What Do Totems Do In Dead By Daylight?

In Dead by Daylight, Totems play a major role in gameplay, with Hex perks and Boon perks turning the game's meta upside-down with their many game-changing effects. Totems provide a secondary objective for both killers and survivors, as both sides have their own unique ways to interact with these items scattered throughout the map.

In this guide, we'll explain the three different types of totems, including Dull Totems, Boon Totems, and Hex Totems, and what exactly they do in Dead by Daylight.

What Do Totems Do In Dead by Daylight?

There are five totems on every Dead by Daylight map. These five totems can either be Dull Totems, Hex Totems, or Boon Totems.

Dull Totems

Totems that are not lit blue or red are Dull Totems. Survivors can bless a totem to turn it into a Boon Totem, which offers several benefits to the survivor team depending on which Boon Totem perk is used. On the other hand, survivors can bring up to four Hex perks to turn the Totems into  Hex Totems, which benefit the killer.

You'll earn 1,000 Bloodpoints for cleansing a Dull Totem as a survivor.

Hex Totems

As we mentioned, Hex Totems are a type of totem that benefits the killer or directly detriments survivors. Hex Totems are denoted by lit candles beneath them.

Hex perks can have a range of effects, such as inflicting Blindness, causing survivors to become Exposed (such as the infamous Hex: No One Escapes Death), or, in the case of The Knight's Hex: Face The Darkness, revealing survivors' locations to the killer.

Survivors can cleanse Hex Totems to remove their effects; however, The Blight's Hex: Undying will transfer the Hex to another Dull Totem, causing survivors to need to cleanse it again. Survivors can prevent this by cleansing all Dull Totems on the map.

If a Hex Totem is blocked, the killer is likely using a perk such as The Cenobite's Hex: Plaything, which prevents survivors from cleansing other survivors' Hex: Plaything totems until a certain amount of time passes.

Survivors earn 1,500 Bloodpoints for cleansing a Hex Totem.

Boon Totems

Boon Totems are to survivors what Hex Totems are to killers, offering the survivor team a range of benefits. They are denoted by lit candles beneath them, too, but they are blue in contrast to eh Hex Totems' red color. Survivors will need to bring a Boon perk and then bless a totem for Boon totem perks to take effect.

For example, Mikaela Reid's Boon: Circle of Healing creates an area where healing speeds are boosted for the whole team, while her Boon: Shadow Step makes a zone where scratch marks are totally invisible.

Survivors can stomp out Boon Totems if they find them, turning the Totem back into a Dull Totem. The survivors can then bless that totem again if they wish, though it takes quite a bit of time.

Killers will earn 1,500 Bloodpoints for snuffing out a Boon Totem, while survivors will earn 1,500 Bloodpoints each time they bless it.

Interacting with all types of totems is a good way to earn Bloodpoints fast since it's a secondary objective in Dead by Daylight.