Lmao and Wesker is a licensed killer. His design, personality, lore and power was all already done for them and people were already big fans of Wesker years prior to his inclusion to dbd. Practically all the majorly important stuff about character design was done for them. It's probably why Wesker is so good, they had basically one job to do for him and that was properly balancing him.
The only thing i liked is that i like the idea of killers invading old maps, like how Skull Merchant set up a base in Shelter Woods. They should add those things for killers that didnt get a map, like Trickster.
Yeah trickster having a stage instead of a main building or something. Would be harder to balance though so maybe keep it smaller, like just replacing one loop or maybe make the shack always thematically tied to the killer but functionally the same? Dunno, something to think about if they ever decide to polish their stuff instead of shit more out
Do the changes to Shelter Woods only show up when you are playing the Skull Merchant? If so, that would be an amazing idea. Otherwise you risk ruining solid maps by adding awful tiles.
Most of the community complained about the Knight's gameplay and how he was only really good played one way. The devs said "we hear you... wanna see us do it again?"
To be fair, chapters take around 9 months to make. It's possible they saw the bad reception boring 1v1 killers were getting at the time and decided to switch to boring 1v4 killers instead
Just because a chapter takes 9 months to make doesn’t necessarily mean they will release is in 9 months quite the opposite, OW2 has a similar thing where every season they have a mythic skin in the bp, they have said mythic skin take at least a year to make yet they release every season, keep in mind ow’s seasons are short. The math isn’t the issue
@@curethwoundethphb2275 They take 9 months as confirmed by a developer. Obviously not all the devs are working on one chapter at the same time, they work on separate chapters 3 months apart to keep the release schedule consistent.
this is hard to explain why but her character design makes me feel like I'm playing one of those games that does bitmining in the background without telling me
The design feels like a first draft, like someone brainstormed for all of twelve minutes and came up with -predator claw? -gas mask (broken)? -overalls? -sexy? And just went with it
@@sirco2166 every gen regression perk besides COB and overcharge requires you to get a down. And ruin doesn't count because you can disable it at any time and it's effect isn't even that strong
@@pintolerance785 I know what happened, the new apex season didn't get a new legend cause DBD just stole their files lmao, absolutely belongs in apex not the tomb raider five n dime sparkle wolverine
I think the worst part about this chapter being so underwhelming was the fact that we all expected a really cool looking robot/cybernetic killer and we got THIS instead.
For once it feels like they didn’t try. With Knight, yes the chapter was weak but they clearly had an idea and it just didn’t get executed very well. Here, I have no idea what they were doing. Her drones don’t even look like they belong to her. Her mask looks very strange as it even contrasts her base outfit. She just feels like a conglomeration of 10 different ideas. And then the teasers and such were very much hinting at a bio mechanical monster. Even her lore is really odd
I'm not sure if I'm in the minority but I really dug her lore. We know what her skills are, we know why she kills (she wants to live out a power fantasy AND she pragmatically only goes after business rivals to fuel her insatiable greed), we have a good idea of her profession, we see this killer has agency in her life as well as the means to kill, and that while nothing in her life forced her to be a killer (arguably her life is much better than most of ours) she chose to be evil. To quote the Ethical Bug: "YOU'RE HORRIBLE! You're an irredeemable monster!" And I love it.
@@poissonsumac7922 My problem with the lore is that she read a manga and wanted to imitate it, that's one of the lamest reasons to kill. Compare that to the hillbilly and everything he went through before he killed anyone, or if you want a character that's just evil for no reason, the doctor is a perfect example, he just wanted to test horrible stuff.
@Redtheyiffer Yiff Compilations I don't think she would've started killing though unless her first victims held out on selling the company. She started killing to solve the problems money CAN'T buy, it's just that she thought it'd also be fun to emulate the manga. Notice how even though she imitates the manga she only seems to kill people standing in the way of her business. Business first, fun second.
@xyex but also nothing not suggesting it. All we saw was a skull and we heard construction noises. It's not crazy to assume the skull could be the killer and the construction could be someone assembling it for a messed up experiment.
This is one of the rare cases where the art and music team have dropped the ball. This killer is extremely lame both in terms of gameplay and aesthetic. I'm extremely disappointed with this chapter.
The only interesting part about her is the little radar tool. They should honestly just extend the chapter date and completely start over. I would prefer that to them sweeping it under the rug and working on the next broken chapter like they typically do.
Yeah I totally agree, although the information is mostly useless it felt very badass and cool tracking survivors on my little ipad. If they rework her and do more with that I think she could be more fun to play
Killers are broken. The Myers add ons are a joke and that’s just one example. Devs have no clue what they are doing. I just use cheats now, idc anymore. Love making killers DC!!!!
This is the first time ever I think I’d honestly be happier if they just cancelled this killer. I am completely serious, there is nothing, genuinely nothing redeeming about this killer and it worsens the game except for her perks which are mid as hell.
She's just an M1 killer with horrible information gathering. The drones being static and useless is painfully the worst part of her kit because a killers power shouldn't be boring, it should be fun to use.
me theory is the liscence fell though and the made this all in a rush. Explains everything. For example, even the worst killers and chapters (knight, twins, the original "depipster" as he was called, legion etc) have always been really cool visually even if they sucked to play as or against but this killer is so incredibly underwhelming I thought she was actually the survivor. Her bio mentions an abomination of flesh and machine but this is just the lady from Rainbow six siege's tutorial cutscenes with a gas mask and a claw
@@Beepbep101 i hope that this isn’t the case because i would love a Predator chapter and if this killer is the closest thing we ever get that would suck
@@douglasbreno4966 i mean I'm talking out of my ass here, it's probably not but the alternative is that bhvr just collectively had a stroke because almost everything about this chapter is a failure including the thing's theyre normally good at. Even with bad kilelr's i have never been unsatisfied with a killers visuals, but this is just... very very meh, which is almost worse.
The thing that really rubs me the wrong way about her is her design. It just feels like a bunch of different qualities duct-taped together that just don't mesh well. She has three main parts of her design, the mask, the weapon, and the clothing. The mask represents the manga character from her dad's manuscript she's trying to imitate, her weapon represents the technological nature of her power, and her formal clothing shows that she is a millionaire, as her lore states. My question is. . . Why? Why does she have so many of these qualities? Why is the fact she's trying to mimic her dad's manga so important that her killer name, The Skull Merchant, is literally named after it? Why is the only high-tech part of her design her weapon when her whole ability is based around machines? It feels like this killer doesn't have any identity. She's not a mechanical, technologically based killer, the only high-tech parts of her kit is her power and weapon, everything else about her design, lore, and even Mori have nothing to do with being high-tech. Every killer up to this point has had a clear-cut identity that you can sum up with a few words; The Knight is a Knight, The Doctor is a maniacal Doctor, The Dredge is a Boogeyman, The Deathslinger is a cowboy, etc. But what is The Skull Merchant? Sorry if that came off as nonsensical and rambling, I have a hard time putting this into words. I don't *HEAVILY* dislike the killer, but from a design standpoint, she just seems. . . Off. In a way that's hard to describe. Addendum: Now that I think of it, that's probably why they decided to name her 'The Skull Merchant,' they couldn't really think of a certain identity or gimmick to name her around, so they just took something from her lore. Shes not really a mechanic or technician or machinist, so you can't call her 'The Machinist' or any variation of that.
No it makes sense and you're right. The most succinct way I could think to put it is very disjointed design. Lots of people believe she's what's left of what should have been a Predator killer, and the fact she just seems hastily slapped together aesthetically further adds to that feeling.
Said it on an Otz vid: Make a Survivor Put her in a Halloween costume from Party City Bam. New Killer. This upcoming chapter feels like hardcore "doing a report for school during the lunch period before class." Probably explains the level of silence and last minute teasers before tossing it in PTB.
Scott's the type of guy to play a new Killer for multiple hours, form a well thought out opinion on the killer, then release a 25+ minute video explaining his thoughts on why the new killer is a failure.
There are a multitude of ways this power could have played out that would have been potentially interesting. But they chose to have a radar and a nearly impossible expose mechanic instead. If anything I'm more worried about how low impact the new killer perks are while the survivor side got some insane new picks
You might be right, but that's literally what has been said, again and again, since Hag seemed too Trapper-y like a million years ago. Soon enough, they'll be out with a Wesker, but they gotta run through a few duds if they're gonna occasionally strike gold
That’s what happens when you literally change nothing about the core gameplay for 7 years. They’re clearly scraping the bottom of the barrel for killer powers and perks. BHVR, I’m begging you, add something new, some new objective alongside gens, something, anything.
the one thing good about this killer, THE DRONE DISABLING ACTION ISNT A PROGRESS BAR WITH RANDOM SKILL CHECKS It took them 7 years but we have a new "minigame" I hope we see more stuff like this in the future
I want DDR up in this his-house and force every player to have a ddr pad or they get fucked for not having the hardware to do the gen Or donkey Kong bongos, I can work with that too
@@EliTheGleasonimagine azarack or vecna from dnd with those mechanics on a tomb of horrors dungeon map. Even the map could have survivor’s be able to break open doors by picking locks.
The thing that annoys me the most about her is her giant robot arm which does NOTHING. There's all that machinery just to hold the blade in place? It seems like such a missed opportunity for her weapon to be some moving crazy robot arm
I didn't even really think about this aside from thinking it was cheesy asf, but you're so so right. She might as well just carry around a dinky little knife like the legion or clown. It's not like she gets any extra range from the contraption or even the lunge like Amanda(The Pig) smdh
I like how it also suggests she's actually weak af and the survivors would be able to overpower her if she didn't have a hydraulically powered robo arm. She can't even use the weapon with her own strength, she needs something to assist her.
Killers are broken. The Myers add ons are a joke and that’s just one example. Devs have no clue what they are doing. I just use cheats now, idc anymore. Love making killers DC!!!!
I actually think that it was originally a predator chapter. The whole idea of a map changed into some base works literally perfectly with predator. Perks work too. The only thing is killer's power but it could easily be just another killer that they were supposed to release later and make power better but they lost license to predator and rushed this killer to keep up with chapter releases
I keep seeing comments like this and really the only similarities to the Predator are the claw weapon and that the killer wears a mask. Hardly original concepts to begin with. Was the Predator known for using drones?
@@utes5532 Maybe it's my bad english but I said that This killer is the only thing that doesn't work with the aesthetics aside from weapon and mori and maybe the whole idea of tracking survivors with technology
I truly believe they got 90% of the way through developing the Predator as the next killer but then the licensing deal fell through so they had to redesign the killer last minute. The skull taker theme, the weapon, the survivor acting like the killer is invisible in the Mori, the surveillance and undetectable themes.... Change my mind
Even the music is reminiscent of a "Jungle hunt" theme, and the map rework looks like a military outpost if you dim some of the lights and remove the expensive designs of the main building
I see absolutely no reason as to why survivors are given so much information about her power. They see the activation radius with a massive orange wall, they see the drone scanning, they see when the killer is tracking them with the GPS thanks to a huge orange eye, they know the exact moment when they’re going to become exposed. The fact that survivors can see the drones and deactivate them is counterplay enough. They don’t need to know literally everything the killer does.
But, but, but, killers are so op and broken! But seriously, why are survivors given so much information about what the killer is doing when the killer has to guess at what the survivors are doing and even that doesn't always work
What's even more pathetic is that the information her power gives her is useless most of the time. Pulling up the radar to just see a blip on it of a survivor who is across the map from you is not good information. Even the weakest aura read perks give more valuable information.
Killers are broken. The Myers add ons are a joke and that’s just one example. Devs have no clue what they are doing. I just use cheats now, idc anymore. Love making killers DC😂😂
@@MetalBalu01 If the predator theory is right, they were working on Predator and then the license fell through. So they had to improvise and make a totally new killer in a much much shorter span of time. It's why the art doesn't look good, the animations are jank and the killer as a whole feels weak.
Killers are broken. The Myers add ons are a joke and that’s just one example. Devs have no clue what they are doing. I just use cheats now, idc anymore. Love making killers DC😂😂😂
All they had to do was make it so we could fly the drones around for intel and then give her a stealth power like wraith to sneak around the map. Then for the drones that you place, if the survivors want to break them; they should get that little tracker thing on them for 20-30s. Sure she might not be good, but droning and sneaking around sounds a lot more fun than this
Ik. Every killer only has one chance per concept. They used the idea of drones on this character, and they are hardly even "drones". I mean what's the point of them being DRONES if all they do is just stay in one spot in the air? I mean they might as well just place a camera on a tree or something, because now that they've fucked up the concept of drones and wasted the idea, no other killer can use drones. I mean you can't control them, they don't move, it's just so lame and bad.
@@tfcbioshock Yep that's the thing that pisses me off the most about this killers design. The drones are just fucking glorified alarm bells that the killer has to set up. Once you see it for what it is, you can't look away.
@@Justmonika6969 it's just knight with extra steps, considering the knight can set up a guard on a loop in under a second, but agent skully here takes like 3-5 seconds from throwing a drone to activation, even then it takes like 10 seconds to even be marked by a drone to get exposed, meaning it's tons easier to just W key away from a drone instead of a knight guard, not to mention five and dime tomb raider rip off here is pretty much useless when chasing an injured survivor since their power gains little value besides undetectable at that point
Killer was clearly their attempt at a predator but they couldnt get the licensing. Even the mori screams "The killer was supposed to be cloaked behind the survivor" but then because they didnt get the licensing they had to remake the power, redesign the entire character and shove it all back out in time for the PTB chapter launch.
That makes a lot of sense to me for the mori, because she’s literally just standing behind the survivor until they back up into her. If it was a cloaked Predator it would make so much more sense
That’s what I was saying. Plus the new Red Forest maps look like it’s kind of jungley as if this was meant for a new map but they chose to use these textures for the map reworks instead
The thing with that is I doubt BHVR is THAT bad, where they had a killer not secured but set to launch in like a month. It definitely gives off Predator vibes, but I fail to believe it was a last minute switch, especially since the idea that they just reused the mori animation seems crazy to me (though that still brings up the question about predator licensing in the future)
@@batteriesnotincluded7635 no it was most likely them pulling out in the middle of them making it. Obviously it wasn’t them making the killer without having the license secured but it was 100% supposed to be Predator. The weapon is the same, the map additions is from the first predator movie, the 2 survivors are based off the brother and sister in the tv series Prey. The rework map jungle. The mori. It’s hella obvious and you’d have to be naive to think otherwise.
Tbh i think this killer exposes the core problem i have with the game, that being the generators themselves. There are only so many things you can do with a singular objective like that, i think they've run out of ideas that actually work so now their just throwing anything they can at the wall and praying something sticks.
We are officially in the Mad Libs portion of killer designing; "Her name is SKULL MERCHANT, she was inspired by DARK MANGAS, and uses DRONES to HUNT survivors!"
@@usedhalfcart you can play like that but it's about as useful, or slightly less useful, than Ghostface trying to expose you while already IN a loop. You'll get pallet stunned and then have to go to another loop
The sad thing is that even one of her perks is just an almost objectively worse version of one of Knight's perks. THWACK! is basically just Nowhere To Hide, but weaker.
I'd say stronger since it can be used in chase, Nowhere to hide is pretty bad since most of the time people don't hide next to gens and where you have them cornered you're already in a power position. This will be good to spot players skulking around you while you're chasing.
@@nou8830 Nah nowhere to hide is stronger because 1. It doesn’t require you to hook someone, 2. There is no timer to use it, and 3. It’s absurdly strong in 3-gens which is already the strongest thing in the game.
I thought she's be like the pig in a way. A surveillance killer with traps and machines to torment you. I mean the chapter is called tools of torment but her drones don't really call for the name of torment. I'd expect her to make traps and place them on the map and on survivors, make weapons, and use drones to watch her tools at work. She can do this by making her equipment at desks around the map. Traps that punish teamwork, shocking you by being near teammates or on the killers demand making doing anything impossible. (Until the battery dies) Traps that shut down areas. Trip wire flood light trap that disorients survivors slowing them down and blinding them. (Imagine a flashbang going off, deaf, blinded with being hindered) Drones that watch your every move. She can craft drones and can place them to wander the map and will directly follow survivors that it spots. (They run out of battery after some time) And modifying her claw hand to allow her to shoot the blades, 2 shots only. When empty you have to reload at a desk. (She can melee with no blades but she has reduced lunge.) You can only have 2 abilities that can crafted at a desk at a time. Changing an ability to a different one will replace the first ability you had and anything relating to that ability will disable. Meaning any trap type and drones deployed around the map/on survivors would despawn. So be mindfull about switching abilities. Now this feels like a more intricate and fun killer. And maybe survivors can use her desks as well to make stuff too, maybe they can make noise makers that can reveal the killer aura, or traps of their own :3
Killers are broken. The Myers add ons are a joke and that’s just one example. Devs have no clue what they are doing. I just use cheats now, idc anymore. Love making killers DC😂😂😂
I think the Red Forest stuff is pretty cool! I wish they'd changed the maps like with Eyrie while they were at it, but the art is pretty cool. Just those stupid transparent-looking non-transparent bushes... Sheltered woods main is meh. Too techno for my tastes and what vibes with DBD, but I'll probably get used to it
@@redtheyiffer Oh yeah all that's trash ngl. The moris recently have been so dope that I was *really* disappointed when we got a repeat of one of the most boring moris in the game.
@@sorin_markov the original mori was going to be the predator decloaking out of invisibility and then ripping out the survivors spine, possibly with the skull still attached. But something went wrong and predator fell through so instead we've gotten whatever the hell that mori is.
I don’t think it’s predator cause he never used drones in the movie? He had thermal vision, invisibility and a laser cannon. The only resemblance is the bladed weapon.
That's why I don't think that if this was intended to be predator it wasn't like a last minute change cause like they would've scrapped a lot of shit and programmed in like this weird new drone power for enough time
I wonder what the devs were thinking about when they designed this power. How were they intending for it to be used? Did they think people would find whatever purpose they thought of fun? And how didn't they already know what's going to happen as soon as people figure out how to use this killer? It seems like no real thought actually went into making this something people will want to use or play against. There's nothing fun about it past it being new, people are going to be sick of it even faster than the Knight. This is like if they released Myers and Ghostface back to back, except they made Ghostface 110% and he can't lean. At least the server time limit will be put to good use
I got sick of the killer in the first game. Her power isn't just weak, it's fucking pointless and boring. She has drones that are just glorified alarm bells that sit in one spot and scan an area with massive tell tales. That's it. That's her power. The "exposed" part is actually impossible to pull off if the survivor just leaves the area. Hell, as a survivor you can run through one end and out the other and not get exposed at all.
I think drones would have been an awesome power. Like a drone playing the terror radius so you can’t tell if a location is safe or not and being able see killer instinct if they get to close. But instead we got a terrible power.
Back in 2019 I had the thought of a spider like killer, something similar to the entity, it would look kinda like the dredge does, but with entity legs. The power in my head worked a lot like blights does now.
Don't even give it powers, just change this killer into an actual spider that builds a web and eats flies while the survivors work on the gens and it would be more fun.
The most important thing that needs to happen imo is the claw trap you get for dismantling her drone needs to be much more detrimental- Perhaps being inside the drone reveals your aura and/or makes you hindered, but getting the trap on you inures/inflicts broken, similar to the trapper's purple addon. Something that makes dismantling the trap an actual decision needs to be made, since right now there's no reason not to dismantle it.
You can wait out the Active state of the Drone and sneak up on it during Scouting state... Or you can just run up to it during Active and disable it. Both methods attach a claw trap and give her information on you so there's no reason to be subtle and play around the Drone like you'd expect. The Drones should be straight up unremovable during active state.
The chapter is called tools of torment, the power should of been what that one guy suggested in the killer power idea vid. The one about crafting different weapons after getting materials.
Ideas for weapons: magnetic spear it acts as a regular m1 weapon until thrown, if it hits a survivor they will be injured or downed, when the survivor is speared u can press m2 to pull the survivor to u for a short duration which also breaks the spear (think of junker queen knife from overwatch) Missing the spear throw cause it to stay where u threw it and requiring u to go pick it up to get it back Active camo: when activated gain wraiths cloak for 15 secs, pulling out other weapons deactivates camo Battle axe: break pallets and walls 30% faster, hitting a survivor with this weapon grants a shorter on hit speed burst (down from 1.8s to 1.0s) trade off is that u move at 4.4
The title: “Tools of torment” The content: “hurr durr you have a funny pig trap on your arm. Aren’t you feeling tormented??” Edit: Tools of Torment would’ve been a better name for Pig’s chapter than it is for this killer
Killers are broken. The Myers add ons are a joke and that’s just one example. Devs have no clue what they are doing. I just use cheats now, idc anymore. Love making killers DC😂😂😂
I wish they went all-in on making an information killer. Someone with a sub-par chase, but always knows where you are. Unfortunately there are just way too many limitations in her to do that. The only reason I can think of for this is they may have something big coming and they were in a bit of a rush. Say what you will about Knight or Sadako, at the very least they were ambitious. At least her perks look pretty fun
Tbh I feel like the last original killer that really captivated me was dredge. I haven't played the game at all since knight dropped so I can't speak on him but Dredge is genuinely so much fun to play
Something big coming? I wouldn't be getting my hopes up I have no idea what something big could be since the life blood of this game is the different killers and to a lesser extent survivors so when that starts going by the way side.
i know this doesn't add anything to the discussion, but we brazilians waited so so long for brazilian characters to finally make it to the game and it's just sad that this is what we got
I immediately knew she'd be a three gen nightmare the moment I saw her power and how it functions. Even if she can't reliably act on that information, she's still absolutely obnoxious to face in this scenario. She's a letdown honestly.
I think The Skull Merchant's design could've been more interesting if the devs had leaned harder into the robotic aspect of it. Just to name a few examples, her claw weapon could've been her ENTIRE arm (not a simple brace or gauntlet) with a spinning/flipping mechanism, half of her head could've been fused with some type of machinery, her back/chest could've been an exposed network of bones + gears/wires, she could've also had a sack/tool belt filled with skulls hanging from her waist (to reinforce the moniker), etc. I can imagine this killer modifying herself, using the money she's collected over time head-hunting to enhance her physique with cutting edge technology (she's an engineer/inventor, so of course she did all the modifications by hand). For another example, "In her bottomless greed, Adrianna sought ways to make herself the perfect hunter. What little humanity remained was lost as she rebuilt her own body with metal and steel, tearing apart the physical limitations she no longer had any use for. Now more machine than woman, Adrianna would continue her work, fashioning tools of torment from skulls of her prey to harvest future bounties." The devs REALLY dropped the ball on her ability, design, perks, and mori; her power isn't God-awful (still very weak), but everything else is just so lackluster and disappointing. I'm not even a killer main and I feel let down. HOWEVER, I DO like the Red Forest rework (+ the visual additions to Shelter Woods) and the new survivors (but some of their perks might be broken if they go live without any changes/adjustments).
BHVR, can we please get a werewolf already? Wouldn't be hard to make. Just give them demi-gorgons leap and a howl/speed boost whenever they hook a survivor.
Yeah if they’re willing to rip off assets from the predator DLC that fell through they can recycle Demogorgon into a wolf man so that everyone can enjoy that gameplay. The tunnels can be dirt digging or whatever as well
Tbh I feel like this killer was a test more than anything, this is the first time since Doctor a killer relies on their addons to make their power somewhat interesting to use/build around. I still think she's weak but I feel like this could maybe make for more interesting killer designs in the future with addons that do more than just break the game (blight) or improve certain aspects slightly-moderately
Killers are broken. The Myers add ons are a joke and that’s just one example. Devs have no clue what they are doing. I just use cheats now, idc anymore. Love making killers DC😂😂
I feel like she could've either been made into a stealth killer with her drones being a way of stalking survivors or she could've been another trap using killer Both not good ideas but they're probably better than what we got
it's crazy how, within a few hours of a killer's release, scott can form a more reasonable opinion on its balance/gameplay than the playtesters can throughout the entire development cycle.. bhvr remains incompetent to their core. when will they hire scott to playtest for them?
And on top of that, at least post change, you CAN be chase knight. It's not effective and not super fun for the survivors either, but you can do it and I find it fun as a killer. There seems like nothing to do for her. I'll get her p3 for the perks and never touch her.
@@kobold7964 I agree, that's how I play him and I love him. I'm just tired of getting @'d by people arguing with me that three gens are better against the gen rush meta, so thank you for fighting the good fight when I wouldn't.
Even better idea: Wait for the perks to come on the shrine so you never have to buy the chapter thus BHVR doesn't get money from this wastebin of a chapter LMAO
Upon first reading of the power I really thought it would be played like a very weird myers or ghostface, in which you drop drones and then remove the furthest one in order to stay undetectable, but like survivors can see the orange fields bruh like what, they will see you setting this up. Like I felt like this could have been a super cool take on the sneaky then strong killer to just have the stealth fall apart when you see a giant orange field pop up, and trying to find some way to have it already set up in a way that you can go back to use it is just too inconceivable in the actual goings of the game
when i saw the teaser i thought we'd get a killer that looked like they came from Killing Floor 2, ended up with a tomboy with a stapler I like her! but I feel they could've done so much more with her design
I wish I could see the devs’ faces when they see the backlash that this is getting. They really did fail this time. They need to take a step back and get their priorities straight.
So I have been personally been having a lot of fun with The Skull Merchant. I know this is just my opinion but I feel that the killer themselves isn't much of a chase powerhouse and more of a wraith alternative. (HEAR ME OUT) I run the brown pallet breaking addon and the green oblivious addon (these are the best two from my point of view) as well as Nemesis, Enduring, Brutal strength, and the new perk Game Afoot (I was running jolt instead of nemesis and it worked arguably better but I'm an unga bunga kinda guy) Now the key part of what I feel makes her fun at least for me is the playstyle with this build. Instead of placing the drones at loops or in the open I place them near generators to force the survivors to either deal with it before doing a gen or risk the exposed. I don't actively go for three gens and nor do I try to hold them. The main reason for this is so that the survivors are forced into the scenario of breaking the drone and getting the battery. This then makes chases so interesting because instead of being a purely m1 killer you can strategically use your drone on the survivors with batteries to recharge them and make them rethink pallets and what tiles to use in order to not break their own pallets. The other chase perks just make it easier on you when the survivors don't have a battery and or you're drones are on cooldown. Alongside this the Oblivious addon makes survivors treat you as a pure stealth killer when they are in the drone range (and the oblivious lasts quite a long time too) making actually using the built in undetectable much more viable and makes the drones do something to even injured survivors. Now like you said this killer can be very oppressive at three gens but so can many with the right perks that's just the current state of the game. Along side that most of my games were up against the random match making in the PTB so far so skill is very inconsistent and there are little to no comms. I feel that with comms she becomes marginally weaker like most stealth killers but I player her almost like the hit and run wraith playstyle and really only stick to survivors who I know have a battery or are in a bad spot. NOW ONCE AGAIN THIS IS JUST MY OPINION so it might not be for everyone but man I love what I've played so far. Do the survivors enjoy it? I don't know I haven't received any complaints yet.
I've had fun with her. I've been using two builds, one with terror radious fuckery using her iri and dark devotion and one with her purple that buffs her speed and actions when in drone range + superior anatomy and bamboozle.
Better power: Sadistic Tech Skull Merchant has 4 different gadgets to use, able to put a certain amount down of each. Tech 1: Flash Trap She can place down a mine that emits a vague beeping noise, up to 3 at a time at least 16 meters from each other. When a Survivor walks or runs near it, it sets off and emits a blinding light, causing loss of vision for any Survivor nearby for 2 seconds. An addon can be used to add a ringing noise to disorient hearing too. Survivors can crouch to avoid setting it off, and a brief interaction can be done to smash it, but if they fail the skill check, it sets off and blinds them for 3 seconds. Tech 2: Sensor Can be placed down in an area to scan in a specific direction. If a Survivor goes into the line of sight, it alerts Skull Merchant. 1 can be placed at a time. Survivors can break it, but doing so requires a brief interaction involving 3 consecutive skill checks, and if one is failed, the Survivor is shocked and gains the incapacitated status effect for a short time. Tech 3: Kill Wire Can be placed on pallets that are not dropped. If a Survivor drops a pallet with a kill wire, it will briefly delay the drop, for a default of 1 second, longer with addons. 5 can be placed at a time, and Survivors cannot see the wires. Tech 4: Spider Drone Able to be placed in lockers, up to 3 at a time. When a Survivor interacts with a locker housing a spider drone, it lunges out and latches onto them, putting them into the injured state, and acting as an A.I controlled Victor. Her Perks Advanced Tracking Every interaction a Survivor does that creates noise is 10/20/30% louder. Hex: Broken Toys When a Killer specific event occurs, gain one token, up to a max of 3/4/5. When you hit a Survivor, if they are holding an item, it drains the amount of charges equal to your token count, then resets to no tokens. If they did not have any item, instead all their perks deactivate for 1 second per token. This includes Boons, meaning they must relight their Boon, even when the effect ends. Dexterity When stunned by any means, for 15 seconds, the Killer's pick up, drop, generator/wall/pallet destruction and vaulting animations are 10/15/20% faster.
If this was 2016 DbD where the Chases were an alien concept and most survivors just tried to hide, I could see this being a decent killer. But that’s just the thing, everything about her screams 2016 DbD, the Mori with no thematic relevance, the very simple power that doesn’t help in chase at all and the animations of her walk cycle and the mori seem a bit janky
So far this is twice in a row where they released a pretty similar killer to the one that came before it The dredge was similar to sadakao and now the skull merchant is similar to the knight
all of the other videos ive seen on the new killer have seemed really ingenuine. this killer is even more disappointing than the last killer and its so weird that no other content creators have been being honest about how badly designed she is
The leading theory right now is that this was a Predator chapter, but they pulled the contract in late development, so they had to change a bunch of stuff
Starting from Twins, BHVR releases two bad killers followed by two good ones. I honestly kinda believe they're sapping development and design time from those two to focus on making their anniversary/licensed killers, and the results are either an over-ambitious mess or badly designed.
These last few killers feel like they are testing the waters for a sentry killer. The knight summons his goons, the merchant summons her drone, and the singularity summons his tumors. It's almost like they are trying to make a summons killer
I was worried kind of about this the other day when I saw speculation that the killers power revolved around drones because people saw the blueprints in the teaser and assumed the tweet about the metal box was that it was a drone box and I thought the only thing I can think of for a drone power is monitoring areas for like a 3 gen or getting perma aura reading to some extent, and I am both equally disappointed that I was kind of right and also not surprised at how bad the killer is. It very much reminds me of the knight for if we focus just on just the power and not the other random design aspects thrown into this killer, the drone idea similar to the knights power idea in how its just bad on paper and incentivizes 3 gens and camping in a similar but not exactly the same way as the knight who at least has some variety in the way you play him as you can use his power in a chase and not just use it for 3 gens or camping like this killer.
I'm pretty sure she was supposed to be The Predator but the deal fell through Skull drones, turning undetectable (invisible), claw weapon on arm. It all fits.
I just want to break down her power for everyone and why it fails in the similar way that Onryo did. >The power is to set up machine which has a short boot up period. Right off the bat we have an issue. This is a set killer so she automatically will be compared to killers who put things down. Hag, trapper, nightmare and now the knight. But half of them require to let the survivors be while the other allows for near immediate use on survivors forgoing the need for set up. And even then the other 2 killer who need set up can be powerful once those set up have been paid off. So let's see what that pay off is. >It gives undetectable to the killer and notifies you of survivors in a small area around it. So the power is useless. If you enter the area survivors might be able to predict where your coming from. If you aren't survivors know your coming from. And it notifies you of survivors in it but you might not be able to capitalize on it. Plus it doesn't help in chases. >if survivors stay within this area for to long, they are locked on and are exposed till specific conditions are met (downed or the lock on meter is reduced). So the pay off is insta down. So survivors who are already injured don't care and from what we see in the vid, the survivor can literally run across to the other end of the area and still not be marked so the window and time needed to expose them is insanely long. >The machine enters scouting mode where the survivors can disable it. This is fine if the former exposure ability was faster and more dangerous. However it does not so it's just a waste of time and further notice for the killer who may not be able to capitalize on it once more. >If a survivor disables the machine, a clawtrap is placed giving the killer the survivors location if they check on their power. And once more just info which the killer cannot make use of or capitalize on it. Did I mention that this location thing can last longer if the survivor doesn't want to remove it? As much as that's useless and it can be removed easily enough. So with that said: >Horrible stealth ability Her stealth can literally work against her and it isn't that great >Horrible chase power She relies on perks or abilities to get downs because she has no chase power. >Unreliable lethality Lethality that the killer cannot predict or make use of reliably on their own skills. >No mobility She's stuck with the killers who will suffer on big maps. >Vast amount of free information Her only strong aspect is that she can get knowledge on survivor location which many killers can already achieve and have some powers in chase. >Poor area control Like many killer she cannot control one area even with their powers making it easier. So now that we know why she's bad let's break down what we can do to make her stronger and built around her theme if they ever do fix her- So her theme is that she's basically a hunter who uses machine to gain information, scout and down survivors. Let's build on that- >The killer is undetectable while all machines are on her. For each machine she uses her terror radius increases and her undetectability is slowly removed. With 3 machines she can be detected with killer instincts. With 2 Machines she produces noise and with 1 machine her undetectability is lost. With this she now has good stealth which is lost over time for lethality/area control. >When the survivors enter the area their aura is revealed. When clawed, the survivor produces 50% more noise, if they are running they scream. If they interact with objects their aura is revealed. If they are clawed and enter an area of the machine, they begin screaming and the machine automatically enters active mode. This would give her more lasting information which would force the survivors to take risk. OR >When a survivor enters the area, they become blinded and deafened. When clawed, they become blinded until it is removed and he killer has a killer instincts showing their location whenever they interact with objects or survivors. If they enter the area of a machine it enters active mode. With this she now has more lasting information she can make use of and preserving her stealth while forcing survivors to interact with her power and stay out of the area if they haven't removed the claw. >Rate of exposure increases and decrease exposure does not happen while clawed Once more and lastly, the exposure must be faster so that the area is an actual treat and forces them to stay out of the area till the machine enters observation mode to then be able to enter it and force the survivor and killer on this loop to try and find each other. The only nerf I would have would be reducing the number of machines the killer has each time a survivor is killed to balance this out.
I think they were trying to make this character part stealth killer, so maybe making it easier and more rewarding to play them like one would make them better. Like a setup stealth hybrid that also gets information on survivor locations. (Also making it so you can place drones closer to each other would be a nice quality of life fix)
I think she might be better if the drones were a bit easier to disarm, she had a small chase buff, and the claw trap lasted much longer and had some other consequence along with tracking. But that still doesn’t fix the fact that her core design is just not that fun to play and is optimal with gen kick perks + 3 gen scenarios. Do I think she’s a failure? Ehh… Her look, theme, and mori suck. She has a unfun power. But I’ve had some fun with her. But that’s mostly because I like experimenting with killer powers and perk builds. I highly recommend hex builds with her by the way.
She looks like a dollar-store version of a Dishonored character. And they expect people to pay real dollaridoos for a chapter of this quality ? I'm expecting a flurry of high quality cosmetics in the next weeks to try and make up this massive lack of money this chapter is going to create.
