Today we're showing off the rulebook for Dead by Daylight™: The Board Game! Come and see how the game is played.
Download the rulebook!
For those who want ALL the details, you can download the rulebook right here. But if you want to just read the highlights and key mechanics from a top-down perspective, here they are!
Asymmetric Sides
One player will play a lone Killer, while the other 2–4 players will play as Survivors.
Each side has a different objective.
If you're the Killer, you want to accumulate 8 sacrifice progress, which you get by sacrificing Survivors on the hooks found throughout the trial grounds.
As a Survivor, you'll need to explore and find generators, then spend time repairing them. Repair 4 generators, then repair the exit gates, and the Survivors win as a team!
Secret Movement
The game's board is divided into zones, and each turn, you will move between zones—either to discover new interactive props as a Survivor, or to hunt down Survivors as the Killer.
All players select their moves for the turn simultaneously, and reveal them one by one as the round progresses. The Killer always goes last, and gets to take two turns—this allows them a lot of leeway to react to the Survivors, and makes the reveal tense until the very last second.
Bloodpoints & Perks
Each character, Killer or Survivor, has a set of special actions they can use called perks. Each of these perks has a cost in Bloodpoints that's needed to activate it. Perks let you bend and break the rules of the game, and ensure that each character plays differently.
Each Killer and Survivor has a standard loadout of 3 perks. You can also use the cards included in the game to customize your build, opening the door to all kinds of new strategies.
Just keep in mind that each perk can only be used once during each round of play, and bloodpoints are a very scarce resource. The best way to replenish them is to hunt for hex totems around the trial grounds.
Interactive Props
The game board contains a random distribution of props. Most actions in the game require characters to interact with props, and these props come in 4 different categories.
Objective Props are generators and exit doors. These are the props that Survivors will use to win the game.
Boldness Props are hooks and hex totems. These are props that the Killer will use to win the game or hinder the Survivors.
Survival Props are crates and lockers. These are tools the Survivors can individually use to protect themselves from the Killer.
Altruism Props are pallets and crows. These are useful to the Survivors as a team, and strategic use of these resources is critical to their victory.
Skill Checks
Skill checks are made using custom dice. A result of 1–4 is a success. A result of 5 is a great success. A result showing a skull is a failure.
Just like in the video game, only Survivors will make skill checks. Skill checks are used to resolve healing, hiding, repairing generators, and attempting to escape while being carried by the Killer.
Furthermore, whenever a Survivor fails a skill check, the Killer gets some extra bloodpoints, which eventually add up to let them use more perks or take bonus turns.
So there's a preview of some of the key mechanics in Dead by Daylight™: The Board Game! Join us on our live chat today at 2:30pm Mountain Time and we'll talk about the design processes and gameplay implications behind some of these mechanics. See you there!
Remember to check out the project and click "notify me on launch" so you can get your copy!
