Dead By Daylight Patch Makes Important Changes to Killers

Game Rant

By Rory Young

Published Jul 7, 2017

Dead by Daylight reworks the victory conditions for Killers in its latest patch, simplifying the system into Killer Goals which all four survivors can reward.

Dead by Daylight's win conditions are changing for Killers, shifting from a system based on point accumulation to one with specific actionable goals. Patch 1.5.3 went live on July 4, titled the Victory Cube Patch, changing the Killer victory and ranking system from Bloodpoints to Killer Goals. Rather than simply farming Bloodpoints through ambiguous means by emulating killers such as Michael Myers, Killers will now have to actively Hook and kill all Survivors in order to win a Trial and increase their rank.

Victory in Dead by Daylight continues to be a murky issue. It's not simply a matter of survival or slaughter, but a meta-game involving accruing "pips" through various participation-oriented objectives. Pips can either fall into the negative or reward exceptional performance depending on how a Trial goes, but pips are measured on a player-by-player basis. That means one person's success doesn't necessarily imply another's. Changing how Killer pips work could dramatically change the dynamic of games.

Killers now have Killer Goals and how many Killer Goals are accomplished in a Trial will determine a Killer's end-of-Trial pips. Dead by Daylight , which is available on Xbox One, PS4, and PC, pits four Survivors against one Killer, so the new system prioritizes the Killer spreading the love to all Survivors. Each Survivor can potentially reward 4 Killer Goals to the Killer, so the maximum a Killer can gain in a Trial is 16. Each of three phases of putting a Survivor on a Hook completes a Killer Goal and a Survivor's death will reward the final point.

While Hooks are the foundation of the Killer Goals, performing a Memento Mori can also provide +2 Killer Goals. Players will have to decide for themselves whether a Memento Mori is the best choice in a given situation, because it could cost them overall Killer Goals.

Dead by Daylight Killer Goals Patch - Hooks

The Killer Goal patch also builds into it some anti-AFK and anti-disconnect functionality. For example, a Survivor who disconnects more than 5 minutes into a Trial will grant a Killer a full +4 Killer Goals since it can effectively ruin a Trial. A Survivor who disconnects at the loading screen grants +2 Killer points, which fairly changes a Trial to a 1v3 rather than a 1v4. And of course if the Killer disconnects, their Killer Goals are adjusted to 0, effectively giving them -1 pips.

What ultimately matters is how these Killer Goals change the Killer's victory conditions. Keep in mind that a Killer has 16 maximum Killer Goals, with each Survivor representing four. Here's how a Killer can win a trial under the new system:

Less than 7 Killer Goals - Entity Displeased (-1 Pip)
8 Killer Goals - Brutal Killer (No Pip Change)
9-15 Killer Goals - Ruthless Killer (+1 Pip)
16 Killer Goals - Merciless Killer (+2 Pip)

The new system encourages Killers to Hook all Survivors, rather than just shadowing a single Survivor, but in the end the meta-pip system doesn't change and Survivors are still on the the classic Bloodpoint system. At least Killers are probably happy that things are more straight forward. If anyone's going to benefit from the changes it'll be new players, who will have a more straightforward system when they start playing. Just hunt as many Survivors as you can and put them on all on hooks to win!

Dead by Daylight is available now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.