Apex Legends Season 3: Meltdown is in full swing, with a new map, battle pass, and playable character available. The Meltdown patch brings a significant amount of new gameplay changes too. The update is out now on PC, PS4, and Xbox One, and Respawn has released the full patch notes, giving us a chance to dig into everything new. As the season goes, more changes continue to be introduced--such as the opening of the loot-filled golden vaults and the start of limited-time events like Fight or Fright.

　　There's a significant amount of tweaks and changes to the way Apex Legends plays. Existing characters have had their functionalities fiddled with, and the way various weapons and items perform have also been altered to create a balanced gameplay experience. Interestingly, there have also been some more drastic changes, with new hop-ups being added and one fairly recent addition being removed. Additionally, the Executioner perk is now available to all players with the previous gold armor perk effect. What this means is that executing a finisher will recharge your shields to full.

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　　Now Playing: Apex Legends: What's Coming In Season 3

　　Of course, there's also a bunch of quality of life improvements and bug fixes. You can take a look at the patch notes below. The new character Crypto, meanwhile, has a drone that can be used for recon, among other things. You can learn about what he's capable of in our full Apex Legends Crypto breakdown.

　　

Apex Legends Season 3 Update Patch Notes

Legend Meta

All Legends

　　Executioner Perk: Previously, the Gold Armor perk, “Executioner”, gave a full shield recharge on successful completion of a finisher. In Season 3, all Legends will have this perk meaning--finishers will fully recharge your shields regardless if you have Gold Armor equipped or not. Gold Armor will now have a Guardian Angel perk that is detailed below in the Loot/Meta Changes section.

Gibraltar

Dome ShieldPlayers in the Dome Shield use healing items 25% faster.Increased the throw distance by 60%.Increased cooldown. 20 seconds -> 30 seconds.Defensive BombardmentDecreased cooldown. 4.5 minutes -> 3 minutes.Decreased duration 8 seconds -> 6 seconds.Increased throw distance by 36%.

Bloodhound

Eye of the AllfatherReduced the animation time to activate by 33%.Now immediately tells you how many targets have been pinged.Beast of the HuntFixed an issue with FoV scaling messing up ADS aim sensitivity.Reduced animation time to activate by 30%.Increased movement speed bonus 25% -> 30%

Bangalore

Rolling ThunderIncreased damage 20 -> 40Octane

　　Adrenaline JunkieFixed an issue with FoV scaling messing up ADS aim sensitivity.Wraith

　　[Designer notes: We’ve pulled back additional nerfs for further testing, but Wraith’s power balance is definitely on our radar.]

　　Dimensional RiftNo longer deploys if you are downed before placing it.Pathfinder

　　GrappleReduced the grapple projectile velocity by 33%, meaning it takes a fraction of a second longer to connect the grapple to the wall. The behavior once you are connected remains the same.ZiplineIncreased cooldown 90 seconds -> 120 seconds.

Weapon And Loot Meta

Hop-ups: [Designer notes: We think the number of hop-up types in the game is about as high as we want to go right now when we consider loot dilution and the likelihood of finding a desired hop-up. Going forward, we intend to rotate hop-ups each season -- some may be removed from the loot pool to make room for new or returning ones. Below are the changes we’ll be making to hop-ups for Season 3.]REMOVED: Disruptor RoundsREMOVED: Skullpiercer RiflingWingman: Was 2.0 base / 2.25 with Skullpiercer. Is now 2.15 base.DMR: Was 2.0 base / 2.5 with Skullpiercer. Is now 2.15 base.The base headshot damage multipliers of the DMR and Wingman have been increased slightly.NEW HOP-UP: Anvil ReceiverAttaches to: Flatline and R-301.Rarity: level 4 (gold).This hop-up empowers semi-auto mode; it offers highly increased damage, but at the cost of reduced rate of fire and double ammo per shot.NEW HOP-UP: Double Tap TriggerAttaches to: G7 Scout and EVA-8 Auto.Rarity: level 3 (purple).This hop-up makes each trigger pull fire a quick two round burst.Consumables

　　Ultimate Accelerants 20% -> 35%.Ultimate charge restored increasedReduced the amount in the world by around 40%.Gold Gear Changes

　　Gold BackpackThe gold backpack has a new perk, “Guardian Angel”. With Guardian Angel, you will revive downed teammates with bonus health and shields (if they have armor).Gold Armor: The gold armor will now have "Fast Use" (consumable items take half as long to use), which was previously on the gold backpack. Now, you will be able to tell when an opponent has the ability to heal faster by seeing the gold armor damage numbers.

Weapons

[Designer Notes: For Season 3 weapon changes, our goals were to encourage and improve longer range gunfights and reduce power on some of the weapons that have been dominating lately. We will of course be closely watching data and player feedback on these during the season.]

　　R-99Base mag size reduction Before: 18/22/26/30After: 18/20/23/27Added some recoil randomness to patterns.PDW ProwlerAdded some slight recoil randomness while maintaining the same pattern when fired in full-auto mode.Longbow DMRReduced rate of fire 1.6 -> 1.3Reduced leg damage multiplier 0.9 -> 0.8G7 ScoutIncreased base damage 30 -> 34HemlokIncreased base damage 18 -> 22Slight decrease to rate of fire to both fire modes.R-301Reduced damage 14 -> 13MozambiqueDecreased pattern spreadMozambique will now reset from recoil faster, which should make it easier to track targets and see where shots land.L-STARSubstantial reduction to horizontal recoil.Now comes equipped with 1x Digital Threat optic.Reduced damage 21 -> 19New Kitted Gold Weapons

　　We’ve swapped out the previous set of Gold Weapons with some fresh new ones for Season 3. Keep an eye out for these fully kitted beasts that all include tier 3 versions of all compatible attachments, hop-up, and the following optics:

　　Flatline Includes 1x-2x opticsEVA-8 Includes 1x threat scopeTripleTake 4x-10x Threat scopeG7 Scout 2x-4x opticsCharge Rifle 4x-10x threat scopeQuality Of Life

　　Added a "random" option for customizing your unlocked loadscreens.Expanded the Ping Wheel so that you can now equip your unlocked Intro and Kill quips. Equip up to 8 intro or kill quips in the lobbyNearby enemies can hear quips when activatedPress Y while ping wheel is up to access (controller) or F1 (default keyboard binding -- you may need to set this manually as it won’t auto-bind)."Celebrate" quickchat is now the 1st option in the quip wheel (Previously down on dpad).New Legend battle chatter - Legends now have voice lines that will call out when your squad is being third-partied. This is triggered if you take damage when recently damaged by another living squadYou can now equip multiple skydive emotes (if you have multiple available on a character) - Hold A while skydiving to open the menu to select the skydive emote you want to use.Daily challenges should only give you, at most, 1 challenge for a Legend you don't own.No dupe character daily challenges (e.g. you should never get 2 Gibraltar dailies in the same day).Fixes for slowdown/performance drops at the start of a match.Mirage - decoys will now go where directed when deploying them during the drop if Mirage isn’t the Jumpmaster.Lifeline - D.O.C. Healing Drone will no longer float away after being deployed on Supply ShipsFixed issue where Legends could show up as locked instead of selected when joining a match late.Small improvements across UI to make fonts and other elements more readable.When swapping weapons with one on the ground, attachments will now attempt to transfer to your stowed weapon in addition to the weapon you are about to pick up.Bug Fixes

　　Octane - fixed a bug where sometimes mantling while using a tactical stopped players from being able to perform any other actions until the tactical is finished.Wattson - fixed bug where sometimes the visual FX from her fences would not show up after being deployed.Pathfinder - Fixed a bug with Insider Knowledge passive where Survey Beacon locations would disappear from the full map after activating them.Fixed bug where players could sometimes receive additional Battle Pass rewards by leveling up two games in a row.Fixed an exploit that allowed players to spam fire with the Peacekeeper.Fixed bug where looting Lifeline’s Care Packages would not count towards the “Loot X amount of Care Packages” in the Battle Pass challenges.Fixed a bug where sometimes the smoke visual FX from Gibraltar, Bangalore, and Caustic Ultimates would show up on scopes when swapping weapons rapidly.PC - Fixed bug where model settings would be forced to “high” regardless of what setting was selected.Fixed a bug where players could sometimes skip the landing animation after a long fall.Fixed bug where sometimes map fog visual FX would disappear while looting a deathbox.Rebalanced audio to address issues with footsteps, ziplines, and jump jets.Ranked League Series 2

　　You can check out the full details for Series 2 and learnings we got from Series 1 in our Ranked Blog here. Some highlights of the changes we’re making below.

　　Rewards for your placement in Ranked Leagues Series 1 will be available to you after downloading the update for Season 3.We’ve adjusted the scoring for Series 2 that allows for more granularity for future improvements.At the launch of Series 2 on 10/1 we’ll be doing a soft reset on everyone Ranked Position from Series 1. The reset will be 1.5 tiers. That means if you ended Series 1 in Gold II, you’ll be reset to Silver IV. Players in Platinum IV will be reset to Silver II, and Apex Predators will be reset to Platinum II.Assists have been added to your overall score.New HUD elements have been added to help players keep track of their in-match RP gains or losses.