May 2019
I guess my question is... Has Respawn altered the drop chances of items in Apex Legends or is this just bad luck?
What I'm making specific reference to here is the rate in which certain items (specifically med kits, shield cells, shotgun bolts and grenades) spawn around the map, as well as why I'm experiencing issues with them during my time with the game recently.
We've all had bad games, whether we've been killed within the first 20 seconds of hitting the ground or ones where we run round the map and find nothing but P2020's and helmets.
This is like one of those games...
Recently I have noticed more and more that some areas of the map just don't get decent loot drops.
Yes there are high tier and low tier zones but what I'm specifically referring to is the matter of there being inconsistent item drop rates for all zones regardless of what tier they are.
How many of us have entered a game and in an entire high tier loot zone there is nothing more than a Mozambique and a bunch of ammo packs for weapons we wish we had?
So right now I make specific reference to my most recent match and my team's journey across the game map so please refer to the attached image of a diagram I made to visually depict our route travelled in the game I'm discussing.
In this last game I played I felt prompted to write this and document the experience as I felt it was the worst example of poor and unbalanced loot drops I have ever witnessed in Apex Legends.
In short I can describe this game as one were my squad lasted around 15 minutes, covered around 1/3 of the map and found no truly useful gear to help us survive in the later stages of the game.
1: Landing Zone
My team and I landed in the small town area just west of Bunker. We looted the entire place and found ourselves off to a positive start with a handful of decent items.
(I had a Spitfire, level 2 Body Shield, level 1 Helmet, 2 Syringes, a Shield Battery and a couple of Arc Stars, with my squamates having similarly good initial loadouts.)
Then we were attacked by an enemy team who came from Airbase.
We managed to stave off their attack and beat them, but during the firefight every one of us was downed at some point or other.
(I used up my two syringes and shield cells when I was almost downed after getting ambushed by a Pathfinder who zip-lined over us.)
When I got the last kill against this squad we attempted to heal up... Except we couldn't.
After looting the entire area and the death boxes of our defeated enemies, we found ourselves without any syringes or med kits.
No big deal we thought, we just started and we'll find more.
OH HOW WE WERE WRONG!
So this is where we began to have the best worst luck I've ever experienced in a game of Apex Legends.
Areas 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 & 8: Runoff to Cascades
After realising the team that attacked us came from Airbase, our team decided to hit Runoff for the chance to find some health consumables. It's not the most popular place to land so we thought our chances were good despite two of us having only a tiny bit of health.
(We had an Octane so they were good for healing thanks to their passive ability.)
Upon reaching the south side of Runoff we got armoured up after all of us getting our hands on level 3 Body Shields and a fair number of spare ammo packs.
We then proceeded to split up to cover more ground.
I went over to the small buildings West of Runoff because hardly anyone goes over there and knew I'd be safe to loot, whilst my teammates Wraith and Octane hit the rest of Runoff.
Then the ring started to close.
I was on the edge of the map playing as Gibraltar so being the slowest I began running to avoid the closing ring. As did my teammates as it seemed they could not find any useful consumables in the whole of Runoff either.
Running back through that area I could see all the level 1 attachment items strewn about the place (mostly Sniper Stocks and Shotgun Bolts with an occasion close range sight scattered around).
We quickly hit the supply crates surrounding the respawn beacon east of Runoff and moved to the small building south of The Pit and then on to the other supply crates north of Bunker.
At this point we were growing agitated because despite all the ground we covered and all the places that possessed loot, not a single one of us was able to gather up a single syringe to heal with.
This was especially vexing seeing as the ring was closing on us and left us loosing even more health as we frantically ran to Cascades.
Areas 9, 10, 11 & 12: Cascades
At this point in the match we realised that we really were having the best worst luck. No enemies around which was good, but no health or means to restore it either.
Cascades is usually a hotspot for activity but for some reason, like with Runoff, we had the entire place to ourselves.
We thought this wouldn't last so we quickly set about looting the place for what we desperately needed.
However YET AGAIN, not a single health consumable was to be seen... NOT ONE!
So despite it seeming like no enemies were on this side of the map, we were still sitting ducks with mine and Wraith's minuscule amounts of health.
We went through every single building in Cascades to the point where we were now heading up to the high up facility in the north-most part of that area and still no health packs of any kind were found.
The only things we were coming across were level 1 Shotgun Bolts, Sniper Stocks and Body Shields and a strangely large amount of Thermite Grenades and Shield Cells.
Given how we were picking up anything we could consider useful, we soon realised that there was a serious overabundance of Shield Cells and Thermite Grenades.
When checking our inventories each of us had noticed we had essentially filled our spaces with Shield Cells. I had 18 of them with 7 Thermite Grenades.
(My teammates had similar numbers. Octane even dropping 3 Shotgun Bolts after thinking they were Syringes).
After noticing this we dropped most of the stuff we knew was useless and began heading up to the facility on the hill north of Cascades, still finding nothing particularly useful, just Shield Cells and Thermite Grenades.
(At this point I began counting. From the south side of Cascades to the facility in the north, I came across 13 Thermite Grenades, 17 Shield Cells and 9 level 1 Shotgun Bolts.)
Eventually we finally found health!
In the last two spots we had to check in Cascades we found 2 Phoenix Kits in supply crates. Me and Wraith were finally back to full health when the ring began to close again.
But our looting troubles did not end there...
Areas 13, 14, 15 & 16
As the ring is beginning to close again Wraith scouts ahead towards the building on top of the hill south-east of Cascades, whilst Octane and me head east from the north facility towards the woodland area south of Artillery.
Wraith quickly passes through the buildings to find that that area has already been looted by enemy teams. (Understandable seeing as we were bound to encounter enemies sooner or later.)
We then regroup in the woodlands area after checking the other site further east and going through all of the unopened supply crates in the area.
STILL NO HEALTH CONSUMABLES!
We evaluated our chances and checked our gear and realised that although we had no way of healing ourselves in a fight, we at least stood a chance to take down enemies before they had a chance to do the same to us seeing as how we were armed with LMG's, sniper rifles and assault rifles, each fully modded with at least level 1 attachments.
As we witnessed a firefight break out around 200 metres away between 2 enemy squads of the 6 that were left, we thought our best chances to gather up meaningful loot was to attack them.
Around 50 metres out the fighting had stopped so we thought they must be healing up.
At this point we rushed in to attack them whilst they were healing and had a fair shot a them.
I as Gibraltar using my ultimate and Octane & Wraith flanking them we managed to down 2 of them very quickly in the space of a few seconds.
Then another 2 enemy squads turned up and we were caught in the middle of a firefight containing at least 10 players including us.
Area 17: Death
What would happen when you are a small, slightly weakened squad with below average gear caught in the centre of a firefight between three better equipped teams?
Exactly what you think would happen... We were wiped out.
So we backed out of the game and that's when I begin to make this post...
I understand that this could be construed as me sounding like a sore loser whining about being eliminated when being outgunned, but that's not the case.
Nor am I complaining about how I feel situations like this occur all too often in Apex Legends and that the way in which loot is distributed around the map needs some revision.
I'm simply stating that sometimes things are incredibly unbalanced.
We covered a substantial portion of the map over the course of 14 minutes of play time but despite this RN-Jesus saw fit to bless us with only Body Shields, level 1 weapon attachments and a seemingly infinite supply of Shield Cells and Thermite Grenades.
How long are poorly equipped players expected to last against squads who use things like Krabers, Mastiffs and fully kitted out weapons when they don't have any way to properly heal themselves?
After traversing 4 high tier loot zones, 8 low tier loot zones and opening at least 20 or so supply crates my squad ended up with only a handful of useful items.
Granted we found decent weapons, but the sheer lack or useful attachments above level 1 and hardly any means to properly regenerate our health we essentially became nothing more than cannon fodder for those who chose to land in more popular hotspots.
We had easily 1/3 of the map to ourselves after we started the match and we weren't able to gather gear that would help us survive in round 3 against better equipped squads.
Not even a single supply crate dropped in the northern half of the map during the entire match.
Now imagine if other players were to have landed in the zones we visited.
Given the loot we came across, we would not have found anything useful there regardless of whether to not we got into a fight and survived.
No-one would've had items to heal themselves with.
At some point I wonder if players will end up resorting to throwing shotgun bolts at each other just to attempt to deal some damage.
Hell even after running through the whole of an unlooted Cascades, there wasn't even a single P2020 or Mozambique to pick up and they're the most common weapons in the game!
It'd be nice to see the zones in Apex Legends be a little bit more balanced. No more inconsistent item drops like having 8 level 1 Shotgun Bolts spawn in a single 50ft. square area.
We've all experienced moments like where we get respawned by teammates to get to the nearest supply grate and for it to only contain 2 level 1 body shields and attack of shotgun ammo and nothing else.
I'm not asking for every supply crate and building to contain fully kitted weapons and level 4 armours, but I would call for giving players better chances to survive the full duration of the game.
After all, you are most rewarded in this game for surviving the longest. However the majority of players cannot survive more than 10 minutes due to the sheer absurdity in the items that spawn.
Like I have state with this most recent game I played... We covered a 1/3 of the map, over 15 minutes and that was simply down to sheer dumb luck that nobody else landed nearby.
It would've been unlikely that anyone landing in the areas we visited would have survived for long based on what my team found.
If players are meant to survive, then they must have a chance to begin the process of doing so.
May 2019