Apex Legends Season 5, “Fortune’s Favour,” is live now. It brings a new character, a player-versus-environment mode, some shakeups to the King’s Canyon map, and a host of character tweaks.
First up is new character Loba, who’s set up in the lore as a rival to most recently added character Revenant. She can teleport by throwing her bracelet, and her passive lets her see epic and legendary-level loot through walls. Her ultimate, called Black Market Boutique, creates a kind of shop around her staff that pulls in nearby loot for her squad to choose from. The patch notes mention that enemies can also snag some of this loot, up to two items per player.
Also new this season are Quests, a new PvE mode. Season 5’s Quest is called “The Broken Ghost.” A squad is tasked with searching for nine pieces of a “mysterious artefact,” either solo or in squads, on the King’s Canyon night map. Hunts, as well as rewards, appear to be unlocked by finding treasure packs in “competitive” matches, which encompass duos, trios, LTMs, and ranked mode. The quest unfolds over the course of the season, with hunts changing weekly; the notes highlight that “While you can always join in on Hunts, you’ll only get the Rewards if you’ve unlocked the mission yourself.” Completing these hunts earns you rewards and unlocks lore, while finding all nine pieces will “uncover a secret that the Outlands might not be ready for.” A PvE mode is a real change for Apex Legends, and I’m excited to check it out for myself.
There are also a ton of changes to the King’s Canyon map. Respawn has a whole blog detailing the changes, which get rid of popular areas Skulltown and Thunderdome. An area called Salvage has been added to the map, which Respawn describes as “a protected arena with high-tier loot.” The eastern corner of the map has been changed to include an Offshore Rig, and Wetlands has been replaced with a landmark called Capacitor. There are underground caverns and areas to explore and escape through. Charge Tower is another new area of the map, and Respawn writes “By interacting with the control panel, you can trigger a blast that restores the ultimate of every player on the Charge Tower platform.” King’s Canyon will be the only available map for the first two weeks of the season, after which World’s Edge will return to the rotation.
There are a ton of other tweaks as well. Seasonal content has its own tab in your lobby screen now, where you can view quests, your battle pass, and challenges. Legends will now have some different chatter depending on which other Legends they encounter. Mirage has gotten some big changes: you can now control his decoys to mimic his actions, and the decoys he releases with his ultimate “mimic his every move (think “Emergency Dance Party” from DUMMIEs Big Day).” His passive, which used to send out a decoy and cloak when downed, now includes cloaking when he uses a respawn beacon, as well as cloaking himself and the appropriate teammate when he’s reviving someone. Respawn also writes “Mirage’s ‘You got Bamboozled’ line will now trigger when you bamboozle an enemy, instead of when you release a decoy,” which is a minor change but makes a lot more sense.
Other Legends have gotten tweaks as well. Crypto’s drone can ping banners. Caustic’s gas no longer slows down teammates, and his traps “are no longer triggered from the other side of a door.” There are reductions to Octane’s launchpad cooldown, Bloodhound’s tactical, and Gibraltar’s dome shield duration.
There’s no new weapons this season—Respawn writes “We believe there is a “right” amount of weapons in the loot pool, and we think we are currently in that sweet spot.”—but there are a ton of weapon tweaks, with the Mastiff going into the regular loot pool and the Peacekeeper going into care packages (nooo!). There are also a bunch of fully-kitted gold weapons, including the Longbow and Spitfire.
As always, there’s a new battle pass, and a ton of bug fixes and quality of life changes, including the removal of location-based weekly challenges and changes to the deathbox UI. Season 5’s patch notes are hefty, and I’m excited to see how all these changes feel on the ground. We’ll have more impressions of Apex Legends Season 5 as we finish our downloads and get to playing.
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