Apex Legends dev explains why Wraith still needs a nerf
Wraith has undergone a series of adjustments in Apex Legends, leading players to complain she’s been nerfed too much. A developer responded giving a detailed explanation of why Wraith needs to be nerfed.
Wraith has been one of the strongest legends in Apex since its release in 2019. This agile character can create portals to quickly transport her teammates and even become invulnerable to damage for a short period.
The developers at Respawn have had a hard time balancing Wraith, as even after several nerfs, she has still been the most picked character in Season 7.
In The Third Party: An Apex Legends Podcast, senior game designer Daniel Klein said they are looking at adjusting Wraith further by increasing her hitbox for Season 8. This has led to players fearing she’ll be nerfed too far.
In a Reddit post, user ‘QuickScopeDash10‘ criticized Respawn for continuing to weaken Wraith. Her abilities have taken a hit several times, so a further adjustment to her hitbox would be too much. Although being a Wraith main since day one, the user continued to say that they might have to change legends in Season 8.
Respawn’s response
John Larson, a Live Balance Designer at Respawn, gave a lengthy response to the Reddit post. Although the majority of the original comment was removed, the rest was posted later on.
Larson began by saying almost a third of his kills in Apex are with Wraith, so “to all the sweaty wraith mains out there, I have your back.”
“Wraith’s kit has been nerfed and tweaked more than any other legend’s, but her win rate and encounter win rate has remained an anomaly,” he continued. “The common argument is that mechanically gifted players are drawn to her kit, but when we filter by skill brackets (rank, average damage, you name it) she’s still head and shoulders above everyone.”
In another comment, Larson compared Wraith to Pathfinder, who has also undergone several changes. He said that Pathfinder’s equipment nerf was too much, but he is in a much better place after the hitbox adjustment. Additional hitbox fine-tuning could be a necessary change for the character.
When balancing Wraith, she can’t be so much better than the other legends, but she still needs to be fun to play. “Feeling good is the number one balancing metric in my book, more so than quantitative data points,” he said.
So as not to nerf Wraith so much she’s no longer fun, he teased that they might have to take Wraith out of the game for a season.