Dead by Daylight The Skull Merchant Killer Perks, Abilities & Build Guide

The Skull Merchant, aka Adriana Imai, is the newest killer in Dead by Daylight. Along with the Skull Merchant comes two survivors, Thalita and Renato Lyra, who are siblings with perks based around working together. Considering these new survivors have some pretty good perks, you might want to check out The Skull Merchant’s perks, abilities, and best builds in order to counter them.

What Are The Skull Merchant’s Abilities & Perks

The Skull Merchant’s power enables her to set up drones around the map, which helps her to easily track the survivors’ whereabouts and weaken them. Her perks allow her to slow down healing, see the survivor’s auras, and gain some speed. The Skull Merchant’s perks are as described below:

• THWACK!: After hooking a survivor, the next time you break a wall or a pallet, all of the survivors will scream and you will see their auras for up to 4 seconds.
• Leverage: Every time you hook a survivor, you will earn a token up to a maximum of 10. Each token you earn will decrease survivors’ healing speeds by 3/4/5% depending on the level of the perk. These percentages will stack for each token meaning you can slow healing speed by up to a maximum of 50%.
• Game Afoot: When you hit the survivor who has been chased the longest in the match, you will then be able to gain a 5% haste status effect after breaking a wall, pallet, or damaging a generator. The survivor with the longest chase time will also become the obsession.

Best Build for ‘THWACK!’ in Dead by Daylight

Being able to see survivors’ auras is incredibly useful, but in order for THWACK! to work you need to be breaking walls and pallets, which takes some time. Here are some of the best perks for pallet and wall-breaking speed:

• Brutal Strength (The Trapper)
• Enduring (The Hillbilly)
• Fire Up (The Nightmare)

With Brutal Strength, you’ll be able to break walls and pallets, and damage gens faster which is ideal. While on your pallet-busting journey, there is the chance of getting hit by one, which is why we have Enduring to reduce the time you’re stunned for. Fire Up will also increase the breaking speed each time a generator is finished and it will stack with Brutal Strength, which makes them perfect together.

Best Build for ‘Leverage’ in Dead by Daylight

Considering this perk slows down healing, you definitely want perks to benefit from that, or perks that will make healing overall more difficult for them. While there are only four perks that can be equipped, there are quite a few to choose from. Select three of these perks to go with Leverage:

• A Nurse’s Calling (The Nurse)
• Unnerving Presence (The Trapper)
• Sloppy Butcher
• Coulrophobia (The Clown)

With A Nurse’s Calling, you’ll be able to see survivors’ auras while they heal, which is perfect because they’ll be healing for a longer time. Unnerving Presence will make skill checks harder while they’re healing, and Sloppy Butcher will decrease the amount of time they have to heal. Coulrophobia is another excellent perk as it will reduce their healing speed even more, while also increasing their number of skill checks.

Best Build for ‘Game Afoot’ in Dead by Daylight

We’ve all gone against that one survivor who can outrun us for days, and we can only hope for their demise. Game Afoot is a perk that might be able to help you catch that survivor, or at least give you more motivation to hit them. Here are some of the best perks for Game Afoot:

• Superior Anatomy
• Brutal Strength
• Save the Best for Last
• Rancor

Considering Game Afoot requires you to hit the survivor, we have Superior Anatomy which gives you increased vaulting speed in order to catch up to them. After you hit the survivor and earn that 5% haste, you’ll use brutal strength to either break a wall, pallet, or generator faster to activate it. Every time you’re hitting a survivor who isn’t the obsession, Save the Best for Last reduces the cooldown penalty for missed attacks, which will be helpful in catching that pesky survivor. Rancor is added to the list because it exposes the obsession after the exit gates are open. There’s also the satisfaction of being able to finish off the obsession with your own hand. After all the work you did to catch them, you may as well show off a bit.

The Skull Merchant will be available to play for everyone on March 7, 2023. As of now, those are the best perks to use with The Skull Merchant. If you feel we’ve missed any great perks, feel free to mention them in the comments below.