Apex Legends 22 tips and tricks for beginners.

Apex Legends is free* to play now, and to win in the Apex Games you’ll need to stay sharp, use your wits, and keep your friends close. But victory also favors the prepared, and a few helpful tips in your pocket can be the difference between defeat and sweet, sweet triumph.

Check out these critical tips and tricks to help you kickstart your career in the Apex Games and dominate the arena.

Choose the Legend Who Matches Your Playstyle

In the Apex Arena, all competitors are equals, and the Legends are evenly matched in terms of strength, speed, and firepower. It’s their abilities that set them apart, so you’ll want to pick the Legend that matches your preferred playstyle and complements your squad.

Want to be the shield between your team and opponents? Jump into the arena as the hearty Gibraltar. How about helping your squad travel long distances to take your enemies by surprise? Pathfinder, with his trusty grappling hook, is your perfect pick. Is supporting your team with health boosts more your style? Lifeline is ready for action. Figure out what role you like to play and try different Legends to see which fits you best.

Stay Close to Your Squad

Squadplay is critical to success in Apex Legends, where you jump into the arena with two teammates at your side. Working together, you can keep each other safe and outplay your opponents by combining your abilities. A well-placed Dimensional Rift by Wraith, for example, can put her team right on top of unsuspecting opponents, while Caustic can protect teammates by using Nox gas to drive away enemies.

Try to strike out on your own, and you'll be up against other teams who can easily overwhelm you. Stick close to your squad, and you’ll have a greater chance at success.

Use Smart Comms to Keep in Touch with Your Teammates

You can give your teammates critical information – and vice versa – through an in-game system that lets you ping useful items and locations on their screens.

You can pinpoint the position of gear pieces (and what they are), highlight threats, and tell your teammates which direction you’re going before you’ve even plugged in a microphone. Use this to your advantage to make sure your teammates see what you see and always have the latest intel.

Get Familiar with the Arena

Kings Canyon – the map where all Apex Matches take place – is a deadly playground full of abandoned military installations and encroaching nature. There’s a lot of different types of terrain here, from wide-open fields to a swamp littered with abandoned buildings to a sprawling desert full of derelict outposts. Learning how to maneuver, where the hotspots of activity are, and where to find the best loot are all important nuggets of knowledge.

That’s especially true once the Ring starts to shrink. In proper battle royale fashion, the arena is surrounded by a giant Ring that shrinks at regular intervals throughout the match. You have to move fast to grab all the items you need before it closes on you, damaging you for every second you spend outside its perimeter. Knowing your surroundings will help you make decisions faster and maneuver more effectively.

Go for the Good Stuff, But Be Careful

Different sections of the map spawn different tiers of loot – the higher your weapon or armor piece’s tier, the stronger it is, and the better your chance of making it to the end of the match. Some locations on the map are consistently full of high-tier loot, which means everyone will want to get to these spots first. The true motherlode comes packed inside dropships that land at random spots on the map, rewarding anyone who can claim them with the most powerful loot in the game.

You start each match with no weapons or armor, so you and your squad will have to decide if these high-tier caches are worth the risk each time you play. As for where they are? We’ll let you figure that out on your own.

Revive and Respawn Your Teammates

A tightly-knit squad can do something critical that no Legend can do alone: bring each other back from the dead. After your health is depleted, you’ll go into a downed state where you’re still alive, but slow and in need of medical attention. If you die before your teammates can help, they have one last shot to save you.

Every Legend carries a Legend Banner that they drop when they die. Only their teammates can pick these up, and taking one to a Respawn Beacon will bring that Legend back to life. It’s a risky move, because the respawning process takes time and a revived player will return with no weapons or armor. But pulling off a successful resurrection can bring a team back from the brink of defeat, so don’t let the opportunity slip by.

Use Jump Towers, Hot Zones, and Other Features to Your Advantage

Kings Canyon is full of semi-permanent map objects you can use to get a leg up on your opponents. Jump Towers allow you to fly into the air and skydive back down to the ground, helping your entire team cross the map quickly. Hot Zones give you access to higher-tier loot on a random portion of the map if you can get there first. Respawn Beacons can bring downed teammates back to life.

Whether you use them to get out of a hairy situation or take your enemies by surprise, learning how to use these features adds another layer to your team’s strategy. That’s as good as another gun in your arsenal.

Don’t Let Anything Go to Waste

You never know what you’re going to find out there in the arena, so don’t be cautious with the caches you spot. Body armor, weapon attachments, backpack upgrades that allow you to carry more items, and other helpful pieces of gear are all hidden across the arena for you to grab. The inventory system will automatically tell you if a weapon or piece of gear is better than what you already have and keep you from grabbing lower-tier loot. That way, you won’t risk snatching something you can’t use in a panic.

You and your teammates can help each other by calling out item locations as you spot them. The tagging system also notes an item’s rarity level, so you can snag a higher-level piece of gear that you might’ve missed otherwise. Also make sure to loot fallen enemies - they’ll drop a cache when you take them out, and often have some of the best loot. Always keep an eye out, because you never know when a single piece of armor is going to save you in the end.

Stay with the Jumpmaster

Like other battle royale games, Apex Legends begins with the drop. One player in your team of three is designated as the Jumpmaster. The other two can suggest locations to head toward, but at the end of the day, the Jumpmaster chooses the location and the angle at which you head there. Sometimes you may strongly disagree with the spot. Maybe it’s a barren area unlikely to have gear. Or, maybe you can see other teams heading in the same direction. It happens.

But avoid the temptation of separating from your team, which you can do at any time during the descent. Splitting up is a recipe for an early demise. Not only is an organized squad likely to take you out earlier, but you’ll also be too far away for your teammates to revive you.

Don’t land in the exact same spot, though. You don’t want to run behind one of your teammates as they pick up all of the gear in a particular area. Once you’re close to the ground, break for an unoccupied building or loot area and build your loadout solo, always sticking relatively close to the rest of your team. That will give you the best chance of finding decent loot, while also ensuring you’re not left alone.

Pick items and weapons carefully

Unlike Call of Duty: Warzone, ammunition takes up a backpack slot. You only have eight slots to start, so it’s easy to fill those by picking up different types of ammunition, grenades, and health/shield replenishers. You can add another six slots on top of that if you find other backpacks around the map, so always keep an eye out for them.

When you first drop, it’s fine to pick up everything you see. But after you grab a weapon or two, take a gander at your backpack. Chances are you’ll have some incompatible ammunition. It’s up to you, but we recommend shedding the ammo that you cannot currently use.

When you come across new guns, you’ll almost always find the ammunition it uses either right next to it or close by. It’s a waste to lug around unusable ammo, especially when you can use those precious slots on attachments and all important consumables.

Learn the season’s map

Each new season of Apex Legends brings map changes. Depending on the season and if you’re playing ranked or not, you’ll have access to World’s Edge and Kings Canyon. Between seasons, the maps stay mostly the same. However, Respawn regularly swaps locations and adds new points of interest at the start of each season. Simply learning the best places to land and loot is half the battle.

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach to how you tackle the map, though. High-tier loot areas are almost always highly contested, while low-tier loot areas often don’t offer enough gear to outfit a whole team. No matter if you’re playing with friends or with randoms online, you’ll want to discuss a rough strategy about how your team will move through the map. You don’t have to go too deep, but being on the same page about passageways to other areas and when your team plans on hitting high-tier areas will give you an advantage.

Craft missing gear

Season 6 introduced crafting to Apex Legends, and it helps a lot in rounding out your build. You shouldn’t look at crafting as a replacement for looting — it’s a supplement to looting. Use the Replicator crafting stations to pick up extra ammo and outfit your guns with better parts. If you have a specific type of weapon you need — Rampart has faster reloads and increased magazine capacity with LMGs, for example — you can buy a new weapon. Still, it’s best not to rely on Replicators for new guns.

Otherwise, be aware of Replicator locations for any fallen teammates. If you get the chance to revive them, your team can help them craft new gear rather than pick through scraps.

No matter what you’re using the Replicator for, you want to get in and out as fast as possible. The crafting mechanic is very powerful, but it comes with a lot of risk. While you’re scraping together new items, you’re in the open, allowing any astute players nearby to easily earn a party wipe. Before even entering the crafting screen, scout the nearby areas and have a plan about what you’re going to craft. That’ll give you the best chance to pick up some new items unscathed.

Don’t worry too much about the ring at first

Like other battle royale games, the playable area gradually shrinks throughout the match. You shouldn’t worry too much about this until the late game, though. Once the timer for each round hits zero, a new timer starts that tells you when the ring will start shrinking. In short, you have a lot of time to avoid the closing ring. Pay more attention to the persistent threat: Other teams. You have to be really trying to die by the ring.

On the flip side of this, it’s sometimes smart to post up just inside the ring as it’s closing. You might see a team or two scrambling to get in that can be easy prey.

Heal out of harm’s way

Healing takes time. Whether you’re replenishing shields or health with consumables, you need to not be interrupted. Don’t heal out in the open during a firefight. You’re better off fleeing the scene entirely or trying to take out enemies with low health than trying to heal when under pressure.

Make use of the ping system

The most novel system in Apex Legends is undoubtedly its contextual ping system. It facilitates nonverbal communication and makes playing without a mic very doable. When you see an enemy, mark them with the ping system to tell your teammates their location. Even if you think they saw the enemy too, it never hurts to place the mark.

When you find gear that you aren’t going to pick up, mark it. Your character will vocally call out the gear so your teammates can see if it’s something they could use. When you want to explore an area or head in a certain direction? Tell your teammates by placing a marker. Using the ping system often, even excessively, can go a long way toward surviving.

Grab yellow gear

There are five pieces of yellow legendary gear in Apex Legends. Their stats are identical to the purple (rare) versions of that item, but they have perks that can be very helpful. If you see a yellow piece of gear, grab it no matter what. Here’s what they do.

§  Backpack: Consumable usage time is cut in half

§  Helmet: Faster regeneration on tactical and ultimate abilities

§  Armor: Shields replenish from finishers

§  Knockout Shield: Lets you self-revive one time when knocked down

§  Digital Threat Scope: Highlights enemies red

Be careful when reviving teammates

Just like using personal health and shield items, reviving teammates who have fallen can be risky. Hopefully, your teammate will crawl to a safe position to help you out, but you should wait till the coast is clear before going in for the revival. It’s very easy to get killed while reviving a teammate, and that won’t help you or your fallen comrade.

With that said, sometimes your teammate will have to bleed out due to the situation. If that happens, you can still bring them back to life by recovering their banner within 90 seconds. Again, be careful recovering the banner and then hoof it to the nearest beacon to bring your buddy back to life.

What you need to know about movement

Apex Legends has zero fall damage, so do not worry about jumping off buildings, cliffs, bridges, whatever. You cannot get hurt. Speaking of movement, get to know the crouching slide. It helps you move quicker down slopes and even when going down small inclines.

You can also climb a short distance by holding the jump button. This lets you scale walls and climb to the second story of buildings or rooftops. Lastly, when running, consider holstering your weapon. You run faster without a weapon equipped.

Perpetual motion

“Camping” doesn’t come up much in multiplayer shooters nowadays, and that’s a good thing. Like other battle royale games, staying in a single spot in Apex Legends is a sure way to die (if the ring doesn’t get you, other teams will). You want to keep moving in the early game, picking off opposing teams as you find them and piecing together a loadout in the process.

Once there are only a handful of teams left, securing a position and protecting it can be helpful. If you don’t want to think of it as camping, call it a “tactical advantage.” Staying in a single spot in the late game allows your team to properly deploy any traps and set up a good defense. What you want to avoid is running around the small area inside the ring, unless your team is really good. Even if your aggression pays off with a few kills, there’s probably an enemy sniper somewhere waiting for an open shot. Don’t give them one.

Pay attention to balloons

See those balloons in the sky? They let you redeploy. If you want to cover ground quickly, head over to one of them and ride the vertical zipline. You won’t launch as high as you were at the start of the match, but you can cover solid ground.

Only use finishers when the coast is clear

One of the neat yet untold aspects of Apex Legends is finishers. If you down an enemy, there is one final step to eliminate them: Finishers. You can approach the enemy and press the button prompt to perform a finishing move. That said, while a finish looks cool, you should think twice before implementing one. An enemy can interrupt a finisher, so your character can even die mid-animation. It’s best only to do finishers when you’ve eliminated all of the threats in the area. Confirming that the coast is clear first means you can fully enjoy the finisher as it happens.

Attachments make the gun

Apex Legends has a great variety of guns available, from pistols to SMGs to LMGs to assault rifles, with something to please every type of player. However, none of these guns are incredibly easy to use (unless you are shooting at point-blank range) without a sight. If you have two weapons, one with an attachment and another without, it’s almost always preferable to use the one with the sight. After all, that’s how it would be in the real world.

You can find ways to make weapons more powerful. There are a few add-ons you can use to create a more enhanced version of gameplay like barrel stabilizers, extended magazines, and hop-ups. Hop-ups are cool in that they can do many different things. Adding a Precision Choke to the Peacekeeps shotgun tightens up your spread over time, while a Selectfire Receiver with a Prowlers enables full auto-fire.

Remember that all attachments are not universal – they all work with specific guns or gun selections. Pay attention to the weapons an attachment works with because finding one that does not match with your weapons is fairly useless to you. Note that the more accessories and add-ons your gun uses, the more obsolete firefights become.

 

Reference:

Steven P. (Jan, 2021), Apex Legends tips and tricks, Retrieved form: https://tinyurl.com/vtzcc8tx

APEX LEGENDS BEGINNER’S GUIDE, Retrieved from: https://tinyurl.com/4hrktapb