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[Apex Legends]: Breakout is here! 5 years of ApeLegs!

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Posts

  • CampyCampy Registered User regular
    Well I'm already seeing a shift in how folks play, way less crazy hot drops with much more cautious play generally. So the changes are definitely working how respawn intended.

    Really interesting how it affects fights just before the 10 team mark. Everyone is so fucking cagey 😂

  • ForarForar #432 Toronto, Ontario, CanadaRegistered User regular
    I find it hilarious how the game just slows to a crawl the moment there are 12 or 11 squads left. It's so close, everyone can taste it, nobody wants to eat a wipe and get a pittance in RP for whatever kills they managed up to that point.

    First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
  • mRahmanimRahmani DetroitRegistered User regular
  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    phi4xzgs9g62.png

    Even discounting Bronze IV (and Rookie) for people that have not played enough matches, Currently Bronze 3-1 is ~40% of players, Silver 4-1 is 38% of players, Gold is 20% of players and Plat IV+ is 2% currently

    Compare to the end of last split:

    898lzyy00le5.png

    If you disregard Bronze, Plat IV is actually the "Average" rank.

    I know it's only 5 days in but currently Bronze I matches are played more serious than Gold I last season.

    I like the matches, but this is causing a new issues where it must be daunting for the lower half of players, since they're bunched with so many people better than them. There's a reason I never pushed beyond Plat IV myself, and it's because I get outshot so much that I can't compensate for it. I know how unfun it is to be in a lobby where you can expect to lose 80% of all 1 v 1s.

    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • BlazeFireBlazeFire Registered User regular
    Where are those graphs and their underlying data from?

  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    https://apexlegendsstatus.com/ I understand they can just access data off an API but I have never looked into it.

    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • CampyCampy Registered User regular
    Already games with people trying to ape it are in the vast minority. Very cool!

    I suspect that the tuning of the point spread is intentionally heavy handed, and will be reduced once Respawn are sure that the meta has changed for good. CleverGirl.jpg

    Also, with the new more cautious play style, I can definitely see long ranged weapons like snipers becoming much more utilised. Although I'm not sure rushdown load outs will ever truly go away.

  • ForarForar #432 Toronto, Ontario, CanadaRegistered User regular
    I've gone from Bronze II to half way to Silver III with a little casual play over the last week. It's still early, but I'm heartened to see how people seem to have gotten the message. Spreading out, finding a POI with 1-2 teams, looting up and picking a fight is way better (to me) than suicidally hot dropping half the lobby into one place.

    You don't progress swiftly without making some kills, but (hopefully) gone are the days of the Diamond trail random on my team hurling themselves into a woodchipper to get two solo squad wipes before being murdered in 17th place and disconnecting when their banner times out.

    I wouldn't call it perfect, but I'm glad they're at least trying. As someone who will fight and stay to the bitter end every time, it was always frustrating to watch players who are objectively better than I am throw any hint of team work or commitment to us all doing well out the window just because they felt confident they could down enough players before they got third partied into the ground to come out ahead.

    I'm sure it won't stop some, and I suspect this season will be a substantial challenge just to get out of Gold (and if I'm honest, higher silver might be more trouble than I'm accustomed to), but hopefully it all settles out by the end of the season.

    First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    I agree that the games are more fun, but the math needs some adjusting. I'm currently Silver IV, still seeing 5 teams with diamond trails in my lobbies on average. Just had a game with 2 kills and 7th place, that's +17, but if we had lost an early 1 v 1 it'd be -27. So I need my good games on average to be better than that, just to stay in silver. I just think that for up to (and probably including) gold there needs to be more leeway on the scoring mid. ultimately you want something like 25% bronze/silver/gold 20%plat 4.5% diamond 0.5% master/pred

    There are competing goals here. You want ranked to be fun, but that includes playing against people of your own skill level. Right now the smush is so bad that you don't know if the team pushing you is a newbie or someone that is going to 2shot with wingman crits.

    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • ArteenArteen Adept ValeRegistered User regular
    edited May 2022
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frPP4N5AkPY
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLVvK46MLRM

    I'm never gonna play it, but the mobile version looks good. This shows off the new mobile-exclusive legend, too.

    Arteen on
  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    I wish I had a magic wand to wave that could make someone better at the game.

    I try to be cheerful and constructive and non-toxic but queueing with someone who regularly does 0 damage multiple times a night kind of wears on you.

    XNnw6Gk.jpg
  • SatsumomoSatsumomo Rated PG! Registered User regular
    Apex is unfortunately not a game you can really play with friends at different skill levels.

    I don't invite friends to play mostly because they'd absolutely hate playing in my lobbies, so I've made smurf accounts to play with them, and I try to handicap myself by using guns I am completely uncomfortable with, and acting much more as support rather than attacker.

  • mRahmanimRahmani DetroitRegistered User regular
    Man ranked is insane right now. I just got to silver 2 and this is harder than my platinum games were last season.

  • Mortal SkyMortal Sky queer punk hedge witchRegistered User regular
    when I do play with friends at totally different skill levels, we usually just play pubs as if it were ranked (unless we're in total hotdrop mode) and then make an attempt at using it to patch up our own deficiencies

    for example, I am usually ok at reading the map and aiming/movemont, but have a hard time at doing both and also calling shots out loud - so when I play with my buddy who has great aim from CoD/Halo but also shit game sense and movement, I tend to try and lead to call shots

  • schussschuss Registered User regular
    Yeah, playing with friends is pubs unless you're all close in skill.

    Took a bit of a break and ranked is sweaty as hell even in bronze. Nice that it isn't filled with master/diamond trails like at the start of the season.

  • OmnomnomPancakeOmnomnomPancake Registered User regular
    The diamond and masters trails are a bit misleading this season, as it has been noted that last season had the largest jump in people achieving diamond/masters due to previous rank changes.

    There are a lot of fairly skilled people that were reset too far back this season to sort of better shake-up the ranks with the more significant RP changes, but their corresponding dive trails are often not indicative of their true skill within the system at large.

    Of course, with how ranking up and RP is now gauged, and how many points it actually takes to rank up, I've largely ignored dive trails and just go into every match assuming they're full of a collection of a variety of sweats.

    But I've also largely ignored ranked, because the sheer amount of RP and grinding effort required to even get to my comfortable Platinum simply isn't worth the time and stress, to say nothing of the dice-rolls of teammates one acquires with a solo-queue.

    As with Overwatch, the safest path to enjoyment has been playing pubs and not giving a single fuck about the try-hards.

  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    Unfortunately it's (probably?) not even MMR differences. I'm also somewhat fresh coming back to the game so when we were in Ranked, we were both climbing Rookie and Bronze. It's just a difference in capability/rust that we're working through.

    I did come up with a solution: Reconnect with another friend who I hadn't been able to talk to for several years because he dropped off the face of the map and who also just happened to be coming back to the game and have them as our 3rd. They're way better at microshotcalling to work with, which leads to better squad success.

    XNnw6Gk.jpg
  • ForarForar #432 Toronto, Ontario, CanadaRegistered User regular
    Another thing to keep in mind is that they compressed the ranks a LOT in a way I don't know if they've ever done before (definitely not since I started in S5).

    I was Plat IV last season and I was bumped to Bronze II. Supposedly Masters and Predators got knocked down to Gold II.

    Now, while it's my understanding that the game will at least make a token effort to put a lobby together with players of a similar level, Bronze/Silver/Gold are all (at least were, and still are as far as I'm aware) considered the same pool, with Plat and above segregated away.

    So they've added a Rookie tier for utterly brand new players (and those who just haven't ranked much or ever), but they get put in Bronze and Silver lobbies as well (I'm Silver I on console and have had several Rookie squadmates, including at least one who very much still seemed to be figuring out how the game even worked), and they are thus being put into lobbies that may or may not contain some of the very best players of the last season (especially on low population regions and/or at odd hours of the day).

    While this should sort itself out, that's further contrasted with the increased entry fees and increased points to get out of each tier. One would assume that some former Masters or whatever would tear a bloody swathe through many Bronze/Silver lobbies and get punted out to Plat+ where they belong, but it only takes a few such squads (or players) mixed in to really shit up a lobby, and while the supply of those players is hardly endless, I daresay there are enough to make things messy for a while yet.

    I do hope that as the days and weeks go by, the ranks start to filter the truly stellar players up out of the lower tier pool to make it a bit less obnoxious, but I'm not going to state it definitively either.

    I started back in S5, and have been hitting Plat since S7, often through a mix of luck and patience more than anything.

    I enjoy this shakeup of how Ranked works. It pushes more passive/cautious players like me into fights if we want to advance, and it pushes more aggressive players to be a touch more conservative in their play if they want to reap the rewards of killing multiple squads on their own. It sucks to get wiped out in 11th place with a pile of points waiting for you, but it feels pretty damned rewarding to see a good chunk of them pop up when we do manage to wipe a few teams and those participation points get added into the mix along with a few actual kills/assists.

    There's room for improvement. I hear that they're looking into ways to possibly alleviate the solo queue challenges (yes, being in a squad with friends or a premade or on the right Discord is highly beneficial, but if I wanted to base my gaming around organizing groups of people for things at set times, I'd still be raiding in WoW), and I hope/suspect they may tweak the points a little (earned, required, entry fees, etc) a bit for Season 14, if not perhaps at the split (doubtful though, I expect they want the results of this thing all the way through, for good or ill).

    Thank you for attending my TED Talk.

    I leave you with this little moment from todays drops that made me feel like the Cavalry charging in to save the day.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qM4J3szW9HM

    First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    I enjoy ranked games more on average, and it has cooled down a bit, but the difference in lobbies is still crazy.

    And I get more annoyed at hot droppers now than ever. It is such a terrible proposition to go into a 4 way fight at the start. 75% chance of -30pts or more, 25% chance of -25pts and having to survive.

    I also feel that as a response nonranked has become even more hotdrops. I did an hour of nonranked yesterday, 6 drops, 3 went down the butthole on stormpoint and lasted 1 minute combined, a fourth was 4 teams by the end of zone 1, 1 game was relatively normal, and then it switched to Olympus and immediately the hotdrop there, where I get cursed out for landing in the same building as the jump master when 6 teams are in 50m.

    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • OmnomnomPancakeOmnomnomPancake Registered User regular
    Yeah, for pubs at the moment on Olympus it's quite a lot of hot-dropping Estates (the apartment complex cube place) and on World's Edge it is nearly 24/7 Fragment (the ruined city).

    I simply want more King's Row and Storm Point for the lack of hot-drop points that EVERYONE gravitates to. Heck, those two maps do have that, but they feel designed with enough space that it's less of a murderous grinder.

  • mRahmanimRahmani DetroitRegistered User regular
    Olympus actually has a pretty high number of popular POIs which helps space things out a bit. World’s Edge is a problem because all of the most popular non-Capital drops have been removed:

    Mirage Voyage
    Sorting Factory
    Train Yard

    There’s big Maude off in the corner of the map I guess, and Bloodhound’s trial, but either of those is particularly enticing. Climatizer is probably the only remaining non-Capital drop.

  • schussschuss Registered User regular
    Skyhook/Trials and Lava City/Maude are both excellent. I find it's more "I want something different from ranked and I want to fight" that defines a lot of the pub population. Hopefully the return of control will alleviate that a bit. There's not really a great spot for mixed-rank groups to hang out and play "properly"

  • SanderJKSanderJK Crocodylus Pontifex Sinterklasicus Madrid, 3000 ADRegistered User regular
    I land Countdown most of the time. It tends to be a slightly contested PoI, 0-2 other teams. It has guaranteed armors, rotation is always easy. Often a Vault key.

    I want to give a shoutout to the French duo that just got me to Gold IV, I was 60pts away, we land late and see nobody in zone 1, then right as it closes 3 teams push into us at the same time, and me and one of them go down pretty fast. The Bangalore manages to get my banner and healwalks through zone all the way to the other side of the map because it kept pulling far. 4 teams left. Is able to res me. My galaxy brain move is that nobody has touched the armory near Mill, and a small part of it is in zone 5. So we go in and start the armory, untouchable by the other teams. Right as Zone 5 closes we yeet out on a roof, it's a 2 v 3, but they play badly and it becomes the French dude vs 2, and he wins it, because the other team doesn't realize how slow the final zone is. They ran into the open way too fast and one gets dropped.

    350 damage, 2 assists for me, +250pts.

    Steam: SanderJK Origin: SanderJK
  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    edited May 2022
    Starting to pick up normal wins at least semi-consistently a couple times a night at least.

    It also feels like night and day still between when I'm running weapon categories for a weekly that I'm less comfortable with or when I can just no stress take an AR and lean on that the whole game. I have to get my SMG recoil control back, ugh.

    https://youtu.be/FYRomAm3n_g

    Spectrum on
    XNnw6Gk.jpg
  • Redcoat-13Redcoat-13 Registered User regular
    Had two games today where I ended up dying on the hot drop but somehow the surviving team mate got my banner and spawned me back in.

    First game got a longbow because I could not find any other weapons; I’m always massively surprised when I hit anything with it. Sadly I didn’t record the end of it but we ended up gate keeping the last two teams and won.

    The 2nd game I ended up with awful loot when I rez’d and could not find anything.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2mPN5QGrjd0

    PSN Fleety2009
  • mRahmanimRahmani DetroitRegistered User regular
    Redcoat-13 wrote: »
    Had two games today where I ended up dying on the hot drop but somehow the surviving team mate got my banner and spawned me back in.

    First game got a longbow because I could not find any other weapons; I’m always massively surprised when I hit anything with it. Sadly I didn’t record the end of it but we ended up gate keeping the last two teams and won.

    The 2nd game I ended up with awful loot when I rez’d and could not find anything.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2mPN5QGrjd0

    Omfg that finisher nearly gave me a stroke. I had a very painful loss a few seasons ago finishing the last downed guy and the storm caught up to me -_-

  • OmnomnomPancakeOmnomnomPancake Registered User regular
    edited May 2022
    With the return by the Flatine this season, and the avowed loyalty to the gun by many a streamer and pro, I really gave it a shot, and have come to realize certain guns don't have a flow or tempo that I enjoy at all. Like a flatline with a skilled player has great range, and it shreds medium to close, but I don't enjoy the sound of it, or the bullet pattern, or having to fight everyone else for heavy ammo for it?

    What is everyone's favourite gun?

    After years, I've realized that I just adore the Hemlock's burst pace, similarly for the Triple-Take too, and the wind-up prep of the Havoc/Devotion are like a pre-fire focus phase where I mentally lock in.

    I also love the RE-45 because some ephemeral anime I watched in the early 2000s had a character who used machine pistols and that's just tight.

    OmnomnomPancake on
  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    With the return by the Flatine this season, and the avowed loyalty to the gun by many a streamer and pro, I really gave it a shot, and have come to realize certain guns don't have a flow or tempo that I enjoy at all. Like a flatline with a skilled player has great range, and it shreds medium to close, but I don't enjoy the sound of it, or the bullet pattern, or having to fight everyone else for heavy ammo for it?

    What is everyone's favourite gun?

    After years, I've realized that I just adore the Hemlock's burst pace, similarly for the Triple-Take too, and the wind-up prep of the Havoc/Devotion are like a pre-fire focus phase where I mentally lock in.

    I also love the RE-45 because some ephemeral anime I watched in the early 2000s had a character who used machine pistols and that's just tight.
    The Flatline lol (though I also like the Havoc)

    Well, my true ultimate favorite gun is an Alternator with Disruptors but that shit only lasted a season for a reason

    Though truthfully, for me, it's more that I have guns that I hate than I necessarily love my top guns that much more than everything else. I can't stand the Triple Take or the Bocek and I've never been fond of the Hemlok.

    XNnw6Gk.jpg
  • mRahmanimRahmani DetroitRegistered User regular
    edited May 2022
    It’s kinda funny because my favorite weapons aren’t necessarily the ones I run all the time. The Wingman stands out as one of the guns that really made me fall in love with the game, even though I’m not that effective with it. I love the R99 even though the CAR has replaced in most of my games, it’s just so satisfying to use. The Hemlock has been one of my favorites since the beginning, but I don’t typically use it unless I’m running and gunning in pubs, I just don’t find it effective enough in ranked.

    Probably the only one of my favorites that I use when tryharding is the Longbow. Which seems to be a rather unpopular choice, but I’m weirdly effective with it and love using it in ranked.

    mRahmani on
  • Mortal SkyMortal Sky queer punk hedge witchRegistered User regular
    I really like the Hemlok but I think it needs a tiny damage buff to compete with the Flatline or 301. Maybe if it got the old "Anvil Receiver" upgrade, to really buff the single fire's efficacy or something

    I also really enjoy the Prowler, especially for punishing corner peekers, even if I know the CAR is objectively better

    I really miss the ground loot Volt, on that note, because that one's a fun fun even without attachments and energy weapons need more love

  • MyNameIsWalrusMyNameIsWalrus Registered User regular
    https://youtu.be/wwwTs21znMI

    That's the fastest I've downed five people in a long time.

  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    Was pubbing for my dailies last night and ended up in one of those squads where the other two just W key towards fights literally the entire time. It was a real struggle trying to catch up.

    The surprising part was that they actually put work in and didn't just lose and quit out and complain about me.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IR2y9AV9abc

    Not captured: They very quickly abandoned our landing and moved to another POI and cleaned up a fight there all while I was still looting and crafting our original POI.

    XNnw6Gk.jpg
  • Halos Nach TariffHalos Nach Tariff Can you blame me? I'm too famous.Registered User regular
    I got my first win with Newcastle! Some of his abilities feel a little janky, especially the tactical is kinda hard to use effectively, and the ultimate is a little tough to use when it's not targeting to a teammate, but being able to jump from sniping/ranged support to literally leaping to your allies' aid feels super cool.

    Also has a fun game where I was stuck using the bow and a white bolt shotgun throughout, and one teammate left after getting knocked, but managed to great escape with the other respawn card and turn it into a win, I don't play Caustic much, but I can't deny how useful he is.

  • SatsumomoSatsumomo Rated PG! Registered User regular
    Ughh I hate it when I forget to turn on replay recording, I just had a whole team push my own team really aggressively and since they downed my two other teammates almost instantly they got really cocky and bee-lined towards me.

    Me and Sheila that is. They didn't live.

  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    Getting real sick of Apex technical issues. If it's not DXDI_DEVICE_REMOVED/HUNG and its derivatives CTDing me at random, it's fighting hours of EAC literally BSODing me before something random fixes it again. Or getting disconnected randomly and then their stupid system only letting you have one chance to reconnect before perma kicking you from a lobby.

    XNnw6Gk.jpg
  • SatsumomoSatsumomo Rated PG! Registered User regular
    Weird, now that you've mentioned it, I haven't been getting of any those crashes the past two weeks. Did get them very often the first week of the season, only thing I changed was that I updated my nvidia driver since then, but not sure if that actually helped.

  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    Satsumomo wrote: »
    Weird, now that you've mentioned it, I haven't been getting of any those crashes the past two weeks. Did get them very often the first week of the season, only thing I changed was that I updated my nvidia driver since then, but not sure if that actually helped.
    I originally suffered from the DXDI errors a few weeks back. After a variety of attempted fixes, what did help was underclocking my GPU slightly.

    Unfortunately, at one point I had some kind of freak error that hardlocked me on loading the game. I'm unsure of what precisely happened during it, but after restarting EAC starting full up BSODing me. After lots and lots and lots of attempted fixes I got it to work for a day. Then after not changing my setup, it broke again out of nowhere the day after. Then after lots more attempted fixes I did a partial memtest, aborted it, and it started working again.

    Then of course the DXDI errors started up again, but I re-underclocked my GPU and those seem to have gone away again (and so the cycle begins anew).

    XNnw6Gk.jpg
  • Redcoat-13Redcoat-13 Registered User regular
    Had a really odd game where it seemed like our drop leader was afk. We were the last in the drop ship to leave at which point the other guy and I dropped to one place and the drop leader went off elsewhere.

    Met about 10 minutes later as the zones contracted (we both had adventures if the voice lines were anything to go by), and then went on to win the game.

    PSN Fleety2009
  • SpectrumSpectrum Archer of Inferno Chaldea Rec RoomRegistered User regular
    Sometimes, even after a long and tiring day, you can still wake up and choose violence.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4AYTlxF5eg

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  • vagrant_windsvagrant_winds Overworked Mysterious Eldritch Horror Hunter XX Registered User regular
    It feels really great to just completely screw over a team's entire approach with Fuse and corral them into your teammates' awaiting bullets.

    // Steam: VWinds // PSN: vagrant_winds //
    // Switch: SW-5306-0651-6424 //
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