XDefiant players furious over ‘unplayable’ Spiderbot that didn’t actually get nerfed

Not a day on from XDefiant‘s season one update, players are already demanding Ubisoft takes another pass at the DedSec Spiderbot ability, which seemingly hasn’t received the full nerfs the developers promised in the pre-update patch notes.

The patch notes for the July 1 update stated DedSec’s Spiderbot ability, which sees the player drop a spider that chases and stuns enemies, had its cooldown increased from 25 to 40 seconds. However, it appears the Spiderbot still has the same shorter cooldown. Coupled with a “bugfix” that now prevents latched enemies from destroying the Spiderbot while attached, it’s become a serious problem XDefiant players want fixed pronto.

“You literally can’t counter it anymore, the game is actually unplayable like this when everyone chooses Spiderbot,” frustrated XDefiant players declared in a July 2 Reddit thread. One big issues fans flagged was that the Spiderbot can stun enemies for four seconds, block vision, slow you to a crawl, and deal significant damage. Previously, if you looked down to the ground while the Spiderbot attacked, you could shoot the bug off, but this is no longer possible. Outside shooting the Spiderbot as it crawls erratically on the ground, using EMP Grenades, or the Hijack ability, you’re at the mercy of the Alien-like “facehugger.”

“Wow, talk about an ability with zero counter play and zero skill to use,” other fans said. “It’s seriously unplayable. Everyone’s running it now and it’s nonstop Spiderbots everywhere and there’s nothing you can do.” Some have resorted to only using DedSec and the Spiderbot ability out of protest so its usage rate climbs, hoping to force Ubisoft’s hand.

It was already an annoying ability before the beginning of season one, and in a game where wallhack exists via the Intel Suit or the instant-kill AoE of the Firebomb, being able to disable and almost guarantee a single kill with the Spiderbot feels tame to some. Nevertheless, getting that cooldown increase we were promised as well as a method to dealing with the Bot after it latches on would go a long way to balancing this overpowered ability.

We’ll see whether the Spiderbot gets another look as XDefiant‘s season one rolls on.