If you're an asymmetrical multiplayer enjoyer, Dead By Daylight is the perfect game. Developed and published by Behavior Interactive, the game features a PvP one versus four gameplay where a killer has to chase down and sacrifice four survivors to The Entity before they finish all the generators and escape.
Since the killer player has to take advantage of every mechanic to win against four people, tunneling becomes a common practice. Whenever a killer chases the survivor that just got unhooked, the community calls that tunneling, and it's a practice that is looked down upon, unless necessary.
8 We'll Make It
While this doesn't directly counter tunneling, it can discourage killers from doing so in certain scenarios. The main reason for killers to tunnel is that the unhooked survivor usually needs only one hit to go down. This perk easily prevents that from happening.
If the killer is far enough away when you unhook a survivor while using We'll Make It, you can give them a quick heal just under the hook before the killer even gets a chance to come back and chase them. Now, the killer will see the survivor fully healed on their HUD and have a lesser chance of going for the same person.
This can be combined with Desperate Measures, Botany Knowledge, and a medkit to provide ultra-fast healing to the unhooked survivor. This can finish the heal within seconds.
7 Boon: Exponential
Upon getting unhooked, you're vulnerable as the killer can hear you and see your scratch marks and pools of blood. If the opponent wants to go for you again, there is nothing to stop him, unless your teammates take a few hits. Boon perks allow you to bless a totem and the perk takes effect upon blessing in a certain radius.
If you are getting tunneled, you can run inside the radius of Boon: Exponential as the killers usually tend to leave the survivors they're tunneling on the ground for a little while. This can give you time to pick yourself up and possibly get away from the killer. You can also use Unbreakable instead of this perk, but you can only pick yourself up once with that.
It can be a good idea to pair these perks with Soul Guard if you're having a lot of tunneling killers. With that, you'll have an endurance status effect after you get up from the ground that can tank a hit.
6 Guardian
This is one of the best perks you'd want to run if you want to prevent your teammates from getting tunneled. Guardian hides the scratch marks and pools of blood for the unhooked survivor apart from giving them a speed bonus that combines with the base haste mechanic.
Apart from that, you also see the killer's aura, so you can run towards them and show yourself, giving the killer an incentive to chase you instead of trying to look for the injured person, since there's a chance they don't find the injured survivor because of the other effects.
5 Renewal
This perk takes a bit of setup, but it's perfect to punish a killer for tunneling. To activate Renewal, you have to heal any survivor (apart from yourself) for the equivalent of one health state. Once you have it, you will get fully healed after 20 seconds of getting unhooked.
This has a few conditions, though. For example, once you get unhooked, you will have to either hide from the killer or last in a chase for 20 seconds to get healed. But, if you manage to heal with Renewal mid-chase, it can be very discouraging for them as they now have to hit you twice unless you're Exposed.
4 For The People
Released along with Zarina Kassir, For The People is one of the perks that killers never see coming. Using the perk, you can instantly heal another survivor for one health state when you're fully healed yourself. Upon activating, you'll become injured and Broken for a certain amount of time.
If you're noticing a killer tunneling a survivor, you can either use For The People on them when you unhook them, or follow them around and use it once they go down. The former is preferred more as the latter doesn't help a lot if the survivor goes down in open space.
3 Borrowed Time
Borrowed Time is the best perk you can use to prevent killers from tunneling your teammates. After the addition of tiny base-kit BT in the game, this perk extends the effect of Endurance and Haste up to 15 seconds. That's enough time for a survivor to get to a strong loop if the killer tunnels them.
And if the killer decides to hit a survivor with Borrowed Time active, they will go into a cooldown while the survivor gets even more distance, making it a bad choice to tunnel at all.
2 Decisive Strike
This perk has witnessed, quite possibly, the most number of nerfs among any other perks. It activates after you get unhooked for 60 seconds. If the killer picks you up while it's activated, you can hit a skill check and stun them for three seconds, giving you time to get away.
This is the most generic anti-tunnel perk in the game, and it is specifically made for that. While three seconds is quite a lot of time against most killers, this perk is kind of useless against a good Blight, Nurse, or Spirit because they catch up to you quickly.
Decisive Strike deactivates prematurely as soon as you perform any Conspicuous Action, and it can only be used once per trial.
1 Off The Record
Behold, the best anti-tunnel perk in Dead By Daylight, and also one of the best perks in general. Off The Record provides you with an Endurance status effect for 80 seconds every time you get unhooked. This means that you can tank an extra hit if you get hit when you're injured within the time frame.
Not only can you prevent tunneling by using this perk, you can also take protection hit for a teammate who desperately needs it. The Endurance status effect from this perk doesn't stack up with any other similar effects since Endurance doesn't work when you're in Deep Wound.
This perk also deactivates upon performing any Conspicuous Action including exit gates and totems.