Her stealth is millions way better since it doesn’t force you to stay in a specific location and can be used preemptively when coming to a concrete place.
@@N.E.M.o777 It seems better due to being instant, but it's actual utility is far worse and you actually get less overall time in stealth. Tying it to drone deployment rather than being in radius and then lingering afterwards means you aren't able to use it to traverse distance like before. You instead really only get it in situations where it isn't as useful and with the heavy limitations on recalling and setting drone you're disincentivized from attempting to maximize your stealth. The old version never forced you to stay in a specific location on that you needed to pass through that location and on multi-floor maps you could get a ton of stealth value with a single drone. Let's be clear though, her stealth was only as good as her tracked target movement buff allowed it to be and now tracking and the associated buff are far less consistent and frequent. Clawtraps were and still are the worst part of her power, but now they are the entirety of her power even moreso than the drones were. Everything about her is way worse and as Skull Merchant main seeing other Merchant mains trying to overdose on copium is sad. Like all of the actual skill based play that was in this killer got stripped out in the most reckless manner when all they needed to do was address her ability to hold gens. Yeah, they solved the problem, but they did it by hitting her with a tactical nuke and reducing her down to a bare minimum viable form of herself. The only thing they accomplished is making her a killer who has one actual playstyle that survivors still with complain about because instead of boring stalemates she'll just produce boring chases.
I mean, it's not like she was bad in the previous version to say that everything about her being worse is a bad thing. She was SSS tier in her "chess" playstyle against randoms
@@bebesulfannot really, it was too map dependent and that is coming from someone who loved her old play just because the slowdown and haste allowed me to play with any perk and have time to actually have fun chase.
@@giannis_tar That's not actual strength though. Chess meme aside it wasn't a valid playstyle, it was highly deviant to the point the devs said directly it wasn't what they intended for her to do and folks shouldn't be doing it. She wasn't even strong doing it against randoms, people just more often than not gave up. She was a bad killer before and a worse killer now. If that ptb version goes to live it is truly jover for BHVR's development credibility.
I still find the circumstances that led up to skull merchant being the worst received killer ever to be fascinating. For months, survivors biggest complaint was the gen kick meta, prolonging games to a boring pace. The prior killer was knight, a killer that could make good use of the gen kick perks with his ability to hold a three gen. A disappointing chapter for most, but a cool concept for a killer (fun to play, not so much play against) and a clear theme. Then along comes skull merchant. Thematically confusing, boring to go against and play, and had the capability to extend matches to the point they time out. All during the gen kick meta. How BHVR wasn’t able to see the community’s disappointment with her coming is mind boggling in retrospect.
tbf they do develop killers months beforehand, so gen kick meta wasn't really thought of when designing her gameplay. doesn't excuse the skull merchant being boring as hell though.
They absolutely saw the disappointment she was going to be, but they force their 3 month Killer cycle which means they couldn't delay the Killer or scrap her for a new one. How it even got approved in the first place, that's a mystery.
Release Day DBD: Trapper is a big bad man who sets bear traps. Watch out for the bear traps! Current day DBD: *dissertation’s worth of complex power description*
this is any ability based game. League, overwatch, siege, and in some cases apex fall under this same problem. when you want to keep pumping out new ideas you will eventually need to get more complex ideas, and with dbd especially if they didn’t have small changes between then we would essentially have 5 nemesis type killers with a ranges melee attack
Most games with character powers eventually get to this point. Only so much you can do with one concept before it gets repetitive. Just look at League lmao
@@AshtonyssI think the rework should’ve just been a new power that reflects her character or makes her fun. Make the drones move and kill survivors, or pick them up and drop them in front of Adriana. I think her aesthetic is pretty interesting, but her design doesn’t reflect it well. The blade suggests she builds things by herself, yet the mask shows how rich she is and she wears a weird bodysuit that is somehow practical and completely useless at the same time. I think the recent outfit with the blue hair and skull mask she got is perfect and reflects her character properly, the weapon looks sophisticated and so do her clothes, yet they are tattered to show her ruthlessness. Plus the mask just looks way cooler.
I feel like her traps should be focused on the idea of her getting stronger as she obtains information from her drones. If there's 3 tiers of lock on, give her buffs when she chases that survivor at each tier.
Make her tracking more and more powerful. (Eg. aura reading/hindered at higher levels [somewhat like Wesker’s power] but give survivors counterplay [again, like Wesker’s antidote])
Map of the realm + Stridor is a personal favorite combo for me, hearing a Survivor and dropping a guard on them is so satisfying to me!! Knights the most misunderstood killer imo, Map of the realm makes him a very aggressive, fun killer imo
@@-arcademaster101- honestly him as a diet Spirit is so fun imo!! Plus, Map of the Realm with uh... that one Yellow that extends the length of the Patrol Path (its been a while since ive played) is also super nice!
Maybe if the drone is disabled for like 10 seconds when put down and when a drone in stealth mode detects a survivor, it gets in scouting mode, and then if it catches any survivor it locks on and gives all current lock on effects, before getting disabled for like 10 seconds and going black to stealth mode aftedwards, plus what pixel bush suggested. This would remove the knight 2.0 gameplay and make her a pretty good trap killer.
The complaint that the killer is just use power at loop and the survivor either leaves loop or gets hit/down at loop applies to every fucking killer so idk why even bring it up.
Most are in denial about that fact cuz "muh favorite killer is fun and balanced" meanwhile their favorite killer has a ton of bullshit design issues I could point out objective issues about almost the entire cast
That is far from true (Killers like Billy, Bubba, or Blight make leaving the loop much more dangerous than playing it.), but also it misses the key issue he has: Killers like Knight, Skull Merchant, or Artist have powers that that can guarantee hits pretty much entirely independent of the actions of either party. This devalues the choices of either side during chase since your only actual option in each scenario is to leave the loop. Of course, if you don't value the chase side of the game as much as the macro side, this might not really be an issue for you, but it is absolutely a facet of their design that isn't nearly as present in other killers.
@@verygayowl4199 Small correction, Knight can't guarantee the hit unless you're in a small or claustrophobic loop, so i'd say he's not really on that camp. If there is any open space you can literally just double back and strafe past the guard and he'll be none the wiser and will right run past you. Most people do not seem to realize this.
@verygayowl4199 two of them are instadown chase killers that are the worst offenders of will they won't they loop gameplay due to chainsaw that you half the time drop pallet and fuck off to the next loop and rather play in a jungle gym. Blight gives you the illusion of choice since his mobility is insane and it's more on him to fuck up than anything else.
@@DarkDevastator77 Blight recovers tokens so fucking fast that it's not even an illiusion at that point, he WILL rush right after you run away and he WILL hit you.
I don't see an issue with someone enjoying the rework more than Three-Gen Merchant. I thought most people would celebrating the demise of that playstyle. Honestly she's more fun to play against if nothing else, so if someone likes the rework does it matter? Feels like we're still on the Skull Merchant hate train when the main (and admittedly justifiable) reason to hate her is on the way out.
So what you ACTUALLY mean is you're glad you'll never play against a Skull Merchant ever again. Because we both know she's going to be picked even less than Twins after this rework.
@@Mr_Mistah That's not at all what I mean, and I literally haven't played against a Skull Merchant in months anyway. I played as her a few times on live since then, and had some fun with her on the PTB despite her being definitely being weaker.
I think it'd be fine just to give her aura reading with her drones and let her be a killer that gets info. The drones don't need to injure or expose people, that's the thing that offers zero choice. Then you have the choice of "do I want to get chased without being able to juke or leave immediately?" Maybe just give hindered when you get the 3 stacks. Honestly I just miss OG Freddy
The whole reason they will never delete a killer like they did freddy is because the freddy rework was shit. I refuse to believe there’s another reason
I was just thinking that having the drones give aura reading in the radius would be way more interesting, maybe the longer the survivor is in the radius, theres a stacking hindered effect that increases by like 1% to a max of 10% over the span of, idk, 30 seconds? an amount of time where a survivor should def be caught by then. (or a stacking haste effect on the killer, might make it feel less oppressive just because theres no debuff on the survivors screen) So her main strength would essentially be creating a "max" amount of time a chase could go on for within a tile but in a way that still has some form of counter-play, and itsnt as oppressive as just losing a health state without much you can do. Maybe even give the survivors an equally punishing effect if they choose to leave the tile, so theres a weighing of options, and maybe even a better time to leave a loop than another time so you arent punished as much. the survivor chooses when they receive that debuff by leaving or staying. this probably sounds like rambling so if you or anyone wants me to clarify something feel free to ask.
@@somelolicon293forever freddy was back when freddy got reworked, there were 2 add-ons which reduced action speed in the dream world by quite a bit. Like I think it was 4 stacks of current thanatophobia. Combining that with other dreadful slowdown perks caused gens to take a long ass time.
The problem with Skull Merchant is that I am never in a situation where I think to myself that she outplayed me with her power or that I outplayed someone with it. It always feels more like a happy accident if you get value from her drone rather than an intentional play even while doing the trapping sort of a playstyle. Like I get thinking that you placed the trap and pushed the survivor into it but if you do that enough times of course you'll get value and unlike other trap killers the radius is so big that you don't even need to really plan how you place for it to work. That's the main thing I feel they need to address. Something that would give me the feeling that what I did mattered
Pixelbush likes the Macrogame, he's outspoken about that. His reasons to like the Skull Merchant are because he likes making a plan come together, and most killers are built for the Microgame.
@@RainyFun I honestly think this is the biggest thing scott needs to learn at some point. What he thinks "objective good game design" is, is simply just his subjective view on what is fun and what is not.
@Regenerd I realized that when I found I like knight for the harass multiple people but it's not the most chase happy killer so it's objectively unfun but here I am
I think his title was misleading a bit. it's not skull merchant as is he likes, but the potential that she can be with some extra tweaks to make her, a trap killer, is what he likes. Basically, the direction she potential can be put in is what he sees and therefore likes about this current skull merchant because of the possibility.
I do like where their going with the SM rework. Along with some of pixel’s points I would like to have the drone’s radius be hidden until a survivor trips it.
Pyramid Head's trenches are underrated as a slowdown tool but yeah it's pretty bad. Adriana's is still better than that though, especially if the drones get buffed from the ptb.
@@dumblenutz5561well it need to be bad bc if they buff it then PH will be killing everyone for free, also he still has his M2 which he can use for window and pallets.
@@Jack.Martson Uhuh, checks out. I mostly just wanted to say that his trenches are underrated as a tool to hinder survivors. if you line a hallway with them the survivors are gonna have a hard time. They either avoid that path altogueter or painstakingly crouch thru it, buying you time. It's a hidden gem of PH's.
@@dumblenutz5561Don’t forget how good it is for pressuring survivors towards dead zones. Convenient how PH is also getting an unintentional buff once the anti-camp update drops.
He was defending this hard on twitter, and honestly, it got to the point where I was just impressed. I think Pixel has the unique ability to see the good in something, no matter how wank it actually is.
@@SlidiusNone of his points actually make an ounce of sense. It honestly seems like he just likes her design and will come up with a load of nonsense about how she "has potential'
@@DaftPanda1I think this is pretty accurate. But from all of the arguments I’ve seen him be pulled into by directly being @‘d, I understand a degree of defensiveness. The amount of times he HAS said that he simply likes her but people demand a reason is insane. I don’t think he deserves an ounce of fault.
@@Slidiusthere’s probably more recent tweets that I haven’t seen but from the ones I have seen, They haven’t “argued”. Most of Pixels engagement with Scott is a result of being @‘d in the comments by some random person.
I think I have to disagree with the whole "chase killers are the only fun killers" sentiment I've seen going around. Trap killers are fun to face. They make you think about where you go during chases more and in hag and artist's case introduce new mindgames at tiles. Maybe I'm biased being that I both play these types of killers and also know how to play against them but I always have fun against trap based killers. I have a similar feel towards Legion. They're fun to face in chases and during frenzy. I like the mindgames you can do during frenzy and I like facing m1 killers in chase, which legion always is for the last hit unless you just feed them frenzy hits. I wish more people would think things other than "fake going left then go right" against chase killers was fun.
Trap killers are zone/loop denial for the most case. Survivors don't like be trapped in a corner with zero ability to escape because they will get injured, but more importantly, downed. If they simply removed Hags triggered traps completely screwing with a survivors camera, she would be a lot less stupid to face. Artist should be a 110 killer, as it makes zero sense that she is 115 with a projectile that can damage through walls and apply pressure to the entire map.
What’s fun about being forced to leave a loop because a killer used their power? It’s way more fun to actually use your skill by playing tiles than holding w because the killer placed their power. Literally no skill expression from both sides.
@@1nfiniteVo1dIsn’t this Dead By Daylight where you’re supposed to be a survivor running away from a killer that is faster and stronger than you? No shit they should be able to deny you your comforts.
What would you think about a SM change where she would become like a stealth or secret-debuff type trap killer where you would have hidden drones around that apply debuffs to survivors that are revealed and activated only when entering chase and you would have to go get rid of the drone to get rid of the debuffs. The debuffs could also be active not during chase but also not revealed instead of only activating during chase. Lets say she spawns with a few drones pre-placed that would go back to her if disabled, but are like near gens and apply something like oblivious, slower gen speed, or even hindered without the survivor having those debuffs revealed to them unless they notice it themselves and go to get rid of the drone. I only mention this as I can only really imagine her as a stealth-trap killer now as she can't really be salvaged any other way as you mentioned. Since if she was this way, survivors could actually be aware enough to notice there is something wrong and respond by searching for the nearby drone that basically ghostface locked-on to them and applied that debuff. There could also be some way to get rid of the debuffs mid-chase since if the debuffs lasted the entire chase, you would once again in SM fashion have no choice against getting rid of them until you like lost the chase or got hit. This change would make it so she can find survivors with the radar with them not being aware of it, unless they notice some debuff on them and find the drone to get rid of it. If they didn't, she would be rewarded with having an easier chase due to the debuffs on that survivor that didn't notice the debuffs at which that point they would be revealed. The debuffs could also go away after certain actions or events, like maybe a debuff that would break the next pallet you vault, or block the next window you approach. Maybe even apply slower healing speed to you next time you start healing someone or unhook someone. The drones could also be revealed at some point so you're not just running across the map with debuffs you can't do anything against because you don't know where you got debuffed. Maybe instead there could also be a chase mode that activates when you enter chase which would be at least a little like skull merchant that would place some sort of zone denial, which I imagine Aruni from Rainbow Six Siege, which puts up a gate at doors or windows, which could also go for pallets in Dbd. I would imagine these also wouldn't last very long. The gates could apply debuffs or give buffs to the SM instead. This wouldn't be as cringe as taking damage from being in an area and being forced to go to another one. Since they wouldn't last long, it would mean you can try to play around the loop avoiding the gates over and over. This would actually mean there is some skill impression since if you place that drone-gate in some useless spot, the survivor would just run the optimal way, with having the choice to just run through the gate with a downside, but maybe making a window in time and that being the right play, even if there is a gate on it. But after all I am just yapping in hopes of saving the SM, even if she's a doomed character. I also have an anime PFP so if you read this and think it's an awful idea, you can just mention that and all my points are null.
Devil's advocate for the final point about not wanting killers to run a flowchart to win or lose - I think that that's Pixel's entire point about how new SM works. New SM, whilst weak and limiting, doesn't have zero choice. She has zero choice if you're in a chase and you run to a loop and that loop is pretrapped and there is a scenario where you can't split from the loop. The whole point is that you can interact with the drones preemptively to weaken her power, which is why Pixel brings up that these things can be tweaked. Old SM was completely broken, but this rework provides more options for minor tweaks to her power to decrease the strength of her mid-chase setting up of drones and to increase survivor potential when counterplaying by disabling drones, and on the flipside increasing the reward for successfully corralling people into traps (with the increased speed ideas etc.) I'm not gonna say I find the "disabling traps" counterplay particularly involving with Trapper or Hag, but at least it's more involved than "I run to loop and leave if Knight places his guard. If other loop exists repeat, if no other loop exists get hit in the open and take a damage state".
I personally liked new Skull Merchant when I played her on the PTB both playing as and going against so I’m interested to see where they take her when the patch hits live.
@@NinjapowerMS Hey I know that guy, that's me. Same goes for when I play mobas. Not at the level where I like skull merchant though, that's insane even for me.
Pixel bush feels like a contrarian who doesn't even realize he's a contrarian. He also said one of his favorite horror films of all time is malignant and I'm sure you've never seen it, but it's about a woman who has an attached twin living in her head and she gets superpowered at the end of the movie and the film turns from a horror movie into an action film
Honestly I think a minor rework that could help the feeling of not having much skill with her drones is giving her the ability to trigger them to go faster or reverse directions. That way she can actively control the drones in chase to get value from them and it wouldn't be as autopilot. Of course it doesn't really address the survivor side of still needing to leave the loop most of the time but it at least would make the killer player have more control over their power besides pressing right click and makes her a little stronger. Like imagine you are chasing a survivor you drop your drone and they are on a bad cycle for the drones spin and wouldn't get caught while leaving the loop but you can pull your radar out and reverse the direction and get a stack. It's situational but would feel much more rewarding then if they just give a flat buff of the radius size or speed
Prime examples of a simple, low mechanic killers that’s fun for all parties. Huntress, demogorgon, Wesker (if you ignore certain things like slide bugs and stuff). Probably some more, but.
Just swap the drones from a spin to a pulse if they're active. 360 degree red beams going from slightly taller than survivors down to the floor. Every 2 seconds or something. Now you can't just catch it at the right time and run right through the vicinity of the drone behind the beam. You'll need to time a sprint burst/lithe/something to get through it in the 2 seconds after it scans.
I think her drones should rotate faster and apply lock-on instantly without any stacks mechanic. But they shouldn't injure you. Any further scans should just apply hindered status effect or reset claw trap timer. That would make her regular M1 killer but with consistent tracking and speed buffs.
Yeah, the thing I really liked about original SM was that you could absolutely play her like an M1 killer with great info and a haste that scaled with how well you tracked your prey. I think that's always the direction they should have gone with her. I still think this is an improvement but the kit is still a little unfocused, I think.
The fun part of her kit is the concept of the power itself and the vibe. Its like how people will main Ghostface or Pig even though they arent good. They just love their design and power concept. Also i have noticed that enjoyers of Skull Marchant tend to like Singularity and Alien. Maybe its an aesthetic(sp?) thing
Man, it sucks actually really enjoying Knight and hearing how other people devalue his gameplay. I swear if people would open up and play Knight in the based way (insta killing predrop pallets and long range assassin gameplay) then he is a really fun engaging killer.
I love playing knight, I feel like there could be a punishment to instadropping which doesn’t stop its current use (countering pallets, flashies and ds stuns). So potentially if a guard is sent ON PATROL with a patrol path
I agree with you. There are a lot of fun strategies you can do with knight and people still really don’t like him. Sure, he’s got access to quick and low skill requirement anti loop, but so does artist and a bunch of others. And even with this, he’s b tier at best; having to rely most more on the perks he brings in order to win. Although, he is frustrating at times for me because he’s so add on dependent and is limited due to a very flawed ai.
imagine if they just made it so the survivors could choose when to disregard the clawtrap. Positive: can counter 3-gen by making it so the killer has 0 drones you CAN counter the killers power in some way The skull merchant can get use from its "map" Mayby also make so the clawtrap makes the survivor always hear a terrorradius like the killer is far away, so the survivor can notice if the killer get's close but won't get the chance to prerun just as early, kinda gives a form of stealth
Every time I play Singu I always wish he had just a little bit more. It seems weird how easy of a status is to get rid of for how useful it is comparing to like plague with the health state reduction or wesker with the slow. Maybe I'm just bad idk I still feel like I'm always learning something new about Singu
These kinds of people frustrate me. If you don’t like different play styles that’s fine, but why you gotta act like there’s something wrong with them though? They got rid of 3-gen merchant, so what’s wrong with people enjoying her new playstyle? I think Pixel actually summed it up pretty good in his video: Not every character will be FOR YOU, and that’s okay! Gunslinger and Pyramid Head really ain’t my cup of tea, but there’s nothing wrong with OTHER people enjoying them. Why you guys gotta act so confused with every damn person who likes Skull Merchant’s design? It’s juvenile.
Humans are just naturally close minded blockheads like this. They emulate the thoughts of the majority and If you aren't part of their clique, they shun you and call you crazy. You see it all the time. To begin with, your entire early age as a child is spent being brainwashed and indoctrinated into human culture so that you won't formulate your own thoughts. It's pathetic, really. Humans are beasts of instinct but pretend they aren't.
Scott knows that there’s more to skill expression than just mechanical right?… Like not every play-style has to be the same for them to be a ‘skillful’ character. That’s what I got annoyed by tbh
Idk if I'll be able to summarize my thoughts about this, but I'm very surprised to hear you argue for competitive design, despite your apparent disdain for "try hard"/"sweaty" play. To some people, mastery of this game can be how well they implement "sweaty" strategies. Perhaps they don't encounter enough evidence to suggest these are not the reason they lose, or maybe they just have more fun winning this way to show any kind of dominance over a community that tends to like showboating/bullying anyone they can. I forgot what my point was, but your video about why games are sweaty felt like an oversimplification of a poorly defined "problem".
Hot (?) Take, but all they needed to do to rework her would be to slap the 'No lock-on if stationary' onto her drones and make it so the drones can only lock onto 1 survivor at a time
SCOTT this is is how you fix her have her traps work like they did before no expose status. Still give her 6 drones have them go in a circle around the map slow at first but once it goes in the inactive mode then they move faster searching for survivor they still see walls if hacked they get a claw trap. Same thing before. That way she is a HUNTER killer like she is supposed to in her lore.
For trapper, if they remove the chance aspect of getting out of the traps, and increase the time neede to remove it, then add more traps, i think it's nice as a slow down and not an immediate hook.
Why do these drones not move, they're are drones you use them to survey big areas, make them patrol, move towards loud noises, I hate how they just sit there it bothers me so much, like zombie roaming ai is there already. Deploy drone it scans after x time it begins to roam, while roaming they have a front facing camera shown with an aura, you can disable them if you get behind them, occasionally they will sweep an area, when they spot someone they glow red build up lock on until LOS is broken or out of range, drones who have spotted someone roam to the last known position, they are alerted to noise notifications, once lock on reaches 100% they tag the survivor with a claw trap, injure them or whatever, radar shows tagged survivors and spotted survivors. There a rework that makes drone counterplay more engaging. Works more like singularity.
16:40 I think all those could work if hacking a drone disabled it until the killer went to reset it physically, like you would a trapper trap or a phantasm trap, instead of being able to remotely reset it. Being able to remotely reset your drones makes it so hacking the drones is ultimately kinda useless. Still, making her trap playstyle more lethal but making it more worthwhile to disable drones would be a way to buff her.
If you play Merchant as efficiently as possible then sure that could get boring for both sides pretty quickly, but I don't think that was the point PixelBush was trying to make, rather that her kit is diverse enough where it isn't necessary to play her as efficiently as possible every game because you can experiment with zoning, trapping, stealth, tracking, haste, etc. in addition to her add ons and perks. Merchant is a killer for players who enjoy variety even if it costs them the match, because playing efficiently to win every game just isn't fun for everyone.
The radar hardly does anything because as I've said before information is king in this game so they limit how much you can see or your get stuck with 3 gen merchant again because she would know if you car close to the gen or not
The drones should just reveal the survivors auras and make them oblivious while they are in the radius, and damage a survivor who fails hacking them. Its simple and makes sense and thats always the best way to go about things imo.
I will never understand why the drones don't have some ability to like roam...they must have similar code for the nem zombies. When I first read she'd have scouting drones that's what I assumed it'd be like.....
I think they need to switch their focus from the drones to the claw traps. If they made the drones survey a limited circular area and move towards survivors in the radius and shoot a claw trap on them that has affects that can be activated in chase by the skull merchant for a 1 time use that would be a lot cooler. For example if she popped it mid chase it could slow a survivor for 2 seconds or keep them from dropping a pallet or vaulting for 1 second.
Can't make trap killers engaging? I'm up for the thought challenge. Having a trap that can instatake down does suck, I agree with that. Trapper is very Binary like that. Having traps do almost nothing also sucks. Skulls drones and Freddy's spilled cranberry sauce fall in that camp. Hag's traps and Singularity Cams are probably some of the best we have. Some counterplay, options for both sides in how they are used. Pig's are alright, but they are kind of that looming threat instead of immediate threat. So we would need a trap killer that has traps that could still be threats, with counter play, with multiple uses. What if you had a killer that could set up trip wire traps? When the killer is placing it they can place it as an alarm or as an attack. The alarm one is low to the ground and harder to see, tripping it just makes an audible bell sound that gives the killer a noise que. The attack trap is just the sawn off shotgun trap in Saw, where tripping it will damage you. The wire is still harder to see, but having a shotgun up against something would be your give away. (Maybe this could be added to the Pig kit, just go full trap setter) I imagine when placing you would see a highlight before hand, ala trapper traps, so you can try to make it harder to see, then you can choose any direction to place the wire. Can put it in pallet loops, windows, just off a tree somewhere to catch people off guard. Probably can't have to many active, and probably a longer set up time to disincentivize trapping while chasing. If it is places sneakily you can catch people off guard, you could do some cheeky shit where you have an obvious trap that is guarded by a harder to spot one, have a one time punishment for god pallets, and the counterplay is probably as simple as disarming bear traps. Really this whole idea is just bear traps with more flexibility and the ability to be placed on walls and have bells.
This PixelBrush video about the merchant rework simply presents a different perspective, one that the Dead by Daylight cannot be fine with. RESPECT DIFFERENT OPINIONS. I agree with him that a specific killer's playstyle, whether deemed boring or enjoyable, may not appeal to everyone. Personally, I find Skull Merchant uninteresting, primarily due to her aesthetics, and I prefer playing a mix of killers. Some killers like Demo, Xeno, Oni, Wesker, and Billy receive praise like gods, whereas others like Knight, Legion, Pinhead, Clown, and Sadako are hated. I believe that not every killer must excel in chasing; and mechanical/ trap-oriented killers are needed to keep up the variety and player interests.
that doesn't mean that playstyles or abilities that are built around slowing the game down to a point where players want to give up simply because of frustration or boredom are good gameplay concepts. you primarily play a game for fun. Only because there exists a niche of players that likes to grief other players, doesnt mean it's valid, because eVeRy pLAYstYLe nEeds to bE rEspECteD. The same counts for cheating. NOONE NEEDS TO RESPECT ANYONE'S OPINION, OTHERWISE VALID AND DOGSHIT OPINIONS ARE TREATED EQUALLY. Hint: The amount of consensus can help you determine that.
@@finni4832 I never said that power that slows the game down are good concepts, but that doesn't mean players who might enjoy them and trying different strategies deserve to be insulted. We know how toxic this community can be.
@@Leaf__22Xeno is pretty strong right now but she’s been nerfed to PTB status and there’s ample counterplay to avoid having to deal with her impossible-to-dodge tail strike (yea it’s kinda busted but you can take her out of it.) Saying Demo is horrible to go against doesn’t make sense to me though, you have plenty of warning against a shred and you can disable his portals as well.
Eh, the claim of "trappers can never be fun for survivor" is really only true if, like Scott, you only find running loops fun as survivor. Most of the fun of going against a trap-based killer is making predictions and outsmarting the other side, but that is based on making predictions which can be wrong. I will admit predicting wrong is a feel-bad moment, but predicting right is way more fun than running another set of loops. Intentionally misinterpreting him saying "she has a TRAP SETTING skill expression that no other killer's got" is in reference to how one expresses skill at setting traps, not general skill expression. going "hurr durr press a button" is a pithy way to dismiss it, but the skill expression isn't about mechanical aim or chasing but expression of being clever and judicious in how you use your resources. The skill expression is an expression of smart use of the killer's kit, not just flicking your mouse. I think the issue here, as evidenced by most other videos, is Scott basically is incapable of seeing a different playstyle besides his own as fun so scoffs at the notion of this sort of cat-and-mouse gameplay fun, but I and many others prefer it to just another hold forward chase-based killer. The trouble is you can't just input your actions into a flow chart as a survivor and actually make some informed predictions and be a more focused player as survivor which many people don't want to do. They don't want to ever have things play out differently as survivor, but a variety of killers should warrant a variety of survivor plans for success. This is immediately driven home by saying "never base gameplay off of lore" which is just such a joyless thing to say. That's the soul of what makes a game fun, and a huge part of why DBD is successful, as it leans into the lore of all of its characters. Dismissing it out of hand just feels like something someone who has forgotten how to feel joy might say.
This has been a successful rework because the bar was set so low at least no more 3 gen so I’m happy and if someone finds the new SM fun more power to you
My main issue with new Skull Merchant is the lack of info. That's the one thing I liked about the Skull Merchant is that we finally got a 2nd info killer with the only other one being the Doctor. What's even the point of her having a radar now if it's never going to give you any info. All they really needed to do is to not have drones work at generators.
Man, it would be cool if they focused more heavily on the tracking aspect. She could use her radar to “lock on” to a survivor and gain haste or something. Yet they keep falling back into this endless “place power at loop, hold W” play style.
As someone who did enjoy her ptb rework despite the weakness heres the issue ive seen most people who tried her mess up with her. Play her like a pseudo hag set up a web of drones keep one or two on you and run then into your web. As for a few fixes realistically increase the speed of the scanning beams remove the cool down on placement and increase the speed of lock on and shed be fine. I personally enjoyed her because of this its an aggro hag.
I will play the new skull merchant. Yes, I think she is fun to play and I love her add-ons. I do agree with Pixel's video but I would not increase her drones to eight. It's a simple fix: Increase the rotation of the drones to 20% and slightly increase the drone's radius to 10 meters, for 30 sec, if a survivor with a claw trap enter the drone's radius, make the hacking harder or a fail hack will result in a claw trap, survivors will have to crouch and stand still for the drones to not detect them (this will help with the three gen tactic), and survivors, with a claw trap, can not hack a drone. What do you think? 😁
So survs having no options But to take a hit is Bad design? Then killer side as a whole is Bad design cause only way u can get any hits is If survs Have no other choise. Sure u can mindgame them and that has skill to it but isnt managing all 4 survs into a lose lose scenario skillfull play?
The first frame of his video tells you why he (and I) likes her if you look to the right of the screen 😊 On a serious note, I also like the rework because it perfectly fits how I played her: Stealthy. I NEVER did 3 gen with her because I prefer the stealth aspect of killers.
@ScottJund you played him exclusively as a chase killer though, even saying that you cant set up as him and can only effectively use his power in a chase. Even in viewer build streams you refuse to play twins, hag, knight, and skull merchant. It's fine to not like macro killers, but it really feels like you just hate macro play sometimes
@thedoomslayer5863 sure i can. I love dismantling macro killer control over the map. Some of my favorite killers to play against include hag, knight, and twins. They make you play differently and I think that's very fun and interactive. On the flipside of that, I enjoy killers that are able to spread their pressure over the map partially because it's a different kind of skill. Using victor to control an area or guard two areas at once. I love setting up with Trapper to knock down survivors later when they think they're safe. Just because you don't enjoy them doesn't mean that they're objectively unfun to go against. Even recently I've been seeing tons of people flip their opinion on twins after hating them since they released.
@@joshsquidlyburgh5820 Yeah, honestly, same. I really don't get the argument that trap killers have no skill expression or interaction. The whole point is to avoid getting put in a position where you have no options by countering the traps ahead of time. Macro gameplay is still gameplay, and I find using my brain a lot more fun than the mindgames of spinning around at loops.
After going against a bunch of Dull Merchants, the playstyle didn't really change that much since even if the drones won't injure somebody working on a gen, the moment somebody leaves the gen in a hurry (pushed off by a patrolling Killer) then they will almost always get scanned. It's a matter of time before the Survivor is claw-trapped and pretty f***** if they didn't see the Killer early. Most Dull Merchants I've gone against use almost the exact same strat as before, it's just that they have even more drones and so they can trap the loops closest to the 3-gen as well as the gens. In the smaller maps the drones can cover most of the map which makes for fairly irritating traversal and near-impossible chases (saloon is one of the most egregious cases since SM can effectively control almost the entirety of the main street and shack which only leaves the edge-map to work with).
At the end of the day im happy with it all because id much rather have this than what we had before. Most people wanted her to just straight up be removed than stay isnt it better we got one extra killer even if its boring and weak than having old skull merchant.
It seems really reductive to say "She uses power, leave loop". Given that the drones are on a rotation, is it not possible to try to play the loop while also *gasp* factoring in her power to try to alter your approach to said loop and avoid the detection. I'm not thrilled about the rework personally, I just don't care. But at the same time I don't really agree with your take on the power lacking engagement on both sides, unless you choose to approach it in an unengaging way which is your call to make.
I was always surprised that the drones didn't become stronger over time as they persist on the map. Something like the radius growing by 100% over two minutes, or allowing the radius to apply lock on through LoS after a certain amount of time. It would encourage survivors to do that drone hacking mini game to actually disable drones and give them some form of counterplay while giving skull merchant some actual payoff for planning drones ahead of time.
Since avoiding drones will be as easy as standing still or crouching, I would make partial lock-on more useful: - survivors with 1/2/3 lock-on stacks can be tracked by the Skull merchant from 16/32/48 meters - survivors with 1/2/3 lock-on stacks perceive the Skull Merchant's terror radius reduced by 8/16/24 meters The lock-on is reset only on hook. This way Skull Merchant has partial bonuses for partial lock-on plus she doesn't have to immediately overchase to get the down. She would get help at getting back at someone later on, until hooked.
I'm convinced the DBD community is both unimaginative and completely self-absorbed. Killers like the knight no shit you can just use his power on a loop and get half decent results making you think thats how to play him but it takes 20 seconds to realize not only does the time for that to happen not make sense but at any point you can read the killer power and understand that each of knights guards have unique perks to them like how only one can even catch survivors. Skull merchant actually isnt half bad but the more yall unimaginatively play her like every other killer instead of what i'd argue is a diff kind of hag yall are just gonna keep complaining about something thats not even true
That's Scott "reacting to content" Jund. That's quality.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
mr steben has uploaded so little his fanbase has to flock to other creators instead
Oh no
what a weird combination of fans lol
That's Scott "Scott Jund" Jund. That's quality.
The funny thing about new skull merchant is that literally everything about her is worse. Tracking, Haste, Stealth all got destroyed
Her stealth is millions way better since it doesn’t force you to stay in a specific location and can be used preemptively when coming to a concrete place.
@@N.E.M.o777 It seems better due to being instant, but it's actual utility is far worse and you actually get less overall time in stealth. Tying it to drone deployment rather than being in radius and then lingering afterwards means you aren't able to use it to traverse distance like before. You instead really only get it in situations where it isn't as useful and with the heavy limitations on recalling and setting drone you're disincentivized from attempting to maximize your stealth.
The old version never forced you to stay in a specific location on that you needed to pass through that location and on multi-floor maps you could get a ton of stealth value with a single drone. Let's be clear though, her stealth was only as good as her tracked target movement buff allowed it to be and now tracking and the associated buff are far less consistent and frequent. Clawtraps were and still are the worst part of her power, but now they are the entirety of her power even moreso than the drones were. Everything about her is way worse and as Skull Merchant main seeing other Merchant mains trying to overdose on copium is sad.
Like all of the actual skill based play that was in this killer got stripped out in the most reckless manner when all they needed to do was address her ability to hold gens. Yeah, they solved the problem, but they did it by hitting her with a tactical nuke and reducing her down to a bare minimum viable form of herself. The only thing they accomplished is making her a killer who has one actual playstyle that survivors still with complain about because instead of boring stalemates she'll just produce boring chases.
I mean, it's not like she was bad in the previous version to say that everything about her being worse is a bad thing. She was SSS tier in her "chess" playstyle against randoms
@@bebesulfannot really, it was too map dependent and that is coming from someone who loved her old play just because the slowdown and haste allowed me to play with any perk and have time to actually have fun chase.
@@giannis_tar That's not actual strength though. Chess meme aside it wasn't a valid playstyle, it was highly deviant to the point the devs said directly it wasn't what they intended for her to do and folks shouldn't be doing it. She wasn't even strong doing it against randoms, people just more often than not gave up.
She was a bad killer before and a worse killer now. If that ptb version goes to live it is truly jover for BHVR's development credibility.
I still find the circumstances that led up to skull merchant being the worst received killer ever to be fascinating.
For months, survivors biggest complaint was the gen kick meta, prolonging games to a boring pace. The prior killer was knight, a killer that could make good use of the gen kick perks with his ability to hold a three gen. A disappointing chapter for most, but a cool concept for a killer (fun to play, not so much play against) and a clear theme.
Then along comes skull merchant. Thematically confusing, boring to go against and play, and had the capability to extend matches to the point they time out. All during the gen kick meta. How BHVR wasn’t able to see the community’s disappointment with her coming is mind boggling in retrospect.
tbf they do develop killers months beforehand, so gen kick meta wasn't really thought of when designing her gameplay. doesn't excuse the skull merchant being boring as hell though.
They absolutely saw the disappointment she was going to be, but they force their 3 month Killer cycle which means they couldn't delay the Killer or scrap her for a new one. How it even got approved in the first place, that's a mystery.
I wouldn’t say Knight was the problem, it was more so the meta which so happened to work well with his power.
Release Day DBD: Trapper is a big bad man who sets bear traps. Watch out for the bear traps!
Current day DBD: *dissertation’s worth of complex power description*
@eternaljade2k154and people still complain about power repetitiveness anyway, ironically
@eternaljade2k154 not everything has been done, you and BHVR both are just uncreative.
this is any ability based game. League, overwatch, siege, and in some cases apex fall under this same problem. when you want to keep pumping out new ideas you will eventually need to get more complex ideas, and with dbd especially if they didn’t have small changes between then we would essentially have 5 nemesis type killers with a ranges melee attack
Most games with character powers eventually get to this point. Only so much you can do with one concept before it gets repetitive. Just look at League lmao
@@capycapy8920 bro was super interesting though. it is funny to be like "oh so like *x hero*" on every release too
I think the problem is that singularitys power works like hers should have. They gave her power to a different killer.
She would have teleported?
@@juicedup14yes.
I would prefer to keep Hux and dump Skull Merchant.
Singularity just has a better aesthetic and flavor.
It works way better on singularity/makes way more sense, her design is so ugly it would have ruined a cool power
@@AshtonyssI think the rework should’ve just been a new power that reflects her character or makes her fun. Make the drones move and kill survivors, or pick them up and drop them in front of Adriana. I think her aesthetic is pretty interesting, but her design doesn’t reflect it well. The blade suggests she builds things by herself, yet the mask shows how rich she is and she wears a weird bodysuit that is somehow practical and completely useless at the same time. I think the recent outfit with the blue hair and skull mask she got is perfect and reflects her character properly, the weapon looks sophisticated and so do her clothes, yet they are tattered to show her ruthlessness. Plus the mask just looks way cooler.
I feel like her traps should be focused on the idea of her getting stronger as she obtains information from her drones. If there's 3 tiers of lock on, give her buffs when she chases that survivor at each tier.
Make her tracking more and more powerful. (Eg. aura reading/hindered at higher levels [somewhat like Wesker’s power] but give survivors counterplay [again, like Wesker’s antidote])
"Things that make you go....3:46"
Man, I miss Skrump's compilations he used to do for Scott.
Why did he stop making them?
I will never stop telling people that if you play knight by putting a guy at the loop and making people leave then you're playing him wrong
Map of the realm + Stridor is a personal favorite combo for me, hearing a Survivor and dropping a guard on them is so satisfying to me!! Knights the most misunderstood killer imo, Map of the realm makes him a very aggressive, fun killer imo
@@BeriAngel I really wish MotR was base kit so those options would be available no matter what
@@BeriAngel I am so happy to know I am not the only person who plays him like spirit with extra steps
@@-arcademaster101- honestly him as a diet Spirit is so fun imo!! Plus, Map of the Realm with uh... that one Yellow that extends the length of the Patrol Path (its been a while since ive played) is also super nice!
@@Splonton ikr!! I really hope MotR becomes basekit, it feels so necessary on him
Maybe if the drone is disabled for like 10 seconds when put down and when a drone in stealth mode detects a survivor, it gets in scouting mode, and then if it catches any survivor it locks on and gives all current lock on effects, before getting disabled for like 10 seconds and going black to stealth mode aftedwards, plus what pixel bush suggested. This would remove the knight 2.0 gameplay and make her a pretty good trap killer.
That’s cool
The complaint that the killer is just use power at loop and the survivor either leaves loop or gets hit/down at loop applies to every fucking killer so idk why even bring it up.
Most are in denial about that fact cuz "muh favorite killer is fun and balanced" meanwhile their favorite killer has a ton of bullshit design issues
I could point out objective issues about almost the entire cast
That is far from true (Killers like Billy, Bubba, or Blight make leaving the loop much more dangerous than playing it.), but also it misses the key issue he has: Killers like Knight, Skull Merchant, or Artist have powers that that can guarantee hits pretty much entirely independent of the actions of either party. This devalues the choices of either side during chase since your only actual option in each scenario is to leave the loop.
Of course, if you don't value the chase side of the game as much as the macro side, this might not really be an issue for you, but it is absolutely a facet of their design that isn't nearly as present in other killers.
@@verygayowl4199 Small correction, Knight can't guarantee the hit unless you're in a small or claustrophobic loop, so i'd say he's not really on that camp.
If there is any open space you can literally just double back and strafe past the guard and he'll be none the wiser and will right run past you.
Most people do not seem to realize this.
@verygayowl4199 two of them are instadown chase killers that are the worst offenders of will they won't they loop gameplay due to chainsaw that you half the time drop pallet and fuck off to the next loop and rather play in a jungle gym. Blight gives you the illusion of choice since his mobility is insane and it's more on him to fuck up than anything else.
@@DarkDevastator77 Blight recovers tokens so fucking fast that it's not even an illiusion at that point, he WILL rush right after you run away and he WILL hit you.
Classic Scott content, that’s why they call him “Cranium Seller” Jund!
Noggin huxter jund
that one dude coping about Blight existing in chat 💀💀
One of those react videos where everyones takes are bad.
I don't see an issue with someone enjoying the rework more than Three-Gen Merchant. I thought most people would celebrating the demise of that playstyle. Honestly she's more fun to play against if nothing else, so if someone likes the rework does it matter? Feels like we're still on the Skull Merchant hate train when the main (and admittedly justifiable) reason to hate her is on the way out.
So what you ACTUALLY mean is you're glad you'll never play against a Skull Merchant ever again. Because we both know she's going to be picked even less than Twins after this rework.
@@Mr_Mistah That's not at all what I mean, and I literally haven't played against a Skull Merchant in months anyway. I played as her a few times on live since then, and had some fun with her on the PTB despite her being definitely being weaker.
He’s free to have his own opinions on the killer, Scott is just pointing out why said opinion isn’t exactly correct and doesn’t apply to most players
@@Trigger__Happy Scott wasn't who I was referring to, it was a lot of people in this comment section. Sorry if that was unclear.
@@RBHadoShoryukenWell there’s always going to be people with extreme opinions in comment sections lol
I think it'd be fine just to give her aura reading with her drones and let her be a killer that gets info. The drones don't need to injure or expose people, that's the thing that offers zero choice. Then you have the choice of "do I want to get chased without being able to juke or leave immediately?" Maybe just give hindered when you get the 3 stacks.
Honestly I just miss OG Freddy
If anything itd make her unique, i don't believe any other killer has basekit aura reading
I miss og freddy too...
The whole reason they will never delete a killer like they did freddy is because the freddy rework was shit. I refuse to believe there’s another reason
I was just thinking that having the drones give aura reading in the radius would be way more interesting, maybe the longer the survivor is in the radius, theres a stacking hindered effect that increases by like 1% to a max of 10% over the span of, idk, 30 seconds? an amount of time where a survivor should def be caught by then. (or a stacking haste effect on the killer, might make it feel less oppressive just because theres no debuff on the survivors screen)
So her main strength would essentially be creating a "max" amount of time a chase could go on for within a tile but in a way that still has some form of counter-play, and itsnt as oppressive as just losing a health state without much you can do. Maybe even give the survivors an equally punishing effect if they choose to leave the tile, so theres a weighing of options, and maybe even a better time to leave a loop than another time so you arent punished as much. the survivor chooses when they receive that debuff by leaving or staying.
this probably sounds like rambling so if you or anyone wants me to clarify something feel free to ask.
I offered this idea since the ptb, even on Reddit - was met with ridicule, so glad to see others agree
play billy instead, his chainsaw is a trap too
It feels like he wants to be a contrarian for the sake of being one
This whole video felt like pixel trying very hard to not admit he wants forever freddy as its own killer
What’s forever freddy
@@somelolicon293forever freddy was back when freddy got reworked, there were 2 add-ons which reduced action speed in the dream world by quite a bit. Like I think it was 4 stacks of current thanatophobia. Combining that with other dreadful slowdown perks caused gens to take a long ass time.
@@reuv8441 then… would Pixel be doing the opposite of what this comment is saying? He said that it was a good rework.
@@somelolicon293 Some Lolicon 293
@@Latencyyy yes that’s my username
The problem with Skull Merchant is that I am never in a situation where I think to myself that she outplayed me with her power or that I outplayed someone with it. It always feels more like a happy accident if you get value from her drone rather than an intentional play even while doing the trapping sort of a playstyle. Like I get thinking that you placed the trap and pushed the survivor into it but if you do that enough times of course you'll get value and unlike other trap killers the radius is so big that you don't even need to really plan how you place for it to work. That's the main thing I feel they need to address. Something that would give me the feeling that what I did mattered
Pixelbush likes the Macrogame, he's outspoken about that. His reasons to like the Skull Merchant are because he likes making a plan come together, and most killers are built for the Microgame.
If it's not chase heavy Scott can't fathom why anyone would play it
@@RainyFun I honestly think this is the biggest thing scott needs to learn at some point. What he thinks "objective good game design" is, is simply just his subjective view on what is fun and what is not.
The "All coming together" playstyle.
And I admit that new SM is making me like that playstyle to.
Meanwhile scott is chase is like "mmm, I can't use my power here". 😴@@RainyFun
@Regenerd I realized that when I found I like knight for the harass multiple people but it's not the most chase happy killer so it's objectively unfun but here I am
Wait till Scott sees his Twitter
I can’t believe Scott “#1 Skull Merchant player” Jund was Skull Merchant all along. Next Scott will reveal his wife is Alpharius.
Who's alpharius
I am Alpharius
@@thedoomslayer5863I’m Alpharius.
@@Luna.Tenebrathat’s impossible because I’m Alpharius.
I'm Alpharius
I think his title was misleading a bit. it's not skull merchant as is he likes, but the potential that she can be with some extra tweaks to make her, a trap killer, is what he likes. Basically, the direction she potential can be put in is what he sees and therefore likes about this current skull merchant because of the possibility.
I do like where their going with the SM rework. Along with some of pixel’s points I would like to have the drone’s radius be hidden until a survivor trips it.
I'm gonna say it, her 'trapping' is on-par with Pyramid Head's
Pyramid Head's trenches are underrated as a slowdown tool but yeah it's pretty bad.
Adriana's is still better than that though, especially if the drones get buffed from the ptb.
@@dumblenutz5561well it need to be bad bc if they buff it then PH will be killing everyone for free, also he still has his M2 which he can use for window and pallets.
@@Jack.Martson Uhuh, checks out. I mostly just wanted to say that his trenches are underrated as a tool to hinder survivors. if you line a hallway with them the survivors are gonna have a hard time. They either avoid that path altogueter or painstakingly crouch thru it, buying you time.
It's a hidden gem of PH's.
@@dumblenutz5561Don’t forget how good it is for pressuring survivors towards dead zones. Convenient how PH is also getting an unintentional buff once the anti-camp update drops.
I forgot I changed playback speed to 0.75. Watched this whole video and I just thought Scott was drunk
He was defending this hard on twitter, and honestly, it got to the point where I was just impressed. I think Pixel has the unique ability to see the good in something, no matter how wank it actually is.
He's a Twins main after all..
He was biased for SM from the start and was arguing with scott on twitter because he couldn’t read scott’s tweets properly
@@SlidiusNone of his points actually make an ounce of sense. It honestly seems like he just likes her design and will come up with a load of nonsense about how she "has potential'
@@DaftPanda1I think this is pretty accurate. But from all of the arguments I’ve seen him be pulled into by directly being @‘d, I understand a degree of defensiveness. The amount of times he HAS said that he simply likes her but people demand a reason is insane. I don’t think he deserves an ounce of fault.
@@Slidiusthere’s probably more recent tweets that I haven’t seen but from the ones I have seen, They haven’t “argued”. Most of Pixels engagement with Scott is a result of being @‘d in the comments by some random person.
I do enjoy the self awareness that we are all going to hate her anyways
I think I have to disagree with the whole "chase killers are the only fun killers" sentiment I've seen going around.
Trap killers are fun to face. They make you think about where you go during chases more and in hag and artist's case introduce new mindgames at tiles. Maybe I'm biased being that I both play these types of killers and also know how to play against them but I always have fun against trap based killers. I have a similar feel towards Legion. They're fun to face in chases and during frenzy. I like the mindgames you can do during frenzy and I like facing m1 killers in chase, which legion always is for the last hit unless you just feed them frenzy hits.
I wish more people would think things other than "fake going left then go right" against chase killers was fun.
Trap killers are zone/loop denial for the most case. Survivors don't like be trapped in a corner with zero ability to escape because they will get injured, but more importantly, downed. If they simply removed Hags triggered traps completely screwing with a survivors camera, she would be a lot less stupid to face. Artist should be a 110 killer, as it makes zero sense that she is 115 with a projectile that can damage through walls and apply pressure to the entire map.
What’s fun about being forced to leave a loop because a killer used their power? It’s way more fun to actually use your skill by playing tiles than holding w because the killer placed their power. Literally no skill expression from both sides.
@@1nfiniteVo1d What's fun about staying at the same tile when the point of the game is to run away from the killer?
@@Angel_Flash I mean that’s how you run away from the killer. Holding w is more effective, but looping and playing tiles is way more fun.
@@1nfiniteVo1dIsn’t this Dead By Daylight where you’re supposed to be a survivor running away from a killer that is faster and stronger than you? No shit they should be able to deny you your comforts.
What would you think about a SM change where she would become like a stealth or secret-debuff type trap killer where you would have hidden drones around that apply debuffs to survivors that are revealed and activated only when entering chase and you would have to go get rid of the drone to get rid of the debuffs. The debuffs could also be active not during chase but also not revealed instead of only activating during chase. Lets say she spawns with a few drones pre-placed that would go back to her if disabled, but are like near gens and apply something like oblivious, slower gen speed, or even hindered without the survivor having those debuffs revealed to them unless they notice it themselves and go to get rid of the drone. I only mention this as I can only really imagine her as a stealth-trap killer now as she can't really be salvaged any other way as you mentioned. Since if she was this way, survivors could actually be aware enough to notice there is something wrong and respond by searching for the nearby drone that basically ghostface locked-on to them and applied that debuff. There could also be some way to get rid of the debuffs mid-chase since if the debuffs lasted the entire chase, you would once again in SM fashion have no choice against getting rid of them until you like lost the chase or got hit. This change would make it so she can find survivors with the radar with them not being aware of it, unless they notice some debuff on them and find the drone to get rid of it. If they didn't, she would be rewarded with having an easier chase due to the debuffs on that survivor that didn't notice the debuffs at which that point they would be revealed. The debuffs could also go away after certain actions or events, like maybe a debuff that would break the next pallet you vault, or block the next window you approach. Maybe even apply slower healing speed to you next time you start healing someone or unhook someone. The drones could also be revealed at some point so you're not just running across the map with debuffs you can't do anything against because you don't know where you got debuffed. Maybe instead there could also be a chase mode that activates when you enter chase which would be at least a little like skull merchant that would place some sort of zone denial, which I imagine Aruni from Rainbow Six Siege, which puts up a gate at doors or windows, which could also go for pallets in Dbd. I would imagine these also wouldn't last very long. The gates could apply debuffs or give buffs to the SM instead. This wouldn't be as cringe as taking damage from being in an area and being forced to go to another one. Since they wouldn't last long, it would mean you can try to play around the loop avoiding the gates over and over. This would actually mean there is some skill impression since if you place that drone-gate in some useless spot, the survivor would just run the optimal way, with having the choice to just run through the gate with a downside, but maybe making a window in time and that being the right play, even if there is a gate on it. But after all I am just yapping in hopes of saving the SM, even if she's a doomed character. I also have an anime PFP so if you read this and think it's an awful idea, you can just mention that and all my points are null.
Holy essay.
Devil's advocate for the final point about not wanting killers to run a flowchart to win or lose - I think that that's Pixel's entire point about how new SM works. New SM, whilst weak and limiting, doesn't have zero choice. She has zero choice if you're in a chase and you run to a loop and that loop is pretrapped and there is a scenario where you can't split from the loop. The whole point is that you can interact with the drones preemptively to weaken her power, which is why Pixel brings up that these things can be tweaked. Old SM was completely broken, but this rework provides more options for minor tweaks to her power to decrease the strength of her mid-chase setting up of drones and to increase survivor potential when counterplaying by disabling drones, and on the flipside increasing the reward for successfully corralling people into traps (with the increased speed ideas etc.) I'm not gonna say I find the "disabling traps" counterplay particularly involving with Trapper or Hag, but at least it's more involved than "I run to loop and leave if Knight places his guard. If other loop exists repeat, if no other loop exists get hit in the open and take a damage state".
I personally liked new Skull Merchant when I played her on the PTB both playing as and going against so I’m interested to see where they take her when the patch hits live.
another oddball
@@ToadrixAceskull merchant isn't an oddball stop it please
@@ITinay she is kinda tho but i was talkin about him
Dude they barely ever change anything from PTB to live
@@doctaterror tbf onryo's changes made her a lot stronger
I mean he also plays twins so it’s not too absurd that he would like the rework
Feel like he's one of those players who intentionally just likes doodoo characters in fighting games lol.
@@NinjapowerMSyes I know him because I also do that but not in fighting games I just do it because I hate getting yelled at for taking someone’s main
@@NinjapowerMS Hey I know that guy, that's me. Same goes for when I play mobas.
Not at the level where I like skull merchant though, that's insane even for me.
Pixel bush feels like a contrarian who doesn't even realize he's a contrarian. He also said one of his favorite horror films of all time is malignant and I'm sure you've never seen it, but it's about a woman who has an attached twin living in her head and she gets superpowered at the end of the movie and the film turns from a horror movie into an action film
Honestly I think a minor rework that could help the feeling of not having much skill with her drones is giving her the ability to trigger them to go faster or reverse directions. That way she can actively control the drones in chase to get value from them and it wouldn't be as autopilot. Of course it doesn't really address the survivor side of still needing to leave the loop most of the time but it at least would make the killer player have more control over their power besides pressing right click and makes her a little stronger. Like imagine you are chasing a survivor you drop your drone and they are on a bad cycle for the drones spin and wouldn't get caught while leaving the loop but you can pull your radar out and reverse the direction and get a stack. It's situational but would feel much more rewarding then if they just give a flat buff of the radius size or speed
Prime examples of a simple, low mechanic killers that’s fun for all parties. Huntress, demogorgon, Wesker (if you ignore certain things like slide bugs and stuff). Probably some more, but.
Just swap the drones from a spin to a pulse if they're active. 360 degree red beams going from slightly taller than survivors down to the floor. Every 2 seconds or something. Now you can't just catch it at the right time and run right through the vicinity of the drone behind the beam. You'll need to time a sprint burst/lithe/something to get through it in the 2 seconds after it scans.
I think her drones should rotate faster and apply lock-on instantly without any stacks mechanic. But they shouldn't injure you. Any further scans should just apply hindered status effect or reset claw trap timer. That would make her regular M1 killer but with consistent tracking and speed buffs.
Yeah, the thing I really liked about original SM was that you could absolutely play her like an M1 killer with great info and a haste that scaled with how well you tracked your prey. I think that's always the direction they should have gone with her. I still think this is an improvement but the kit is still a little unfocused, I think.
BCS > Breaking Bad
The fun part of her kit is the concept of the power itself and the vibe. Its like how people will main Ghostface or Pig even though they arent good. They just love their design and power concept.
Also i have noticed that enjoyers of Skull Marchant tend to like Singularity and Alien. Maybe its an aesthetic(sp?) thing
Man, it sucks actually really enjoying Knight and hearing how other people devalue his gameplay. I swear if people would open up and play Knight in the based way (insta killing predrop pallets and long range assassin gameplay) then he is a really fun engaging killer.
Hell I would even argue after awhile, predrop Guard is one of the weakest most time consuming things you can do and barely helps you
I love playing knight, I feel like there could be a punishment to instadropping which doesn’t stop its current use (countering pallets, flashies and ds stuns).
So potentially if a guard is sent ON PATROL with a patrol path
Finally another big brain knight enjoyer
I agree with you. There are a lot of fun strategies you can do with knight and people still really don’t like him. Sure, he’s got access to quick and low skill requirement anti loop, but so does artist and a bunch of others. And even with this, he’s b tier at best; having to rely most more on the perks he brings in order to win.
Although, he is frustrating at times for me because he’s so add on dependent and is limited due to a very flawed ai.
imagine if they just made it so the survivors could choose when to disregard the clawtrap.
Positive:
can counter 3-gen by making it so the killer has 0 drones
you CAN counter the killers power in some way
The skull merchant can get use from its "map"
Mayby also make so the clawtrap makes the survivor always hear a terrorradius like the killer is far away, so the survivor can notice if the killer get's close but won't get the chance to prerun just as early, kinda gives a form of stealth
The skull merchant has 6 drones now, and you can work on gens in a drones radius freely
Every time I play Singu I always wish he had just a little bit more.
It seems weird how easy of a status is to get rid of for how useful it is comparing to like plague with the health state reduction or wesker with the slow.
Maybe I'm just bad idk I still feel like I'm always learning something new about Singu
He has too much already, if you ask me.
These kinds of people frustrate me. If you don’t like different play styles that’s fine, but why you gotta act like there’s something wrong with them though? They got rid of 3-gen merchant, so what’s wrong with people enjoying her new playstyle?
I think Pixel actually summed it up pretty good in his video: Not every character will be FOR YOU, and that’s okay! Gunslinger and Pyramid Head really ain’t my cup of tea, but there’s nothing wrong with OTHER people enjoying them. Why you guys gotta act so confused with every damn person who likes Skull Merchant’s design? It’s juvenile.
Humans are just naturally close minded blockheads like this. They emulate the thoughts of the majority and If you aren't part of their clique, they shun you and call you crazy. You see it all the time.
To begin with, your entire early age as a child is spent being brainwashed and indoctrinated into human culture so that you won't formulate your own thoughts.
It's pathetic, really. Humans are beasts of instinct but pretend they aren't.
no one cares about someone liking her individually the problem is that shes awful to play against and a grand total of five people like her
bro she aint givin you head😭
She’s flavorful
Scott with the soft spot for daddy Myers 2:33
2:43 Can Myers pop tier 3 from tier 1? I need to check his addons and read his power again
Add ons and perks can reduce terror radius.
good ole Scott "I Disagree" Jund.
Scott knows that there’s more to skill expression than just mechanical right?…
Like not every play-style has to be the same for them to be a ‘skillful’ character. That’s what I got annoyed by tbh
Idk if I'll be able to summarize my thoughts about this, but I'm very surprised to hear you argue for competitive design, despite your apparent disdain for "try hard"/"sweaty" play. To some people, mastery of this game can be how well they implement "sweaty" strategies. Perhaps they don't encounter enough evidence to suggest these are not the reason they lose, or maybe they just have more fun winning this way to show any kind of dominance over a community that tends to like showboating/bullying anyone they can. I forgot what my point was, but your video about why games are sweaty felt like an oversimplification of a poorly defined "problem".
I need pixelbushes plug cause what the hell is he smoking
the guy plays twins and skull merchant, just an actual FREAK
@@usedhalfcartdbd player when someone isn't part of the hivemind
@@usedhalfcartWhile I hate Twins and Skull Merchant, let’s not insult someone based on what killers they play.
Hot (?) Take, but all they needed to do to rework her would be to slap the 'No lock-on if stationary' onto her drones and make it so the drones can only lock onto 1 survivor at a time
SCOTT this is is how you fix her have her traps work like they did before no expose status. Still give her 6 drones have them go in a circle around the map slow at first but once it goes in the inactive mode then they move faster searching for survivor they still see walls if hacked they get a claw trap. Same thing before.
That way she is a HUNTER killer like she is supposed to in her lore.
2:13 note that he hasn’t watched any of the examples he gives
For trapper, if they remove the chance aspect of getting out of the traps, and increase the time neede to remove it, then add more traps, i think it's nice as a slow down and not an immediate hook.
Why do these drones not move, they're are drones you use them to survey big areas, make them patrol, move towards loud noises, I hate how they just sit there it bothers me so much, like zombie roaming ai is there already.
Deploy drone it scans after x time it begins to roam, while roaming they have a front facing camera shown with an aura, you can disable them if you get behind them, occasionally they will sweep an area, when they spot someone they glow red build up lock on until LOS is broken or out of range, drones who have spotted someone roam to the last known position, they are alerted to noise notifications, once lock on reaches 100% they tag the survivor with a claw trap, injure them or whatever, radar shows tagged survivors and spotted survivors.
There a rework that makes drone counterplay more engaging. Works more like singularity.
moving drones is just knight
New skull merchant feels like a weird hybrid between sadako and trapper
Pixelbrush is a genius. This is the best bait I’ve seen in a while.
16:40 I think all those could work if hacking a drone disabled it until the killer went to reset it physically, like you would a trapper trap or a phantasm trap, instead of being able to remotely reset it. Being able to remotely reset your drones makes it so hacking the drones is ultimately kinda useless. Still, making her trap playstyle more lethal but making it more worthwhile to disable drones would be a way to buff her.
If you play Merchant as efficiently as possible then sure that could get boring for both sides pretty quickly, but I don't think that was the point PixelBush was trying to make, rather that her kit is diverse enough where it isn't necessary to play her as efficiently as possible every game because you can experiment with zoning, trapping, stealth, tracking, haste, etc. in addition to her add ons and perks. Merchant is a killer for players who enjoy variety even if it costs them the match, because playing efficiently to win every game just isn't fun for everyone.
The radar hardly does anything because as I've said before information is king in this game so they limit how much you can see or your get stuck with 3 gen merchant again because she would know if you car close to the gen or not
Am i the only one excited to see that scott's cats have tiktok?
Scott you should go on a dbd journey to discover fun skull merchant
The drones should just reveal the survivors auras and make them oblivious while they are in the radius, and damage a survivor who fails hacking them. Its simple and makes sense and thats always the best way to go about things imo.
no way he called her flavorful :D
I will never understand why the drones don't have some ability to like roam...they must have similar code for the nem zombies. When I first read she'd have scouting drones that's what I assumed it'd be like.....
Why is crouching through it a problem? You can't crouch in a chase, and you can't get rid of stacks.
just run urban evasion :^)
11:10 Scott learns how traps work
I think they need to switch their focus from the drones to the claw traps. If they made the drones survey a limited circular area and move towards survivors in the radius and shoot a claw trap on them that has affects that can be activated in chase by the skull merchant for a 1 time use that would be a lot cooler. For example if she popped it mid chase it could slow a survivor for 2 seconds or keep them from dropping a pallet or vaulting for 1 second.
15:09 thats a really good idea for a trapper buff can you tell behavior to do that scott
Everyone wants to play chess until that chess is looking at biopod cameras
Can't make trap killers engaging? I'm up for the thought challenge.
Having a trap that can instatake down does suck, I agree with that. Trapper is very Binary like that.
Having traps do almost nothing also sucks. Skulls drones and Freddy's spilled cranberry sauce fall in that camp.
Hag's traps and Singularity Cams are probably some of the best we have. Some counterplay, options for both sides in how they are used.
Pig's are alright, but they are kind of that looming threat instead of immediate threat.
So we would need a trap killer that has traps that could still be threats, with counter play, with multiple uses.
What if you had a killer that could set up trip wire traps? When the killer is placing it they can place it as an alarm or as an attack. The alarm one is low to the ground and harder to see, tripping it just makes an audible bell sound that gives the killer a noise que. The attack trap is just the sawn off shotgun trap in Saw, where tripping it will damage you. The wire is still harder to see, but having a shotgun up against something would be your give away. (Maybe this could be added to the Pig kit, just go full trap setter)
I imagine when placing you would see a highlight before hand, ala trapper traps, so you can try to make it harder to see, then you can choose any direction to place the wire. Can put it in pallet loops, windows, just off a tree somewhere to catch people off guard.
Probably can't have to many active, and probably a longer set up time to disincentivize trapping while chasing.
If it is places sneakily you can catch people off guard, you could do some cheeky shit where you have an obvious trap that is guarded by a harder to spot one, have a one time punishment for god pallets, and the counterplay is probably as simple as disarming bear traps.
Really this whole idea is just bear traps with more flexibility and the ability to be placed on walls and have bells.
i think he is saying he likes it so bhvr dont revert her back to her original 3 gen strategy state
Why would BHVR do that? That's like thinking they'll revert Freddy back to his original state. Pure naivety
@@Mr_Mistahhe was joking
This PixelBrush video about the merchant rework simply presents a different perspective, one that the Dead by Daylight cannot be fine with. RESPECT DIFFERENT OPINIONS. I agree with him that a specific killer's playstyle, whether deemed boring or enjoyable, may not appeal to everyone. Personally, I find Skull Merchant uninteresting, primarily due to her aesthetics, and I prefer playing a mix of killers. Some killers like Demo, Xeno, Oni, Wesker, and Billy receive praise like gods, whereas others like Knight, Legion, Pinhead, Clown, and Sadako are hated. I believe that not every killer must excel in chasing; and mechanical/ trap-oriented killers are needed to keep up the variety and player interests.
that doesn't mean that playstyles or abilities that are built around slowing the game down to a point where players want to give up simply because of frustration or boredom are good gameplay concepts. you primarily play a game for fun. Only because there exists a niche of players that likes to grief other players, doesnt mean it's valid, because eVeRy pLAYstYLe nEeds to bE rEspECteD. The same counts for cheating. NOONE NEEDS TO RESPECT ANYONE'S OPINION, OTHERWISE VALID AND DOGSHIT OPINIONS ARE TREATED EQUALLY. Hint: The amount of consensus can help you determine that.
@@finni4832 I never said that power that slows the game down are good concepts, but that doesn't mean players who might enjoy them and trying different strategies deserve to be insulted. We know how toxic this community can be.
Demo and xeno are both horrible to go against
@@Leaf__22Xeno is pretty strong right now but she’s been nerfed to PTB status and there’s ample counterplay to avoid having to deal with her impossible-to-dodge tail strike (yea it’s kinda busted but you can take her out of it.)
Saying Demo is horrible to go against doesn’t make sense to me though, you have plenty of warning against a shred and you can disable his portals as well.
Why are ppl dragging Pixel for no reason 💀
Because they simply dont like Skull Merchant. 😂😂😂
I LOVE THIS VIDEO A LOT THANKS SCOTT
Eh, the claim of "trappers can never be fun for survivor" is really only true if, like Scott, you only find running loops fun as survivor. Most of the fun of going against a trap-based killer is making predictions and outsmarting the other side, but that is based on making predictions which can be wrong. I will admit predicting wrong is a feel-bad moment, but predicting right is way more fun than running another set of loops.
Intentionally misinterpreting him saying "she has a TRAP SETTING skill expression that no other killer's got" is in reference to how one expresses skill at setting traps, not general skill expression. going "hurr durr press a button" is a pithy way to dismiss it, but the skill expression isn't about mechanical aim or chasing but expression of being clever and judicious in how you use your resources. The skill expression is an expression of smart use of the killer's kit, not just flicking your mouse.
I think the issue here, as evidenced by most other videos, is Scott basically is incapable of seeing a different playstyle besides his own as fun so scoffs at the notion of this sort of cat-and-mouse gameplay fun, but I and many others prefer it to just another hold forward chase-based killer. The trouble is you can't just input your actions into a flow chart as a survivor and actually make some informed predictions and be a more focused player as survivor which many people don't want to do. They don't want to ever have things play out differently as survivor, but a variety of killers should warrant a variety of survivor plans for success.
This is immediately driven home by saying "never base gameplay off of lore" which is just such a joyless thing to say. That's the soul of what makes a game fun, and a huge part of why DBD is successful, as it leans into the lore of all of its characters. Dismissing it out of hand just feels like something someone who has forgotten how to feel joy might say.
So I guess twins aren’t public enemy number 1 now?
the people using this as an excuse to literally hate on pixelbush are weird af
this is a video game
This has been a successful rework because the bar was set so low at least no more 3 gen so I’m happy and if someone finds the new SM fun more power to you
My main issue with new Skull Merchant is the lack of info. That's the one thing I liked about the Skull Merchant is that we finally got a 2nd info killer with the only other one being the Doctor. What's even the point of her having a radar now if it's never going to give you any info. All they really needed to do is to not have drones work at generators.
Man, it would be cool if they focused more heavily on the tracking aspect. She could use her radar to “lock on” to a survivor and gain haste or something.
Yet they keep falling back into this endless “place power at loop, hold W” play style.
There was no way to make the skull merchant more boring to face than before. I love the skull merchant rework for this reason only
As someone who did enjoy her ptb rework despite the weakness heres the issue ive seen most people who tried her mess up with her. Play her like a pseudo hag set up a web of drones keep one or two on you and run then into your web. As for a few fixes realistically increase the speed of the scanning beams remove the cool down on placement and increase the speed of lock on and shed be fine. I personally enjoyed her because of this its an aggro hag.
As an ex hag main i immediatelly knew exactly what to do with her too.
Lay her drones in high traffic areas you expect survivors to run into.
@@dumblenutz5561 exactly also yay another hag player high-five
i’m just convinced people who play dbd just don’t like looping or don’t understand the difference between looping and running the killer.
I will play the new skull merchant. Yes, I think she is fun to play and I love her add-ons. I do agree with Pixel's video but I would not increase her drones to eight. It's a simple fix: Increase the rotation of the drones to 20% and slightly increase the drone's radius to 10 meters, for 30 sec, if a survivor with a claw trap enter the drone's radius, make the hacking harder or a fail hack will result in a claw trap, survivors will have to crouch and stand still for the drones to not detect them (this will help with the three gen tactic), and survivors, with a claw trap, can not hack a drone. What do you think? 😁
Yes! Scott, teach these non-believers in the ways of The Shape
"you gotta be trollin" hahaha
So survs having no options But to take a hit is Bad design? Then killer side as a whole is Bad design cause only way u can get any hits is If survs Have no other choise. Sure u can mindgame them and that has skill to it but isnt managing all 4 survs into a lose lose scenario skillfull play?
The first frame of his video tells you why he (and I) likes her if you look to the right of the screen 😊
On a serious note, I also like the rework because it perfectly fits how I played her: Stealthy. I NEVER did 3 gen with her because I prefer the stealth aspect of killers.
playing an unfun killer with terrible lore because she has an ass is crazy
Cant believe mr scott "refuses to play macro killers" jund doesnt like the new macro focused killer
i literally mained singularity for 2 months
@ScottJund you played him exclusively as a chase killer though, even saying that you cant set up as him and can only effectively use his power in a chase.
Even in viewer build streams you refuse to play twins, hag, knight, and skull merchant. It's fine to not like macro killers, but it really feels like you just hate macro play sometimes
@@joshsquidlyburgh5820macro killers are usually some of the least interactive most boring killers and that cannot be denied
@thedoomslayer5863 sure i can. I love dismantling macro killer control over the map. Some of my favorite killers to play against include hag, knight, and twins. They make you play differently and I think that's very fun and interactive.
On the flipside of that, I enjoy killers that are able to spread their pressure over the map partially because it's a different kind of skill. Using victor to control an area or guard two areas at once. I love setting up with Trapper to knock down survivors later when they think they're safe. Just because you don't enjoy them doesn't mean that they're objectively unfun to go against. Even recently I've been seeing tons of people flip their opinion on twins after hating them since they released.
@@joshsquidlyburgh5820 Yeah, honestly, same. I really don't get the argument that trap killers have no skill expression or interaction. The whole point is to avoid getting put in a position where you have no options by countering the traps ahead of time. Macro gameplay is still gameplay, and I find using my brain a lot more fun than the mindgames of spinning around at loops.
After going against a bunch of Dull Merchants, the playstyle didn't really change that much since even if the drones won't injure somebody working on a gen, the moment somebody leaves the gen in a hurry (pushed off by a patrolling Killer) then they will almost always get scanned. It's a matter of time before the Survivor is claw-trapped and pretty f***** if they didn't see the Killer early.
Most Dull Merchants I've gone against use almost the exact same strat as before, it's just that they have even more drones and so they can trap the loops closest to the 3-gen as well as the gens. In the smaller maps the drones can cover most of the map which makes for fairly irritating traversal and near-impossible chases (saloon is one of the most egregious cases since SM can effectively control almost the entirety of the main street and shack which only leaves the edge-map to work with).
At the end of the day im happy with it all because id much rather have this than what we had before. Most people wanted her to just straight up be removed than stay isnt it better we got one extra killer even if its boring and weak than having old skull merchant.
This is the reason not everyone should be able to vote
/s
I mean sometimes it's true 😂
Scott does not believe in the concept of nuance
Most of this to me seems like Scott just doesn’t like the design of traps
It seems really reductive to say "She uses power, leave loop". Given that the drones are on a rotation, is it not possible to try to play the loop while also *gasp* factoring in her power to try to alter your approach to said loop and avoid the detection. I'm not thrilled about the rework personally, I just don't care. But at the same time I don't really agree with your take on the power lacking engagement on both sides, unless you choose to approach it in an unengaging way which is your call to make.
Scott where did the red hat go ? 💔
I was always surprised that the drones didn't become stronger over time as they persist on the map. Something like the radius growing by 100% over two minutes, or allowing the radius to apply lock on through LoS after a certain amount of time. It would encourage survivors to do that drone hacking mini game to actually disable drones and give them some form of counterplay while giving skull merchant some actual payoff for planning drones ahead of time.
Since avoiding drones will be as easy as standing still or crouching, I would make partial lock-on more useful:
- survivors with 1/2/3 lock-on stacks can be tracked by the Skull merchant from 16/32/48 meters
- survivors with 1/2/3 lock-on stacks perceive the Skull Merchant's terror radius reduced by 8/16/24 meters
The lock-on is reset only on hook.
This way Skull Merchant has partial bonuses for partial lock-on plus she doesn't have to immediately overchase to get the down. She would get help at getting back at someone later on, until hooked.
I'm convinced the DBD community is both unimaginative and completely self-absorbed. Killers like the knight no shit you can just use his power on a loop and get half decent results making you think thats how to play him but it takes 20 seconds to realize not only does the time for that to happen not make sense but at any point you can read the killer power and understand that each of knights guards have unique perks to them like how only one can even catch survivors. Skull merchant actually isnt half bad but the more yall unimaginatively play her like every other killer instead of what i'd argue is a diff kind of hag yall are just gonna keep complaining about something thats not even true
Based take