The developers of Dead by Daylight have announced a huge Mid-Chapter Update which targets healing, med kits, flashlights and more. There are also balance changes for numerous killers, maps and add-ons.
The bloodwebs are also receiving a huge quality of life change, and a new accessibility feature grants survivors to have a visual terror radius. This is one of the biggest mid-chapter updates the game has ever received, so buckle in as we outline the biggest changes.
Bloodweb Improvements
After a long wait, the bloodwebs are finally receiving much needed improvements with the Mid-chapter update. You can now press on a specific node that you want, and the game will automatically purchase all nodes that are on the way.
Furthermore, if you press the centre node, the bloodweb will automatically complete for you, purchasing nodes based on the cheapest option. Finally, you can now switch off the hold to buy feature, meaning that you can simply press a node to purchase it rather than having to hold it down.
Overall, these bloodweb changes aim to make the experience of spending bloodpoints faster.
Healing Changes
The healing mechanic has received massive nerfs in this new update, reducing the speed of healing, the effectiveness of Boon: Circle of Healing as well as massively nerfing med kits. The developers have said that this is to make killers’ hits more affective, as previously survivors could easily heal from a hit even within chase.
Firstly, healing now takes an additional 8 seconds by default (24 seconds instead of 16 seconds).
Med kits have now been nerfed as well, with their add-ons and healing speeds being reduced across the board:
- Camping Aid Kit: Increases altruistic healing speed by 20% (down from 25%)
- First Aid Kit: Increases altruistic healing speed by 25% (down from 35%)
- Emergency Med Kit: Increases altruistic healing speed by 30% (down from 50%) and no longer increases self-healing speed
- Ranger Med Kit: Increases altruistic healing speed by 35% (down from 50%), increases skill check success zones by 10% (down from 14%) and increases great skill check zones by 10% (down from 15%)
Autohaven Wreckers Map Updates
The Autohaven Wreckers maps, Blood Lodge and Gas Heaven, have received changes to hopefully make them more balanced for both killer and survivor.
The Blood Lodge main building has been moved to the centre of the map and the maze tiles have been split up to counter survivors easily combining them together.
In addition, Gas Heaven is changing the car piles. By adding in some pallets and gaps between the piles, it will no longer feel like one long wall of cars. Furthermore, the gas station main building has also been moved to the centre of the map, and the pallet and window spawns have been altered.
Killer Changes
A number of killers have received tweaks either in their powers or add-ons.
Hillbilly Changes and add-on nerfs
The Hillbilly has had his overheat mechanic adjusted to be more forgiving, reducing the heat generated when revving the chainsaw, but increasing the heat generated while Chainsaw Sprinting. His Doom Engravings and Death Engravings add-ons have been nerfed, providing less movement speed and increasing his heat generation.
The Pig’s add-on buff
The Pig’s add-on John’s Medical File, has been updated to increase the movement speed bonus by 10% (up from 6%) whilst crouching.
The Oni’s add-on buffs
Two of The Oni’s add-ons have benefited from the new update: Blackened Toenail and Bloody Sash. Blackened Toenail now increases movement speed whilst absorbing blood by 0.4m/s (up from 0.3m/s) and Bloody Sash now increases movement speed whilst absorbing blood by 0.7m/s (up from 0.6m/s).
The Nightmare’s add-on buffs
The Nightmare has received 2 buffed add-ons: Sheep Block and Unicorn Block. Both of these add-ons have an additional 30 seconds of blindness status when a survivor triggers a dream snare or pallet.
The Executioner’s add-on buff
The Executioner’s Scarlet Egg add-on is being buffed, to offer 3 seconds (up from 1.5 seconds) of Killer Instinct from the Rites of Judgement. This means that the Executioner can now pinpoint survivors who step on his Rites of Judgement trail more easily and accurately for longer.
The Clown’s add-on nerf
The Clown’s add-on Redhead’s Pinky Finger has been nerfed. This add-on makes a survivor exposed when you hit them directly with a bottle, but now the number of bottles you can hold is reduced by 3 (was 2) which makes this add-on slightly less forgiving.
Perk Changes
7 Perks have received changes, including some of the most popular perks in the game such as Dead Hard, Boon: Circle of Healing and Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance, as well as other generator-kicking perks. It seems as though the developers want to get rid of the generator-kicking meta which has been prominent for the past year.
The Dead Hard nerf
Dead Hard now only activates after safely unhooking a survivor. It still provides the endurance status effect for 0.5 seconds if the active ability button is pressed when running and injured. However, it now deactivates after being used successfully. This makes Dead Hard much less reliable, as you can no longer use it every chase, and have to unhook another survivor before you can use it again.
The Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance nerf
Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance will be reworked: the perk now starts with 4 tokens, and each time a survivor is hooked on a scourge hook for the first time, the generator with the most progress will explode and lose up to 15% progress. This means that this perk can only be used 4 times in a match and should be less oppressive than it was before.
The Boon: Circle of Healing nerf
Unfortunately, survivors will no longer be able to self-heal within the boon’s radius without a med kit. Instead, Boon: Circle of Healing’s main ability will provide a 50% healing speed bonus when healing other survivors. However, this no longer stacks with med kit speed bonuses. Another change is that the auras of all injured survivors within the boon’s range will be revealed to all other survivors, still keeping the boon as a safe place to regroup and heal together.
The Overcharge nerf
Overcharge has been nerfed, reducing the maximum regression speed to 130% (down from 200%) and the missed skill check penalty is 2/3/4% (down from 3/4/5%). However, the start regression speed has been slightly increased to 85% (up from 75%).
The Call of Brine nerf
The Onryo’s perk Call of Brine has been nerfed as well, reducing additional regression speed to 125% (down from 200%) when a generator has been kicked.
The Gearhead rework
Gearhead has been reworked, now activating when a survivor loses a health state. Whilst active, any survivor who hits a good skill check will have their aura revealed to the killer for up to 8 seconds. This new function is completely different to Gearhead’s previous abilities.
The overzealous buff
Finally, Overzealous now will activate after blessing a totem (instead of just cleansing a totem), and its repair speed bonus is now up to 10% (was 8%). This means that Overzealous may finally have a spot in survivor’s boon builds.
Flashlight Changes
Dead by Daylight is removing killer-specific flashlight interactions, due to how niche they are. From now on, survivors can no longer use the flashlight to burn the Wraith out of invisibility, burn the Nurse out of blinks, scare away the Artist’s crows, or destroy the Hag’s phantasm traps.
Instead, survivors can now interact with the Hag’s traps to get rid of them, by crouching over a trap and rubbing it away for a couple seconds. The developers have made this change to make sure that the Hag is not too oppressive after traps can no longer be removed by the flashlight.
New Visual Terror Radius Accessibility Option
There is a new visual terror radius option added to Dead by Daylight, as an accessibility option for those hard of hearing. A heart will appear in the centre of your survivor’s chest, and beat more intensely as the killer approaches. This is very similar to the heartbeat mechanic in Dead by Daylight mobile and has been long-awaited for the rest of the community.
Overall, this Mid-chapter update is set to be a huge change for the game, and likely will shift the meta away from generator-kicking as well as from Dead Hard, which has dominated survivor’s loadouts for years. This update is set to come to the Public Test Server on the 28th March, with a live release usually scheduled for three weeks later. As always, there might be changes made between the test build and the live release, so make sure to check it out for yourself. To read the full patch notes, head over to the Dead by Daylight forums.
In light of all these changes, make sure to check out the best niche survivor builds for 2023 for the best chance of escape, or take a look at the newest killer and survivor perks here.