Dead by Daylight is revamping its matchmaking to improve the experience for all players – at least that’s the theory.
Matchmaking has been a major point of criticism in Dead by Daylight. No matter when over the past 5 years – complaints have repeatedly surfaced in the subreddit. Now, Dead by Daylight is addressing this issue and rewarding frequent players with a lot of blood points. We reveal what is changing.
What was the problem? Dead by Daylight previously had poor matchmaking. The only indicator for that was the players’ rank. However, this only partially reflects a player’s skill and is more a sign of how much time one spends in the game. Essentially, every player reaches the upper ranks sooner or later if they play enough matches.
Despite this, many players felt that they were playing with or against “the very best” survivors or killers when someone held a red rank – even though this says little about their actual skill.
What will change? As previously tested multiple times, Dead by Daylight will introduce a skill-based matchmaking system with the next patch. Then it will no longer be the rank that decides against whom you play, but a certain value that – like in many other games – represents your skill and changes through wins and losses.
Particularly interesting: You have a separate matchmaking value for each killer. So, if you are an absolute killer god with the Trapper, you will face strong survivors there. However, if you are making your first attempts with the Nurse and are not doing so well, you will also be matched against weaker opponents.
Does the system really make a difference? At least that’s what the developers claim, and they have released some numbers to support this. They compared the latest tests with skill-based matchmaking to matches from rank-based matchmaking and came to the following conclusions:
- During peak playtimes, 99% of matches were considered “reasonably balanced”, with chances of escaping (as a survivor) or killing (as a killer) being +/- 25% of the average.
- Moreover, 75% of games even fell within a range of +/- 5% of the average.
- In the old system, 99% of games had a deviation of 45%, and 75% of games still had a deviation of 25%.
What is the purpose of ranks now? Ranks will be replaced by the new “Grades” system. This works quite similarly to before, allowing you to earn pips and rank up or down. However, the grades will no longer affect matchmaking.
There is, however, another use for it: With the monthly rank reset (which becomes a grade reset), all players will be reset to the lowest grade (Ash). At the same time, each player will receive blood points credited, depending on their earned grade from the last season. The best rank will reward a whopping 250,000 blood points, and accordingly less if one doesn’t rank as high.
What do you think of these changes? Are these good innovations for Dead by Daylight? Or do you think the new rank system will only be accepted once you have really seen it in action?
