Apex Legends 24.1 patch notes with big changes to legends, weapons and ranked

Essential guide to Apex Legends 24.1 mid-season update with strategic insights and gameplay tips

Beast Mode Event Overview

Apex Legends 24.1 delivers a substantial mid-season refresh headlined by the three-week Beast Mode Event, introducing transformative gameplay elements and balance adjustments. This comprehensive update fundamentally shifts combat dynamics with the addition of the Power Sword melee weapon alongside significant legend reworks and ranked system improvements.

The Power Sword Royale LTM serves as the centerpiece, featuring an energy-infused blade capable of devastating close-quarters strikes while providing defensive utility when aiming down sights. Strategic positioning becomes crucial as the sword’s energy slashes offer both offensive pressure and area denial capabilities. Players should master the timing between melee combos and defensive stances to maximize effectiveness.

Complementing the primary event, Solos mode returns with an innovative Respawn Token system, while a chaotic April Fool’s LTM ensures variety throughout the update cycle. These rotating modes create diverse combat scenarios that test different skill sets, from individual survival instincts to coordinated team tactics.

Weapon Balance Changes

The weapon meta undergoes significant restructuring with hop-up redistribution and systemic adjustments affecting multiple weapon categories. Strategic loadout choices now carry greater weight as attachment availability shifts across the arsenal.

Dev Notes: With the Nemesis losing the Accelerator Hop-Up we wanted to make sure that it’s still an appealing option for players. We’re making some QoL changes that should make it feel a little smoother.

Dev Notes: The L-STAR has proven to be a powerhouse weapon that gets away with murder at every engagement range. We’re happy it’s seeing so much play, but want to make sure it doesn’t outclass the rest of the roster. Removing its reverse hipfire should help it feel a little less oppressive in CQC and create some room for our SMGs to shine.

Dev Notes: The 30-30’s charge shot isn’t quite as impactful as we’d like for an opener so we’re increasing its damage so that slower more methodical gameplay feels rewarding and worth spending the time on.

Dev Notes: The Scout is getting an adjustment up to compensate for losing the Accelerator Hop-Up.

Dev Notes: We’re taking a pass at most of our SMGs ammo capacity to make them a little more lenient when challenging our more bursty shotguns and consistent LMGs. We’re hoping a little more ammo in the mag can help close out those tight engagements before being forced into a reload.

Strategic Insight: The magazine increases provide crucial flexibility in extended firefights, particularly when facing multiple opponents. Players should practice burst fire control to maximize the additional rounds rather than spraying indiscriminately. The Volt SMG with its new Accelerator Hop-Up becomes a dominant close-to-mid range option worth prioritizing in loot rotations.

Skirmisher Class Rework

Skirmisher legends receive transformative class perks designed to enhance team coordination and aggressive playmaking potential. These changes address previous issues where mobile legends often outpaced their teammates, creating disjointed squad engagements.

Dev Note: Many Skirmisher Legends are well known for using their mobility to lead the charge into a fight (or rotate early looking for one and leave their allies behind). With this in mind, we wanted to give Skirmishers a chance to turn that inherent nature into squad utility and allow their allies to keep up with their high mobility playstyle in order to keep the squad together.

With the Charged Knock perk, Skirmishers can feel free to be more aggressive with their abilities—knowing that if they perform, they’ll be able to earn that free charge to quickly escape or stay in the fight longer. Our hope is that Skirmishers are more confident diving into a fight and staying alive if they do well, and their squad is more likely to be close behind if they don’t.

Advanced Strategy: Coordinate with your squad to maintain optimal 20m positioning for consistent Trailblazer activation. The Charged Knock perk rewards calculated aggression—focus on securing knocks during pushes to gain temporary ability advantages. Remember that the health regeneration can be canceled by incoming damage, so disengage to safe positions before activating the heal.

Legend Updates & Adjustments

Multiple legends receive targeted adjustments to refine their gameplay identity and competitive viability. These changes range from complete ability overhauls to quality-of-life improvements that enhance player agency.

Alter Rework

Dev Note: We’ve always loved Alter’s playmaking potential, but the limited utility of her kit in some situations made her a tough pick. By adding an additional Tac charge, the improved wall-based Void Siphon, and new Level 3 Upgrades, we’re giving Alter’s Tac more playmaking potential across a wider range of situations. Additionally, her Upgrades now allow you to build Alter into either what your squad needs or what best suits your playstyle. Want to play strategically? Take the more Recon style upgrades to make plays around or hunt your enemies. Want to provide a rock solid back-line for your squad? Take the more Support style upgrade and bring people back from the brink of elimination—which works extremely well with the new Ultimate rework.

Wraith Improvements

Dev Note: Wraith is getting a number of adjustments to return her closer to her original form. Her sped up activation allows her to be both more reactive and aggressive with her Tac—especially when paired with the new Skirmisher perk. We wanted her to assert more control over when she exits phase to get her back into the fight sooner, which is why Wraith can now control when she exits the Void. The Ult adjustments aim to allow her more active access to her rotation potential and, alongside the speed ramp, it will make it easier than ever to set up a portal rotation for her squad. Also, the run is back. Enjoy.

Revenant Buffs

Dev Note: Revenant’s fallen significantly from his reign of dominance, so we were looking to reinvigorate him in a few ways with this Skirmisher split. His raid-boss Ult has been less potent with the regen structure and we wanted to give him more strength back into the initial activation of his Ult, especially amidst the new TTK this season (we’ll keep an eye on this though). However, his Shadow Pounce had a long cooldown and required a significant amount of windup to use, so it was often saved for the right moment to disengage rather than to close-in aggressively. We’ve reduced this wind-up time both by default and through the Upgrade to allow him to feel more free to use it to engage and secure those knocks to take advantage of the new class perk. Fly, death kitty, fly!

Pro Tip: Alter’s dual tactical charges enable creative flanking routes and escape options. Use one portal for engagement and save the second for disengagement. Wraith players should practice manual phase exits to minimize time spent unable to shoot. Revenant mains can now use Shadow Pounce more freely for initiation rather than conservation.

Limited Time Modes & Events

Mixtape (March 25-May 5, 2025)

Pubs: Trios & Duos (March 25-May 5, 2025)

Pubs LTM: Power Sword Trios (March 25-April 14, 2025)

LTM: April Fools(April 1-April 7, 2025)

LTM: Solos (April 8-April 14, 2025)

Mode Strategy: In Power Sword Trios, designate one player as the sword specialist while others provide covering fire. The defensive ADS capability makes the wielder excellent at pushing through chokepoints. For Solos mode, conserve your Respawn Token for late-game redeployment when the EVO bonus provides significant shield advantages.

Ranked System Changes

Introducing the new Tier-based Split Reset rule: every split system will reset players to the lowest division of their last split rank tier:

Dev Note: To foster fairer competition and reduce mismatches, we’re replacing the traditional hard reset with a new Tier-based Split Reset rule. At the end of each split, your performance will determine your tier and your score will be reset to the minimum threshold of that tier instead of a uniform baseline. This means you’ll start the new split with other players at a similar skill level, preserving your progress while ensuring a more balanced competitive environment.

Ranked Insight: The extended kill cap rewards consistent performance throughout matches rather than early elimination farming. The tier-based reset system reduces the skill disparity at season start, creating more balanced lobbies. Players should focus on maintaining position in higher tiers before splits to minimize reset penalties.

Bug Fixes & Quality of Life

Comprehensive bug fixes address longstanding issues while quality-of-life improvements enhance the overall gameplay experience across multiple systems.

Audio adjustments reduce sensory overload while maintaining tactical information:

These fixes create a more polished experience where abilities and systems function as intended, reducing frustration from technical issues during critical gameplay moments.

Technical & Performance Updates

This patch removes the option for DirectX 11. We discussed this decision and compared performance between DX11 and DX12 across the entire playerbase in this Dev Update. For additional clarity, DX11 was released in 2009 and as a result it does not have many of the capabilities shared by DX12 and consoles, including previous-gen consoles. Keeping DX11 increasingly requires maintaining two versions of the rendering engine: one only for DX11 and a second shared by every other platform. While continuing to support DX11 allows older GPUs to continue to play the game, it also slows down the development of our rendering engine considerably leading to fewer performance and graphical improvements over time.

DirectX 12 is supported by GPUs starting with the AMD Radeon HD 7790 and the Nvidia GTX 960. In Seasons 23 and 24, approximately 1 out of 1000 Apex players were playing on GPUs older than that at any given time. Rather than split our efforts, we decided to focus on improving the engine for the 99.9% of players who can make use of it.

This patch also contains a number of improvements for DX12:

We also want to mention a known issue with DX12. Less than 1% of PC players are experiencing more common GPU crashes (DXGI errors or sometimes a crash with no error) on Nvidia GPUs, typically every 1-2 hours of play. If you’re one of these affected players, please see our Trello post for possible workarounds as we continue to investigate.

Performance Optimization: Players with modern hardware should experiment with the new DX12 launch options to fine-tune performance. The -no_render_on_input_thread argument particularly benefits systems with high-core-count CPUs when using premium peripherals. For competitive play, maintain texture streaming at “None” or your GPU’s default setting for optimal frame consistency.

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