Season 16 brought a major change to how classes work in Apex Legends. Now there are five distinct classes with well-defined play styles and unique perks assigned to each.
Whether you’re a veteran of the Apex Games or you’ve just downloaded it today, you’ll want to know what these classes do and how they might affect your game. Here’s everything you need to know about the class system revamp and how to play each class.
The Class System Revamp
Unlike the previous class system, these new class passives all significantly affect how your game progresses. From offering new information to providing additional loot, these passives bring new concepts to the game and vastly expand on old systems. Here are all the new classes, a quick description of what they do, and which Legend goes where:
|
Class |
Description |
Legends |
|---|---|---|
|
Assault |
Legends who specialize in initiating and dominating fights. They can loot an extra compartment in deep red bins and carry more ammo. |
Bangalore, Revenant, Fuse, Ash, Mad Maggie |
|
Skirmisher |
Legends who excel at movement and escaping fights. They can scan distant care packages to see what’s inside. |
Pathfinder, Wraith, Mirage, Octane, Horizon, Valkyrie |
|
Recon |
Legends who can reveal and track enemy teams. Their previous Survey Beacons now reveal all enemy teams on the map. |
Bloodhound, Crypto, Seer, Vantage |
|
Support |
Legends who supply the team with loot and save them in tricky situations. They can loot the extra compartment in blue bins and craft teammates’ banners at Crafters. |
Gibraltar, Lifeline, Loba, Newcastle |
|
Controller |
Legends with an unparalleled ability to claim and defend territory. They can now scan Ring Consoles to reveal the next ring location. |
Caustic, Wattson, Rampart, Catalyst |
These passives all come with plenty of new additions to the HUD. If you have an Assault Legend on your team, for instance, you’ll be able to see the location of every red bin on the map. The same holds true for Survey Beacons, blue bins, Ring Consoles, and even care packages.
Each class’s ability is incredibly important and can easily influence how you play the game, but most of them are focused on helping the team instead of enhancing your own abilities. Because of this, it’s a good idea to have three different classes on your squad, so you can access as many different class abilities as possible.
If you’re playing with friends, take a few moments to think about which class combination will fit your play style. Would you prefer the extra looting capabilities of having an Assault, Support, and Skirmisher on the squad, or do you prefer the information provided by Recon and Controller Legends?
How To Play Assault Legends
Assault Legends have one of the most directly impactful class abilities in the game. Their ability to store extra ammo lets them prepare better for fights, which pairs well with their excellent initiation tools. Of course, you can’t talk about the Assault class without mentioning the red bin compartment, which gives tons of amazing weapon attachments.
The extra ammo class perk lets all Assault Legends pack an extra 20 ammo per Light, Heavy, and Energy stack and an additional five and nine Shotgun and Sniper ammo respectively. The impact of this ability, while it might seem small, is massive. Namely, it makes ammo-hungry guns much easier to use, especially if they use sniper or shotgun ammo.
If you’d rather stick with guns that use very little ammo, consider cutting down on how much you carry. Two stacks of Light ammo with an Assault Legend is still 160, which is enough for an engagement or two. While you’ll have a bit less ammo, it will free up a whole inventory slot which could be used to hold an extra grenade (two if you’re playing Fuse) or additional healing. Any way you use it, it will transform the extra ammo passive into even more utility in fights.
Red Bin Compartments
These compartments can be a vital tool in gearing your team up for a fight earlier. They are guaranteed to contain attachments for you and your team’s weapons, and while that might not sound too exciting on its own, the specifics of this ability are what make it really shine.
Red bin compartments will drop a weapon if no one on your team has one, meaning it can act as a guaranteed weapon at the start of a match.
These bins use a new smart loot system that can tell what attachments your team needs and provide them for you. These compartments are also guaranteed to have at least one optic attachment and will be rare at the very least. On top of that, you and all your teammates can see where they are on the map, meaning you can plan your drop location or looting paths based on the red bins in the area.
If you’re playing an Assault Legend, take the time to open the compartment on these bins — it’s well worth it and can give you an edge in your next fight.
How To Play Skirmishers
Skirmishers have one of the simplest abilities, but it can still be quite useful in the right hands. When you see a distant Care Package, whether it’s still falling from the sky or a few hundred meters away, you’ll see a ring appear around it. Look at that ring for a short time, and you’ll be able to see the highest-tier item available in the Care Package.
On top of that, if you or one of your squad mates are playing a Skirmisher, you’ll be able to see Care Packages on the map with precision even after they land. This lets you plan your looting path around old, potentially ignored Care Packages and stock up on the insane weapons they contain.
Skirmishers are also the best Legends to open Care Packages that might have enemies nearby. Escape abilities like Wraith’s Into The Void and Pathfinder’s Grapple make getting loot and then getting away far easier than it would be on any other class.
While this class ability might have the least direct impact on your average game, it’s definitely not something you should ignore. A Kraber can easily be the difference between winning or losing a game, and only Skirmishers have the ability to check Care Packages for coveted weapons without going out of their way.
How To Play Recon Legends
Recon Legends all excel at gathering information, finding other teams, and revealing their position. The Recon class passive takes those abilities to the next level with an incredibly powerful, map-wide scan.
To access this scan, simply move toward a Survey Beacon marked on your map and interact with it. Your map will turn a deep teal color, and the positions of every living player will show up as red arrows. This is undoubtedly an incredible amount of information to have. It can help inform your rotations and either seek out or avoid fights, but to make the most of it, you’ll have to understand how players usually move on the map.
Using The Scan Information
When you get the scan information, the first thing you should think about is where the highest concentration of players is (Fragment, what a surprise). If you’re looking for hectic, back-to-back fights, you can simply head straight there, but if you’re looking to avoid fights, or only take controlled fights, you’ll have to analyze the map a bit more.
Look for any point of interest that has two to three teams. These areas will likely erupt into fights naturally as these teams loot and spot each other. Next, look for what teams are nearby those lightly populated spots — it’s highly likely that these players will run toward the sounds of the fight and try to third-party it.
If you find a spot that should have a fight soon, and there aren’t too many teams nearby that could third-party it, that’s a prime opportunity for you to attack. Even if another team third parties the fight before you, you’ll be able to join the fight last and capitalize on weakened opponents on all sides. You can use your Legend’s scanning abilities to find out more about the fight right before you join it.
Of course, you may want to avoid fights entirely while you make your way to the zone. If so, keep in mind that teams usually take a meandering path to the next zone, trying to hit as many high-loot and highly-populated points of interest as possible. Don’t expect them to always take a straight path!
How To Play Support Legends
Support Legends received two incredibly useful passives, both of which can drastically change how you play: blue bin compartments and crafting teammates’ banners. The first ability is relatively simple. Blue bins, which are marked on your map, will have an extra compartment that contains healing items, Heat Shields, and Mobile Respawn beacons.
On top of that, Support Legends can also craft teammates; banners at Crafters, making them the best class at respawning teammates hands down. You can craft these banners even if they’re expired, and it only takes 30 crafting materials.
This passive is a game changer. If you’re playing a Support legend, consider hanging back more in fights. As long as you’re alive, the team has a chance to rejoin the game, so you never want to be the first person to go down when the shots start flying.
On top of that, keep an eye out for crafting materials and bins throughout the game. Even if you don’t plan on crafting, you should keep a healthy supply of crafting materials on you so that you don’t have to worry about them if your teammates go down.
If a fight looks like it’s going poorly, don’t be afraid to run away, but make sure you ask your teammates first. A lot of fights can be won if the whole team commits a little more aggressively, so as good as your class ability is, don’t let it influence how you fight to a fault.
How To Play Controllers
Controllers are the defensive Legends of Apex, and each one sports a suite of abilities that will help you hold down key locations. Their class ability amplifies these abilities by giving Controllers the ability to figure out where the next zone will be, meaning you can set up your defenses before other players know where they have to go.
To learn where the next zone is, simply go to a Ring Console marked on your map, and after a brief animation, the next ring will appear in green on your map. Once you know where the zone is, all that’s left is to claim a building within it and start setting up your defenses. However, there are a few ways to make sure you get the most out of this ability.
To get the most out of Controller Legends, consider playing with friends so that you can be sure your teammates will follow you to the next zone.
Scan for the next zone as early as possible and as often as you can. The sooner you know where the next zone will be, the more time you have to act on that information before the rest of the lobby learns it too. On top of scanning quickly, prioritize getting to the zone as fast as possible once you drop. This will give you the best chance of getting the exact building you want, and if you get there fast enough, there might even still be some loot left in the area.
While you need to rotate as swiftly as possible, be extremely careful when you do so. Most Controller Legends have abilities that aren’t as useful outside defensive situations, so getting into a fight while you’re moving is the worst-case scenario. Do whatever you can to avoid fights before you get set up in the building of your choice.
