Read more Dead by Daylight ➜ https://deadbydaylight.mgn.gg
tl;dr perks and addons have a greater impact on the match than your actual skill with a killer or the powers they come with
http://www.twitch.tv/ScottJund
source
Read more Dead by Daylight ➜ https://deadbydaylight.mgn.gg
tl;dr perks and addons have a greater impact on the match than your actual skill with a killer or the powers they come with
http://www.twitch.tv/ScottJund
source
you showcased a match where the team took 3 minutes to complete a single gen…
Very insightful, but how did those suvivors in the vid not done a single gen while you were chasing Rebecca
Game design nerd here. I love this topic, so excuse me while I type a 300 word essay. I'll mostly stick to talking about how this effects how people play killer, since killer and survivor are technically different enough in how they are played that you can make a strong argument that they are separate games entirely.
Firstly, this video is mainly about strategy compared to skill, but also lightly touches on RNG and it's effects on skill expression. "Strategy" here refers to non-skill based actions which a player can perform, as it does not take skill to navigate a menu to equip a loadout or choose a killer (e.g. it doesn't take skill to put 20 burn spells in your Magic: The Gathering deck, but it does take skill to know when to use them and what to use them on).
RNG vs skill expression a fairly nuanced and complicated discussion, so I won't elaborate much past "casual players enjoy winning unexpectedly, hardcore players hate losing unexpectedly". High RNG vs low RNG just depends on the playerbase, really. Chess used to feature things like dice rolls for attacks, but it eventually evolved out of it since players hundreds of years ago didn't randomly having their attacks fail, while other ancient games still feature randomness very prominently.
So, that brings us to builds vs skills. The truth of the matter is that balance is actually largely irrelevant in games as long as strategic collapse has not occurred (don't worry, I can elaborate). Strategic collapse is when only an extremely small subset of strategies are viable, "pick this strategy or lose" (e.g. if you did not pick Space Elves and your opponent did, you have already lost). As long as an acceptably significant number of choices in strategy are available to the player, balance is in a decent state. All a player needs is the breathing room to play how they want without feeling forced to play in a way they deem undesirable or not fun.
This means that despite Nurse being the undisputed queen of Dead by Daylight, the fact that Knight, Onryo, and Trapper can still realistically expect to win allows us to confirm that the game is, indeed, in an acceptable state of balance from a killer perspective (although from a survivor perspective, Nurse and Blight are often too strong to beat without meta loadouts… but all that is irrelevant since we could be here all day talking about how SupaAlf and OnePumpWillie both have 100+ win streaks as the best killer in the game and the worst killer in the game, respectively).
Scott's data actually proves that strategic collapse has not occurred in Dead by Daylight: you can win with strategies varying from "M1 killer with meta perks" and "decent killer with no perks," all while not using tactics that are often deemed essential for victory by most of the community (camping and tunneling).
Anecdote: you can play mid-tier killers with zero slowdown and do fine, I run slowdown perks maybe only one game every month or two. The DbD playerbase just has a mindset problem, where they think they HAVE to run the meta to win against meta survivors, or they feel entitled to victory because they have 1,000+ hours in the game (spoilers: so do many of the players you are vs'ing).
Conclusions: Fun is more important than balance right now for Dead by Daylight, since balance is in an acceptable state. Eruption is the king of anti-fun perks, but people understandably think the problem is it's strength. Eruption still requires player input and is not an auto-win button, but it is often an auto-DC button for survivors because it sucks lmao
I think the problem is that while most players are still casual, dbd is feeling the pains of an old playerbase. Everyone still around is decently competent at dbd, as much as solo q suffers compared to comms the average survivor can loop and tackle gens to the point that killers have to get sweatier and sweatier. To compensate killers have relied more and more on slowdown to essentially buy more time to apply pressure. The 90 second gens help, but at the end of the day it broke even when most of the best slowdown got hit. I think if base killer got some more buffs and survivors had more items and options in gameplay then perks could be toned down, but as is if you hit perks everywhere it either makes killer awful because gens are too fast, or killers camp, slug, and tunnel too much
I think that the equivalent to this on the survivor side is just a new player with a small perk pool and someone with a bunch of t3 perks.
behavior lessened the grind but with my 100 hours of survivor gameplay, I still have barely enough perks to consider any of my builds finished
I don't have the "meta" perk builds on killer or survivor, and it sucks.
That’s dependant whether or not if you are playing as an S-tier or A-tier killer, if you’re playing as those killers then it doesn’t matter what build you are using. But if you are using B through D-tier killers then you need everything under the sun to keep up with good survivors and majority of the time it’s still not enough. For instance, Wesker can be played without perks because he’s that good.
This video made me realize DbD operates very similarly to poker. You can do everything right and still lose to a bad player who gets really lucky. Making money in poker isn't about winning big hands, it's about using smart plays to mitigate your loss over time. It doesn't matter if you go on a losing streak out of sheer bad luck, because if you're doing everything right, it will turn around slowly but dramatically. I think if everyone in the DbD community knew this, we would be less inclined to be toxic to each other, and less inclined to take massive breaks or quit altogether.
Its good that perks are powerful, it allows you to change your play style in a meaningful way which keeps things interesting.
Yes.
What I feel like might be also a problem is both complexity and simplicity of certain things in the game. Mostly it is manifested in killer power's difference. For example, playing against huntress you are troubled by 4 perks, and her ability to hit you from distance. So as soon as you figure the perks out and are able to hide / chase at a reasonable degree and not 3-gen yourself, your chances are pretty even, the sneakiest, dodgiest and most accurate will thrive. Then you take an example of Pinhead, and all hell breaks loose, because not only you are challenged by build and range, as it is with Huntress, but also by the chainhunt, which can interupt any action you take, reveal your position, deny loop, deny heals, deny gens, deny totems, deny exit gates, so pinhead in state of chainhunt is a circle, the center of which is everywhere and circumference is nowhere, and when you stack eruption pain res call of brine and merciless storm on top, the sheer quantity of phenomena you have to contend with at once making it almost guaranteed, that at least one of the group will mess something up, and it won't take much of messing up for the entireteam to crumble.
This is very insightful. It has certainly changed my mind on how the game should be balanced to some end. That said I have a few ides that you might enjoy.
I always thought maps and perks are what always keep this game unbalanced nearly as much as blight and nurse and is what makes people frustrated because sometimes your losses can feel really unfair
I mean, at a decent level everything you said is real. But the reason why you perform better with just perks than just power is cause of your game sense, also. For the skill level where people don't know when it's worth to kick gens or drop chases I think maybe the result would be the opposite
RNG is the most deciding factor and good builds are those that help with consistency, stacking as much RNG in your favour as possible. Slowdown is good because the longer the match the more likely the killer will find an opportunity to close the game. Skill helps, but even the most skilled survivor will be useless in chase if caught in a dead zone with a less skilled killer, and the odds of this to happen are much higher in a longer match.
In some weird freakish world where the matchmaking was goo (its not) and that was a good thing (it wouldn't be) I feel like actually balancing perks differently based on grade or mmr or whatever could be interesting. Perhaps DS could be stronger at ash grade but not as strong at iridescent; dead hard could get more endurance duration the worse the player is; hell, corrupt could last even after a down or could last longer. I feel like this would be.. interesting. not necessarily better, but definitely interesting
or perhaps this could be used to counteract the bad matchmaking; if you're "high mmr" and are going against "high mmr" survivors then things are normal, but if you're up against babies your perks could be weaker in order to emphasize your skill.
Your experiment is flawed in my mind. Using your power effectively isn’t the only way to express skill. There’s loads of things that you do in match that less skilled players don’t do. You run tiles better, you have a better grasp of what the other 3 survivors are doing outside of chase. Map knowledge. Mind games. Strategy. All of this things are skills you can hone that have nothing to do with your power or your perks.
Are there some situations where lesser skilled players skate by with a win because of a strong meta build? Sure. But in most games the more skilled player will beat the less skilled player.
A relatively inexperienced 100 hour player with poor fundamental skills is going to get absolutely stomped every time regardless of their build. Meanwhile, a perkless 5k hour player will do the stomping.
I agree certain meta builds are plaguing the game and should be brought in line with other perks. But I don’t think the solution to win more games is to simply run the meta crutch perks. It’s to play the game a lot and learn how to play better.
the shack had like 4 safe pallets into a jungle jim i would be mad
I disagree with the semantics here. It seems really inaccurate to say a worse player with the best build wins over a better player with no build. The perkless, 30-sec head start experiments as a counterpoint. DBD is all about the chase and someone who sucks at chase could bring every perk in the game and still lose.
I've won 3v1s where the 4th died at 5 gens because the killer was just that bad at chasing, knowing when to spread pressure, etc.
Perks more important than power? Absolutely. More important than knowing how to create dead zones, and prioritize chase targets? I disagree. Perks and powers are just differently powerful force multipliers.
My take might be seen as controversial, but I think the game is fine as it is. Yeah you can lose to people running strong perks but if there isn't the ever present threat of a loss looming over your head the game wouldn't be very fun. Maybe it's strange to say but I can enjoy losing a match and for me that's part of the fun and it's the fantasy the game provides; 4 (mostly) helpless survivors trying to survive a slasher situation with what they have available to them. Could things be better? Obviously things could be better. How would one achieve a better DBD experience for both sides? That's hard to say because that'll mean different things to different players. It's all about perspective really.
More viable perks + more perk shakeups. Worst case scenario the devs over buff a perk and can just nerf it in the next meta shakeup.
Make all perk stronger so there are more builds and more variety
makes sense but i also dont really see how making everything more balanced would deter worse players by default. i feel like people in dbd CANNOT accept when someone else is better than them
Funny you should make this video… I literally just did the same experiment with Myers. I really wanted to see how strong Survivors could be now with the New HUD. The matches with no build were far more stressful. Even more than when I would do similar experiments with Myers before the HUD. I felt like the only way I could have "won" some of the matches was to get real sweaty.. .and that's not really my style. So I agree 100%… build matters.
I've never thought dbd couldn't be both fun and balanced and still don't. I'm by no means insinuating that it could be a perfect game, but I think we can get it pretty close
Fun should definitely remain the goal. You keep the game fun and fresh while also having overpowered perks by retooling large groups of perks on a regular basis. Detune the perks that are over-represented in the meta even if they arent problematic to force regular meta shifts. Tune up the underused perks. This keeps things fresh and keeps people trying new things and those are the lifeblood of a game like this.
Yes
carrying perks make more money
Skill is Nature and loadout is Nurture. A guy can be really good at Hockey (good map awareness, good mindgames) but someone with a high powered puck launcher (any gen perk, playing any A+ tier killers, tunneling/ camping, rushing kills, un-counterable "gimmick" builds, etc) then skill isn't important
I have said this before and I'll say it again; If DbD was balanced, the Game would die instantly.
As much as making the Game more skill based would make me and other people happy, it would really only hurt the Game in Hindsight.
And as frustrating it can be to get outplayed bc a Killer or Survivor was running a certain Perk, I don't want that gone.
Casual is King.
Why not add a game mode that allows that and those players can go there.
Well I can say from my own experiences since I have played DBD for 6 years and I am a average killer player myself. I main artist a killer I think is the textbook example of pretty average. She’s not to oppressive and has counterplay. I win more games with a good build rather then skill. There are some exceptions when I get a bad map that Artist struggles mostly map with multiple floors. But running a meta build for Artist is more efficient to winning the playing her at the highest skill possible. Slow down perks like Thanata or DeadLocked can often carry you through matches by themselves and that’s just chasing and tunneling. But tunneling does play a second big factor targeting the weakest member on a team can quickly turn a match around.
skill should always be > builds, thus is one reason why i kinda wish they started a perkless mode, im so tired of this constant back and forth of people crying about the builds on one side being op while igoring their own, which can ultimately ruin the game overall, a perkless/addonless/itemless mode would be really nice
You ever notice how these popular DBD Youtubers always end up going against bad Survivors with no concept of looping with a S-A Tier killer to prove a point in almost every video? Hey, look I kept up with good Survivors using the Nurse perkless. Hey, look I beat a SWF who dead zone themselves vs my Blight. Hey, look I beat good Survivors who bring Urban Evasion and I beat them with Spirit. Hey look here is proof loops are not busted watch what I do with Huntress. Hey, you don't need perks vs good Survivors look what I can do with a good killer like Wesker. Are builds more important than skill? that is a stupid question. Of course, the builds are more important than skill, you can have all the skill in the world and still lose as a low tier killer. Doing this with A-S Tier killers literally proves nothing other than the killer you use is better than most of the killers in the game. Do this with Freddy vs good Survivors perkless, and I mean actual good Survivors on a Survivor sided map that are not brain dead in the chase, who don't dead zone themselves the entire match. Let's see perkless, no Add-On Freddy vs good Survivors, let's find out if skill is more important than builds. And as I said prove it vs good Survivors not free kills.
Having good perks is fine, like lithe and pain res. Having perks that are overbearing that make players who misplay like crazy to win are too much, like eruption and dead hard. A specific issue is stacking. Like how you can stack all slowdown and make gens take 300 seconds, or stack gen perks and finish them in like 45 seconds.
if relation to trying to compare killer having powers and surviors not i think the survivors being able to throw pallets and vaults very quickly would be considered a power, could you survive without vaulting or throwing pallets? i reckon you could it would be difficult and more stressful just as not using a power on killer with perks. lets say surv brings the best build but cannot vault or throw pallets could they still win? you could definitely compare the two is what im saying.
hey mind if i steal this clip and use it for another entirely different game that follows the same premise, fun and RNG over skill just to give everyone a chance. I'll link back here of course. THANKS!
I disagree with the RNG argument simply because how are Casual players supposed to know how to deal with RNG? RNG affects killer way more than it does Survivors. Knowing the killer can't afford to chase on certain tiles doesn't mean the game is giving lesser skilled survivors a chance, it means it's just naturally limitting the killers ability so the Dopamine effect is absolutly void once you understand that. You're not surviving because of your skill you're surviving because the game said NO to the killer. If every survivor manages to run towards that tile then the killer can't play at all.
RNG is absolutly horrible for game Balance. Again i fully understand, and i've always said as much, it's a Casual game, that's exactly why all this systems exist the way they do, it's what BHVR wants. IT's not a game made for skillfull players or a game that offers much in terms of evolution as a player. However there's a freaking limit to how much unimportance everything can have. You're still a PVP game, things have to matter and things have to have a proper Balance.
And MMR exists primarily to seperate skillfull from Casual players, that was the intent, however the skillfull players couldn't get matches because Casual games atracts Casual players thus when there's a low number of skilled players MMR becomes useless or you do what DbD does.
It's precisely because of this reason that MMR counts Escapes and Kills instead of all the things it could account for. EScaping and Dying don't mean you have skill or lack skill it's just a track record used to predict wether or not you're likely to survive or die your next match.
Again another system that simply doesn't benefit anyone at all. That's why SoloQ is in shambles, because there's a very very low skill requirement to play the game and since the end result doesn't indicate skill whatsoever the meaning of matches is absolutly void.
The Gen Kick Meta is stupid because it doesn't hold any value, and the same is true for SWF or Gen Rush Meta or Second Chance Meta. Essentially because you're giving things no importance you end up with people feeling frustrated constantly, especially because of the "False Pressure" of the existence of MMR. People hear and know MMR exists in DbD and they think there's an actual skill component to the game when there isn't. RNG can and will make you win or lose without you having to do much of anything.
You can 0 all match and escape and that's a win for you. The other 3 can die but that's a win for you so screw the other 3. What the hell kind of message is this!? This is why the game is not Survivors vs Killers and that's why the game is not Balanced at all. IT's not 4v1 it's a Free for All. The fact Survivors have the same objective doesn't mean they are a Team like they absolutly should be.
I know that you always qualify these videos by acknowledging that you aren't doing these experiments rigorously, but I think your analysis here is actually off for once because one of the biggest factors here is how you play. The if in "it's really hard to win a game if you play nice" is a pretty big if. It isn't nearly hard to win when you aren't playing nice (points at negascott). I think you're not taking into account that you are still above average at the game, even without a power. I'd say the reason that you lost more (I also wonder how wide the margin in escape rates is since you put a lot more emphasis on how stressful it was than how often you lost) without perks is because the way that you play gives survivors time that they wouldn't have against the most cutthroat killer you could be, and slowdown perks just make up for that lost time. That does mean a killer who doesn't know how to use their time well can have some time bought for them by their perks, but I think ultimately your skill (ie your ability/decision to manage time well) is still a large part of the equation in whether you win. The other huge factor is raw luck. Perks are going to be a relatively small part of that whole equation and will only save a player who just isn't in a position to win so often.
All that said, I still agree with the conclusion. All these perks make the game less fair and more fun.