In Dead By Daylight, you can choose to play as survivors. The survivors have no real ability to fight back against a killer, except by working together to fix generators or outrunning/hiding from killers. The survivors can try to do things like stun a killer by having the killer chase them and dropping pallets or trying to blind the killer with a flashlight. However, the survivors can't really use tools to fight back.

Fixing Generator


While it might sound terrible to be hunted and have no ability to defend yourself - since in real life that would suck, it is fun to play as a survivor if you are doing it with a group of friends. The reason it is fun is you have to trust and rely on your teammates to come help you, in order for you all to succeed. In order to escape the killer from the arena you are in, you have to fix at least 5 generators spread out throughout the map. Then, once 5 generators are fixed, the exit doors will be able to be opened. Alternatively, if your friends die and you are the sole survivor, you can also try to locate the exit hatch to escape.

Escaping via Open Exit

The number of exit gates that survivors need to repair is number of survivors loaded into the game +1. Once at least one of the two Exit Gates has been opened, the Endgame Collapse will commence. Survivors will have anywhere from 120 seconds to 240 seconds (if a survivor is hooked or in a dying state) to escape the Trial Grounds.

Escaping via Hatch

If all of your friends have died and you are the only survivor, you can alternatively try to locate the exit hatch that will automatically spawn when the last survivor is left standing. This hatch will have a holy sound coming from it. It will look like an open door with black mist coming from the floor. You can press M1 (left moust click) to jump through it to escape.

Unlike the survivors, a killer's goals differ. The killer's objective is to kill all the survivors before they an escape.

Killers can kill in a variety of different ways. The most common is for killers to place you on a hook. The hooks will take away a life state. If you are just starting the game, you will have 2 hook states. If the killer hooks you once, you just dangle. If the killer hooks you a second time, you need to do skill checks to stay alive. If the killer hooks you 3 times, you die.

Some killers can kill without hooking you. Several killers have add-ons or natural abilities to 'mori'. This means if they catch you- down you- even if no hooks are around, they can just murder you on the spot.

Each killer comes equipped with different basic perks. The killer perks can be obtained through earning in-game points, called Blood points. Using these points, items and perks can be earned in the blood web.

There are many killers to choose from. Each killer has different strengths and weaknesses. The mode that each killer uses to conqueror survivors is different. Familiarizing yourself with each killer's abilities can improve your play as both a survivor and killer. Many YouTube videos exist on tutorials for each killer.


Killer Ranks
Killer RanksIn the DBD community, there are frequent generalizations made about killer ranks, which refer to the strength of the killer. These are not official game ranks but rather ranks that the community has come up with in describing how strong or formidable killers typically are. Skilled killers typically use killers that can cover the map quickly, such as Nurse, Spirit or Hag. This are S rank killers. Below this are strong killers. The killers in A rank require more skill to be good. So, on and so forth. Realistically, any extremely skilled player can be a strong killer regardless of which character they choose to play if they know the abilities and limitations of their character. With proper add-ons, even 'lower tier' killers, such as the Clown can be extremely difficult to win against.


Brief on DBD Killers

• Artists - can locate you using birds and also down you using a giant bird
  
• Blight - lethal rushes at survivors to down them
  
• Cannibal - downs survivor with chainsaw from full health to dying state
  
• Cenobite - can throw chains at you; forces you to 'solve' his box; can teleport to said box
  
• Clown - throws bottles to speed boost himself or slow you down; can make it hard for you to see
  
• Death Slinger - can spear you from long distances and then down you
  
• Demogorgan -aka demo dog; teleports through portals and can 'shred' you
  
• Doctor- zaps people with electric shock ability; can use it to find you & force your body to lock
  
• Dredge - can teleport to lockers; can teleport locally
  
• Executioner - can leave 'trails of ooze' that give away your location & also can kill without hooks
  
• Ghost Face - stealth killer; stares at you to power up/ you can stare back
  
• Hag- sets traps that she can teleport to & hit survivors from; walking speed normally is slow
  
• Hill Billy - can fly across the map with his chainsaw; can instantly down people with it
  
• Huntress - throws hatchets at great distances; can throw them to kill you sniper style
  
• Knight - can camp like its ok with a bot that is a version of himself
  
• Legion - can hit survivors with ability to see other survivors heart beats
  
• Nemesis - can whip you with his tentacles; make you infected & have his zombies swarm you
  
• Nightmare - can sneak up on you in dream state; teleport to gens; fake pallets or blood pools
  
• Nurse - can basically kill you through walls; can fly across the map; no where is safe
  
• Oni- injures you; drinks your blood to power up & gain instant down abilities
  
• Onryo - can teleport out of TVs all over the map; can mori you if you don't 'return cassettes'
  
• Pig - stealth killer; can pounce on you & dash at you from close range
  
• Plague -aka vomie mommy; throws up on gens and people to infect them; can power up
  
• Shape - stealth killer; sneaks up on survivors & can 'expose them' to make them instant downs
  
• Spirit - can phase across the map quickly to get you from almost anywhere
  
• Trapper - sets bear traps that survivors can accidentally step in
  
• Trickster - can throw a bunch of knives at you so rapidly that you will get hit and downed
  
• Twins - sister (big body) can block and hook survivors; child (brother) can move fast & pounce
  
• Weskar - punches to kill and uses some weird foam to make you not sense his presence
  
• Wraith - turns invisible and sneaks up on survivors; can only hit survivors in visible form

As this is a teamwork based game, communication is key. You are going to have to work together and coordinate your abilities. This is why I recommend playing with voice chat enabled. You can do this by using Steam Voice Channels or Discord Group Chats as currently Dead By Daylight does not have its own voice communication feature.

With this technique, you can communicate in game. You can also pick out which survivor skills (perks) or offerings you will give so that they are synergistic with one another. There are some offerings that are labelled with "stacks" at the bottom. This means the offerings can be added onto others offerings to increase the yield. You can stack luck or stack blood point increases.

Alternatively, you can try to play in game using just hand signs from your character. You can press 1 for pointing if you wanted to show the other survivors something or make them look in a specific direction. You can press 2 if you want to signal follow me. Unfortunately, hand signals are currently limited to these two until more updates are made.

It is worth noting for PC players: In the lobby of Dead By Daylight, there is an option for in-game chat during the lobby and after the game before you exit out. You can type your comments into the chat box. All players can view the comments, including survivors and killer.

There are a lot of survivors to currently choose from. Not only do different survivors have different skins or appearances, each survivor has their own unique teachable perks. These benefits can be advanced and taught to other characters after leveling. For some survivors, it will be easier than others to escape as their abilities are more conducive to helping teammates out and fixing generators.

Survivors by Height


If you search for Dead By Daylight top survivors, you will see many different lists with opinions people have for which survivor is best. The survivor that is best for you and your team may differ depending on what suits you and your game style. In order below are some commonly recommended characters.

Meg Thomas

Meg has unique perks called "Quick and Quiet." This enables her to hide in lockers , vault over windows, and pallets with little to no sound. This helps her escape killer's once the killer has begun to chase her. She also has an ability called "Adrenaline," which automatically heals her one health state and gives her a sprint burst once the gates are opened.

Dwight Fairfield

His skills make him an effective leader for getting himself and everyone else out of the game alive. His skill "Bond" allows him to see his allies in a sizable area near him. His other skill "Prove Thyself" enables him to increase repair speed of any generators that he works on with allies by 10% each. Finally, his skill "Leader" makes him a valuable survivor because he can quickly unhook, search chests, heal and sabotage almost 25% more quickly.

Claudette Morel

Claudette is a very popular character in-game as she has abilities that facilitate healing. Healing is necessary for new survivors especially as they are likely to be injured often by the killer. Her supportive features, include empathy, botany knowledge, and self-care. This helps her heal without the aid of a first aid kit or teammate.

Jake Park

Jake is one of the original four Dead by Daylight survivors. He has a really great perk called "Iron Will" that pretty much makes him undetectable by sound. He is really hard to catch as a survivor because he is so quiet and his clothing has a tendency to blend easily into the background.

Perks in Dead By Daylight are abilities that each character can bring into the trial. As your character level advances through blood points in the blood web, you will be able to open up more perk slots. This means you can bring more perks into the trial. At level 1, you will start with 3 perks to choose from and 1 slot open to bring into the match. At level 5, another perk slot will open. At level 10, another perk slot. At level 15, all four perk slots will be open for you to equip.


A description of what the perk does is listed when you hover your mouse over the perk. You can see what abilities it will grant you. Generally useful perks are ones that are best suited to your design play. You should customize your build to match how you like to play. For example: If you are a stealthy type of player, perks that you may enjoy are: 1. Jake Park's Iron Will (which prevents you from making sounds when injured), 2. Jake Park's Calm Spirit (which prevents crows from making sounds when you are nearby), 3. Nea Karlsson's Urban Invasion (which lets you crouch walk), 4. featherweight (which reduces your scratch marks or foot prints when running).

Survivor Builds
The best build for your survivor depends on what kind of play style you have. You will want to use builds that naturally match your preferred style and also skill set. For beginners, this usually involves stealth builds rather than more aggressive looping builds.

Stealth Builds
Picking a small female character that has dull colored clothing is great for stealth plays. The character Claudette is known as Blendette because she can easily hide in the shadows and blend into the background. There are times if you stand still the killer may miss that you are hiding in plain sight. A good stealth build would be one that avoids detection. Perks that can help this include Iron Will (a Jake Park perk, which makes you quiet), Calm Spirit (another Jake Park perk, which makes woodland creatures not reveal your location and also your screams to remain silent), Spine Chill (a common perk, which alerts you if the killer is looking in your direction and makes you vault /cleanse/ repair faster if they are looking at you), Distortion (a Jeff Johansen perk, hides your aura for some duration) or Urban Evasion (a Nea Karlsson perk, which allows you to crawl around the map at fast speeds in crouch mode).

Of these, I would say the best if playing stealth on Claudette are iron will, spine chill, calm spirit, and urban invasion.

Efficiency Builds
If you would like to be efficient at playing survivor, you and your teammates will need to work together. Ideally, all teammates will want to survive together. The way you can do this is by having all teammates do some type of contributing action that will help your survival. For example: each team member that is not currently being chased or on the hook should be repairing generators or cleansing totems that are cursed.

Efficiency perks come in many different types and flavors. They are efficient because they help you do tasks faster or provide you information such as aura reading abilities which enable you to see information about what is going on in the map that you wouldn't normally otherwise be able to see.

Examples of Basic Types of Efficiency Perks

• Aura Reading Perks: Alert, Aftercare, Bond, Dark Sense, Kindred, Solidarity
  Generator Repairing/ Protecting Perks: Prove Thyself, Resilence, Spine Chill
  Hook Save Perks: Borrowed Time, Desperate Measures
  Exhaustion Perks: Balanced Landing, Dead Hard, Sprint Burst

To be efficient then, a great perk to equip is Kindred. This common perk allows you to see every survivor and the killer when a survivor is hooked. If you are on the hook and you have this equipped, the perk allows other survivors can see everyone's aura. This allows all teammates to be able to see visually what they should be doing. They should see who is in a chase, and therefore unable to do a hook rescue. They should be able to see who is working on a generator. They will also be able to see who is hiding in a closet.

Why Kindred

Another great perk to equip for efficiency is Resilence, this perk enables you to repair faster when you are injured. Therefore, if you have been hit, you are now faster at repairing, unhooking, vaulting windows, and even sabotaging hooks. Knowing combinations of perks really can maximize the value of any builds you create. For example: combining the capability of resilience and spine chill can enable you to vault at extreme speeds very quickly to avoid downing during chase while injured.

Typically for beginner to intermediates, it is recommended to run one of each type of perk: 1. aura perk (to know what's going on in the game), 1 gen repair perk (to help support your team), 1 hook save perk (usually borrowed time), 1 exhaustion perk (to get extra mileage in escaping chases). Choosing such a build enables well-roundedness as a player as you would be expected to perform each of these activities to be a good teammate.

To really learn about perks, it is recommended to read their description and try them out.

Challenge Yourself
Sometimes you want a challenge. If you do, there are some perks that are considered 'forbidden' in terms of how useless they are. In fact, they aren't really useless. Playing with these 'perks' make you play the game on 'ultra hard mode'.

No Mither
One such perk is David King's "No Mither." This controversial perk will increase the speed with which you repair generators and allow you to pick yourself up from the dying state an infinite amount of times. You will leave no pools of blood and your grunts of pain will be reduced to 75%. This sounds amazing, but nothing in life is free. In exchange, you will maintain a broken status throughout the game, which means you will be one shot.

To this day, many people debate about the usefulness of this perk. You can easily find discussion boards arguing about it. Some people believe if you run this perk, you will be tunneled out of this game by every killer. While it is true, many killers may go after you as easy prey and likely they will not slug you - if they know your abilities - there are many things you can do with the other perk slots you have to make the game exciting and doable.

Example of Successful No Mither Build
It is possible to escape from a trial with no mither against decent killers, such as bubbas. To do so, you may want to strategically compensate for your perk's weaknesses. You can be a super looper, and avoid being hit. This can be challenging as looping indefinitely is difficult.

You can also bring complementary perks, such as "flip flop", "tenacity", and "soul guard". As illustrated, the combination will allow you to pick yourself up quickly and take an extra hit once you get up from slugged state. You will also be able to crawl to a team mate who can hopefully revive you. Another more powerful combination may be "flip flop", "unbreakable" and "power struggle". The purpose of unbreakable in this case is to speed up the progression of flip flop.

Knowing the combination effect of your perks will help you maximize your build. You can use your build to do things like avoid detection or allow you to have maximum wiggle progression, so you can wiggle free from your killer's grasp, should you be caught.

In order to survive as a team, you will need for all of you to live. The only way for you to successfully exit is for you to all start working on generators. Immediately, you should try to locate a generator and begin repair on it. As there are 4 survivors to begin with and you need to start at least 5 generators, this means you each are responsible for 1.25 generator repairs (if you are all pulling your weight equally).

Of course, if any of you die, then you will immediately be responsible for more generators. Therefore, it is in your best interest to start working on completing generators as quickly as possible.

Locate an Unrepaired Generator

In order to fix a generator, all you have to do is locate one on the map. You can tell if the generator has not yet been repaired because it will be quiet and none of its 4 pistons will be moving. A partially completed generator will have <4 of its pistons moving. A fully repaired generator will have all 4 of its pistons moving. If the generator is not fully repaired, you can repair it by simply going up to it and pressing repair. Typically, unaided it will take 1 survivor 80 seconds to complete a generator repair assuming no skill checks are failed.

The speed with which you repair a generator can be enhanced by having another survivor come help you, successful completion of skill checks (hitting the space bar at the right time), bringing tools or perks that help you repair the generator.

Pass Skill Checks


When you fix generator, it is good to try to fix them in a strategic manner. For example: In the start of the game, you may want to spread out your characters so that you are not all in the same region of the map. This way the killer has to search more ground to find all of you. Or, alternatively, you may want to vary the location of which generators you choose to fix. This way the killer has to traverse more ground to search for incomplete generators.

Theory

In this game, it is important to be able to stall for time. Looping killers is essentially taking killers on a really long tour of the map without getting injured (ideally) or downed (before gens can get done). Your goal as a survivor is to waste the killer's time as much as possible, while your teammates hopefully do gens. Similarly if you are not being chased, then you should be working on a gen.


Know Thy Enemy

Generally killer's track in three ways:

• eyesight (they see you move)
  
• scratch marks (aka footprints)
  
• sound

Getting away from killer's is easy if you know how the killer's mind works. The killer has a limited field of view compared to the survivors. They can basically only see what's in front of them, whereas survivors can see almost completely in front and also to the sides. Many survivors can hide from killers if they just stay outside of their immediate field of view. This is why crouching or standing still behind objects works so well. It can be easy for survivors to exploit killer's weak eyesight.

Killers also track by scratch marks. Scratch marks are foot prints that survivors leave when they run. They only leave them in the game when they sprint. They do not leave them when they crouch or walk. Experienced survivors know to hide their scratch marks and run only when necessary. (Really advanced survivors may also alternatively leave purposefully confusing scratch marks that confuse the killer.) There are even some perks that will let you leave 'fake scratch marks' in a direction you are not even going (e.g. Diversion).

Killers also track via sound cues. A lot of killers will turn up their headphones so they can hear the survivors more easily. Survivor interactions make noise. Gen repair is noisy. Healing can be noisy if you miss skill checks. Running makes sound. Vaulting makes sound. Unhooking makes sounds. Walking and even breathing makes some slight sound. ( The exception is if the survivor runs perks like Iron Will and Calm Spirit together while crouch walking.)

Use Resources

A lot of survivors believe that looping killers is difficult. The reason why they think this is because killers have weapons in this game; survivors do not. However, you do have resources on the map that you can use to defend yourself. The first are pallets. Pallets are wooden objects that can be dropped on the killer to stun them. This will give you a brief duration, where you can escape. There are also vaulting locations. If you fast vault a window, for example, you can get a speed boost. This will also enable you to make distance and get away from the killer.

Other weapons include things like taking advantage of the map and stickiness of tiles. Some killers for example cannot easily turn around objects in the game. Blight, Bubba (aka Cannibal), and Billy for example have difficulty 'curving' around cylindrical shaped objects. You can make them collide with bushes when they aim their weapon. If you do this, you can often escape their one down shots and render them useless.

You can bring in game items, such as flashlights to blind or stun many killers. You can use flashlights to burn nurses when they blink or burn wraiths when they phase into existence. You can also blind killers if you aim correctly at the eyes when the killer cannot look away.


Basic Technique: Make Distance



In general, when you are being chased by most killers, you want to put as much distance as you can between you and the killer. The reason you do this is so that the killer can't hit you with their sharp pointy weapon. Many killers are known as M1 killers, which means they are mouse 1 killers. They can only deal damage by hitting you up close and personal. For these killers, you are best served by just putting as much space between you and their pointy object.


Basic Technique: Break Line of Sight



For all killers you want to lose them and you do this by confusing them. You try to make them loose track of you. You can do this in a variety of ways. However, the simplest way to lose the killer is to put objects between you and the killer's field of view. You can hide behind bushes, run behind tall structures, double back over your own tracks, and other clever ways to confuse the killer in terms of which way you went.

Intermediate Technique: Use Exhaustion Perks
Most standard DBD players will tell you to bring always at least one exhaustion perk into the game. The exhaustion perks work by helping you gain distance from the killer. They can do this by helping you boost your speed or reach distances greater than without them. There are a lot of heavily favored exhaustion perks.

Favored Exhaustion Perks Ranked (and by Survivor whom you unlock it from)

• Dead Hard - David King - press E when injured to make distance
  
• Sprint Burst - Meg Thomas - press space bar to get a boost in running
  
• Balanced Landing -Nea Karlsson - leap from tall buildings without fall damage
  
• Lithe - Feng Min - vault a window/pallet and burst into a fast sprint
  
• Overcome - Jonah Vasquez - get hit and get an extra few seconds of speed

Advanced Technique: Mirror the Killer's Motion

More advanced techniques of wasting the killer's time involve mirroring the killer. You can look at the killer and see what they are doing by looking behind you periodically when you run, or by standing still at a corner and watching where a killer begins to move. The reason you want to keep eyes on the killer is because you can use this information to decide where to go. You again will be trying to put distance between you and the killer, however with mirroring you are doing this continuously through timing. You are basically dancing with the killer in the same location for a prolonged period of time. As the killer moves closer to you, you move further away. However, you do this around an object, such as for example the Killer Shack.

Advanced Technique: Exploit Boons

Boons are so overpowered right now. Basically, there are 3 survivors that carry them. If you can unlock all of them, you can use a single survivor to light up a dull totem and bless it with abilities. The abilities include: Boon Circle of Healing (heal with out a med kit), Boon Shadow Step (hide your aura from killers), Boon Exponential (pick yourself up from the dying state), and Boon Dark Theory (gives you a 2% speed boost). Most killers will not be able to counter 1 let alone 2 of these perks. If you have a skilled enough survivor who is able to run all 4, the survivor team can be greatly enhanced by this exploitation.

If your teammates are struggling and you like them, you should try to help them. It's part of good teamwork after all. The way to help your teammate is to heal them if they are injured. You healing an injured teammate is always faster them they healing themselves with self-care. You can also try to unhook them if they have been placed on one by the killer.



If you are an especially good teammate, you can also try to divert the killer's attention of the killer is hunting one of them. You can rush out into the field and try to divert the killer's attention onto yourself. This last one is a risky move because you risk incurring their wrath yourself. However, this can be a nice gesture if you are a more skilled teammate than others. For example: If you are good at dodging attacks, your character has special abilities, or you have gotten zero hits and your friend might die because they have already been hit multiple times.

Juking a Killer (aka faking them out)


You can also try to save your friends by rushing out to the killer and trying to blind them with a flashlight. This move will work if you actually aim correctly and the killer hasn't equipped a perk to counter your flashlight move.

Blind Them