Apex Legends’ season 6, Boosted, is live

Apex Legends’ sixth season has begun.

Players can finally meet Ramya Parekh, also known as Rampart—the finest gunsmith in the Outlands and next legend to join the Apex Games. The new season is also bringing in a magnitude of gameplay changes, including the new Volt SMG, changes to World’s Edge, the crafting system, and overhauled armor, as seen in the patch notes.

New legend: Rampart

Rampart is coming to the Apex Games with the help of her mechanic sidekick, the deadly machine gun Sheila. The new legend is an expert at fortifying positions and can place down amped walls that soak up incoming bullets and boost outgoing damage.

Rampart can create true fortresses with her kit and the help of Sheila. The duo is especially deadly when coupled with defensive legends, such as Wattson or Caustic. That doesn’t mean she’s unstoppable, however. A few well-placed grenades can easily take down Rampart’s positions.

Some legends can also get an edge over the gunsmith. Crypto’s drone can temporarily disable her ordnances, while Bangalore can smoke out a position and break the line of sight from Rampart’s unidirectional fire.

Stop this train

New seasons usually bring changes to maps and Boosted is no exception. World’s Edge has undergone a deep restructuring to open up more rotation options. Three new POIs—Launch Site, Countdown, and Staging—made their way to the Talos arena and will feature fortified blast walls that can restrict the flow of players to some parts of the map, or at least hinder them.

The new World’s Edge also features plenty of cut-throughs and passageways to make for easier rotations. This includes a passage between Survey Camp and Skyhook, which links the northeast and northwest portions of the map.

To create more rotation options, however, Respawn had to take out the train. Maintaining it created a lot of “dead space,” according to lead game designer Carlos Pineda, since the tunnels needed to remain clear for the train to move through them.

Crafting

Not all players are fond of diving head-first into action. Season six is bringing in a way to level the playing field between aggressive and risk-averse players. The new crafting system lets legends expend materials found in matches to build items or upgrade their shields.

Players can only build a handful of items that are on a timed rotation. The availability changes every day and week, although some offerings—such as healing items and shield upgrades—are permanent.

Improved armor

Upgrading your armor through crafting is just part of Respawn’s bigger plans for shields in Apex. Season six gave built-in Evo capabilities to all shields (except gold). Players need to either deal damage or expend materials to upgrade their armor. All legends get a built-in “level zero” shield on drop. This means that taking down the first opponent more likely than not won’t warrant an extra level on Evo.

Legend and weapon changes

The balancing updates are an integral part of Apex seasons and Respawn doubled down on the key meta changes to the guns and characters this season. Recon characters received a significant buff that lets them all use Survey Beacons, as well as adjustments to their individual kits.

The weapon pool also saw a significant shake-up with the addition of the Volt energy SMG, the R-99’s move into care package territory, and the Devotion’s return to the ground loot pool.