Dead by Daylight – How to Survive While You’re Surviving (Survival Guide)

A guide to surviving each killer and a look at how to increase your chances of succeeding.

The Basics

So you’ve just got the game. Maybe you weren’t in the beta, and maybe you’ve played some but dropped it after a while. Welcome to the life of a survivor and their attempts to escape the horrifying entity. While you play the game primarily in third person the killer is a person always forced to a first person perspective which gives you the advantage of better situational awareness. Some of the basics still carry over but there’s a few new things to keep in mind.

Getting to know your killer: The Trapper

The elusive trapper, he was the killer available as an option since the beta. Knowing if he’s your killer is simple as you’ll see uncollected bear traps scattered throughout the level. Surviving him means being aware of your surroundings as he places bear traps in his enviroment that must be disarmed. If you get caught in one struggle until you get free while you wait for a team mate to help you out. Or hope that a team mate is the first one to get to you.

Places to be especially weary of:

  • Near Generators
  • Near Juke Spots (On the other side of windows to leap through; By objects you can throw down and interact with)
  • Near and inside of tall grass
  • Under hooked teammates or close by them
  • Blocking doors and entry points
  • Under exit gate switches and inside of exits
  • Near the escape Hatch
  • Out in the open

How to survive:

Moving slowly means that you’ll see the prompt to disarm it before you’ll actually step in it if you don’t have the perk to highlight them. Staying low and moving slow can keep you out of them and stop you from alerting everyone to where you are. Having a toolbox means you can disable these traps. This means that you’ll destroy them instead of disarming them and that they can’t be used again leaving him with fewer at his disposal.

Getting to know your killer: The Hillbilly

The Hillbilly is the second of the killers. Armed with a chainsaw at his disposal being hit by it automatically downs a survivor. He can be known as the killer by his distinct hunch backed appearance and with the distinct sound of his chainsaw revving. He can use the chainsaw to either charge at his prey or to quickly break interactable objects between you two.

How to survive:

His most deadly asset is the chainsaw. Although deadly and instantly fatal to any survivor hit by it his use of it is limited to a near straight line. Making a break for nearby objects and keeping props such as trees, rocks, crates, and other things around your enviroment and keeping them between you two will keep him from being able to successfully chainsaw you. Use your chances to break the distance between you in any way possible by vaulting over something if you’re sure he’s far enough so that he can’t grab you.

Getting to know your killer: The Wraith

The wraith is the third of the deadly killers. Armed with only a bell at his disposal he uses stealth to dispatch of survivors by turning invisible. While invisible your ability to sense a killer by his heartbeat is gone, meaning that being aware of your surroundings is paramount to success. He can be known as the killer by the distinct ringing he uses to turn himself between invisible and visible.

How to survive:

He’s unable to attack while invisible, and during the transition between visibility and invisibility. Although his main advantage is being able to turn invisible this doesn’t grant him full invisibility meaning that you’ll be able to see him shimmer along the enviroment if you keep aware of your surroundings to look for him. Noticing him while he’s invisible without the use of your heartbeat sensor and breaking for it during the transitions to his visibility are the keys to coming out of your encounters with him alive.

Survival Tips: How do I make it out alive

Making it out alive means identifying your killer and knowing if it isn’t the trapper. If you hear any of the indicators that its either of the other killers this means that you can be less cautious about bear traps since they’re unable to use them and instead focus on how to survive against them. Keeping things in mind such as the lowered vaulting speed which gets slower each time you juke in succession, which has a cooldown before it returns to its original speed, and keeping an eye out for the red cone of vision that is his line of sight and lets you know which way they’re looking, but here’s some more tips on how you’ll most likely make it out alive.

  • Stay low and move slow: Know when to run and when to walk as running leaves a trail mark that a killer can follow to your location that stays long enough for him to find you if he’s on your tail. Try to stay behind objects, inside of tall grass, and by objects you can use in case your pursuer is able to find you. Stay hidden and don’t panic if he’s close. You can give away your position if you stand up and break off running but he doesn’t know you’re there yet, and if you’re injured pay attention to the wimpering you’ll make, as it produces enough sound for him to know you’re close, and the trail of blood you leave that stays a few seconds which is more than enough for him to follow you. Try to stay in tall grass where puddles of blood can be concealed by the enviroment, and especially if you get downed enough to crawl but he hasn’t picked you up yet. While you’re laying down your teammates can see where you are, and crawling for tall grass and away from the area while staying concealed can mean the difference between being hooked or not if hes wandered off.
  • Stay aware of your surroundings: If you hear a heartbeat and you’re in the middle of repairing a generator move away from it until the heartbeat is gone and your killer is off to check somewhere else. If you’re in the middle of repairing a generator, unhooking someone, or opening a gate and he’s close enough to come after but you aren’t close to finishing stop working on it and run off. He can instantly shoulder you if he catches you in the middle of doing something. At the same time make a note of where the basement is on each level and make an effort to stay far, far away from it.
  • Stay Quiet: Be careful to not make a lot of noise. These leave identifiers that the killer can follow to your location. Actions that make noise are sprinting to vault over windows and cabinets, throwing cabinets down, and messing up skill checks. If you make any noise while the killer isn’t by you consider moving to another area and coming back later. Chances are he’s on his way to check it out.
  • Lend a helping hand: You’ll need to rely on your team mates and need each others help to survive. Help repair generators together, heal each other, and help each other off of hooks if possible. Make sure it’s safe and that you have enough time to do each of these actions. Prioritize healing your teammates over repairing a generator together if you encounter one while working on a generator, and repair generators if the killer is elsewhere instead of hiding and waiting for your team to die.
  • Know when to fold them: Ideally you’ll want everyone to survive, but at the same time its not always possible. Know when a situation is too much to go and help someone. These include times where the killer is sitting at their body to make sure it gets sacrificed, if the killer left a survivor incapacitated instead of hooking them, or if a survivor is hooked onto a hook that’s inside of the basement. More likely than not the killer will use them as bait to lure people closeby, and If the killer is unwilling to follow you away to leave them or is watching them your time could be better spent repairing a generator. This goes double for dangerous hooks like those in the basement. If you can’t rescue them at least survive instead of going down with them, but keep in mind that he can only focus on one thing at a time if he’s downed two people stuck on the surface if they aren’t close by. 
  • Closets: Like in the movies you can take your chances and hide inside of one, but if its close enough to a generator or where you leave your scratch marks at then the killers will often check them leaving you to be instantly downed. Risky to do but can be done if he doesn’t know you’re there to begin with, but better left avoided, especially when injured. Not only do leave a puddle of blood under it if you’re injured, but your wimpering will attract him to you. 
  • Running away: If the killers hot on your heels its time to run. Try to keep as many objects between you two as possible. Hitting him with interactable objects you can throw down stuns him and causes his camera to look up, while breaking them or climbing through windows causes his sight to breifly look down. If the trapper gets caught in one of his bear traps it’ll free any survivor caught in his arm, but also causes him to look down as if hes picking one up or putting one down. If you’re able to break line of sight consider walking and crouching behind objects instead of running off and leaving a trail. Chances are you may be able to shake him and walk away while his back is turned. 
  • Hooks: Having a toolbox means that you can sabotage any hook that isn’t a basement hook. With enough charges this can leave the killer unable to hook anyone on the surface, forcing him to walk long distances to hook a survivor and giving you more time to struggle free. At the same time if you happen to be caught and hung on one don’t fight or struggle especially if he’s watching you bleed out. You have a 5% chance at escaping each time you do it, and it runs down your meter for how long you can hang there leaving you with a cap at three chances for success while lowering how many times you can be hung before you’re automatically sacrificed. This not only leaves your teammates with less time to attempt to rescue you if they’re going for it, but if the killer is watching you he has less time to babysit you before he can move on to hunt others. At the very least if your team doesn’t get you down you’ve made him waste enough time for them to repair some generators. Hold out for as long as possible and only struggle if it’s your only option of being rescued such as being hooked while everyone else is either downed or also hooked or you know they aren’t coming back for you. 
  • Leaving: There’s two ways to win. One is by leaving through the hatch and the other is by exiting through one of the two exit gates located on every level. If there are only two of you left consider locating the hatch and making a note of where it is in case your partner goes down and return to repairing generators. At the same time if you think you can open an exit before the killer can reach you and you have enough health to take a single hit you’ll be able to run out the gate to freedom. If you’re able to open the exits and you aren’t the last one consider hiding behind one of the two brick walls for the rest of your team and those injured to make it out, and if they get downed consider the risks of saving them against escaping. You may not be able to save them and make it out yourself. In the worst case you may die trying. 
  • Items: These are intended to help you survive against your killer and can be found scattered in the level inside of chests or taken in with you. Escaping with one means keeping it but dying while holding one means losing it until you can regain another one from the bloodweb. While the flashlight can blind your pursuer temporarily and cause him to drop a survivor if he’s holding them keep in mind that he can drop them and chase after you instead. At the same time make sure its safe before sabotaging a hook with a toolbox or healing yourself or a teammate with a medkit.
Volodymyr Azimoff
About Volodymyr Azimoff 15056 Articles
I love games and I live games. Video games are my passion, my hobby and my job. My experience with games started back in 1994 with the Metal Mutant game on ZX Spectrum computer. And since then, I’ve been playing on anything from consoles, to mobile devices.

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