Soon, Freddy will receive his major rework in Dead by Daylight. The developers have now released many details.
The major rework of the killer Freddy has long been on the agenda of the developers of Dead by Daylight. After all, the killer is not fun for anyone – neither for killer players nor for the survivors who have to face him.
Now, he is finally being changed. Starting next Tuesday (07/09/2019), the new Freddy will be available on the PTR for testing. He has already been extensively presented in a livestream.
The new abilities of the Nightmare
Freddy has two standard abilities that he can use, in addition to the passive sleep (see below).
Dream Projection: Freddy can target a generator that is not fully repaired yet and channel a ability for a few seconds. Upon completion of the ability, Freddy teleports to that generator.
While he is channeling the ability, the survivors can see the selected generator as it sprays blood fountains. This ability has a long cooldown, but is reduced by 15% for every survivor who is currently sleeping (up to 60%).
Dream Traps: Freddy can place “Dream Traps”, up to 8 at the same time. This does not slow him down, but the traps take a second to become active (so they cannot be spontaneously placed under a survivor). The traps can only be seen and triggered by sleeping survivors.
They are well recognized as red puddles of blood on the ground. If a survivor steps into the trap, the corresponding survivor screams loudly and is slowed down by 15%, making it impossible to quickly climb through windows. This makes it difficult to loop Freddy.
Alternative – Dream Pallets: Through addons, it is possible to swap the Dream Traps for pallets. Then Freddy is able to set up a Dream Palette at all possible pallet spawn points. Survivors can only interact with these and see them when they are asleep.
If the palette is overturned, it explodes in a blood fountain and has no further use – the killer will not be stunned.
Freddy can always attack survivors: The best part is that Freddy can now hit survivors at any time, whether they are asleep or awake. This was the biggest point of frustration for players.
Previously, Freddy had to first put his victims to sleep, which took time. This allowed survivors to escape multiple times without being prevented.
Further effects of Freddy
This is still not all the developers changed about Freddy. There are further adjustments.
Sleep is passive: The mechanic of sleeping still exists. All survivors automatically fall asleep after 60 seconds. They can then be affected by Freddy’s dream abilities (like the traps).
To wake up, they must either fail a skill check or find an alarm clock that appears as far away from their position as possible.
Alternatively, they can also be woken up by another survivor who is still awake. However, this becomes less effective each time. Waking another survivor takes 4 seconds the first time, then the duration increases by 4 seconds each time up to a maximum of 16 seconds.
Later in the game, it is much wiser to wake up via the alarm clock or skill checks to save time.
However, Freddy can no longer see the auras of survivors who are sleeping. This effect has been removed.
What addons are available? A few addons for Freddy have also been roughly hinted at. In addition to swapping the Dream Traps for Dream Palettes, there is also an addon where all generators explode in blood when he teleports to a generator.
Another addon reduces the action speed of survivors in the dream. There is also one that shows the aura of survivors when they knock over a palette. This is particularly useful in combination with the Dream Palettes.
Whether Freddy will come this way will probably depend on the feedback on the PTR.
What do you think of the new Freddy? Are his abilities cool and does everything sound promising? Or will Freddy be worse this way?
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