Apex Legends will keep tap-strafing, at least for now
"We've concluded we need to take more time to get this right"
A couple of weeks ago, Respawn Entertainment said they were going to get rid of tap-strafing in Apex Legends, but now it seems they've changed their minds. Tap-strafing is a movement exploit that allows players to keep their momentum after slide-jumping, letting them make speedier turns than they should. Unfortunately for Respawn, they say getting rid of this tech has some "unexpected side effects", so tap-strafing gets to stay in the game, for now.
"It is still our intention to address some of the most egregious use-cases of tap-strafing, but for now we are delaying our planned change to a later patch," the devs say.
"Movement is sacred in Apex. We weigh every change to these systems carefully and value feedback. After further testing, we've concluded we need to take more time to get this right to make sure related movement mechanics aren't caught in the cross-fire."
To perform a tap-strafe, you need to spam your forward button after slide-jumping while attempting to move to the side. It lets you keep your momentum from the slide, then fling yourself around by 180 degrees to speedily hop around corners, or dodge enemies. Most players who're experienced with this tech will bind "move forward" to their mouse scroll wheel to consistently pull it off.
Originally, Respawn said they wanted to remove tap-strafing because it's "inaccessible, lacks readability/counterplay, and is exacerbated by movement abilities." It's the sort of movement tech used predominantly by high-level players, and part of the argument is that it's not fair on console users (now that Apex has cross play), or folks using a controller, because they can't tap-strafe as effectively.
Movement exploits like this have existed in FPSs for yonks. Quake 3 had it's own version of strafe-jumping that a dev tried to get rid of because he didn't like everyone "bouncing around all the time".
So, while Apex's next patch will no longer be removing tap-strafing, it is adding a new collection event to the battle royale today. Named Evolution, it comes with Rampart's Town Takeover, turning a section of the World's Edge map into a paint-splattered mod shop. Players can use crafting materials here to buy Rampart's Custom Modded Paintball Weapons, which sounds like fun.
On top of that, Rampart's heirloom weapon is being added, plus she'll have some discounted modded weapons for players to use in the 3v3 Arenas mode. As always, there'll be new cosmetics and a handful of balance changes too, and you should be able to check it all out yourself at around 6pm BST today (that's when Apex's updates tend to go live).