Dead by Daylight Is Getting Full-Time Skill-Based Matchmaking

Behaviour Interactive has been running skill-based matchmaking tests off and on in Dead by Daylight for some time now, and when the game’s 5.2.0 update drops, that system will become permanent. The developer announced this week its intentions to fully roll out the skill-based matchmaking system as part of that update alongside a reworked rank system that’ll now give players “Grades” depending on how well they do over time with different Survivors and Killers.

Under the new system, players will still earn “pips” from each match which are used to track performance within any one match. By earning enough pips over time, players raise their Grade. These Grades are staggered into different tiers that start at Ash IV and work their way up to the Iridescent level as players improve.

Grades reset on the 13th of every month with Bloodpoints awarded to players based on how high their ranks got during that month. Grades are shared between Survivors, but because of how different the Killers are, each Killer a player plays has their own Grade assigned to them. That means if your Wraith is only at the Ash grade, you’ll play against Survivors who are of a similar rank. If your Hillbilly is a much higher Grade, your matchmaking experience will scale accordingly.

While this sort of rollout has been inevitable since Behaviour’s been testing this system for a while now, SBMM is still far from a system that people universally agree on. Many players – and not just those in Dead by Daylight – view SBMM as a system which turns every game into tense experiences since you’re always matched against people of the same skill level. For the naysayers, it turns every experience into a sweaty, must-win scenario and detracts from the fun of the game.

Behaviour said the most recent test exceeded their expectations, however, and that almost off of the matches were “reasonably balanced.”

“During peak hours, 99% of matches formed were what we consider reasonably balanced, with your odds of escaping or killing a Survivor varying within +/- 25% of the average,” a post explaining the rollout of the new system said. “Better yet, 75% of matches fell within a +/- 5% chance. This is a huge step up from Rank-Based Matchmaking where 99% of matches saw a 45% variation, and 75% of matches saw a 25% variation.”

Dead by Daylight’s new SBMM system will release as part of the 5.2.0 update, though a release date for that patch hasn’t been set yet.