Removing Tap-Strafing and Aim-Assist. Or Neither.

Earlier this week, we announced our intention to “remove tap-strafing,” a decision that was met with surprise by many movement enthusiasts. Tap-strafing is a term associated with different sorts of movement, depending on who you ask. Internally, we generally use it to describe what many associate with scroll-wheel strafing. 

To be more explicit, this change targets multiple rapid directional commands after jumping. Movement should feel unchanged for controllers and for M&K (mouse-and-keyboard) players who hadn’t heard of the term “tap-strafe” until this week. Thanks to the work of a couple of our engineers, this is now easily tunable on the fly, and we have the ability to iterate on or even revert it completely without a client update.

Our goal is to remove some of the sharpness in momentum conservation around 90°+ angles. That’s what I’m thinking of when I use the term “tap-strafe” throughout this post. Things like wall-bounce redirects back onto that same wall should feel unchanged, but movement afforded by scroll-wheel strafing will be removed.

Since tap-strafing is a unique M&K mechanic, many platforms have asked about our approach to controller-specific systems like aim assist. As Apex and its players evolve, it’s only prudent for us to continue to evaluate whether or not aim assist needs adjustment.  When top-level controller players say they would be alright with nerfing aim assist, we definitely take note. Players should not feel forced to use a specific input type to stay competitive

When people say, “Gee dang it, Respawn’s balancing decisions cater to controller players,” the best answer I have is: “When it comes to accessibility, we often must consider controller players given the constraints compared to M&K. But, accessibility isn’t the same as balance design, and it’s a strawman argument to treat it as such.”

This is why we believe tap-strafing exists solely as a design problem. Even in a M&K-only Apex world, or a scenario where controller and M&K could tap-strafe just the same, we don’t believe it would be a healthy change with the freedom it currently allows, for three main reasons:

The first issue: it’s highly inaccessible. By “inaccessible,” we mean that it’s an opaque technique that’s practically impossible to learn organically (and the most egregious examples require a strange keybind). 

Secondly, tap-strafes have terrible readability and limited counter play. Path grapples and Octane pads aside, I’ve seen clips of players breaking ankles with victims (including high-skill players) who are at a loss for what to do. While it’s not terribly prevalent, I’m concerned about how this could continue to evolve as more players adapt and further develop their tap-strafe mechanics.

The third point, and the most problematic, is how tap-strafing is exacerbated by movement abilities. I can buy that a tap-strafe at normal velocity in a gunfight occurs infrequently and is relatively mild enough to not immediately kill with fire. But Path grappling past and tap-strafing back into your face with a Mastiff, or Octane cranking 90s while maintaining ridiculous speed both bring up greater gameplay concerns.

Mobility creep is something to be very mindful of in this game. While many love the freedom that Apex’s movement system affords, constraints are just as important. It’s not surprising that mobility legends are highly popular. Why don’t we just do more of that? Well, over time (and I’d say we are already seeing it) mobility creep can open up a Pandora's box of new problems to solve. How is third partying affected by mobility? Within a fight, how are frontlines defined? How quickly can I close the gap on an enemy? As a game, Apex is designed to work well with a finite number of movement possibilities.

I feel it’s important to note that limitations don’t always equate to lowering skill-gaps; there are skill-gaps in working within constraints. One could argue that bunny-hop healing lowered the skill-ceiling—players could make up for misplays with less constraints on their ability to safely heal. Different types of skill expression are changed when we touch something like perfect air control, for better or for worse.

Hopefully this provided some context, and as always, we’re happy to hear your thoughts."

It's obvious whoever wrote these reasons does NOT play apex AT ALL. ZERO hours played. It has never been more obvious that someone has NO CLUE what they are talking about came up with these reasons. 

Let's start by saying things will always exist for Console or PC that cannot exist for the other.  This CANNOT and never will be an an equal game.  Classic Apples and Oranges here. 

"1.) The first issue: it’s highly inaccessible. By “inaccessible,” we mean that it’s an opaque technique that’s practically impossible to learn organically (and the most egregious examples require a strange keybind)."

 - A.) My assumption when someone says it's inaccessible; they mean to a portion of the player base. Obviously tap-strafing is inaccessible to people that don't play apex. So, it's a mechanic in the game that some people can't find information to learn? or do you mean it is literally inaccessible information to learn how to do? DEVS COULD add the "inaccessible" information to the firing range. Dev's themselves are the ones capable of making the information accessible and choosing not to do so they create a problem. 

-B.) The next assumption by inaccessible is: they mean not accessible on all platforms. Perhaps watching people strafe in the air creates animosity for wii' users. It ruins a sense of immersion knowing you're nun'chucks' will never be able to do such a movement.  OK. Have you ever practiced something before. Anything at all. Sports, E-Sports, anything competitive. In track and field steroids' are not allowed because of accessibility? or is it because it gives an athlete a competitive edge over another athlete? In this example the amount of time two athletes are given to train, the one with steroids will accomplish more in the same amount of time. It's as if they had an extra year to train over other athletes who were given the same amount of time. 

Lets talk about mechanical tracking. In a straight line or in a firing range. The point is, tracking takes a lot of time to practice and master. Console players get aim-assist which takes thousands of hours to master. Console players get steroids FOR FREE. Being able to micro-track movements is extremely hard to master. Situations in game cause you to mis-track opponents. ie lighting conditions (you're in a tunnel), muzzle-flash (looking at you- L-star), or a spooky grenade going off from a no-audio revenant-octane or rev-tane 3rd party coming up behind you. Every single one of these cause you miss micro-track your opponents. Not the case for console. The game Auto-Detects, magnetizes and follows. This feature inaccessible is not accessible on all platforms. So remove this feature.

"(and the most egregious examples require a strange keybind). " Calling binding "w" to "scroll -forward" on a mouse "egregious" is egregious. Calling some information inaccessible and choosing to ignore other mechanics that also alienate a portion of your player base is not fairness. It's selective alienation. 

You can literally take almost any mechanic in the game and make it sound terrible. Take every single point listed above and apply it to Caustic.

"The first issue: it’s highly inaccessible"  (sounds like caustic gas) What about players just starting? You have to buy the legend and have the knowledge of how to play him. And you have to know that caustic is the only counter to caustic before that purchase or play time? That's inaccessible information that was not provided in the firing range. 

"Has terrible readability and "limited counter play" (sounds like caustic gas) The only counter to caustics gas-slow is to play caustic. That's EXTREMELY limited counter-play.

"Exacerbated by movement abilities" (sounds like caustic gas) People who move fast essentially have their movement exacerbated by movement abilities because of the slow of the gas. "I'm concerned how fast caustics run in their own gas."

We could do the same points above for KRABER.  Inaccessible. Limited Counter-Play ( Literally ZERO if they headshot ). 

The real problem is that there is clear buffs and nerfed to cater to the controller players of apex over the PC portion of apex players that play with mouse and key.

This removing this is a terrible and unfair decision. And your game will suffer financially because of your terrible decisions.