Gibraltar and Horizon are dominant characters in Apex Legends right now, but their supremacy could be short-lived.
Respawn is planning to tone down the power of the two legends by adding bleedthrough to Gibraltar’s Gun Shield and adjusting Horizon’s tactical in a future patch, according to Respawn game designer Daniel Klein.
Some of the major changes were set to launch with the Chaos Theory update but weren’t ready in time. The March 9 patch will still tone down their power but not with the full force that Respawn wanted to use. The intended adjustments could be ready “hopefully by season nine,” but no promises, according to Klein.
Gibraltar
Gibraltar’s Gun Shield is in line for major adjustments. Respawn plans to add bleedthrough to it at some point—which means that excessive damage would go right into Gibby’s armor or health. “We’re working on arm shield stuff, but there were some nasty bugs that cropped up that stopped us from shipping the nerf we’re aiming at [in the Chaos Theory patch],” Klein said.
Adding bleedthrough would drastically mitigate Gibby’s ability to soak up damage, especially from high-powered weapons such as snipers. A Kraber shot, for instance, would break the gun shield and still deal considerable damage to Gibraltar himself.
The Chaos Theory patch will remove the 15 percent faster heal passive when inside a Dome Shield—which isn’t the intended change but should help tone down Gibraltar so far. He’s “incredibly strong, especially at highest skill levels,” according to Klein, and removing quicker heals could help balance him in the meantime.
Horizon
Horizon’s Gravity Lift is also posed to go under the knife in a future patch. Respawn is looking to tone down how elusive she can be when using her tactical, according to Klein.
“The problem is you can jump in, take a full bat, and strafe while doing so making you almost impossible to punish,” Klein said. “That’ll change, but the proper way to do that takes a little time.”
Horizon’s gravity lift can serve as a platform to skyrocket a squad to great heights, but the astrophysicist can deploy it at will—even inside small buildings—to disorient opponents and make her harder to hit, especially with her passive.
While the nerf isn’t coming right now, Respawn will tweak her ultimate a bit in the upcoming Chaos Theory patch. Her ultimate cooldown will increase to 180 seconds (up from 120). It’s a temporary fix, however.
Her Black Hole “is definitely not the bigger problem,” according to Klein, but “that was just the change that was ready for 8.1.” The real problem lies in the gravity lift, Klein said, “but the nerf for that wasn’t ready in time for this patch.”
