Hello Everyone, my name is Beef! I have played a lot of The Culling since it's release and turns out I'm pretty good at it too. After a lot of games I always try to think about what won me that game or I'll keep an eye out for my killer's perks to see how I could apply them to my own game play or counter them. If I would rate my skill level I would stand around a 8.5/10 as I do get outplayed sometimes but when i do that gives me the opportunity to learn and become better! Anyway, thanks for checking the guide out and I hope you enjoy it and learn a thing or two.

• Cannibal perk heals for 35 instead of 25
  I don't think that this will introduce this into many builds. It might be viable in a successful build but usually you have time to heal between fights.
  
• Speedy Spear and Runs With Knives perk movement speed increased to 13% from 10%
  This buff was added to account for the Leg Day nerf so while 13% seems even more broken, I think we will see less of these perks.
  
• Weakness Effect duration increased from 5 seconds to 12 seconds
  This is huge and my favorite change with the patch. I believe the wound types are what makes a weapon good. That is why blades were so good last patch because of the bleed effect. They would swing fast and apply that bleed wound that would do a lot of damage over the course of a fight but now with weakness getting it's effect more than doubled, it in my opinion extremely good right now.
  
• Chopper and Basher perks charge time reduction now applies to thrown charge time too.
  This is great for ax throwing builds in which I am a heavy fan of. Great synergy with the juggler airdrop.

• Leg Day perk movement speed reduced from 10% to 7%
  This is huge. I'd say the current meta is Legday in almost every perk build out there plus the ones that combo'd this with Runs with Knives or Speedy Spear. This means with people running this perk loosing stamina 7% more faster than you means it opens use to Big Lungs and Recovery. It nerfs people running around with the Stealthy perk and zooming in for a back stab while you're busy crafting or healing. I like this nerf, it was needed.
  
• Reduced damage of firearms (Magnum, SMG, Rifle) by 2 hit points per bullet
  This affects the Rifle the most as the rifle could two shot someone without armor who had full hp but now that its damage is 48, it cant do that. Other than that it doesn't affect the other fire arms too much.
  
• Reduced range of Pepper Spray from 7.5 to 6 meters
• Chemist perk rebalanced to offer 2X Stim effect duration instead
  of 3X
  This one is needed but I still think Chemist is a good perk as 2X the effect is still strong.
  
• Submission and Mangler perks now deal 135% melee damage dealt to
  opponent stamina instead of 200%
  This kind of ruins the solo ax or bludgeon exhaust build. I think you could still run this with a friend in teams because the two of you are still putting out a lot of damage.
  
• Orange Juice buffs reduced from 20% to 15%
  A fair nerf I'd say. Orange juice is still 3 shots packed into one so you cant really complain.
  
• Increased placement time of Explosive Mine and Remote Explosive
  from 0.5 seconds to 2.0 seconds
• Bleed wounds rebalanced to deal 4, 8, or 12 damage depending on
  wound intensity (down from 6, 12, 18)
  This is really big. Blades were OP since release just because of their ability to make you bleed for so much. Although this isn't centered around blade specifically, I think with the game play changes for attack speed with this will make the tier one hatches good early game and because of this you might see more tier one hatches being crafted right away due to the weakness wound buff.

• Bows now use varying bleed wound intensities: Crafted bow = *, Recurve Bow = **, Compound Bow = ***.
  This gives a nice tweak to the bows as the damage didn't scale too much but now with better bleed effects, the compound bow might be worth to order in an airdrop like Commando but I think gun drops for the same amount will still be favored.
  
• Health Station FUNC cost doubled to 1 FUNC for every 2 hit points from 1 FUNC for every 4 hit points
  This is pretty big as it makes healing from these stations even less FUNC efficient when compared to crafting a bandage which is 3 FUNC for 30 hp. This change does help healing during fights because you are getting healed more frequently.
  
• Players are forced out of crouch stance when shoved or receiving a melee combat interrupt.
  This is a big buff for traps! If someone is crouching over your snare you can shove them back into it. With myself loving traps like snares this is pretty awesome.
  
• Bows now use sights for aiming when zoomed instead of crosshairs
  HUGE LOW KEY NERF TO BOWS. Now you do not have that lovely crosshair for the bow if you are aiming down sights or not. This takes away so much vision with the bow and makes it harder to hit running targets.
  Some screens shots showing the new bow aiming
  ADS
  
  No ADS
  
  
• All melee weapons rebalanced in terms of jab and charged attack
  speeds
  This is also the one of the biggest changes in this patch. Now that swing speeds have been lowered, knifes now cant output such an insane amount of swings and bleed. In the early game you attack so much slower making weapons that have more damage in the beginning so much better.

After all these buffs and nerfs, I'd say is hit leg day the hardest with you running out of stamina 7% faster. I was forced to include Leg Day into every successful solo build before this patch and now that I do not think it's worth picking up that it will make the game more interesting as you will see a lot of new perk combos come out.

Two new/tweaked builds I think that will be good with this patches changes:

• The Trapper
  Perks
  • Bombsuit
    
  • Faster Trapper
    
  • Faster Crafter
  Air Drop
  
  • Trapper

I think this build will be fun and is now viable in free for all and even better in teams. With being able to push people that are bypassing your traps by crouching now and not being hunted down by someone with a Leg day + Runs with knives combo. If you run this build remember to back stab people caught in snares!

• Ax Maniac
  Perks
  • Chopper
    
  • Golden Arm
    
  • Big lungs/Recovery
  Air Drop
  
  • Juggler

With the new buffs to Chopper, I think that it will be easier to fling Axes at your opponents face. I'm a little unsure about the last perk spot but I think Big Lungs or Recovery will help you chase down people and help maintain a high stamina pool while constantly charging up throwing axes.

If you enjoyed the guide or learned something write a comment and rate! Thanks for reading!

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