Apex Legends Arenas set for major rework: Matchmaking, price changes & maps

Arenas are receiving a heavy rework in hopes of offering a more cohesive experience for all Apex Legends players. Featuring unique 3v3 tactical shooter gameplay, the smaller maps offer an alternative to the widespread and sporadic combat of the game’s Battle Royale mode. 

Debuting back in Season 9, Arenas have been one of the more divisive additions to Apex Legends in the game’s history, but Respawn is taking aim to dramatically improve the game in the next update.

Instead of being a way to engage with the game’s deep combat systems and mechanics in a controlled environment, problems with the game’s matchmaking have left players loading into a lobby just to be shredded by a team of pros before they even know what happened.

With a focus on rebalancing matchmaking, Respawn has detailed all of the upcoming changes in the Escape update patch notes.

Every change to Apex Arenas in Season 11

Arenas Matchmaking is being reworked

First, is the match finding changes – the game will now be more selective in pairing teams together, ensuring that fewer games end as complete romps of one team or another. This is paired with changes to the Ranked mode, where playing with teammates and enemies of different skill levels will now be reflected in the amount of AP you earn or lose from your games.

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A comment from the dev team reads: “The final calculated AP amount for a match is a factor of your current AP and MMR.  It’s also influenced by the MMR differences between teams. In practice, this difference was factoring in more than we wanted. I.e. Losing a match you were slightly favored to win was giving a bigger AP loss than desired.”

The maps of Arenas are also seeing a significant change: “With the introduction of Encore, the Arenas map rotation will now include only the custom made Arenas maps. We will not be using BR locations for Arenas in the Escape update.”

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While future maps could still be placed on worlds that we’ve already been on, they won’t be based on the existing POIs that players are familiar with. This means the removal of maps like Dome, Hillside Outpost, and Golden Gardens that were added in Season 10.

Apex Legends Arenas weapon pricing changes

Finally, the weapon market is seeing some changes with the following items receiving pricing updates:

• Moz
  • Blue 125 → 150
  • Purple 200 → 250

• P2020
  • Blue 75 → 50
  • Purple 150 →  125

• RE45
  • Base 200 → 150
  • White 150 → 100
  • Blue 250 → 200

• Prowler
  • Base 500 → 400
  • Blue 300 → 350
  • Purple 400 → 350

• R99
  • Base 500 → 450
  • Blue 250 → 300
  • Purple 300 → 350

• Hemlok
  • Base 500 → 450

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These changes might not restore Arenas’ popularity overnight, but it looks like Respawn are committed to revitalizing the game mode in the next season.