Dead By Daylight: Doctor Guide and Best Builds (2024)

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Penned by Aliya Hall

Aliya Hall is a writer and occasional freelance journalist who lives in Portland, Oregon with her fiancée and their three cats: Jane Austen, Hanni... Read more

Reviewed by Benjamin Barr

Another classic, unique and terrifying character in the Dead by Daylight franchise is Herman Carter, best known as simply: The Doctor. Introduced to the game in Chapter 4: Spark of Madness, the Doctor thrives on inducing madness, making it deliberately difficult for Survivors to tell delusion from reality — giving the Doctor an advantageous path to victory. In this guide to the best Doctor builds in Dead by Daylight, we’ll cover everything you need to know to get the most out of playing as Doctor. 

Categorized as a “hard” killer, the Doctor uses his power and special ability to terrorize Survivors and disrupt them from finishing generators. Although this killer takes some getting used to, he’s a fun and challenging killer for Survivors to go up against.

Let’s get started!

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Dead by Daylight: The Doctor

A promising child with an exceptional aptitude in psychology, Herman Carter was hand chosen by the CIA for special training in an “advanced neuroscience program” to extract information from whoever was the U.S.’s current political nemesis. 

Herman began to use strange and violent methods to extract this information, namely the use of electroshock therapy. Over the years, Herman’s reputation as the Doctor preceded him, and the government was so thrilled with his results that no one ever questioned if he held a medical certificate or what happened to the prisoners after they gave up their information. 

It was only after a week of silence from the institute that it was discovered all personnel, patients and prisoners were found dead from all types of head trauma — and the Doctor was missing.   

The Doctor’s Power: Carter’s Spark

As a madness-inducing killer, the Doctor uses Carter’s Spark to incapacitate Survivors, causing them to hallucinate and scream in terror, thus revealing their locations. 

By successfully striking Survivors with either of the Doctor’s electro-convulsive abilities — Shock Therapy or Static Blast — Survivors will immediately suffer from the tiered madness status effect. 

There are three madness thresholds: 

• Madness I requires 1 Madness point
• Madness II requires 2 Madness Points
• Madness III requires 3 Madness Points

Depending on the tier, madness will cause increasingly debilitating afflictions on the affected Survivors, making it more challenging for them to complete simple tasks, such as skill checks, and see hallucinations of the killer. 

Once the Madness status effect is obtained, Survivors can’t lose it, regressing back only to Madness I by performing a Snap Out Of It interaction once they hit Madness II. 

Madness I

• Survivors scream once during the tier-up, revealing their aura location to the Doctor.
• Skill checks have a 33% chance to be a Madness Skill Check, meaning a skill check has an equal chance of being placed off-center, moving counter-clockwise (reversed from normal skill checks), or both at the same time.

Madness II

• Survivors scream once during the tier-up, revealing their location to the Doctor.
• Skill checks have a 66% chance to be a Madness Skill Check.
• Survivors experience occasional hallucinations in the form of Illusionary Doctors.

Madness III

• Survivors scream once during the tier-up, revealing their location to the Doctor, as well as intermittently every few seconds.
• Skill checks have a 100% chance to be Madness Skill Checks.
• Survivors experience occasional hallucinations in the form of Illusionary Doctors, and allows Doctor to read the auras of the Illusionary Doctors. 
• Survivors are unable to use their items.
• Survivors are unable to interact with other Survivors, as well as props like totems, chests, lockers, windows, pallets, hooks, exit gates and hatch.  

Doctor Special Abilities

Here, we’ll get into the details of Shock Therapy and Static Blast.

Special Ability: Shock Therapy

To perform a Shock Therapy Attack, press and hold the power button. You’ll unleash a cone-shaped, range shock attack on the ground in front of Doctor that ranges 10.7 meters and impacting Survivors within that radius. 

It takes 1 second to charge a Shock Therapy Attack with a 1 second detonation delay for Survivor’s reactions. Shock Therapy also has a cool down for 1.5 seconds.

This attack is equivalent to 0.5 madness Points — or half of a Madness Tier. A survivor will only scream and reveal their location once, if it coincides with a tier-up. It will interrupt any interaction a Survivor is performing at the moment of impact and surpasses their ability to perform any interactions for 2.5 seconds, this includes vaulting windows and dropping pallets. 

This ability also negates the Oblivious Status effect, which makes Survivor’s unable to perceive the killer’s terror radius or hear the heartbeat warning of the killer’s proximity, as well as keep them from suffering from affects that rely on Survivors being inside the Terror Radius. All Survivors will be shocked. 

Special Ability: Static Blast

The second electro-convulsive ability the Doctor has is static blast, which unless a shock attack that propagates from Doctor through the air and covers his entire terror radius. 

Static Blast activates once the power gauge is full and by pressing and holding the Active Ability Button.  It takes 2 second to charge the blast and a recharge time of 60 seconds. 

This attack increases the Madness level by 1 tier and immediately causes all afflicted Survivors to scream and reveal their locations, as well as interrupt any interaction they are performing at the moment of impact. Static Blast also negates the Oblivious Status effect, and shocks survivors suffering from it. 

Doctor Perks

The Doctor has three personal perks, Overwhelming Presence, Monitor and Abuse, and Overcharge. These perks encourage chases and make him harder to detect when not in a chase. His perk also impacts Survivor’s ability to repair generators effectively, giving him ore opportunity to play with and hook his new potential patients. 

Overwhelming Presence

Survivors within Doctor’s terror radius suffer from inefficiency, making it harder for them to use items like tool boxes or medical kits, and adding to their loss of grip on reality. This gives Survivors a disadvantage to healing or repairing generators. 

• Tier 1 (Yellow): When using an item, its depletion rate is increased by 80%.
• Tier 2 (Green): When using an item, its depletion rate is increased by 90%.
• Tier 3 (Purple): When using an item, its depletion rate is increased by 100%.

Monitor and Abuse

With Doctor’s powers so closely tied to his terror radius, Monitor and Abuse adds another layer by increasing the radius of your terror radius by 8 meters for the entire trial.

However, when you’re not in an active chase with a Survivor, your terror radius is reduced by 16 meters, making it a give and take. While this is a helpful perk, it’s most beneficial for players who are skilled with playing Doctor. This perk cannot be stacked with the perk Shadowborn. 

Along with impacting terror radius, Monitor and Abuse increases field of view.

• Tier 1 (Yellow): Field of view increased by 3 degrees. 
• Tier 2 (Green): Field of view increased by 5 degrees. 
• Tier 3 (Purple): Field of view increased by 10 degrees. 

Overcharge

To make it more challenging for Survivors to repair generators, Overcharge is a generally useful perk that agitates Survivors by halting progress. To apply Overcharge, perform a damage generator action. The next Survivor to interact with that generator will be faced with a difficult skill check, and if the Survivor fails there will be a higher regression penalty. 

Overcharge also applies an increased regression speed from 85% to 130% over the next 30 seconds.

• Tier 1 (Yellow): A failed skill check instantly regresses generator by 2% of its maximum possible progression, in addition to the default progression penalty. 
• Tier 2 (Green): A failed skill check instantly regresses generator by 3% of its maximum possible progression, in addition to the default progression penalty. 
• Tier 3 (Purple): A failed skill check instantly regresses generator by 4% of its maximum possible progression, in addition to the default progression penalty. 

Best Add-ons for Doctor

The best add-ons for Doctor are the ones that boost his terror radius or  the effects of Madness. 

• Mouldy Electrode: Common. Increases the affected area of Shock Therapy by 2 meters.
• “Order” — Class I: Common. Reduces the cool-down duration of static blast by two seconds, and Survivors suffering from Madness will see illusionary pallets. These pallets are previously broken pallets that persist in form until approached. Every 20 seconds a new illusion pallet is generated at the location of a random broken pallet.
• “Calm” — Class I: Common. Increases the Doctor’s terror radius while Static Blast is ready by 4 meters and reduces the terror radius by 4 meters while on cool down. Survivors with Madness II will intermittently hear a distant illusionary terror radius and Survivors with Madness III will constantly hear a distant illusionary terror radius. 
• “Discipline” — Class II: Uncommon. Reduces the detonation delay of Shock Therapy by 1 second. For Survivors afflicted with Madness II during a chase, they will perceive an illusionary red stain and terror radius as though Doctor were right behind them, lasting for 6 seconds after the case ends. For Survivors with Madness III, they constantly perceive an illusionary red stain and terror radius as if the Doctor was behind them. 
• Interview Tape: Rare. Changes the Shock Therapy area of effect into a narrow beam 24 meters in long and 2 meters in width. 
• Iridescent Queen: Ultra rare. Any Survivor struck by an electro-convulsive ability acquires a lingering Static Charge. Any time a Survivor is within 4 meters of another Survivor with Static Charge, both receive a shock identical to a Shock Therapy attack, and the Static Charge is discharged immediately. If Survivors are already within 4 meters of one another when struck by an electro-convulsive ability, they do not acquire Static Charge. 
• Iridescent King: Ultra rare. Survivors with Madness suffer from all available afflictions: Calm, Discipline, Order and Restraint and intermittently hear a distant illusionary terror radius. During a chase, Survivors will perceive an illusionary red stain and terror radius as though Doctor is directly behind them, and this effect persists for 6 seconds after the chase ends in Madness II, but is constantly active in Madness III. Every 20 seconds a new illusionary pallet is generated at the location of a random broken pallet and the Illusionary Doctor is increased by 6 seconds. 

Best Builds for Doctor

The best builds for Doctor when playing Dead By Daylight are the ones that focus on generator pressure as well as adding more challenges for the Survivors to overcome. These tricky builds work great with Doctor’s ranged power and makes it easier for you to impact more Survivors at once. 

Beginner Build

When you’re starting out playing as Doctor and don’t have the full arsenal of perks at your disposal, this build will help you match the strongest Doctor perks with general perks to give your Doctor the best advantage. This build will focus on generator repair, as well as messing with the Survivor’s efficiency in terms of healing. 

Incorporating Overcharge will specifically target Survivors’ ability to hit skill checks, making it more likely to cause higher generator regression when damaging it. 

To help make it easier for you to spot and find Survivors, Whispers (general) will let you know whenever at least one Survivor is within 48 meters of your location, making it easier to hunt and shock them. 

Adding Sloppy Butcher (General) will cause Survivors hit with basic attacks to receive Hemorrhage and Mangled Status Effects, which takes them longer to heal a health state and produces more blood pools. This makes it easier to find Survivors while simultaneously giving them a disadvantaging with healing. To add to their struggle healing, finishing the build with Overwhelming Presence will make it harder for Survivors to use medical kits to heal and even tool boxes to work on generators. 

Generator Disruption Build

For a build that’s focused more on disrupting generator repair, continuing to use Overcharge and adding Discordance (Legion), Jolt (general) and Merciless Storm (Onryō). 

Discordance will mark any generator within a 64 meter range that is being repaired by two or more Survivors with a yellow aura. When it’s first highlighted, it will trigger a loud noise notification on the generator, and after the generator is no longer within range or being repaired by just one survivor, the highlighted aura will linger for another 4 seconds. This discourages Survivors from teaming up to repair generators faster as well as makes it easier for Doctor to start a chase. 

Jolt is also a beneficial addition because when you put a Survivor into the dying state with a basic attack, all generators within 32 meters instantly explore and start regressing by 6%. This keeps continued pressure on the generators in play. 

Lastly, Merciless Storm will agitate the Survivors by forcing them to confront numerous skill checks. Once the generator hits 90% repairment, Survivors will have continuous skill checks and if they miss one or stop repairing the generator becomes blocked for 16 seconds. Even though it can only trigger once per generator, per trial, this is a powerful perk that blends well with the other generator-focused perks to keep Survivors from making progress and force them to stay in the trial longer. 

The Best Doctor Build Overall

When it comes to the best overall build for Doctor, we recommend using a mix of tried and true perks, as well as some more targeted perks that give Doctor an immediate advantage. 

Lethal Pursuer (Nemesis) reveals the auras of all the Survivors for 7 seconds and extends the duration of a Survivor’s aura being revealed by an additional 2 seconds. This will help you know what direction to head to use Doctor’s electro-convulsive ability and begin a chase. Combining this with Whispers will keep you updated on Survivor’s within your general location, which will also be beneficial with a ranged attack. 

To add generator pressure, we recommend sticking with Overcharge, and finishing the build with Hex: No One Escapes Death (General Perk). Although it has the ability to be cleansed, this Hex is a powerful tool that gives Doctor an advantage going into end game if you’re able to keep Survivors too busy to cleanse totems. Once the exit gates are powered, Doctor’s movement increases by 2% and Survivors suffer from a permanent exposed status effect, making it easier to track them, shock them and down them. 

Join the High Ground

That’s it for our Dead by Daylight Best Doctor Builds — thanks for reading! Let us know which Killer we should cover next in the comments, and don’t forget to subscribe to our newsletter for more content like this.

Happy gaming!