Apex Legends season 20: Breakout brings some big changes to the game. It’s been five years since the game’s surprise launch back in 2019, and it looks like the team behind the popular battle royale game is looking to switch things up by reworking nearly every aspect of the game, from EVO Shields to the crafting system. There’s even a new perk system in Apex Legends now, and it adds 100 new legend perks.
But one thing that immediately caught my eye in the patch notes was a new “Ring Exploit Prevention” system. A much-needed measure designed to alleviate the pain and suffering of ranked players.
I’ve been testing the ins and outs of this new system over the weekend and have some thoughts to share on how it works, whether it is enough to eliminate zone healers, and what the devs could’ve done differently for a better experience. Yeah, the system isn’t perfect, so read till the end to know what needs changing.
Outside the Ring: Zone healers and their exploitative tactics
Lifeline + Loba + Heat shields = pain for players
Staying outside the playable area in Apex Legends — which gradually reduces after each passing round — is not as punishing as it is in some other Battle Royale (BR) games such as Call Of Duty: Warzone, at least in the initial rounds. This is why you will often see many players not being afraid to make long rotations or even go out of their to engage in fights outside the playable zone.
And that’s fine. However, a minority of the player base has been abusing this mechanic to gain an unfair advantage.
Intentionally staying outside the play zone to evade confrontations with other teams and potential losses in rank points has become a prevalent tactic lately, and these so-called “zone healers” have been plaguing the ranked mode in Apex Legends for a few seasons now.
This worsened with the introduction of the legend class system back in Season 16, as it broadened the scope for zone healing. Support legends such as Lifeline and Loba now had an increased chance of getting medkits and heat shields, an in-game item that can prevent ring damage, from the hidden compartment in Blue supply bins.
Couple this with crafting stations littered around the map, working in the ring, and heat shields, which developer Respawn Entertainment has been reluctant to remove from the ranked mode, and you have the perfect concoction to exploit game mechanics. Let me show you what I mean.
Zone healers wreaking havoc in Apex Legends Ranked Mode
Pros and Ranked players up in arms
The video shared by Apex Legends pro “gdolphn” below is enough to give you an idea of how Lifeline could exploit game mechanics in their favor. The players could survive even Ring 6 damage with a gold shield, an inventory full of medkits, and heat shields collected by teammates.
Once players took note of this simple way to gain RP, there was a significant rise in the number of zone healers. Many started playing Support legends, primarily Lifeline (for her Healing Drone) and Loba (for her Black Market that lets you loot medkits and heat shields with ease).
Zone healers were able to avoid combat entirely but still reach high ranks, stealing top spots from ranked players actually putting in effort and investing time in-game
Abandoning fights, landing away from their squadmates, and constantly healing outside the ring became a common sight in ranked mode. Zone healers were able to avoid combat entirely but still reach high ranks, stealing top spots from ranked players actually putting in effort and investing time in-game. This resulted in widespread discontent within the Apex community.
FURIA’s Apex Coach Jxmo (previously known as PVPX) was extremely vocal about this “heat shield heal exploit” on X for the last few months. And for good reason; since it was unhealthy for the game.
In one of the tweets, you can see Jxmo’s teammate, a Lifeline player, sitting far away from the team outside the ring with an active Loba Black Market. FURIA content creator and Pro player HisWattson, along with TSM Apex Pro ImperialHal, also chimed in. While the former came out in support of zone healers, the latter laughed off this take, saying these players should be banned.
What was respawn’s take on the ring healing exploit, you ask? The developer didn’t think of it as an exploit, at least at first. As reported by JMeyels back in October, Apex Legends Security team member Conor “HIDEOUTS” Ford in response to Jxmo’s call to ban a player using this method said it “is not an exploit,” technically. The tweet has since been deleted, but you can see it attached here:
Now, it’s not like there was a disconnect and Respawn did not understand there was an issue for four seasons. The devs implemented various measures, such as adjusting ring damage, reducing zone shrink timing, increasing materials required to craft medkits, and implementing promotional trials for ranking up in Season 19. However, the impact on zone healers was minimal.
With Apex Legends Season 20 though, there have been sweeping changes. The biggest of them is the new Ring Exploit Prevention system, so let’s learn how it works.
Ring Exploit Prevention in Season 20: How it works
so it was an exploit, after all? huh, Respawn?
As the name reveals, the devs have finally come forward and acknowledged that the zone healers were actually exploiting game mechanics to gain an undue advantage over others.
Does the new “Ring Exploit Prevention” system work? I decided to jump in-game and test the new system myself. The moment I got into a match, I told my random teammates I was going off to test this feature. As a Lifeline, I landed on a Blue bin, of course, and gathered a ton of healing supplies – literally a ton (see below).
With more than 5 medkits and 16 syringes, I started my test and ran into the ring. I was instantly greeted with a “GET BACK IN THE RING” message in the middle of my screen, along with the blaring sound that accompanies the “Out of Bounds” warning in-game. I mean, I get the message, so what’s with the sound? It’s super annoying and distracting.
I sat there in the ring depleting my precious healing resources to bring you the exact time for which you can survive outside the zone. Here’s how it goes:
Once the 5 minutes and 30 seconds run out, you will be eliminated outside of the ring. By following the classic zone healing exploit, I could still easily avoid fights and continue with healing till zone 3, approximately by which the elimination timer starts.
But as pointed out by some players, the timer resets once you get back into the playable area. I even tested this and found that it only takes a minute for the timer to reset, which is way too low. I was again able to sit in the ring, taking damage, for a while, but I can’t bring you an exact figure as it was Zone 5 and I had a team on my tail.
This concluded my silly shenanigans of sitting in the ring and healing…all the time. Now, it brings us to the big question — is the Ring Exploit Prevention good enough?
Closing thoughts
In my opinion, the Ring Exploit Prevention system is good, especially since it’s paired with the amazing crafter change that lets you craft only one medkit, the removal of gold shield, and a revamped rank system.
It’s a step in the right direction, but it’s not perfect. Adding a timer to stop zone healers is good, but the need to reset the timer is beyond me. It will only give Lifeline and Loba yet another chance to run back to the zone and keep healing once their timer has been reset.
Also, as many pros have said before, ranked mode should be the gateway to competitive Apex, especially in the upper echelons. So, why is Respawn reluctant to remove the heat shield item from ranked when they did it for ALGS? Doing so could solve the issue in an instant, in my opinion.
For now, zone healers have been relatively scarce in ranked matches, however, the future remains uncertain as we look forward to the possibility of whether these players abandon this strategy, particularly in this rank system that prioritizes both kill points and placement points. We are only a week into the new season at the time of writing this article, so we’ll see how it goes in the coming weeks.
To wrap it up, I want to praise Apex Legends devs for continuously having an ear on the ground and listening to the community. This feature is a good start to ironing out one of the biggest woes of the players, and all of us truly appreciate it as regular Apex players.
