[2020] Patch v1.6 - Fortnite Battle Royale

The v1.6 patch has arrived, and with it, the Public Test for Fortnite’s new Battle Royale PvP mode. It’s 100 players, one giant map. Put your building and combat skills to the test. The last player standing wins. Fortnite players have access to the Public Test right now before the mode is officially available on Sept. 26. Dive deeper with the official Battle Royal announce blog.

The patch also includes fixes for several crashes, variety of bug fixes and a few balance changes. Check out the full notes below and let us know what you think!

EA1.6 Patch Notes

Battle Royale

• Mode Added
• Code of Conduct posted.
• Battle Royale will be receiving updates regularly. With the updates, stats and any other Battle Royale progress may be reset.
• PvE characters are not carried over to Battle Royale
  • Any differences between Battle Royale characters are purely visual. You will be randomly assigned a different looking character every match.
• Match Flow
  • Meet up with other players in the lobby and wait for the Battle Bus to takeoff.
  • Choose your drop location wisely - Once the bus is over the island, you can choose when to jump out.
  • Use whatever items you can find, such as weapons, ammo, and more to eliminate other players. Most items can be found on the ground, as opposed to in containers.
  • Be on the look-out for chests - they contain high value items.
  • Stay inside the Eye of the Storm as it shrinks to avoid damage.
  • There's no respawning - be the last one standing to win.
• New Mechanics
  • Weapons and other items have been redesigned for the PvP experience.
  • Weapons damage to buildings.
  • Higher rarity increases Damage and Accuracy and decreases Recoil.
  • Crouching has been added - use it to reduce your profile and increase accuracy.
  • Falling damage is increased.
  • Players can only carry up to 5 weapons or consumables at a time.
  • When your inventory is full, picking up an item will swap it with what is currently equipped.
  • Ammo, traps, and building resources do not take inventory space.

General

• Added Battle Royale mode.
• Fixed multiple issues causing players to hitch in game.
• Fixed issue where selecting a Survive The Storm mission would result in a crash.
• Fixed a variety of client crashes.
• Fixed a client crash that would occur specifically when loading Canny Valley Storm Shield Defense 5.
• On consoles, removed chat slider for the settings menu in Fortnite. Players can control chat volume through their system settings.  
• Fixed a crash where the game would terminate after claiming llamas and then attempt to load a Survival Mode mission.
• When loading into a zone with a full party, some players FORT stat values may not be including the values granted by teammates, or may be may be over adding those values. Players should expect to see correct FORT stats now.
• Fixed a bug where players could build Level 3 structures for Level 1 costs. Players should expect structure to match appropriate cost level.
• Fixed an issue that caused severe performance drops at the end of Survival Mode on Xbox. Players should now be getting the correct rewards and crashing should be minimized.
• Fixed an issue where a player couldn't rejoin their party after being disconnected. Rejoin should be working correctly now.
• Fixed an issue that caused a player’s Homebase power to decrease when evolving uncommon lead survivors to three stars.  Players should expect to see their Homebase power increase now.  
• Fixed an issue where joining an invite while another join is still processing could cause both joins to fail. Players should now expect to join the first party invite and should get a message saying, "You are already joining a party currently". The first join should succeed. The second join attempt should not succeed.
• Fixed issue when the player hovers over certain available heroes to slot in their support or tactical slots, the health or shield values may appear red and go down. When the player slots these heroes, the values will correctly update to the boosted values that are intended. After the fix, the hero values should not appear red no go down. The correct values should apply now.
• Known issue:  Players on XBOX will see players from both Saving the World and Battle Royale in Global Chat.  Players on PS4 and PC will have discrete Global Chat channels.

Gameplay

• Increased the health for the Shielder.
• Powerful Clubs and Hardware modifiers now appear as intended in Twine Peaks.
• In Survive The Storm, Survival Level 40 will only appear for players with Home Base Power 32 or above and Survival Level 70 only appears for players with Home Base Power 58 or above. Players are still able to invite/join friends in higher difficulties.
• Lowered the cooldown rate on the Hydra Assault Rifle as it was regaining ammo back too quickly.
• Fixed issue with Plasma Pulse where it was not working nearly half the time. Players should expect Plasma Pulse to work correctly now, even when done in rapid succession with other abilities.
• Fixed an issue where the 1-Star Epic (purple) Centurion Hawk Soldier would evolve into a 2-Star Legendary (orange) Centurion Hawk Soldier.
• Fixed the issue that made the "Frenzied Deathburst" quest impossible to complete. The Frenzied Deathburst modifier is now activating on the map.
• Fixed an issue where low-level crafting items were appearing in higher-level zones. Players should be getting the appropriate crafting items based on zone difficulty.
• Fixed issue to prevent Husks from getting "around" traps and not getting hit by the trap when they should have.
• Fixed an issue with the Affliction weapon alteration. It is now properly applying damage over time.
• Fixed an issue on missions where relay survivors would spawn in a death state before disappearing.  
• Fixed an issue with Shielders being stuck on propane tanks when thrown by Sploders. Shielders now stay with their Husk.
• Fixed an issue where textures would pop in and out while using a scoped weapon.
• Fixed an issue that caused the Shielder to become unresponsive if hit while performing an action.
•  

Heroes

• Fixed issue where the Outlander's Anti-material Charge ability would destroy a vehicle that had a survivor on top of it, no matter where the Outlander was facing.
• Fixed an issue that caused Shuriken Master Sarah's support bonus to erroneously increase pickaxe damage. Now she only gives the intended increase to ability damage.
• Fixed Shuriken Master Sarah's support bonus so that the ability damage increase applies to BASE, TEDDY, Shock Tower, and DECOY.
• Fixed an issue with Bull Rushing Husks and attached Shielders. The shielder would settle inside of the husk and could NOT be damaged by guns without first killing the husk. The Shielder should stay up near the Husk's head now and be susceptible to damage.

UI

• Players should now be allowed to invite multiple friends without needing to reopen the UI each time.
• Removed the toggle for sprinting in the console settings since Sprint is always set to ON for consoles.
• Fixed an issue where players couldn't scroll to see the rewards in the quest log for the "Mission Literally Impossible" quest.
• Fixed an issue in the Edit Banner screen where the Player was unable to change to different icons and color palettes with the trigger buttons.
• Party members are now unable to invite Friends of Friends when “Allow Friends of Friends” option is disabled.
• Removed "Invite" and "Friend Request" from the chat menu on consoles.
• Removed the "Leave Party" option when not in a party.

PC Only

• Fixed issue where double clicking "Survive The Storm" from the map screen would cause the intro message to be skipped.

PS4 Only

• The following message is now displayed when a user with a sub account that has chat blocked goes into gameplay: “PSN CHAT/MSG RESTRICTION”.
• Fixed an issue causing a player to crash if they used Dragon Slash continuously in Survive The Storm mode.

Audio

• Sounds for various foliage will now play correctly when cued.

Art

• Changed Vampiric Hero abilities visual effect from pink/purple (enemy) to green (friendly).
• Fixed an issue where the Shielder would create a shield too large for the Husk it was protecting.

Localization

• Audio for Ray's "The tape cuts off there..." should now be in Russian instead of English on Russian versions of Fortnite.
• Audio files of Ray's phrases with the "medkit" term now in Russian instead of English on Russian versions of Fortnite.

Experiencing issues updating, logging in or crashing in Fortnite? Reach out to player support here.