We know Vantage is the star of the show when it comes to Apex Legends’ Hunted update, but there are a lot of important changes coming to Respawn Entertainment’s free-to-play battle royale with the Season 14 update. One of the most important ones, which could slip under the radar when you look at the latest Apex Legends patch notes, is this: Apex Legends’ development team is finally removing Self Revive from the game.
Yes, that’s right – Self Revive is outta here and we couldn’t be happier. In a pre-release press event, senior game designer Eric Canavese revealed that there would be two important changes made to gold-rarity equipment perks in the coming title update. Firstly, a Gold Backpack is no-longer going to offer players the Guardian Angel perk. Instead, it will feature a brand new gameplay perk: Deep Pockets.
With this rare piece of equipment equipped, using Deep Pockets, players will be able to carry more large healing items in-game. This means that, moving forward, you will be able to three-stack both the Med Kit and Shield Battery in your inventory. In addition to this, you will be able to stack two Phoenix Kit items. This, of course, is going to help players individually – but, it could also introduce a new level of coordination between squad mates and encourage resource sharing in-game.
Where does the Self Revive item perk come into all this? Well, Respawn Entertainment may have removed Guardian Angel from the Gold Backpack, but it’s not being removed from the battle royale altogether. No, rather than drop this perk completely, Apex Legends’ development team are opting to replace the Self Revive perk with it. This means, if you pick up a Gold Knockdown Shield, you’ll benefit from the Guardian Angel perk instead of Self Revive.
If you’re sitting there wondering what the Guardian Angel perk even does, allow us to explain. With this perk, players will be revived with 50% of their current health pool – combining base health and armour health. This means that, rather than reviving players with 25 health points, players will get a total health pool of 75 HP at the very least – with 50 of this being base health and 25 being armour health. If you’re rocking a higher-rarity Evo Shield body armour, you could see yourself being revived with a lot more health.
While this is beneficial in the thick of a fight and can make the difference between a last-ditch victory and a crushing defeat, it’s hardly comparable to Self Revive – something that can be seen as quite overpowered when you take into account the additional health the Gold Knockdown Shield already has. If you knock someone from a distance, you could find that by the time you’ve pushed them, they’re back to full strength.
However controversial, this change is proof that Respawn Entertainment is committed to keeping Apex Legends as one of the best battle royale games available. If you’re looking forward to the next update, you should check out our updated Apex Legends tier list before your next game. Now, more than ever, knowing which legend you need to keep an extra eye out for is vital.