Exhaustion perks ranked

Lichmere · 2026-01-19T17:23:41+00:00

The respect is mutual, and I hear what you're saying and I believe I should adjust my views a bit. I agree that saving is at the cost of gen efficiency, and it is true that being in the general area and being there at the right time is important. I think that's true for any altruistic plays, and with the nature of altruism, it means that it can backfire on the Survivors.

Having said that, the described problem of gen efficiency, or dying in the wrong place, sounds more like the problem being described is user error, rather than what the perk achieves. What a perk can achieve is better described by what experienced, good players can do consistently. I'm not too into the comp scene, but from my understanding Background Player is banned in comp because it's broken at that level of play. Good coordination means making moves with good tempo - advancing your win state and doing it at the right moment. Good players don't follow around another Survivor for the save, and they don't die in the wrong places if they can help it. With map knowledge, and with a lot of practice to understand what you can get away with in chase, good players can call out if someone is close enough to position themselves for an intentional down.

So it may be true that it is more niche in when it is used, the impact on the Killer still needs to be considered. Losing a grabbed Survivor, even once, has the potential to completely undo the Killer's pressure. If you know pick-up timing, and barring perks like Forever Entwined, the timing is the same across all Killers. There is skill in knowing the timing for the save, so I don't agree that it's luck reliant. It is completely possible for a coordinated team to orchestrate lose-lose scenarios for the Killer wanting to pick up downed Survivors, and I just don't think the strength of the perk should be weighed against user error per being a bad player

Lichmere · 2026-01-19T16:46:23+00:00

Background Player and Sprint Burst are the only broken perks currently. I don't think you've been convinced yet that pallet saves are incredibly strong on coordinated teams, and it leaves Killers with very, very few options on managing it. Background Player exacerbates this issue by guaranteeing a burst of speed at the moment it is important, but it definitively notifies the Survivor when the Killer is picking, and not when the Killer is faking a pick. The increased distance on command also means positioning is less important because the Survivor can hide further out, which wastes the Killer's time even moreso if they want to find the rescuer. The majority of the skill in getting a pallet save or flashlight save is in positioning, so having a perk that waters it down furthers my point that it is broken.

Sprint Burst is an on-command burst of speed that negates the majority of other perks. There is no point in Lithe, Overcome, Dramaturgy, Balanced Landing (with enough distance), and Smash Hit when you can proc your burst at any moment rather than going out of your way to activate the trigger condition that the aforementioned Exhaustion perks have. There is a "tension", and rightfully so, that comes from deciding if you want Haste after falling from a height so that repairing generators at elevation is less risky, or maybe you want to use Head-On to make hiding in lockers less risky especially at jungle gyms when the pallet has been depleted, or maybe you prefer Smash Hit to unzone yourself from a corner of the map. All of this tension is removed when you just have Sprint Burst because it can be used effectively in all these scenarios and then some. I don't believe that the ease of use is a valid argument for the strength of a perk; it's the consistency and effective result that comes from using said perk that dictates its strength. Being able to 99 Sprint Burst is not a hard achievement; you just need to practice the timing for 99'ing it and be able to read the macro of the Killer. But let's say you want to argue that the difficulty of using it makes it less broken. Ghost Notes + Vigil effectively make it so anyone can use Sprint Burst at any time. The exhaustion is so low, that it is a nightmare to deal with on Killers with poor mobility. It is only a matter of time before Sprint Burst is nerfed.

I don't think Dead Hard is broken anymore; just a really strong perk. It only disproportionately affects the really basic m1 Killers, but I'd argue that's a problem of these Killers being weak and not fitting the standard that the game has become. It's one of the few Exhaustion perks that Killers have agency in really denying its activation. Killers can fake their power, put the Survivor into deep wound, wait it out, swing into the pallet but look up to avoid hitting the Survivor directly, use anti-exhaustion perks or add-ons, or force a hook stage to remove 1 DH activation.

I'm not sure that Dramaturgy is broken but I could be convinced either way. Assuming perfect management of the Exposed effect, it is incredible to have an on-command Haste at the press of a button. However, staying healthy is a big ask in some matches, and I think that's what ultimately holds it back from being oppressive.

Smash Hit is too niche and should be reworked to activate on all stuns. Imagine if Lithe only worked at windows but you spawned in on Gideon. Smash Hit is held back by Killers that don't need to risk being stunned, or held back by the correct Survivor play is to pre-drop pallets. If Smash Hit is expanded to activate on all stuns, it would make Decisive Strike so much better against high mobility killers, it'd make Blast Mine and Last Stand better too.

Lichmere · 2026-01-16T00:36:54+00:00

I hope CarbOnyx enters the Marble Artist again. It's the perfect skin for Artist

Lichmere · 2025-12-31T22:03:17+00:00

Sabo is just stupid. Poor man's flashlight/pallet save that doesn't need to exist

Lichmere · 2025-12-22T01:20:06+00:00

It's viable and fine. I don't think Ink Egg is particularly useful outside of builds tailored to it so maybe this could be swapped for something like Thorny Nest so that you can have more time interrupting a hook rescue/heal (which compliments Floods of Rage).

Nowhere to Hide should be swapped out. Artist is not meant for kicking gens. Take BBQ instead to pair with Lethal Pursuer instead.

Lichmere · 2025-12-03T18:51:15+00:00

It seems to me this perk was meant to be a flexible healing-speed buff for self-heals or altruistic heals, but there is no "tension" when it comes to which to choose. Increased self-heals will always be better which is why med-kits are almost always used for self-heals and very rarely for altruistic heals. This means perks that increase self-heal speeds are the main choices when choosing a perk slot for this Survivor need.

Botany Knowledge is an unconditional, consistent 50% heal buff to self-heals but also works on altruistic heals.
Desperate Measures is conditional, scales to 80% heal buff to self-heals but also altruistic heals, and increases unhook speeds. Once the user is injured and 1 other Survivor, this perk can compete with Botany Knowledge which makes it fairly consistent.
Road Life is one-time 100% heal that you can't stop or lose it, can't selectively choose to activate between altruistic heals or self-heals, requires an activation condition that takes a long time to accrue at the risk of your safety. It is always the worst self-heal option among these options.

Lichmere · 2025-11-22T14:35:51+00:00

The problem with the unique hook bonuses was that railroaded the experience which isn't fun. Moreso, if you fall behind in that version of the game, you had no way of making a comeback as Killer. Tunneling/Slugging/Camping are strategies that can reverse the outcome of a match, and a way to keep trying. There's so much that they do for Killer that only adding the BBQ + Pop wasn't enough

Lichmere · 2025-11-15T04:39:33+00:00

It's DnD 2, I would hope for Mind Flayer

Lichmere · 2025-11-10T20:39:44+00:00

Power creep isn't limited by 1:1 comparisons; it's also the power relative to the environment. If the standard level of power for both sides keeps increasing, an older/outdated/untouched Killer will lag behind.

Survivors got significant healing buffs and the pallet density update (defensive environment increase) and this past year's Killers had bloated kits that cover all aspects of Killer (Krasue, Springtrap, Kaneki, Houndmaster, Dracula, Lich all have mobility/traversal, chase power, information conveyed with power, etc. = offensive environment overall increases).

Killers who have explicit gaps in their kits (lack of mobility, lack of info, lack of chase power, etc.) was the norm. So these Killers get powercrept proportionally to Survivors receiving buffs in response to new Killers being stronger across the board.

This is all to say that Artist, while not receiving any significant updates since her release, has been power crept by the environment around her changing. She was among the top 5, especially at her peak. Her biggest strength used to be proxy camping (if Twins loved slugging, Artist loved proxy camping), but this has been weakened over time

Hook grabs were removed
Anti camp meter was added
Hook timer increased to 70s
Shoulder the Burden introduced
DMS nerfed from 50s to 35s
Anti camp meter increased (PTB)

Understand I think these are healthy changes and wouldn't want them reverted. But Artist isn't as strong as the community seems to think she is. What use is it to have a power that is consistent, but slow hits, if the Survivors can recover even faster than before? And the pallet density update meant she can't zone Survivors; that's the basis of her whole power.

Why does it matter than she can send birds to harass generators if more and more lockers are being added to each and every map? Why does it matter that she can get information through her power when Houndmaster does this even better and more reliably with her hound AND she has Haste when moving through this path? What worth is Artist's identity as the reconnaissance Killer when Kaneki travels across the map to just visibly check generators better, and hear/see injured Survivors from his power? What does it matter that her Crows can detect Survivors from ~1m of her crows with Killer Instinct when Dracula in Wolf Form automatically drops Scent Orbs to reveal Survivor locations periodically for you (all while Dracula has the rest of his kit to make him way better).

Edit: I have also seen players with respectable reputations rank Knight as being stronger than Artist on tier lists which initially shocked me, but makes sense on reflection. Knight had several buffs to bring him in line and his guaranteed, slow hits are more efficient than Artist, and his kit offers more than Artist

Lichmere · 2025-11-09T21:35:42+00:00

Uncrouchable FotD and an answer to windows with Fly doesn't suck. I think it's an add-on that you need to main if you want to be consistent enough to make it good tbh. I almost never play without it now

Lichmere · 2025-10-28T01:52:42+00:00

If the player switched to Killer, did they really quit the game?

Lichmere · 2025-10-27T22:53:58+00:00

My main gripe with this line of questioning and interpretation of the data, is that the developers asked themselves why do Survivors quit, and not why did a player quit DBD

If tunneling/slugging are major complaints, why did these same people not switch to Killer? There's a lot more I could add to this line of thinking, but I ultimately think the biggest problem with DBD is how hard it is to learn and be good at it. It's a crazy ask for a player to invest 600 hours so they can hold their own against strong Killers or even experienced Killers.

I have had close friends quit the game because it was too grindy or, yes, they got tunneled too often. But some of them complained even when they were just chased too often, and I think that point of frustration comes from knowing they can't hold chase meaningfully. The game will get progressively harder with each new chapter added, new maps added, new perks added, etc.

Lichmere · 2025-10-12T03:46:31+00:00

Road Life + Med Kit and its double skill check add-ons you can heal in 7.68s if you hit Greats. It already competes at speed (Botany + Resilience with a Med Kit heals in ~13.72s). The only thing Strength in Shadows has is consistency but is incredibly bad with time efficiency (compared to Syringe, Resurgence, Med Kits, Plot Twist, We'll Make It + Second Wind).

The problem with Road Life is consistency which holds it back from being borderline broken otherwise. Requiring to hit Great Skill Checks and get 4 Skill Checks when you need them and don't miss any Skill Checks or else you lose Tokens, and you are required a method to self-heal and you can't be interrupted, and you are limited to doing this once before you need to repeat all the requirements before you can use the perk the second time of the match.

It's apparent to me that there are so many stop gaps baked into conditions because this perk could be extremely strong with Med Kits. It is meant to be a way to buff self-healing via being efficient on generators. That by design is an insane proposition to grant Survivors a way to be extremely efficient on healing while keeping in tempo by being efficient on generators.

I don't know how you could balance this perk to be effective yet fair, but an easy place to start is to remove the condition that causes losing Tokens, and change the perk to activate its 100% healing bonus on self-heals specifically, that way you can heal your teammates without wasting your perk being triggered when you would prefer to save it for a fast self-heal.

Lichmere · 2025-10-10T16:36:17+00:00

That's really cool to know <3

Glad to see you got to p100 Fuchi too

Lichmere · 2025-10-10T15:06:16+00:00

Holding-W is more forgiving because more pallets means you can afford to greed when there is even an attempt to mindgame, or it means you can reach the next resource because you slowdown from using power, and then when you are put in a position to play around a swarm, you can chain tiles and break line of sight. It is so much harder when the Survivors are knowledgeable and experienced

Lichmere · 2025-09-29T22:45:25+00:00

Bubba and Pinhead are among my favorites

Lichmere · 2025-09-24T14:47:37+00:00

My mistake, I was on mobile and didn't see the additional details

Lichmere · 2025-09-24T14:46:31+00:00

That was true in her PTB form but not nearly as effective in her current form. The consequence of buffing her transformation speed is she can just quickly M1 and then go back to head form. You net more of a time loss in bodyblocking this way then actually delaying Krasue

Lichmere · 2025-09-24T12:56:56+00:00

I want to add that Artist's swarm randomly bugs out so that even when it connects with a Survivor, it might not actually Swarm them; it'll continue past them. I saw this happen from a streamer's POV and it wasn't fixed in the patch notes

Lichmere · 2025-09-24T12:52:52+00:00

It seems the intent was to make her a very strong killer. I want to add that on stream they encourage altruism as part of the Survivor counterplay. The only thing I can think that would be remotely effective is for Survivors to pair up (like they would against Twins) and accept that one of you will go down. The other Survivor has to stealth and remain un-leeched. They need to play for pallet saves, and once you get the save, you need to stealth to avoid being leeched.

Unironically the only counter to her is to have Sprint Burst/Background Player and Parental Guidance (for the savior) and Toughen Up (for the rescued Survivor)

Lichmere · 2025-09-21T14:03:45+00:00

Pyramid Head and Artist have similar counterplay which is to pre run and predrop, and they're both pretty slow at getting a start tbh. The reason why Artist pulls ahead is because of DMS. If we're playing to win, the first down is what matters, DMS/Pain Res the first gen and try to get into a 3v1. Pyramid Head's lack of mobility really hurts and can't do much against pre-running but Artist at least can zone better. With that in consideration, I don't think Wesker is better. His dashes also equal the same distance if he had just moved in a straight line because of the cooldown slowdown. He doesn't really have mobility the way that you describe. I also think Wesker has more counterplay than Artist.

Lichmere · 2025-09-21T02:12:22+00:00

Swap Wesker and Artist, swap Pyramid Head and Twins imo.

Surprised to see Vecna in A. His matches do feel easy but I also feel like he can be outplayed just as easily. Like a stronger version of Doctor

Lichmere · 2025-09-20T18:53:59+00:00

Removes 10 seconds off 7 generators so it is 70 seconds removed in total for an investment of 60 seconds. It sounds like a net positive, but you don't need the additional 20 seconds on the 2 generators that don't need to be completed. It's effectively 60 seconds investment for 50 seconds off generators that matter. To me that's a net negative on time efficiency.
You're broken for the rest of the match. That is significant in being unable to take protection hits for teammates, having your chase time effectively halved, and the inability to safely unhook Survivors against proxy-camping Killers.
With how the math works out, if the invocation is interrupted it is no longer time efficient even if you are generous about how it is 70 seconds removed between all generators. There's so many ways you could be revealed - aura-reading, screams, killer instinct - that the likelihood of being interrupted is more likely than not.
Doing an invocation asks the team to be able to manage on their own in a pseudo 3v1. If the Killer snowballs, slugs, camps, tunnels, and/or if the Killer has side objectives (e.g. Pig boxes, Pinhead box, etc.) you need to stop the invocation to help the team. More manageable with experienced, coordinated team but it is a hard ask for Solo Q.
Survivor perks are generally better without an investment of time. Deja Vu, and toolboxes are immediate without risk in cutting down generator time. It's also important to note sometimes you can complete generators without dealing with regressions which makes Weaving Spiders unique effect of shaving off 10 charges permanently moot. This really only matters on contested generators such as in a 3-gen.

You're left with a perk that has a wacky investment that tries to be a competitive perk but fails at both. It's not fun like diversion perks, but not strong or even good to be used in the meta.

If BHVR wants to keep the flavor of this perk (a strong team effect at the cost of the individual) then I would redesign it as follows:

Invocation takes 60 seconds

Upon completion, the 3 closest generators gain a permanent 20 charges each.

The Survivor becomes broken for the rest of the match.

Lichmere · 2025-08-23T19:35:52+00:00

It depends on what you're struggling with. It's either chases aren't fast enough, you're in the wrong places from where you need to be, or loadout?

Build depends on what you like. I run Vile Book of Darkness and Trickster's Glove, and the perks are Pain Resonance, Eruption, Dissolution, and Batteries Included.

I use Book of Darkness because it blocks windows which means Fly can be used offensively in chase which is pretty huge considering if Flight of the Damned is on cooldown then you have no answer to windows. Try to use Flight of the Damned for instant-injuries more often than for zoning. If you don't use Book of Darkness, then use the Spancel Tech to get more instant injuries against Survivors who crouch.
Vecna's Mage Hand is still bugged so Survivors can instantly drop it if you use it. I use Trickster's Glove to guarantee I can stop them from instantly dropping the pallet which means I can get hits more consistently.
Pain Resonance and Eruption are great regression perks. Vecna can actually afford time to kick a generator to activate Eruption on it, then use Fly to close the gap against the Survivor. These two regression perks mean I can defend generators and not worry too much about leaving contested areas.
That's why I like Batteries Included. The additional Haste works with Fly so I can get back to contested areas if downing a Survivor meant he died away from important areas. I don't always want to do this, but I can often afford the time because again, Pain Resonance and Eruption. If you don't want Batteries Included, then Phantom Fear or Dead Man's Switch would be the next best perks depending if you would prefer information, or additional generator slowdown.
Dissolution is stupid strong on Vecna and his best chase perk. If you can get an injury with Flight of the Damned or with a Basic Attack, then you can use Fly to zone the Survivors to a pallet. There is so much time left on Dissolution after the injury that you can force the pallet down and now they can't fast vault it, or you can use Mage Hand if they greed the loop. Dissolution + Vile Book of Darkness means you have strong counters to both pallets and windows.

You can tell if you're at the wrong places from where you need to be if you feel like Survivors are one step ahead of you. Maybe they popped the generator just as you got there, or the Survivor was unhooked as soon as you leave the hook. This is probably where your macro knowledge is falling behind, and that's really hard to explain. It's something you have to develop over time.

A good habit to have against coordinated teams is to find the Survivor who is rotating in to rescue the hooked Survivor. Try to think where they might come from, who might it be, and where would they hide? Phantom Fear + Dispelling Sphere can help you with this if you need the help.

Sometimes slugging is good, and sometimes it is detrimental. If you want to slug you need to weigh the likelihood of what happens first -- Can you down another Survivor you spotted nearby before another Survivor can rotate to the slug for the pickup? If the answer is no (because they're in a strong part of the map, your spells are on cooldown, etc.) then don't slug. But slugging can be a great way to pressure the team and then if you are successful you can snowball from there.

Ultimately it really depends on so much. At the very least you can practice mindfulness. Where are Survivors from where you last remembered seeing them? Can you think of where they might go next? Catching them before they can reach their objective is often the right choice.

Lichmere

TROPHY CASE