Apex Legends' Niche Traversal Techniques Become Widely Accessible This Season

The game developers have a special treat prepared for the popular battle royale gamers, perfectly timed for the holidays. Enthusiasts of this game's highly fluid traversal will be pleased to learn that an innovative traversal feature is being implemented when Season 27: Amped goes live on November 4th.

Unveiling The Mantle Boost

Dubbed "Momentum Boosting" by Respawn, this ability provides gamers a burst of propulsion when scaling obstacles. According to lead battle royale designer the design lead, Mantle Boosting was previously existed of Apex Legends for quite a while, often called as "mantle jumping." But it's no easy feat for the average player, and is mainly used by pro gamers in Ranked Mode or tournaments. In this update, the team simplifies the process for everyone to successfully perform these tricky movement boosts.

"This technique have been in Apex for some time, but the movement requires skill to pull off and gamers might not realize it's possible without external guides," the designer states. "We're adding a visual cue so users can clearly identify when and how to trigger the fast-paced traversal skill, opening up the feature and introducing new ways to compete for a much wider base."

The Reasoning Behind Opening Up Advanced Mechanics

What's the reason for making a once niche technique available to everyone? Lead Legend designer Josh Mohan says developers aims for gamers to feel powerful — including ones who are new.

"[The playerbase] is doing advanced techniques like super-gliding and tap-strafing, and we examined at other games, looked at what the community are doing, and we wondered, 'What if we provide some of this power to a broader audience?'" Mohan explains. "Since right now, some of these techniques are somewhat awkward to access — it requires to remap your keybinds and execute within precise timings. So we said, 'How about we create a more official implementation?'"

The Amped Update Movement Focus

Movement is primarily the central theme in Season 27, with Legends the gravity mage, Rampart, and Valkyrie all getting enhancements to maintain them in motion. The cooldown period on her tactical ability has been decreased, and the Gravity Lift will propel players into the air much quicker than before. Her defensive walls now include a roof and the ability to provide speed boosts to those nearby. But the spotlight is on the high-flying this Legend who's getting the most attention this season, with various adjustments applied to make her stronger, faster, and deadlier.

"In my opinion there's quite a consensus that her moment has arrived," says Legend designer the designer. "Certainly she was top-tier in the past, but with the introduction of other characters, mobility perks, and redeployment tools, it felt like she fell behind in current the game. It was an ideal chance for us to revisit a bunch of aspects in her abilities and essentially bring her back to her glory days."

Enhancements to the Aerial Legend

To reclaim Valkyrie's relevance in current strategies, Holstead says Respawn evaluated each of her abilities and introduced some powerful modifications. Her jetpack have been upgraded, boosting velocity while airborne, and this equipment regenerates three times faster, allowing the player to remain longer aloft. Now she won't be harmed from her own Missile Swarm, which has also been upgraded to tag opponents who are hit from it. Her squad redeploy skill — which launches her entire squad into the air for repositioning or escape — now takes much less time to activate. Additionally, she gains some new Legend Upgrades that users can select to conserve resources, expand the spread of her rockets, or further speed up her Skyward Dive takeoff time.

"Valkyrie's equipment now delivers on the pilot experience," Holstead says.

Olympus Improvements

Additionally, the only floating arena, this location, is getting a movement-friendly facelift, with an extensive redesign that opens up choke points and renders securing elevated positions more manageable. The developers says Apex Legends Season 27 is all about providing gamers the resources required to keep up with the competition.

"Essentially, we were looking at Apex's fundamental nature as a fast-paced FPS," says lead Legend designer Josh Mohan.

The battle royale Season 27: Amped releases November 4th at the specified times.

Matthew Higgins
Matthew Higgins

A passionate gamer and tech enthusiast with over a decade of experience in game journalism and community building.