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Survivalist - Jack of all trades rework

Aze

Grizzled Veteran
Mar 19, 2010
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So, I like Survivalist being a jack-of-all-trades perk, but feel it needs to actually be more flexible in that regard. So, let's just get straight to the ideas:

Passives:

* Damageboost = Raised to 20%, and gives 2x bonus on melee weapons (meaning 40% for melee, instead of 20%)

* Damage resistance = Kept as is, but resistance to fire and explosives are doubled (50%)

* Heavy Armor Training = Removed

* Survivor = Increases max health by 25% at max level (1% per level).

* Weaponswap speed = Increase weapon swapspeed by 25% (1% per level)

* Strength = Increases carrying capacity by 3 (1 every 7 levels).

* ZED Time Reload = Kept as is.


The reasoning for these changes:

* Melee damageboost - This is because melee weaponry needs a bigger damageboost than other weapons to keep up, and making a talent (Melee Expert) specifically for boosting melee power is way too niched for a perk like this. Hence, baking it into its passive. Sidenote; The reason it's only 2x bonus (instead of 3x to make it more similar to current Survivalist's melee boost) is because I'd like for Melee weapons to be stronger by default (about 20%), and Berserker's talents to be changed in tandem, to indirectly help other perks' melee crossperks (such as Survivalist with any melee, or Demolition with Pulverizer) to be more viable damagewise.

* Explosive/fire resistance - To reduce selfharm, mainly, when wielding these weapons, to allow safer uses of these types if you wish, but also gives a general survivability boost against Husks, Bomber EDARs and various bossmoves.

* HAT removal - This passive hinders the value of healing talents quite a bit (since they aren't valuable for oneself until you have lost most/all armor)

* Health passive - To compensate a bit for the removal of HAT.

* Weaponswap speed: Jack of all trades kinda needs to swap faster to go faster to each "trade", so to speak.

* Carrying capacity - To allow the Survivalist to be a bit more flexible with weaponchoices by default, without necessitating to pick Weapon Harness.



Talents:

* Level 5 - Dexterity - Reduce all recoil by 15%, increases reloadspeed of ALL weapons (elite reload).

* Level 5 - Tactical Magazines - Reduce all recoil by 15%, increases magazinesize of all eligible weapons by 50% or grant elite reloads to weapons that are not eligible for the magsize boost.

* Level 10 - Mad Doctor - Increases melee attackspeed by 20%, movementspeed by 10% (20% when using melee or syringe), potency of all your healing by 30% and reduces healing dart/syringe cooldown by 50%.

* Level 10 - Survival Instincts - Increases melee attackspeed by 20%, movementspeed by 10% (20% when using melee), regenerate 1 health every second and you can't be grabbed by Clots.

* Level 15 - Combat Vest - Increase ammo by 20%, damage resistance by 5% (additive to passive), allow allies to take ammo from you (like Support), and you may choose between HE Grenades, Freeze Grenades and Medic Grenades (Can be chosen at the trader or in the perk UI by clicking on the grenade icon)

* Level 15 - Weapon Harness - Further increase weaponswap speed by 25% (additive to passive), carrying capacity by 2, max grenades by 1, allow allies to take grenades from you (like Demolitionist) and you may choose between HE Grenades, Molotovs and Flashbangs (Can be chosen at the trader or in the perk UI by clicking on the grenade icon)

* Level 20 - Zed Buster - Increase your max health by 25%, and every 4th Zed you kill will explode, damaging and stunning all nearby Zeds.

* Level 20 - Havoc - Increase all weapon incapacitation effects by 100% and grants weaponspecific bonuses:
-- Non-penetrating, non-explosive ballistics = +2 penetration power (Like SMGs, ARs, Killerwatt fullauto etc)
-- Innately penetrating ballistics = +200% penetration power (Like all shotguns, Railgun etc)
-- AoE weapons = +40% AoE (All Demolitionist weapons, but also includes any of your handgrenades and fiery AoEs)
-- Beam weapons = +40% range (Like Freezethrower, Flamethrower, MWG, Killerwatt charge-attack etc)
-- Melee weapons = 40% reduced damagepenalty on directional attacks (Note: I have a similar talent idea for Berserker in my rework for it).

* Level 25 - Madman - Same as now (3x attackspeed)

* Level 25 - Unstoppable - EDIT: Run with full movementspeed, a 25% movementspeed boost and deal massive damage and knockdown power to any enemy you run into (i.e. a copy of SWAT's Battering Ram). Kudos to MarkoS98 for this suggestion!

The reasoning for these changes:

* Dexterity - Making reloadspeed universal is key to keeping the Survivalist a true jack-of-all-trades. The recoil reduction is to make sure the Survivalist can handle more types of weapons.

* Tactical Magazines - The best counterpart to reloadspeed is magazinesize. But not all weapons are eligible for that bonus - which is why they then get the elite reloadbonus if not eligible! (Imo, this is how Support's High Capacity Magazines talent should work too for the Boomstick & Doomstick, and Commando's High Capacity Magazines for M16M203 altfire and HMT501 altfire).
Weapons that get elite reloads instead of magsize = Pulverizer, Hemoclobber, Eviscerator, Boomstick, Doomstick, all Demolitionist weapons (except Husk Cannon, and the primary mag on M16M203 - its altfire still gets the elite reloading though!), all Gunslinger weapons (except Spitfires and HMT101), all Sharpshooter weapons (except FAL) and HMT501's altfire.
Or from another angle; All weapons that get the magsize bonus are = All Commando weapons (except M16203 and HMT501 altfire), all SWAT weapons, all Support weapons (except Boom & Doom), all Medic weapons (except HMT501 altfire), all Firebug weapons, all Survivalist weapons. The rest (and the exceptions) get elite reloads.
In short, all weapons that can't get magsize bonuses by its original perks get elite reloads instead.

* Mad Doctor - Keeps the improved healing aspects, but bakes in better movementspeed and melee attackspeed (Since Melee Expert was removed and partially baked into the passive). The movespeed bonus is universal, but further improved when wielding melee weapons or the syringe.

* Survival Instincts - A selfish and passive version of Mad Doctor, basicly, but also less potent in regards to potential healing-output (both for self and others).

* Combat Vest - The damage resistance bonus is there since the other bonuses (Grenade type and max ammo) do nothing for you if you don't have enough money. The ammo-supplies is just to give the Survivalist a bit more supportive potential.

* Weapon Harness - The weaponswap speed is there since the other bonuses (Grenade type, max grenades and increased carrying weight) do nothing for you if you don't have enough money, and also as a compensation for the lesser usefulness of the weightincrease (compared to current Survivalist, now when you partially get it in your passives). The increased grenade amount is also compensation for the lesser weightbonus, but also because its grenadechoices are generally a bit inferior to those provided by Ammo Vest. Further, the grenade-supplies is just to give the Survivalist a bit more supportive potential.

* Zed Buster - The healthboost is there to at least give this talent some useage even when you're fighting singular targets. The explosion was also made non-RNG!

* Havoc - Incapacitation bonus makes this talent relatively useful regardless of weapon you use. The other bonuses (penetration, AoE, beam range, directional-melee-penalty-reduction) are all there to increase your fighting qualities in various weapon-specific ways, but they all relate to increase your "group fighting" and/or "fighting range" capabilities.

* Madman - Is good, so is kept as is.

* Unstoppable - Since Lockdown was more or less given to the Havoc talent, this talent was changed to be the same as SWAT's Battering Ram, which is both a cool and functional skill, which also brings something quite different to the table compared to Madman.



What do you say? Good enough? Or overpowered, even?
 
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Cool take on Survivalist, but overall it's just slightly overpowered and over complicated at certain points, I'd change some of them like this:

*Passives

+Damage Boost: 2x bonus on melee weapons;
-since I don't think more than 30% bonus dmg is really needed;

+Weapon Swap Passive isn't needed;
-It feels like it clutters the passives and I think the reload speed from your Dexterity (level 5) talent/skill AND the Ammo Vest (level 15) talent/skill is enough, this way the skills are more meaningful / impactful imo.

*Talents/Skills

+Target Practice (Level 5): Increase damage with all guns* by 15%, reduce recoil by 15%
-This talent shouldn't affect melee weapons or flamethrowers, and increasing dmg by 15% feels more meaningful

+Mad Doctor (Level 10): Everything the same except the 20% movement speed with melee or syringe (keep the 10% movement speed at all time)
-It shouldn't give bonus to melee weapons since the Survival Instincts talent/skill already does that and the additional 10% movement when holding a syringe is kinda pointless tbh.

+Ammo Vest (Level 15): Everything same except you can't choose the grenades type in shop. (You just get Medic Grenades);
+Weapon Harness (Level 15):Everything same except you can't choose the grenades type in shop. (You just get a Molotov);
-Although I do think being able to choose grenade types in shop sounds cool, I just don't see it happening. That's because (if i remember correctly) from a KF2 Q&A on Reddit changing the shop menu UI requires an overhaul of the menu, and from a developers perspective having to overhaul a properly working shop menu to implement a niche feature for 2 talents/skills from a (relatively) niche perk is just not worth it, a big no-no...

+Zed-Buster (Level 20): Just have it the same as Zed-plosion (the current beta 2 version);
-There's no need for that 5% additional damage, isn't impactful and keeps things simple without it (and i like how it works in the current beta 2 tbh);

+Havoc (Level 20): Remove the projectile speed bonus;
-I and a majority of people are used to the projectiles speed and as such it's easier to predict where to shoot, whereas changing the speed might throw people like me off and besides, part of the fun (and skill) of projectile weapons is predicting when they will hit the target.

+Unstoppable (Level 25): Either keep 200% incapacitation and simply move in real time -OR- have it function like the SWAT's battering ram talent/skill (move real time, running into zeds knocks them down);
-It is VERY rarely that you get hit or want to get hit during zed time, besides zed time should be the opportunity for hitting zeds, not getting hit by them and as such the damage reduction is kinda pointless.
-Real time movement is simpler compared to 3x movement and a more elegant way of handling faster movement speed during zed time.
-Having both incapacitation and the battering ram effect would make it a superior version than SWAT's level 25 talent/skill and then the'd have to buff that too...


Overall you made an amazing suggestion for a survivalist rework, but i just found it a bit bloated with needles complications here and there and a bit too strong in very few places. There's only so much you can fit in the talent/skill descriptions and only so many passives that can fit in the perk overview screen. Either-way nicely done!
 
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MarkoS98;n2330221 said:
Cool take on Survivalist, but overall it's just slightly overpowered and over complicated at certain points, I'd change some of them like this:

*Passives

+Damage Boost: 2x bonus on melee weapons;
-since I don't think more than 30% bonus dmg is really needed;

+Weapon Swap Passive isn't needed;
-It feels like it clutters the passives and I think the reload speed from your Dexterity (level 5) talent/skill AND the Ammo Vest (level 15) talent/skill is enough, this way the skills are more meaningful / impactful imo.

*Talents/Skills

+Target Practice (Level 5): Increase damage with all guns* by 15%, reduce recoil by 15%
-This talent shouldn't affect melee weapons or flamethrowers, and increasing dmg by 15% feels more meaningful

+Mad Doctor (Level 10): Everything the same except the 20% movement speed with melee or syringe (keep the 10% movement speed at all time)
-It shouldn't give bonus to melee weapons since the Survival Instincts talent/skill already does that and the additional 10% movement when holding a syringe is kinda pointless tbh.

+Ammo Vest (Level 15): Everything same except you can't choose the grenades type in shop. (You just get Medic Grenades);
+Weapon Harness (Level 15):Everything same except you can't choose the grenades type in shop. (You just get a Molotov);
-Although I do think being able to choose grenade types in shop sounds cool, I just don't see it happening. That's because (if i remember correctly) from a KF2 Q&A on Reddit changing the shop menu UI requires an overhaul of the menu, and from a developers perspective having to overhaul a properly working shop menu to implement a niche feature for 2 talents/skills from a (relatively) niche perk is just not worth it, a big no-no...

+Zed-Buster (Level 20): Just have it the same as Zed-plosion (the current beta 2 version);
-There's no need for that 5% additional damage, isn't impactful and keeps things simple without it (and i like how it works in the current beta 2 tbh);

+Havoc (Level 20): Remove the projectile speed bonus;
-I and a majority of people are used to the projectiles speed and as such it's easier to predict where to shoot, whereas changing the speed might throw people like me off and besides, part of the fun (and skill) of projectile weapons is predicting when they will hit the target.

+Unstoppable (Level 25): Either keep 200% incapacitation and simply move in real time -OR- have it function like the SWAT's battering ram talent/skill (move real time, running into zeds knocks them down);
-It is VERY rarely that you get hit or want to get hit during zed time, besides zed time should be the opportunity for hitting zeds, not getting hit by them and as such the damage reduction is kinda pointless.
-Real time movement is simpler compared to 3x movement and a more elegant way of handling faster movement speed during zed time.
-Having both incapacitation and the battering ram effect would make it a superior version than SWAT's level 25 talent/skill and then the'd have to buff that too...


Overall you made an amazing suggestion for a survivalist rework, but i just found it a bit bloated with needles complications here and there and a bit too strong in very few places. There's only so much you can fit in the talent/skill descriptions and only so many passives that can fit in the perk overview screen. Either-way nicely done!

Alright man, thanks for the thorough feedback! I'll deal with each point seperately:

PASSIVES:

* Damage boost on melee - 2x versus 3x.

Whatever fits better really. Consider though that currently, Survivalist has 15% passively for any weapon, and another 50% from Melee Expert for a total of 65% for melee weapons. With just 45% (which is what you'd get with 3x damage), it'd still be a bit on the lower end, so lowering it to 2x seems... underwhelming, imo.

* Swapspeed

As I explained, the Survivalist is supposed to be a jack-of-all-trades, so swapping between your various weapons quickly is quite important if you wanna fill the various roles at a good speed. Sure, this passive isn't needed really, sure, but it just fits too bloody well :D However, why do you think it clutters the passives? Many perks have 6 passives, Survivalist currently has 4 (would be 6 with my suggestions)

TALENTS:

* Target Practice - Damage only affecting guns?
Why though? That goes against a big idea behind this rework; Make no talent pidgeonholed too hard for weapons. Dexterity boosts speed on both guns (reloadspeed) and melee (attackspeed), so it's fair whatever you pick. If Target Practice increases damage of guns, it should for melee as well so it also remains fair there. After all, the intent of the talents was to choose speed vs power, whatever fits your style (or your kit, if you go with metabuilds) best, not a "guns+melee versus only for guns" kind of choice. So that's a powerful disagreement on my end.
As for raising it to 15%... that's a bit risky, imo. That's doubling your damageboosting for most weapons.

* Ammo Vest - No choice of grenades.
Well Medic grenades are pretty much the best choice here anyway, so I'd be fine with that. But then Weapon Harness should NOT convert your grenades to anything else (i.e. they should stay as HE grenades), so you have a choice to keep them as is. If Weapon Harness made the HE grenades ALSO make a fire-effect (basicly HE + Molotov). Survivalist's Molotov lasts much shorter time anyway, so I see no harm in that.

* Weapon Harness - Molotov vs HE Grenade, if no possibility to choose grenade.
See my response on Ammo Vest.

However, I can see ONE reason for this kind of "grenade swap UI change" to happen though; If new Tier 1 weapons (i.e. starterweapons) ever were to be made, then each perk could potentially get the ability to swap out which starting weapon they use. With a function like that, adding swappable grenades for Survivalist wouldn't be a huge stretch, nor a big workload either, I bet. But all that is incredibly unlikely anyway :p

* Zed Buster - Remove the reliable passive.
I honestly hate how this and Firebug's talents work; They are RNG and they are entirely useless against singular targets. Even if you feel the 5% damage bonus is useless, I feel it's not; As it at least adds that feeling of non-RNG and single target usefulness. It might not be superuseful for most Zeds (there the RNG-explosion would be more noticeable), but it might make a difference on bosses (where the RNG-explosion is, arguably, at its weakest). So, again, I'm being adamant about this little addition. Sure, it doesn't have to be a damagebonus, but it needs to be something that's reliable and always useful.
Also, it IS otherwise the reworked Spontaneous Zed-plosion (higher chance and stun instead of knockdown), in case you missed that (just for clarity)

* Havoc - Remove the projectile passive.
Sure, not a big deal I guess. But on the other hand, there's also Zed Buster to pick as an alternative. And I don't think it would be that hard to learn the new trajectories, to be honest.

* Unstoppable - Full movespeed and no DR - Or make it like Battering Ram
I totally understand the removal of DR (even if it's doing no harm, really). And I also understand simply making it into realtime movespeed (then the DR-bonus is definitely less useful, no doubt).
Giving the Survivalist the equivalent of Battering Ram sounds like a very, very viable alternative to me (if nothing else, a LOT better than the current Lockdown one, that's for certain). I'm very intrigued by this idea, thanks for this suggestion! I'm actually gonna edit that in to the original post!
As for the "If it was Battering Ram + something else, SWAT's Battering Ram would need to be buffed", well, yeah, I feel SWAT's Battering Ram actually needs a buff. In fact, I'll show you my little idea for buffing it:

Siege (Namechange to make more sense of the additions):
During Zed Time, move in real-time and have massive knockdown power on any Zed you run into. In addition, a successful Flashbang will trigger Zed Time (It needs to stun at least one enemy for this to happen. If you feel this buff to Battering Ram is overpowered, remember to compare it to Rapid Assault and that Flashbangs aren't unlimited)

With that then in mind, giving the fullspeed running and knockdown as Survivalist's other Zed Time talent, along with something else, could be totally viable.


Again, thanks for the thorough feedback, and thanks for enjoying the overall suggestions! ^_^
 
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Dr. Lethal;n2330328 said:
You may want to revise Strength, because +1 every 10 levels will grant you only 17kg of carrying capacity, which isn't much and the game only goes up to lvl 25.

Seems plausible for the rest.

Ah, I think you missed that I said that you get +1 weightbonus already from level 1 (then +1 more at level 10, and another +1 at level 20). But if my suggested scaling is not possible to implement, then changing it to like every 7 or 8 levels would suffice to fix this issue.
 
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Ok...there are little numbers everywhere here...that's a pain in the dick to balance. but at least you stayed on topic as the class instead of "add a jumppack"...or something....

Anyway I think my major underlining issue with reworking the survivalist and the constant problem I see when people try to tackle it...is that the survivalist has access to EVERY weapon

=======================================================================================================

He's an example from your tree.
Tier 10 right side. (Survival instincts)​

You made that to be used in melee but all I thought about was a berserker except they decided m99 or rpg is the new eviscerator​

In short, keep in mind every gun is accessible, and most players will NOT use things as you intended if a better solution presents itself.
 
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KillerGerbil;n2330739 said:
Ok...there are little numbers everywhere here...that's a pain in the dick to balance. but at least you stayed on topic as the class instead of "add a jumppack"...or something....

Anyway I think my major underlining issue with reworking the survivalist and the constant problem I see when people try to tackle it...is that the survivalist has access to EVERY weapon

=======================================================================================================

He's an example from your tree.
Tier 10 right side. (Survival instincts)​

You made that to be used in melee but all I thought about was a berserker except they decided m99 or rpg is the new eviscerator​

In short, keep in mind every gun is accessible, and most players will NOT use things as you intended if a better solution presents itself.

Actually, I didn't have that talent intended to be a melee/Berserker choice at all (even if it'd help that style, obviously). It's supposed to be a general and selfish survivability skill, intended to be useful with any weapon you wield, melee or not.
 
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