Apex Duos Has Returned!
Apex’s newest patch, The Old Ways Event, has just hit and brings with it an old friend – duos! That’s right, duos are back in Apex, again. For how long? This time, finally, duos are a permanent addition to Apex. Wahoo! Along with this incredible addition comes a new event, and a handful of balance changes.
Duos?!?
Apex has launched duos on a trial basis several times in the past. This time they finally decided to release it permanently. In their statement regarding it they said that Duos has overall “had a positive effect on the game’s health in regards to queue times and gameplay systems, in addition to reinforcing teamplay”. That’s a bit of a mouthful, but basically they are saying that queue times didn’t go down significantly even though they were splitting their player base with another game mode, which effectively means that it brought a lot more people to play the game, in a lasting sense.
The ‘lasting’ part is important for their follow up, which is that they have done the same analysis and decided that solos will not be coming back any time soon. “When we introduced Solos as a limited-time mode last year we saw it actually negatively impacted the game, especially when it came to new player retention”. Meaning that newer players were getting destroyed without being able to rely on teammates, which is a fair criticism in a game that is so much built around teamwork and not individual skill. They also mention that solos fractured their playerbase too much, so it’s nice to see that this wasn’t an issue regarding duos. However, for those of you looking forward to solos, you’ll have a while to look forward yet. They also reference the fact that there are many legends who are designed around teamplay, having completely useless abilities in solos, which is something that goes against their mission. It makes sense, even if it’s not news a lot of you are happy about.
Back to duos, the other news is that duos currently will not have a ranked mode. We’ll see if this changes in the future. Non-ranked threes and now duos will now be played on the rotating maps World’s Edge and King’s Canyon, including King’s Canyon After Dark. Ranked will not change maps until the end of the season, remaining on Kings Canyon – this obviously will not impact duos.
Old Ways Event
This patch has brought with it a new event based around Bloodhound’s past. If you’re a fan of lore, this is a great event for you. The event adds a large Trial area to the World’s Edge map, where players can go to compete in trials and earn great loot. It’s not separate from the normal gameplay either, so while you’re competing in these trials against vicious AI creatures, other teams can come over and try to finish you off as well. It’s extremely dangerous, but if you can emerge victorious, you’ll be full of great loot.
Throughout the trials you’ll be engaging with beasts that were sent by Bloodhound, and you’ll have the ability to engage with his backstory in a way that lore lovers will adore. If you yourself are playing Bloodhound, he may have some extra voice lines for you!
The event also comes with a whole host of new cosmetics, which will be available both throughout the event, and more taking place in the shop over the next month.
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Balance
There were quite a few tweaks this patch, we’ll run through them as efficiently as possible. There’s also one major change which we will discuss at the bottom.
- G7s headshot and leg shot scale was reduced slightly, and has reduced projectile speed.
- L-Star resets faster allowing you to maintain better aim while feathering, and has reduced time before overheating.
- Kraber has increased headshot multiplier – Will now always down with headshots no matter what.
- Sniper Ammo has reduced ammo pickup 10-8 and reduced inventory size 20-16
Revenant also got a small rework – His Silence now lasts 20 seconds, from 10, it disables Gibralter’s Gun Shield, the area of effect time is doubled, and has two charges. His Death Totem now respawns characters with 50 health instead of 1. This should hopefully make him feel more impactful in games, as he was feeling rather lackluster since release. He also lost his Low Profile status, meaning he no longer takes 5% increased damage from bullets.
Lifeline now has a secondary passive which allows her to access certain crates and find more loot inside them than other characters would. It will always contain health/shields/weapon attachments/knockdown shields, to fit with Lifeline’s design.
Wraith portals will now disappear after four seconds if both ends are outside the circle. Players had been using her portal to remain immune from damage for long periods of time outside the circle – this will no longer be possible.
Evo Armour has reduced damage required to evolve – Blue now requires 75 from 100, Purple requires 150 from 300, and Red requires 400 from 500.
Kings Canyon and variants of the map have increased loot spawns throughout.
Lastly, and most importantly, they have changed the limb damage taken on legends with the Low Profile perk. Previously taking limb damage would cause you to take approximately 25% less damage. However, now, hitting a character with Low Profile in the limbs deals full damage. This is a huge change to these characters who already took increased damage, and many are reporting that it has made their characters feel entirely useless. The legends that currently have Low Profile are Lifeline, Pathfinder, Wattson, and Wraith.
This is the biggest change to this patch as it fundamentally changes the effective health pool for some of the most popular legends. It stands to be seen whether they will leave it or go back and tweak the numbers.
Hope you’re out there enjoying the event, and that you destroy many waves of enemies and collect that fat loot! For more Apex information stay tuned!
