Apex Legends devs are targeting rat-playstyle in Season 18 Ranked
The Apex Legends developer is targeting the “ratting” playstyle in Season 18 with changes designed to reduce the number of competitors avoiding conflict completely.
03rd Aug 2023 16:30
Courtesy of Respawn Entertainment
Apex Legends devs are targeting rat-playstyle in Season 18 Ranked
The Apex Legends developer is targeting the “ratting” playstyle in Season 18 with changes designed to reduce the number of competitors avoiding conflict completely.
03rd Aug 2023 16:30
Courtesy of Respawn Entertainment
While the current Apex Legends season has had its highs with the arrival of Ballistic and the brilliant World’s Edge changes, the low has certainly been the state of Ranked.
One of the biggest issues with the competitive mode has been “ratting,” with players actively avoiding all conflict and still being rewarded a significant amount of RP for doing so.
NRG pro Christopher "sweetdreams" Sexton proved this better than anyone, somehow reaching Predator in Season 17 while dealing no damage and getting no kills.
Well, the Apex Legends dev has revealed that it's targeting the “ratting” playstyle in Season 18 and is making changes to improve the overall pace of Ranked matches.
During a press event ahead of the launch of Apex Legends Season 18, Lead Game Designer at Respawn Chris Cleroux spoke about some of the changes being implemented to combat ratting.
“There are definitely behaviours that we’re looking to address, primarily around exploring spaces of the map that players are using to fully avoid conflict,” said Cleroux.
In order to achieve this, Cleroux revealed that the “map team has been hard at work on fixes in Season 18,” suggesting we can expect some of the well-known rat spots on all of the maps to now be inaccessible.
On top of this, the developer has made it clear it wants to “push the pace” of matches more. So, to up the tempo and eradicate more rats, ring damage in the early game is going up slightly and is also being reduced in the late game. To round off, the ring will also be moving more often, forcing squads to make rotations across the map.
Apex Legends Ranked changes will make it more action-packed
Another way the Apex Legends devs are looking to target rats is through their alterations to elimination bonuses in Ranked.
By putting more emphasis on securing kills and taking down foes to maximise your climb through the tiers, Respawn is hoping to dial up the number of gunfights during Ranked matches.
Despite all of these adjustments, Cleroux made it clear that the team are “ready to make tuning changes” if necessary.
With ratting being a major issue in Season 17, it'll be interesting to see if the strategy survives or whether Respawn will finally be able to eliminate the problem for good.
About The Author
Alex Garton
Alex is a Senior Writer at GGRecon. With a BA (Hons) in English, he has previously written for Dexerto & Gfinity. Specialising in Call of Duty & Apex Legends, he loves (attempting) to improve his aim in competitive shooters and will always make time for a single-player RPG.
