BHVR, Let the Community Help
The massive Perk overhaul that's slated to happen later this year is something that I'm sure all of us are excited for. After all, 40ish Perks are getting a whole heaping of a rework to make them balanced out with the rest.
But, this is where I want to stop you all and say this important message. This Perk overhaul will not work without the community's input. BHVR, it is imperative that you let your community help you with this change.
The community might not be the best at coming to a decision as to what should be changed in this game, but consider the fact that this is the largest Perk overhaul in the entire game, period. It needs some extensive testing and feedback in order to actually be something the community truly wants.
This is a really tall order to ask, but with something of this scale, communication is more necessary than ever. So what could you and the community do together?
- First, you need to tell the community ahead of time what the Perks are going to do in concept; this would be about 2 to 3 months prior to the Perk Overhaul.
- Second, you would need to make a week-long PTB with most-if-not-all Perk changes around the same time as the details, with a respective feedback forum instated here for community and player feedback. This would let players test out the Perks and let you know ahead of time that a Perk might be overpowered, underpowered, or badly designed.
- After this, you then make another PTB one or two weeks after, with the most highly rated suggestions, criticisms and feedback taken into consideration, and in that new PTB, there would be new Perk changes made in accordance to this feedback.
- This cycle would then continue at least one or two more times until most of the Perks are ironed out flawlessly by both developers and the community to give people the quality they deserve on release.
Basically, this would be a whole two-to-three month period where both the community and the company work together to make the best possible outcome for something so significant.
If this does not happen, there may end up being mistakes that won't be corrected for a long while, or ever again. This is why it's important to do this. I know this might be a huge ask for both the community and the developers alike, but please, you need to do this.
Comments
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We always collect Community feedback and will continue to do so with this update. PTB will likely be on a for a week as usual, and the feedback will be assessed during that period.
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I mean they didn't randomly pick 40 perks and decided to switch them around, they're doing this *because* of the playerbase's feedback on the meta being boring etc
Also considering game mechanics changes are coming with the perk overhaul i highly doubt it would be implemented without a PTB first, so we'll be fine i reckon. We don't need mulitple PTBs based on previous PTBs, the average players, which are also the majority, don't play the PTB so the feedback isn't representative of how the reworks would do in average games, it helps with big problems (like hemorraghe on downed survivors for eg) but not really with balance tweaks that usually happen a little while after the PTBs are live. So yes i'd definitely like a PTB, but i don't think multiple of them are needed tbh.
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I think you misunderstand what the PTB is for, its for testing, now I get that testing can mean many things, but here its to get a head start on big fixing on things that dont work. By work here I mean mechanically, meaning the code does not give the results. The PTB is not suitable for gathering data about if X or Y is balanced. Only grossly overpowered or things that don't work as intended. Balance takes far more data and investigation of powerful trends.
The real data gathering happens every day, together with feedback from us which is our help, which we already do.
Your idea seems good on paper, but it would not be done.
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Also remember that our playerbase has console users who do not have access to a PTB. Getting feedback from a small portion of the playerbase who play the PTB isn't ideal. PTB is great for getting that instant feedback and finding game breaking bugs - but there will always be balanced changes made on the basis of the live game.
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Sure but some feedback is better then none at all and even the notes themselves can tell a bit though wrongful conclusions are inevitable no matter what. After all in general even as the game stand now some people are divided on what is or isn’t an issue.
The biggest factor though is that I think people are a bit nervous about what’s been said about changes and want to prevent disaster. The game has a lot of frustrating elements and people are worried that’s going to multiply. They want to know whether it is worth investing their time and mind into this game or not and right now that’s in limbo.
Personally I’m here for a bit unless things get really bad and/or the fixes to certain issues take too long. In other words if it really stops being fun.
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Yeah, feels like a lie to me
Bhvr always use data related feedback. Ence the infamous "object of obsession isnt broken and unfair, people running it dont make it out alive" and being unchanged forever
Its like coh not being mentionned as a problem in the anniversary stream. Sure its not ran by 70% of the survivors like dh but its still present in every single match and is a problem since realease. The "answer" is the new killer perk
Tbh im pretty concerned about perk overhaul (bbq nerf for example ?) and i feel that this "one week ptb testing" is waaaaaaaaay too short of a period
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But Object of Obsession was changed?
And the reason CoH wasn't mentioned is only because it wasn't in the top 5 perks used by survivors, it would be redundant for them to list off 40 perks when they have it on this graph they created
https://news.deadbydaylight.com/en/news/PerkOverhaul
They literally said on stream that there would be posts with more detailed information.
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But my point with a change like this is that this is something extremely significant and not something that should be done with normal procedure. While I understand that there will be a week long PTB (which I feel is too short; I'd say two weeks to a month would be far better), it's the timing of it and the information the community has at the moment that's the most important; if we can know ahead of time and test it well ahead of time (say a month or two before finalization), then the community can properly give feedback on something of this magnitude before the live game launches with the changes in mind. Something of this scale should not have a PTB within weeks of launching the update; it should be at least a month prior.
And in regards to the PTB, while console users are unfortunately never going to have access to the PTB, they will still have access to players' streams and the patch notes, which will at least provide them with plentiful information to make a solid opinion on changes.
Again, something of this scale should have very thorough involvement with both sides, long term. I'm afraid if that doesn't happen, then things will go out of hand like they did with the introduction of Circle of Healing and the rework to Boil Over, and I don't want those scenarios to happen again.
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PTB gives feedback for bugs and obvious balance problems, people don't play normally in the PTB and most people don't test it at all. PTB doesn't give accurate feedback on game balance bc it doesn't help figuring out how the changes will perform in live game. The only way to know that is to send the changes to live game, and see what happens. If things need tweaking they can still be changed.
(and i'd rather play two weeks of mayhem DBD with broken builds for everyone rather than two extra months with boring metas tbh, at least it'd be entertaining lol)
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Don't forget that there's also no matchmaking in the PTB so accurate information with regards to balance is impossible to get from that respect.
We're aware of how to get feedback @Clockwork_Enigma and whilst I appreciate the concern, please do not worry. We will be giving more information on the changes closer to the time, hopefully prior to the PTB - although not as much in advance as a couple of months. And I'll be watching for feedback intently.
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i didn't know mmr was actually turned off, (i mean with so few players i didn't think it'd matter anyway, but it being turned off makes more sense) and not to worry I'm actually very excited and surprisingly optimistic for all this, i genuinely think it'll go well :)
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I'm super excited for it, it's going to be a much needed shake-up and I think it's exactly what's needed at this stage.
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Is there a chance we can get the info a week or two in advance, at the very most?
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Hey, a little question about the possibility of small base game adjustments, with the hindsight on potentially adjusted gen times in regards to the mentioned gap in the Q&A Livestream in January between Solo Q and SWF Voicecommunication Players. Do we have any news regarding the topic of Solo Q Improvements. If base game adjustments will happen it will certainly influence that gap as well or do we atleast get to know if the topic is off the table.
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We absolutely cannot have the perk redesigns based off of the most popular feedback. Have you seen these forums? We're constantly having threads shut down because people are being super mean and awful to each other. Can you even imagine how much worse that would be if people thought the perk redesigns we based off of which people could scream the loudest and most often?
Also, I hope BHVR realizes the problem is that BOTH roles need to be encouraged to interact with each other. Killers should be encouraged to find other survivors instead of camping and tunneling, and survivors should be encouraged to get in chases with the killer instead of hiding. Survivors hiding and being immersed is just as bad as killers camping and tunneling, because it's avoiding interacting with the other side. It would be super unfair if killers got punished for camping and tunneling, but survivors were still allowed to hide as much as possible.
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Eh, even if bhvr did take the feedback into consideration look what they did to so many nerfs and buffs.
Slinger was nerfed into the ground, as some people say, and hasn't been buffed since to make him better. It dang near killed him.
There's no way to tell if they'd actually listen. It would be nice to know more before the actual ptb.
...in fact a lot of nerfs and changes have been taken negatively by the community on this forum...
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"help"
(the help) "NERF ________ RIGHT NOW BECAUSE I SAID SO WHAAAAAA"
this community is not about to help anyone but themselves
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