Just when you thought that battle royale games had outlived their hype, we were greeted with a new title in the form of Apex Legends. I know, it may not be the most catchy name but this free-to-play game from Respawn, the game studio behind the renowned Titanfall titles, feels like a breath of fresh air and has been drawing a ton of interest since its debut earlier last week.
Apex Legends has stepped foot in the heavily-competitive market of battle royale games, still, it has managed to sign up 25 million players in the first week. And if that isn’t more than enough to amaze you, it has recently been reported that over 1 million players are concurrently enjoying the title. So, if you are looking to join the cool kids on the block and jump into this fast-paced battle royale phenomenon, then we’ve got your back. Here are some of the most helpful tips and tricks to start your Apex Legends journey:
Best Tips and Tricks for Apex Legends
Note: All the tips and tricks listed below have been tested on the PC version of the game, but should be accessible on PS4 and Xbox consoles as well.
1. Start Out With Any Legend
Before every match kicks off, each member of your three-man squad is required to pick which character, known as legends, they want to play as. Each legend has its own unique abilities and since you’re new to the game, you shouldn’t worry about picking the right one for you. Just pick one and explore what each of them has to offer.
I usually love playing as Bloodhound or Pathfinder because of their ability to track players and climb up to any location using grapples or ziplines respectively.
2. Know the Ability of Legends
As I just told you, each character in Apex Legends has its own unique abilities and if you want to learn what all they are, you can do that simply by hovering over a legend on the selection page and hitting the right mouse button. You’ll then see the passive (activates automatically), tactical (activated by pressing Q), and ultimate (takes time to become available and activated by pressing Z) abilities.
Note: You can also go to the ‘Legends’ tab in the lobby and right click on any legend to view their abilities.
You will have to pick each of the legends, jump into the game, and see for yourself how their abilities work and whether they are suited for your style. If you love hanging back instead of being at the center of the action, like me, you can choose Lifeline and be the team’s medic.
3. Dropping In is No Hassle!
If you have played PUBG, be it on mobile or PC, then you know you can pin locations you want to land at and loot up with your teammates. However, it’s a chore to talk about the same and land together. Well, Apex Legends brings the same functionality in the fold but builds upon it by assigning one of the members the job of dropping off the dropship.
They’re the jumpmaster and you can suggest drop locations by right-clicking on locations on the map, but ultimately it’s their decision where to land. However, it’s possible to break off the pack by pressing and holding ‘E’ to be a lone wolf but it’s not the best idea.
4. High Tier Loot Locations
One of my favorite things about Apex Legends is that it informs you about the tier of loot (where good, average or bad loot spawns) available in each location as you enter it – right below the name of the location. There are a ton of locations with high tier loot, such as the Bunker, Airbase, or the Hydro Dam.
However, if you fancy having the absolute best gear right off the bat, well, then either the floating Supply Ship or the Hot Zone are your best bets in Kings Canyon. You can see the former flying on the map, so mark it and try to stick a landing on it, else the circular blue zone is where everyone will be headed. Be quick to loot and shoot or you’ll be eliminated.
5. Ping Weapons or Enemies
While most battle royale titles need you to communicate over voice with teammates for everything, Apex Legends has vastly simplified the process. You can now simply point at gear or weapons and press on the middle mouse button to ping the location of the same to your team. It’s possible you don’t need that gear, but your friendly squadmates might.
The same applies for when you spot enemies in your vicinity. You can double press the middle mouse button to make them aware of the location of enemy squads. This really simplifies the gameplay for anyone who doesn’t really wanna talk and solely take down opponents. You don’t want random players shouting at you in the middle of a game and this ping system is the best solution I’ve seen to date.
6. Keep Your Inventory in Check
I know most of us hoard gear in-game – be it attachments, meds, boosters, shield, and other items, and I’m guilty of this too. I start collecting anything and everything after I land in order to have the perfect gear but there’s a lot of unnecessary stuff at the start there. The inventory spots are shown by tiny square icons at the bottom of your HUD and they’re limited but backpacks help increase those.
However, if you don’t need anything, open up your inventory and left-click on everything you don’t need, and maybe ping the items, so your squad mates can pick up things they might need. It’s a great and friendly gesture.
7. Color-coded Gear and Weapons
Unlike in PUBG, you don’t need to remember what all types of ammo are there in Apex Legends and what gun requires which of those – a heavy mag or shotgun one. Well, it’s because everything from weapons, shields, and helmets in Apex Legends is color-coded and it’s the most sound implementation to date.
You can see the color of your weapon on the bottom right, like the shotguns are marked with red and assault rifles are marked bottle green. So, you can simply pick up ammo of those colors when looting a location.
8. Picking the Right Kind of Ammo
Well, if color is being your enemy and you want a better way of knowing which ammo fits your weapon then I have the perfect suggestion for you. When you’re running over all the ammo scattered about Kings Canyon in Apex Legends, you will see a silhouette of the weapon you have in your inventory next to the pop-up over the ammo rounds.
Just keep an eye on the silhouette when you run across ammo and press E hastily to pick those up because time is of the essence in this game. This tip makes picking up the right kind of ammo such a handy task.
9. Lookout for Supply Bins/ Loot Ticks
Since we are on the subject of loot, I would suggest you to be on the lookout for supply bins and loot ticks. While the former are huge cylindrical bins and easy to spot, the loot ticks are pyramidical bots that light up and are fewer in number.
Both of them are randomly hidden around the map and you have the opportunity to search and loot them to gear up. They will often contain some of the most favored gear including weapons, attachments, ammunition, and even shield or helmets. I love to find scopes and shield batteries in the supply bins and it’s awesome!
10. Damage is Color-coded As Well
Apex Legends is really well-designed, keeping the ease of the players in mind, and thus, it also color-codes the damage you deal other players. This relates to the color codes assigned to your protective gear, i.e the helmet and shield, which are represented using white for Level 1, blue for Level 2, and purple for Level 3.
So, when you take a shot at an enemy and connect, the damage numbers shown over them are colored on the basis of the protective gear they have on. This means if an enemy has a Level 2 shield (100 base + 50 shield HP), then the damage will appear blue, revealing how many more shots you’ll have to take to knock or eliminate them. It’s super useful in times of intense firefights.
10. Holster Weapon to Run Faster
I know, after reading the title, you must be thinking that it’s a well-known fact that you’ll run faster when you holster your weapon. And I certainly agree with you but Apex Legends is pretty fast-paced and tapping the ‘number 3’ key while running to the subsequent circle, holsters the weapon.
You can use this tip to quickly escape fights, flank or run into safe zones. And if you can combine it with continuous sliding, then it can help you reach the target location (which you can ping to squadmates) a lot faster.
11. Slide Out of Sticky Situations
One of the most essential abilities in Apex Legends is sliding. You can hold down on the “Left Ctrl” key to slide and I bet you, it comes in pretty handy during gameplay all the time. After you’ve holstered the weapon, you can slide downhill to move even faster and sliding is going to make all the difference when you’re fighting an enemy too.
If you’re caught up in a sticky situation, such as if enemies are surrounding your squad or nuke strikes are about to hit you, then you can combine jumping and sliding to get out instantly. Sliding can be helpful when you’re chasing to kill or save your own skin.
12. No Fall Damage/ Friendly Fire
Yes, you read that right PUBG fans. I know there have been times you’ve been stuck at mountain tops, too afraid to take the leap because it might kill you instantly. Well, Apex Legends takes a different turn here and you can jump down from any height, be it a ledge or tower, without fear because you won’t suffer any fall damage.
The same goes for firing at enemies when your squad is around. Don’t be afraid and just fire away. Throw smoke grenades and take down enemies because your bullets won’t be causing any damage to your team – but they might come in the way of your shots, so do keep that in mind.
13. Use Balloon Ropes to Re-deploy
When you find yourself running around Kings Canyon, I’m sure you will notice these red balloons tied to a rope at many different locations. Well, these are super handy and help you quickly travel long distances – moving from one location to another. How, you ask?
You can simply run up to one of the balloons, ride up the rope attached to the same (by pressing E on your PC when you’re next to it) to redeploy yourself– as you do at the beginning of your game. Once you’re at the top of the rope, you will be shot in the direction of your choice and it’s the simplest way to reach the safe zone if you are caught outside.
Note: You can redeploy anywhere using the balloon ropes, even on the highest place in the game but we don’t recommend the same. Those places are off-limits and a timer that asks you get back down will show on your screen. If you don’t oblige, you’ll be eliminated.
14. Climb Walls To Reach Places
While you can single jump (hitting the space bar once) to traverse most of the terrain in Apex Legends, it’s not that simple to get on top of buildings, or huge mountains or rocks. However, it’s possible to climb over ledges or building walls that may look impossible at first, by running towards it, jumping and holding the forward (W) key.
A lot of things haven’t been revealed in the official tutorial but you can climb atop high mountains by holding on the space bar (jump button) while you push forward. If the mountain offers you something to hold onto, the character will easily be able to traverse upwards.
15. Mute Annoying Squad Mates
I know we just discussed how you can easily play the game without having to talk with anyone in-game, however, it does not mean that voice comms haven’t been baked into Apex Legends. It’s possible to converse with squad mates, but if you feel like a random player is talking too much and getting on your nerves, then go ahead and mute them.
The process to mute someone is pretty straightforward. You’d have hit the Tab key to access your inventory multiple times but did you ever notice that it’s multi-tabbed? We’ve missed on the same at first but the second tab on your inventory page shows all your squad mates and it’s here you can tap the ‘speaker’ icon at the bottom of their player card to mute them. You can now enjoy your game in peace!
16. Respawn Team Members
In all the other battle royale games that you might have played to date, you become a spectator the moment you are killed by the enemy. However, Apex Legends takes the fun a step further, increasing player retention, by granting you the ability to bring eliminated squad members back into the game.
Yes, if one of your squad members is killed in a fight, you have a few seconds to locate their loot box and grab the recovery badge. Once you do that, you can take the badge over to one of the many respawn beacons (as seen above) splayed across the map and respawn your squad members.
Note: Remember your respawned teammate won’t have any inventory, so it would be a good gesture to lend them a gun and some ammunition.
17. Craft Skins for Weapons/ Legends
Apex Legends is certainly refreshing but the feature that makes it further exciting is the ability to craft items.
As you level up in the game, you’ll get Apex Packs, which look like the loot ticks we’ve seen above and you have a chance of gaining some crafting metals for yourself. It keeps adding up into your account and once you have enough, you can use them to craft weapon or character skins, as well as quips they deliver in the lobby.
While I like the crafting abilities of this battle royale game, the process of collecting craft points can be tedious and you may have the urge to buy Apex Packs to craft more.
18. Drop Pods Carry Great Loot
While you can scour for high tier loot in the locations we’ve listed above, you should also keep an eye out for incoming drop pods as they carry some of the greatest loot – especially weapons, attachments, and shields of legendary status. And oh my, they’ve some awesome benefits.
While the legendary shield offers you the same protection as the purple one, you don’t need a shield battery or cells to recharge it. Just use a finisher on an enemy and the shield will be topped up automatically. Then there’s the legendary knockdown shield or Phoenix Kit that acts a full-fledged medkit.
19. You Can Revive Yourself Too
In Apex Legends, if you’ve knocked down by an enemy, there’s a way to revive yourself too. I’m not kidding since if you get your hands on a legendary knockdown shield from some drop ship or loot tick, then you will see the option to revive yourself on the screen after you’re knocked down by an enemy.
However, it can be a little risque in intense firefights or close combat as the enemy can eliminate you before you get the chance to get yourself back in the game. Still, isn’t it awesome that you can come back into the game all by yourself without a helping hand from your teammates?
20. Best Weapons/ Most Damage
Finally, after all the tips and tricks in our arsenal, let us talk about the best weapons and which ones should you try to pick up to deal the most damage to your enemies. Well, the armory in Apex Legends sure is flush with a variety of assault rifles, SMGs, shotguns, and sniper rifles and the best ones are as under:
| Weapon | Type | Mag Size | Headshot Damage | Body Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wingman | Pistol | 6 | 90 | 45 |
| Peacekeeper | Shotgun | 6 | 165 | 110 |
| Prowler | SMG | 20 | 21 | 14 |
| Devotion | LMG | 44 | 34 | 17 |
| Hemlok Burst AR | Assault Rifle | 18 | 36 | 18 |
| Triple Take | Sniper | 5 | 138 | 69 |
SEE ALSO: 30 Cool PUBG Mobile Tips and Tricks to Get that Chicken Dinner
Apex Legends: Don’t Worry, You Can Be a Legend Too
Amongst the plethora of battle royale games that you can choose to play right now, Apex Legends seems to be the most refreshing. It has got the perfect blend of realistic weapon mechanics and characters, and also it’s free-to-play, which is the main reason that a hoard of people are gravitating towards it.
The game is fast-paced and you’re at the center of the action shortly after landing so my best advice is that you follow the aforementioned tips, don’t panic, and try to become the champion. And if you think we’ve missed out on any good tips, then let us know down in the comments section.
