Apex Legends Dev Tracker

shut up and take my money...

OP edited. Should know better by now not to second guess Reddit...

Yeah, it might be that something bugged the *subtle* movement that *is* supposed to be there. I'll get a bug filed for investigation.

EDIT: so, known bug. Fix is coming. ONLY happens when you use non-native resolution. Sorry for bad info below. Just reminded me a lot of the fact that there is some intentional movement in this screen and I thought that was a bug.

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So, this is by design. I actually flagged this as a bug when I first started working on the game. But it's meant to work this way. It should happen regardless of screen resolution.

In terms of the "why," the Designer who implemented said that it actually "feels" more natural to have the UI respond to your directional input. Like, if you think of the game's history and roots in Titanfall, a lot of the HUD stuff comes from having that perspective of being inside of a Titan or inside of a Pilot helmet. So your HUD is going to move a bit as you move.

It still kind of weirds me out, but I can confirm it's entirely intentional.

Primarily, she needed to evolve past her Care Package.

We tried a number of different Ultimates before settling on the Halo. In the end, we were looking at what Lifeline and her players wanted to do when playing as her and where her shortcomings were. Protecting that reset and buying time for her hapless allies was just fundamentally too important to her character and her kit. So leaning into the old aspects of her Res Shield and Fast Heals, but placed into a measured ultimate cadence instead of an on-demand high-skill passive ended up being the strongest way to fulfill on that fantasy.

We made efforts to ensured that it had unique counterplay options and was effectively different than a Gibraltar dome, or a Newcastle shield. But being her Ultimate, it needed to be a strong zone for her team's recovery. So yes, it can be better than other shields depending on the situation, but it's up to the Lifeline to use it effectively and ensure it can't be easily dunked on, ...

We believe she did.

Her kit was very outdated and made her very static - which didn't enable her to fulfill her combat medic role and fantasy well.

The Upgrades System DID infuse new life into her, but objectively we had to stock the care package with powerful gimmicks ( free level, gold items ) and give her self revive to get her there, and were band-aids to the core issues with her kit.

We made the call for Crypto EMP to not destroy Lifeline's wall because of it's Ultimate status and the importance of its protection to the resets she's wanting to perform. Denying her ult wouldn't just remove a barrier - it slate her and her recovering teammates into an incredibly vulnerable state - and we didn't want her Ult to be unreliable from a single legend's hard counter. There may be options we can pursue for the EMP to shut down components of the Ult ( similar to how it works with Newcastle ) in the future - but we also wanted Lifeline players to feel strong and...

To be honest, we've been talking about this perk. It's been a powerful addition to game, but it adds a fairly significant amount of combat power on an axis that isn't exactly unique to the support role or identity. It's been a welcome help for support legends staying viable in the fight - but the more evasive combat power it gives might be something we look at in the future.

Glad you like the changes - and yes, good note on how the drone impacts early game significantly when you more rapidly eat into flesh health. It's a note we called out internally too, and liked that she would provide use immediately out of the gate, alongside no longer having to stay flat-footed to get that benefit.

We are... "satisfied with her care" ...for now. We generally want new legends to have their core abilities shine through on launch, and have made an intentional stand to not have the upgrades fundamentally change the nature of the ability. This is so players don't get confused when...

It was expected. We wanted these changes to come online together to change the way players would need to think about and play apex.

For the last few seasons, the game has been kill race dominated by Pathfidner and Revenant, and we wanted this support meta shift to change the nature of the way players think about and take fights. Make the game feel fresh, new, different. Give players a chance to learn Legends like Newcastle and Gibraltar and see what tactics they actually bring to the table.

We internally were pretty sure that Lifeline-Newcastle was going to be a thing, with a flex pick for rotations & push utility. What surprised us was how much the Gibby changes pushed him up. We knew he'd rise, but it was frankly more than expected.

In hindsight, it might have been cool to roll out the character changes at different times, we've talked about things like that. And to an extent, you might see some of this in the new year as Loba and Mirage come online in ...

Yes, there's a push to make each class have a unique benefit and distinction from one another.

So Controller Legends should feel like they have strength playing zone, Support Legends should feel like they have strength helping their team recover.

The Support perks are not meant to help stall in the ring - which is why there's a crazy long cooldown on being able to gain the benefits of the support res again if you do so in the ring. And we're adding additional measures to prevent against exploitative behaviours.

We're aware of the combative advantage the double-med heals has on the game, and this may be something we look at in the future.

It's true, Lifeline, Newcastle and Gibraltar feasted with this changes. And we've made some adjustments these past couple weeks that release the pressure on these core Legends before the holidays kick off.

For Conduit - she's still doing well, and was doing well beforehand, so her benefits from these changes may not have been as exciting as the others, but she also benefited significantly this season.

Mirage and Loba were intentionally left from the big kids table, however, and you should expect to see them start to make some noise in the new year as the latter half of the Season of Support comes online. So, trend of "wide buffs"? Kinda? It's a subjective statement. Would more likely state that we can expect more bold changes to keep the game from feeling stale.

1. Aside from...maybe Wraith, Lifeline is a pretty marquee Legend for Apex - and when we started her Rework she was feeling incredibly outdated, outclassed by other supports and most importantly not hitting her fantasy as a Combat Medic ( more than any of the other OG Legends ).

Wanting our favourite healer to not be brushed aside made her stand out and as the game changed pace through the seasons it made her an ideal target, regardless of her high pick rate at the lower skill brackets.

1. Nothing's meant to last. Different players have different perspectives on what makes the game enjoyable. This season has brought a new style of play to Apex, but that may not be for everyone. We want players to encourage and expect change and to enable them to explore new ways of playing the game, but that does not mean it will last forever!

2. We've been working to infuse new gameplay into each class. To date, Recon, Controller and Support have all...

We could, and we've done so in the past, but it has led to pretty poor reception and uptake on Legends before. Look at Rampart, for example, she was released in what we considered a fairly balanced state - but without the excitement and draw of the power to show people what she could do and how she could be effective, she fell quickly from the limelight of her launch - and it look a long arduous amount of buffs to eventually pull her into relevancy.

It's generally much more viable to launch a character or change strong, let people play with it, experiment, have fun and then learn where to reign in the parts that are overpowered, rather than aim for perfect balance out the gate and have no one give that character a shot.

So are the Support Legends and perks strong, absolutely. Will they stay that way? No. We've been making strides towards giving each class it's own gameplay identity and revisiting their perks - we've hit Recon, Controller and Support so far. You ca...