Like many battle royale games, Apex Legends features a cast of colorful and heavily-armed characters who have plenty of chemistry on and off the battlefield. One of them is Defense Legend Alexander Maxwell Nox, better known as Caustic, a scientist who tests toxic gases on his opponents. It appears that Respawn Entertainment is once again having trouble balancing Caustic, meaning that Apex Legends Season 12 will be making a big nerf to the character.This is far from the first time Apex Legends has nerfed Caustic, but it may be one of the most targeted nerfs applied to him. According to the Twitter account for Alpha Intel, which reports on Apex Legends news and leaks, players facing off against Caustic will soon have an advantage.In a recent tweet, Alpha Intel states that other players will now be able to destroy Gas Traps even after they've been triggered. While Caustic mains may be dismayed to see the character has been nerfed again, the specificity of this change may suggest that Respawn Entertainment is figuring out how to make him viable. This may be a sign that the developers have finally nailed down how to balance Caustic's lethal traps. Furthermore, since Caustic's Gas Traps have to be hit in a specific area to be destroyed, this tweak may not impact gameplay that much.
Even if a Gas Trap is destroyed after activation, the effects will have still hit players. This means they will be unable to use their abilities and the enemy Caustic will be alerted to their presence. From that lens, this change may not even be considered a nerf to Caustic so much as a tweak of the Apex Legends physics engine. However, some gamers may find that shooting the gas traps isn't that hard, which could potentially have an impact on Caustic's overall ability to defend locations.
As of writing, it appears that many fans are unhappy about the changes to Caustic's gaseous arsenal. Several users claimed that making Caustic's Gas Traps destroyable even after they've been triggered makes him no longer competitively viable. However, other users countered by pointing out that Caustic players could just be more careful about where they place their Gas Traps. One user even went so far as to note that Caustic players were a big problem in ranked matches and this nerf was necessary. It remains to be seen what impact the change will have on Caustic players in the long term.
Apex Legends is available now for PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.