What "Balancing" means:

by papahandsoap
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What "Balancing" means:

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In a game like Apex, there will always be a tier list based on character abilities (passive, tactical, ultimate). Not every character can be "meta" and not every character needs to be all powerful. However, every character should still be useful. While there are tiers A through F, legends can be split down the middle as "good" or "bad." Some of the "bad" legends are bad simply because they were once too much of a problem and are now nerfed into the ground. Some of the currently bad legends are listed here along with why they are bad and how they could be better: 

- Wattson: Her win rate is inflated due to the huge boosting/badge farming economy in Apex. The weeks where Mobile Respawn is in replicator, you can drop into almost any ranked game and find Wattsons farming kills. She is extremely under-tuned although all of her abilities are useful. Not sure if her fences should go back to doing more damage, if they should do more shield than flesh damage, if they need a longer stun, or what. In her current state she is not as capable as other Defensive legends when it comes to holding a building/area and protecting it. 

 

- Caustic: He was a problem in early Season 8, as there was a huge uptick in Caustic camping a building. After that, he was given what appeared to be some slight nerfs (gas damage and visibility through gas) that ended up devastating his in-game use. Caustic gas, even from his ultimate, is now fearlessly tanked by everyone which makes his ability to hold ground much weaker - just like Wattson's right now. 

 

- Rampart: I understand she's getting a buff in S10, but she has been in a very odd place since her release. Her passive is really cool but not compelling enough to result in picking her. LMGs require a ton of ammo and her passive doesn't make them insane, it just makes them more viable. If this could be reworked or tuned to work with all automatic weapons (tuning different weapon categories to balance this from getting OP) I think it could make her an instant choice even with her current kit. Her walls still feel too slow compared to the rest of Apex gameplay even if they're great for blocking doors and anchoring down small buildings without many chokes. Her ultimate is more of a party trick than anything tbh, and I don't know how I would go about helping this.

 

- Wraith: She is honestly already "good," but she's so close to being great that it hurts. The windup for her tactical feels like a millennium mid-fight, and her ultimate distance feels just too short to be useful outside of final-ring higher rank gameplay. I play a fair amount of wraith, and her passive is useful 1% of the time. Granted, I lean towards a marksman or sniper for a lot of ranked play but I rarely ever find myself hitting the hotkey to "warn my teammates" when we're just in comms anyway... it feels outdated. 

 

- Fuse: Similar story to wraith. It's neat and fun carrying more grenades, but he definitely feels like he could use a little spice. A lot of other posters suggested that he could be immune to his ult/burning in general and I think that wouldn't be too ridiculous (even in pro play). 

 

- Mirage: Mirage simply does not have enough to be useful at the moment. His passive is his best quality, and once you get out of a casual lobby and anywhere above Silver in ranked - his decoys become mostly useless. His ultimate is okay at best in Arenas, but still pretty easy to track him through. Again, I'm sure there are god-tier mirage players, but his kit needs to be updated or adjusted to the strength of other high-tier legends. 

 

- Bangalore: I think Bang is the most "mid-tier" of all of the characters. She can be used really well, but only by some of the most skilled players in the game. Not sure the best part of her kit to adjust at the moment, but I think it really comes down to her smoke and how she can use it. Her smoke is immediately rendered useless by a Bloodhound, but the rest of her kit is just good enough that she can continue to be used. 

 

One of the biggest issues with balancing in this game is that win rates and pick rates only reflect a small part of how legends can be balanced. Seeing that Wattson has a high win rate should not mean she instantly gets a negative adjustment, one can spend an hour watching average players skip her or try to use it. Development is difficult, but looking beyond static data is very important when managing and editing a billion-dollar project. 

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