 seconds to break through and have no mind game potential against gen times that can be popped in 3 and a half minutes. Not to mention the issue of Chaser, and Gatekeeper being largely out of your hands.
Frankly, I see Myers as being the perfect "bar" that every Killer should measure up to, and that the Survivors should be balanced against. Ample counterplay, fun for both sides, and I don't see Ghost Face as being that far off of Myers, but that won't stop survivors from consistently crushing him at high ranks due to aforementioned issues on live, which is what will happen unfortunately. Does BHVR have such a "standard" in mind when balancing out of curiosity?
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"The complaints we should be making are that mid tier killers aren't viable, not that killers aren't designed to be top tier."
This has never been the complaint the player base has had. This is the complaint the devs think we are saying and it continues to be perpetuated.
"The complaints we should be making are that mid tier killers aren't viable"
This IS what we have been saying for over 2 years.
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It is what many of us have said, but I see a lot of people complaining that Ghost Face won't be viable; they're right, but not because of the changes BHVR made. It's because to be viable right now you need an absurdly powerful ability with limited counterplay, which isn't particularly healthy design, and it's certainly not the toolset that the Ghost Face has.
Nor should it be, which is why the complaints perplex me. He's not in a particularly bad position, it's just that the Killer role as a whole is.
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"It's because to be viable right now you need an absurdly powerful ability with limited counterplay, which isn't particularly healthy design, and it's certainly not the toolset that the Ghost Face has."
This isn't accurate. What you need to be viable is either high mobility, a power that counters loops, or a combination of the two. That does not mean a killer with limited counter play.
Example being Spirit. Rank one viable while also have a high skill cap and lots of counters in the form of play style and perks.
Killers wouldn't require these things to be viable if loops weren't as broken as they are. However the devs aren't fixing these or at least at a speed that will have it solved even with a years time. Since that is the case, this is the world we are left in with determining what makes a killer strong.
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I mean it's fine to release trash/ bad killers if there was no ranking system, but the fact that we are forced to play on Higher Ranked is the problem
If DBD has casual play whatnot, Devs does not need to buff any killers, but this game is Competitive. And with only Nurse and Billy being used the most/ most viable, shows that something is wrong
Do people seriously forgot that bushes doesn't work for Ghostface, he can't stalk people, and survivors can get you out of it
Also, hooked and down survivors can reveal you
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I think most people are more pissed off that Ghostface is getting a nerf so soon after release rather then the nerfs being terrible.
I do agree with everything you said in this post, the Killer role, emblems, and poor maps just make killer a unpleasant experience.
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I'm firmly of the opinion that the game should be balanced around Huntress/Myers tier killers, and in that case Ghost Face would be perfectly good.
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You need mobility and the ability to shorten chases. This is literally saying "you need to have both of the two most important things in a Killer's kit; you can skimp on tracking, but you need EVERYTHING else."
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Balancing killers around their level is fine if you're balancing around low purple ranks.
If you want to balance around the highest level, which you should imo, killers need to be balanced around Billy/Spirit level.
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Not if they actually balanced survivors around Myers/Huntress as well.
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Also before the hotfix coming up, you can just permanently expose people because your power comes up to re-stalk them before the Exposed actually wears off.
Considering he's just an M1 killer in chase (and you can just 99% like a Myers) this isn't the biggest deal in the world, but it's definitely the bigger nerf.
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Great post. The only thing I will say is that he just needs more feedback and time before doing any changes with ghostface again.
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This sounds like a fanboy TS.
So you're gonna ignore the fact that this has happened before with pig, freddy, puky killer and legion, i.e getting a decent buff to lure people to buy that product, then turning it around taking a huge dump on said killers until it's to the bottom tier?
It's false advertisement. Plain and simple.
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It's kind of the case with Billy. He doesn't exactly counter loops but he is just top tier in almost all other aspects to make up for it.
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Not only does he not need those nerfs coming but I think he still needs buffs, the dude is pretty bad. Against any competent red ranks you are getting looped to oblivion.
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He will indeed. That's what I mean, killers like Myers, Ghostface and Huntress should be viable, but they aren't because of map design and the Emblem system.
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I agree that map design is the biggest hindrance that is hurting their viability.
They need to make them good enough to compensate and function in a world where the maps don't support their play styles since they won't be able to fix the maps in time, if they even intend to fix them properly anyway.
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Mid-tier killers don't need to be as strong as the "top tier killers" (often referred to as the only viable ones) to be "viable"?
lolwut
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@Fictionalname nope. False advartising isn't buffing something and then nerfing him later.
False advartising is just when you lie during an advertisement.
For example when they said that I'm All Ears reveals players outside of their terror radius in the showcase despite having already changed it to being within 48 meters. But even then you could debate if that actually counts as advertisement.
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I'm far from being a fanboy. I rip on map design, the Emblem system and the grabbag full of mediocre killers constantly. If you look up my threads, historically speaking it's 90% criticism, and even this thread is criticism.
I just don't think Ghost Face himself deserves criticism; he won't be viable but that isn't because there's something wrong with him, it's that he gets buried by gen times, exploiting ridiculous map design and the Emblem System. He's very fun to play as & against, and his power wouldn't be bad if the problems already existing in the game were fixed. He's a healthy Killer to add to the roster.
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That's what I was trying to articulate here; I really don't want to design killers around the bad map design, gen rushing and flawed emblem system, because then if they're ever fixed we'll have to change them again.
Rather, I think the criticism should be applied to the source of the problem itself; the Killer's objective takes too long due to map design and gen times relative to the survivor's objective, and the emblem system compounds the issue. If those were fixed we wouldn't need to touch the mid tier killers, GF included, at all.
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That isn't exactly what I was saying. I was saying that killers shouldn't need to be as strong as these two to be viable, but right now they do because of other problems in the game, and it's precisely those problems that I think we should collectively complain about.
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This. The core problems already exist in the game itself. Killers are just the by-product that we can clearly see. Tweaking killers is just another band-aid 'fix'.
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"That's what I was trying to articulate here; I really don't want to design killers around the bad map design, gen rushing and flawed emblem system, because then if they're ever fixed we'll have to change them again."
I agree, I just don't think they actually want the maps changed in the way we are referring to. Even if they do, to actually fix all the maps now would take them a very, very, very long time at the rate they're going.
I think map reworks/changes should be much, much higher on their priority list than it currently seems to be. It''s one of the biggest, if not THE biggest issue in the game.
If the maps were actually changed properly we would see almost a 180 in the tier list of meta killers without actually having touched the killers themselves. This is because we'd be changing the criteria of what makes a killer strong essentially.
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Exactly. Just to preempt the argument "but you could just buff everyone to Billy/Nurse level": that stifles diversity, because there are only so many kits you can design that offer mobility and chasing in sufficient magnitude to be viable, and the field is much more open if these facets weren't absolutely necessary the way they are now.
Not to mention there's an issue of counterplay that begins to crop up once you design kits this strong and the game quality becomes binary, repetitious and dull.
You're absolutely correct, it should 100% be their top priority to fix the maps, because tweaking everything around the maps means we'll have to fix it again later if they ever address the game's core issues.
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Didn't they say during the anniversary stream that they were looking at fixing loops to be less strong?
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They were, but loops aren't the only issue, as a ton of maps just need to be smaller than they are. Map size exasperates the disparity between the haves and the have-nots; don't have mobility? Chases take longer and patrols take longer.
Then because Hillbilly exists and negates map size, BHVR has to throw in a ton of loops to make Hillbilly not overpowered on that map, which doubly screws the non-mobile cast of killers, which is the majority of them.
Not to mention an overwhelming number of maps need loop changes, and the pace at which they're reworked is rather slow because BHVR isn't prioritizing this issue.
That leads me to this thread; people see GF, correctly identify that he isn't viable, but then they reach the conclusion that GHOSTFACE has the problem; he does not, it's the game itself that is the operative factor in his non-viability.
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Which map(s) would you say are a 'good size' for killers right now?
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Well that will most likely be fixed with the map reworks. I'm guessing maybe those are the reason he is even getting nerfed, but in that case I would wish they'd nerf hiin the same patch in which we get those map reworks.
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That's true. Maybe he was nerfed because of the upcoming map reworks. Which will hopefully balance the game much better.
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Recurrent issues:
- Don't put safe tiles next to one another or Survivors can chain the instead of using them to break chase
- Safe pallets shouldn't outnumber unsafe pallets
- Maps shouldn't be excessively large
MacMillan estate
Coal Tower: Just fix the tower loop, the map is the second smallest in DBD
Groaning Storehouse: The size is fine, but there are many safe loops, including the Storehouse itself; not the worst map
Ironworks of Misery: Fix the Ironworks itself; the map itself is also quite large.
Shelter Woods: Very large and RNG dependent, really depends on how many safe loops are spawned.
Suffocation Pit: Fairly large with many safe loops but this map isn't so bad provided it doesn't spawn the semi-infinites, which is RNG
Autohaven Wreckers
Azarov's Resting Place: Too many safe loops, and it's quite large.
Blood Lodge: Same as the above.
Gas Heaven: Mostly fine.
Wretched Shop: Combines safe loops with an incredibly safe Storehouse tile and a large map size.
Wrecker's Yard: Good map.
Coldwind Farms
Fractured Cowshed: You'll see this on every Coldwind map; it's too damn huge, almost every loop is idiot proof it's so safe, the safe loops spawn literally next to each other and the Cowshed is an insufferably safe tile. Every Coldwind map is one of the worst in DBD.
The Thompson House: Same as above except the Thompson House isn't as egregiously safe as the Cowshed is. Still an absolutely outrageous map.
Torment Creek: Absolutely terrible; all the criticisms of Cowshed applies here, as the Creek building is incredibly safe, and it's another of the "RNG matters" maps, although it's always bad, it's just a degree of how bad it is.
Rancid Abbatoir: The odd one out of the Coldwind maps; it isn't too large, but consists almost exclusively of safe tiles within close, chainable proximity of one another. Like the rest of Coldwind Farms, mind games are seldom feasible.
Rotten Fields: The worst of the Coldwinds; it's massive and has safe structures along the parameter with a gigantic cornfield between the safety.
Crotus Prenn Asylum
Disturbed Ward: One of two maps that is DC worthy; it's unnecessarily huge, full of safe structures, and the Asylum tile is one of the safest in the game with an ABUNDANCE of safe, non-mind-gamable pallets under the same roof. With Balanced Landing, it's nearly an infinite loop to boot.
Father Campbell's Chapel: Talk about the opposite of its sister location; this is the fairest map in DBD in my opinion, as it offers plenty of mind games with some safe pallets strewn about and a sensible center building that isn't broken with Balanced Landing.
haddonfield
Lampkin Lane: The other DC worthy map, it has several guaranteed semi-infinite, idiot-proof loops with safe pallets attached, and with BL the Myers house is infinite.
Backwater Swamp
The Pale Rose: Good map.
Grim Pantry: Rework the pantry itself and add some mind games to some of the loops and it's fine.
Lery's memorial Institute
Treatment Theatre: Another contender for the fairest map award, as it offers numberous short lines of sight to lose the Killer. Many of the loops are gamable, but some are safe to offer an escape via the short lines of sight. Generators are harder to rush down despite the close proximity of the map because it's indoors, and it's the smallest map, so mobility isn't essential to be viable here.
Red forest
Mother's Dwelling: Just needs to be smaller, all of the tiles are individually fine.
The Temple of Purgation: Same as Mother's Dwelling.
Springwood
Preschool: Several ridiculously safe tiles and idiot-proof loops, but it's being reworked anyways.
Gideon Meat Plant
The Game: Awful. A literal majority of pallets (by a wide margin) are safe and lack any mind game whatsoever, most of them within a chainable proximity to one another. If you can't negate safety to some extent, your Killer can be bullied.
Yamaoka Estate
Family Residence: Too huge and too cluttered; full of safe loops, too.
Ormond
Mount Ormond Resort: Mount Framedrop Resort is a pain due to map size and the safety of loops.
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And your right. That tier Should be the balance point if they want to balance for fun. The problem is that map design in general butchers that idea entirely, along with gen times without ruin. And i am doubtful that upcoming map changes are going to fix that issue.
With the way the game is now, balancing around myers/huntress tier is essentially making them bad for higher ranks without having top tier addon/perks.
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Solid take on the maps. It's pretty sad how maps that are otherwise fine are either 1. too huge 2. too cluttered or 3. have a BS main building with a semi-infinite window.
I honestly think maps should be their number one priority atm, but I doubt they'll be fixed at an acceptable rate. I feel like turning the PC off every time I hear the Haddonfield music at the start of the match.
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Same. To be clear, I'm fine with adding more, gamable pallets if they fix the issues on these maps and it turns out to make Killers too dangerous, but a lot of these maps are just free losses right now because the strongest loops also lack counterplay.
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Maps are more than about size actually.
Does anybody here consider Sheltered Woods to be Survivor sided? Did you know it's tied for second largest map in the game? But, because it's so open with low pallet counts and wide open areas making vision on the map easy - and killer's like Billy have a field day on it.
But other larger maps that share the same size such as Rotten Fields or Blood Lodge are a nightmare for killers. Asarov's Resting Place has a simular number of tiles but it's squished in such a way that the killer actually has a pretty good fighting chance if they know how to herd survivors around.
Most map design issues have to do with the loops themselves and how they interlock with each other. Strides have been made to make more and more of the longer loops balanced - but more work is to be done.
.
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Couldn't agree more. Let's pray the map reworks will be good. Then I wouldn't mind these Ghost Face nerfs at all.
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I wouldn't say "No counterplay" More like "Boring counterplay" because insta-saw Billy, or Nurse being..nurse. Or just bring endur/BS/Bambzoole/SPiritFury/Ruin with really good addons.
I am agreeing with most of what your saying in this discussion though 😀
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Well unfortunately that's 2 maps getting reworked A YEAR. At that rate the problem is essentially never getting fixed.
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I still have hope that we can get smaller scale updates on some not so problematic maps. I feel they can do more. They did just add new tiles to Yamaoka, for example.
Some maps just need to have a window or two removed or the main building changed or the size reduced. Some are complete trainwrecks that need to be rebuilt from the ground up, like Haddonfun.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or they should just take it out.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or just get rid of it entirely.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or get rid of it.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or get rid of it.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or they should just take it out.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or just get rid of it entirely.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or get rid of it.
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I cannot agree with you more. Though the other problem I would add that concerns Ghostface is that this game is based around chasing, not being stealthy. Stealth needs to be looked at when they redisign maps or get rid of it.
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The problem isn't map design per say. Yes, most building are terribly designed, but IMO the inexplicable omega buffs that pallets received in 1.1.1., which created the game-breaking pallet-looping we have today, are a way bigger issue.
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