There are many weapons in Apex Legends that strike fear into the hearts of players. Usually, Vantage’s ultimate, Sniper’s Mark, isn’t one of them. Yes, the weapon can dish out serious damage if it hits a follow-up shot on a target it’s already marked, but it has a fairly slow, bolt-action reload animation and players generally have enough time to get behind cover once they’ve been hit by the first bullet from the Sniper’s Mark before an enemy Vantage can get the double damage bonus on the second shot.
That is, unless there was a way to fire the Sniper’s Mark at almost the same fire rate as the Wingman. And, because this is Apex, of course there’s a way for that to happen.
Reddit user CaptainBlondiee broke down a TikTok from Apex player LuminousFrost earlier today in which LuminousFrost gets double-tapped by an enemy Vantage in lightning-quick succession. CaptainBlondiee was able to replicate that Sniper’s Mark fire rate in the Firing Range, and the technique is completely devoid of hacks or even a significant exploit. Instead, it’s simply a matter of timing.
Sniper’s Mark functions much like the game’s other bolt-action sniper rifles, the Sentinel and the Kraber. After every shot, the gun must be reloaded manually by your character, which occurs in a brief animation that takes more time between shots than pretty much every other gun in the game. When the Sentinel and Kraber are empty, the animation that plays instead is your character fully reloading the gun’s magazine.
The Sniper’s Mark rifle has no magazine reload animation since it’s an ultimate that gains bullets through ultimate charge. And when you empty the Sniper’s Mark available bullets, there are no extra ones in your inventory to reload—hence, no magazine reload animation.
CaptainBlondiee figured out that timing the last available round in Sniper’s Mark to shoot at the precise moment that another Sniper’s Mark bullet is about to charge up allows you to skip over Vantage’s bolt-action reload animation completely and effectively give you two shots in rapid succession. Put together and with a bit of luck in terms of what armor and helmet an enemy has, it’s possible to lay down more than 200 damage with the Sniper’s Mark in under a second.
Of course, this tech is probably more luck in the heat of battle than it is an intentional attempt from an enemy Vantage to gain the upper hand. The window to accomplish the Sniper’s Mark double tap is very small and players in an actual game are rarely going to be keeping track of the time between their bullets like this.
Still, LuminousFrost’s TikTok shows that, even accidentally, the fast-firing Sniper’s Mark can happen in your average pub match. And that should be enough to make you think twice about re-peeking that Vantage on the other team.
