Apex Legends Season 9 patch notes: Arenas mode, new Legend, more
Apex Legends Season 9, Legacy, will go live on May 4, and the patch notes have been released for the coming update. Here’s everything that we know about, from the new Legend Valkyrie to the Arenas mode.
While there’s still some time left until the arrival of Apex Legends Season 9, there has been a ton of hype in the community as more upcoming content has been revealed, including the new Legend, Valkyrie, and Arenas mode.
There will also be various balancing changes for different Legends. The update will go live on May 4, and we’ve got the Apex Legends Season 9 patch notes.
Apex Legends Season 9 Legacy update patch notes
New Mode: Arenas
A new 3v3 mode was previously leaked for Apex legends, and now we have confirmation that Arenas will arrive next season. This mode will feature custom-tailored maps, and a completely different playstyle from the battle royale.
- Read More: How to register for Apex Legends Mobile beta
Here’s what’s been revealed about it in the patch notes:
- Permanent 3v3 mode
- 2 Custom maps:
- Party Crasher: Mirage crashed into a downtown plaza
Phaserunner: hidden experimental zone at the peak of a mountain
- Party Crasher: Mirage crashed into a downtown plaza
- 3 BR-inspired locations
- Artillery (KC), Golden Gardens, Thermal Plant
New Legend: Valkyrie
This is newest Legend to join battle royale’s roster. She’s the daughter of Titanfall 2’s Viper, and her abilities are based on Viper’s titan, Northstar.
- Passive: VTOL Jets – Press Jump while in the air to engage jetpack. You can switch between hold and toggle in the options menu.
- Tactical: Missile Swarm – Fire a swarm of mini-rockets which damage and disorient the enemy.
- Ultimate: Skyward Dive – Press once to prepare for launch. Teammates can interact with Valkyrie to join the launch. Press again to launch into the air and skydive.
- Class: Recon – Ability to scan beacons and reveal the next circle location.
Olympus Map Changes
Respawn Entertainment teased some new map locations for Olympus, which was first introduced in Season 7. Now we know what will be included in the changes to this area when Season 9 goes live.
Here are all the confirmed map changes for Olympus:
- Olympus has been over by a massive plant flown in by a mysterious aircraft, linked to Valkyrie’s entrance
- Crossroads turned into the Icarus ship
- On scientist corpses, there will be bridge keycards, which allow access to the best loot on the ship
- 2 redeploy balloons have been removed – outside Golden Gardens and outside Orbital Cannon
Legends
- Low Profile removed: Wraith, Wattson and Lifeline will no longer take 5% more damage.
Fuse
- Knuckle Cluster: Fuse now has two stacks of Knuckle Cluster. Reduced cooldown from 25s to 20s.
Lifeline
- Combat Revive: No longer deploys a shield. Can now revive two players at the same time. Can now cancel active revives in progress to allow your teammate to defend themselves with their knockdown shield.
- D.O.C. Heal Drone: Heal rate increased from 5hp per second to 8hp per second. Deployment time before healing begins reduced by roughly 33%.
- Care Package: Cooldown reduced from 6 minutes to 5 minutes. Now guarantees an upgrade (if possible) in three categories: Body Shield, Other Equipment (Helmet, Backpack, and Knockdown Shield), and Weapon Attachment, based on your team’s current gear when the Package arrives.
Loba
- Burglar’s Best Friend: Can now run and slide at full speed while aiming the bracelet and while the bracelet is in the air. Loba will no longer be slowed after translocating.
- Fixed a lot of bugs that caused bracelet tosses to fail.
- Black Market Boutique: Increased cooldown from 90s to 120s.
Octane
- Stim: Reduced cooldown between stims from 4s to 1s. Increased health cost from 12hp to 20hp.
- Increased bullet spread while in the air and shooting from the low Launch Pad trajectory.
Horizon
- Gravity Lift: Reduced lift speed by 30%. Reduced side-to-side acceleration. Limited the time you can sit at the top of Gravity Lift to 2 seconds. Increased cooldown from 15s to 20s.
- Horizon’s abilities will now get zapped by Wattson pylons.
Bangalore
- Smoke Launcher: Thickened Bangalore’s smoke.
Bloodhound
- No longer receives assists from Eye of the Allfather.
Crypto
- Crypto’s drone can now scan and open care packages.
- Can no longer use his drone to “hijack” a respawn beacon that’s already in use.
Weapons
New Weapon: Bocek Bow
The Bocek Bow is part of the Marksman Weapons class. As the name implies, you can use it to fire Arrows at your foes from a distance, and these can be retrieved after firing.
When fully drawn back, the bow will deal 70 damage to body, and 123 damage to the head.
New Hop Ups
Deadeye’s Tempo (Sentinel & Bocek Bow)
- Description: Firing at the perfect moment increases fire rate
Shatter Caps (Bocek Bow & 30-30 Repeater)
- Description: Rounds split into a blast pattern on firing
Care package weapons
- Peacekeeper removed from care packages
- Triple Take goes into care packages
Fully kitted weapons
- Added: Wingman, Bocek, R99, Hemlock, and Sentinel
- Removed: R301, 30-30 Repeater, Mozambique, Longbow DMR, and Spitfire
Peacekeeper
- It comes with the Precision Choke by default, which can be toggled off
- Pellet damage reduced from 10 to 9
- Rechamber time increased from 0.9 seconds to 1.1 seconds
- Reload times increased (regular from 2.45 to 2.5, empty from 3.35 to 3.5)
- Pellet spread increased in general, and spread when charged increased for all charge levels (from 0.65/0.45/0.2 to 0.85/0.65/0.35)
- Quickly loses charge after leaving ADS
Triple Take
- As a crate weapon, it will come with a 9 ammo clip and 63 reserve ammo
- Fire rate increased from 1.2 to 1.3
- Time to full charge reduced from 1.1 seconds to 1 second
- Retains charge briefly after leaving ADS
- Move-speed while aiming down sights has been increased to match other marksman weapons — faster than snipers, slower than ARs
- Increased spread while airborne and aiming down sights
Havoc
- Increased recoil controllability early in the pattern
Spitfire
- Reduced recoil controllability early in the pattern
30-30 Repeater
- Increased leg damage multiplier from 0.75 to 0.85
- Move-speed while aiming down sights has been increased to match other marksman weapons — faster than snipers, slower than ARs
G7 Scout
- Move-speed while aiming down sights has been increased to match other marksman weapons — faster than snipers, slower than ARs
- Increased hipfire spread size (reduced accuracy) to be more in line with other marksman weapons
Marksmen weapon category
- Added new weapon category for the Triple Take, 30-30 Repeater, G7 Scout, and Bocek Bow.
Longbow & Wingman
- Increased headshot multiplier from 2.0 to 2.15
Mozambique buff
- Now has 6 shots
- Moved the lower 2 pellets inward in the blast pattern
P2020
- Increased bullet damage from 15 to 18
- Lowered fire rate from 8.5 to 6.25
Assault Rifles
- Reducing the headshot multiplier for all assault rifles from 2.0 to 1.75
Arc Stars
- Aim and movement slow removed from the initial stick.
Spawn Loot
In Apex Legends Legacy, players will spawn in with a ‘starter kit’.
- White Shield
- White Knockdown Shield
- White Helmet
- 2x Sheild Cells
- 2x Syringes
White gear has also been removed from the loot pool.
Ground Emotes
Ground Emotes added
- Viewed in third person
- Each legend has a default, Epic and Legendary Emote
- Anti-peek system: Legends not in first-person view will not be visible when emoting.
Clubs
Club invites will now show which mode it’s for (BR, Ranked, Arenas), and how many players are in the party.
Challenges
- One free reroll per day
- Challenges are for both Arenas and BR
- Can ‘favorite’ challenges to track them in-game
Ring update
- Ring 4 pre-shrink time reduced from 2:00 to 1:45
- Ring 4 shrink speed reduced from 33 second close time to 40 seconds
- Ring 5 shrink speed reduced from 20 second close time to 40 seconds
- Ring 6 pre-shrink time reduced from 1:30 to 1:00
- Ring 6 shrink speed reduced from 1:40 close time to 2:00
Quality of life updates
- Badges are now sorted by categories and can be filtered by “all” or “unlocked only”. This suggestion came directly from players.
- When looting death boxes, players can now see health bars for everyone on the team.
- Flight path adjustments: Removing edge dropship flight paths to prevent matches where large portions of the map receive little to no traffic. These screenshots show a before/after comparison of possible flight paths on Kings Canyon.
- Players can now request better equipment by going into their inventory and pinging a piece of equipment.
- Ranked: Fixed edge cases where an abandon penalty would be incorrectly applied due to server errors.
That covers just about everything on the Apex Legends Season 9: Legacy patch notes. For the bug fixes make sure you check out the official patch notes, and for more on Apex, check out our article on Valkyrie’s character trailer.
Image Credits: Respawn Entertainment