Apex Legends Season 16 ends today! That means you have a few more hours to finish off that battle pass and claim all this seasons rewards. It also means that we get a sweet new season filled to the brim with all sorts of goodies.
Season 17, called Arsenal, features a whack of new features, map changes and a new Legend for us to play with.
The new Legend, Ballistic, comes from the old Thunderdome Games and has cut a deal with the Apex higher-ups in order to keep his son out of the limelight. You can check out Ballistics story trailer and abilities here, although the abilities listed in the article were based upon leaks, it seems as if the leaks were pretty spot on. According to Ballistics official bio page, his abilities are:
Passive: Sling – Store a third weapon in the sling. Access via inventory or Character Utility Action. The sling weapon cannot take attachments.
Tactical: Whistler – Shoots a projectile that heats up an enemy’s weapon as they shoot. Overheating causes damage. Hold the tactical to lock-on.
Ultimate: Tempest – When activated, nearby teammates, get faster reload, faster unarmed move speed and infinite ammo. Ballistics sling weapon will be equipped and upgraded to gold.
However, Ballistic isn’t the only significant change in Season 17. Ranked play is getting a completely new points structure again.
You can get in-depth information from the EA page, but the most significant things to note are a level cap increase, going from level 20 to level 50 to be able to play any ranked games, and the other is how the points structure will work. Previously, the higher up in the rankings you were, the more it would cost you to play a ranked game. This was designed to make you so sweaty that you could only ever officially play Apex in a black t-shirt covered in antiperspirant. In the new update, there will always be a 35-point cost to play. I’m not sure how this will affect the lower ranks currently at a lower cost of entry, but I guess we’ll have to play a few games to see how it balances out. Flat points are based on where you place in the match, and bonus points for kills/eliminations, MMR standings and Skill.
Along with these ranked changes, Apex is also updating the Firing Range. Typically used to practice with weapons and skills, the Firing Range will now have a few more extra features. Starting with our friendly dummies, Apex has given them a little more life, meaning they can fight back if you want them to. This will give players a better in-game experience when practising their flick shots or 360 no scopes. The dev team have also added an indoor area for players to practice those close combat situations and an outdoor area called “The Pit”, which will allow players to practice their movement techniques, such as bunny hopping, gliding and wall jumping. Adding a 1v1 arena has also been put on the upgrades list for the firing range, so if you want to take this outside, let’s do it!
Other updates to the game include a new item, the Evac Tower, which will spawn a jump balloon at your location, and weapon mastery, allowing players to show off how good they are with specific weapons in-game. The ping wheel is getting a slight overhaul, adding in a few pings such as “retreat to here” and “do not retrieve”, and, as I’m sure you’ve heard, the map “Worlds Edge” is getting a few building changes. While we’ve seen Apex do this before, they are completely updating Fragment, which was quite a spicy drop originally; I’m curious to see if changing the buildings in this area will create a different experience of gameplay or if people will drop elsewhere.
Overall, the Season 17: Arsenal update is meaty AF, so I hope you’re all hungry. Until then, catch you on the field, chumps.