As Dead by Daylight continues into its tenth year, the iconic asymmetric horror game is currently struggling with its most annoying issue yet: infinitely scaling modifiers. While this is still plaguing the full release, Behaviour has finally addressed the issue in the latest DBD patch notes for the game’s PTB server.
With Behaviour planning to keep Dead by Daylight going for as long as possible without creating a remake or a sequel, the developer has explained that this new change is a necessary addition for the longevity of the game.
As of the release of 9.6.0 patch notes, the developers have finally addressed the issue of infinitely scaling modifiers. After 10 years, this issue led to massive power creep in the game for long-time players with many able to gain a huge advantage as they stacked mods upon mods.
The scaling issue has been solved by the introduction of the new Diminishing Returns system, which causes modifiers and status effects to start degrading as a match progresses. Now, “repeated positive or negative gameplay modifiers and status effects are now affected by diminishing return”.
As the game will prioritise your highest value gameplay modifier, lower value mods will decrease in impact, like so:
- 1st value (highest) – 100% of modifier
- 2nd value – 50% of modifier
- 3rd value – 25% of modifier
- 4th value – 12.5% of modifier
- 5th value and up – 5% of modifier
Behaviour explains that this change—which may annoy some—comes due to the balance-breaking issues that infinitely stacking bonuses bring. Additionally, as players were more likely to stack existing modifiers to gain huge advantages, it meant that time spent on creating new modifiers was wasted. With this system, the Dead by Daylight team will now be able to invest in the creation of new mods that change how players play DBD.
“After 10 years of Dead by Daylight, the ability of Killers and Survivors to stack modifiers indefinitely as enabled ever-accelerating and more intense gameplay,” the team said. “With this update, we aim to normalise how modifiers from different sources interact against each other in order to better preserve the integrity of game. All major gameplay modifiers and status effects for both roles are included in this update.
“Additionally, this change will help us as developers create new interesting Powers, Items and Perks with our roster of existing game modifiers, with far less risk of creating unintended game-breaking scenarios.”
Of course, as a brand-new system, the Diminishing Returns system will likely go through a lot of balance changes over the next few years. However, it’s introduction is a wise move for the future of DBD, especially if it means that we’ll get access to some new, more interesting additions as time goes on.
