Apex Legends: Cipher launches today with a Crypto rework, dual-wield Wingmans, and Strongholds

OFFICIAL Written by GPN · Nov 3, 2026, 5:20 AM ET · Apex Legends · Gaming

Respawn's Season 31, Cipher, launches today, November 3, on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC through the EA app, Epic Games Store, and Steam, with the season going live at 1 p.m. ET. The official gameplay trailer frames the season around a single idea: information wins fights.

The headline change is Crypto, rebuilt from a back-line drone watcher into an aggressive intel gatherer. His Surveillance Drone now runs on a 25-second battery instead of lasting indefinitely; when the battery runs out the drone is recalled, and after a 6-second recall it can be sent straight back out with no cooldown wait. Handling and speed inside the drone are improved, the scan zone is now a full 360 degrees instead of just the camera view, and enemies in the drone's line of sight can be scanned and marked, with marks lasting 8 seconds and surviving even if the drone is recalled or destroyed. A manual mark fires with the shoot button on a 4-second cooldown, the speed boost toward teammates is now part of his base kit, and his EMP can be triggered while piloting or from a self-deployed drone, dealing full shield damage and a heavier slow with line of sight or 50 damage and a lighter slow without it, and never hurting Crypto himself. Two new upgrades round it out: marks lasting 4 seconds longer, and 10 extra seconds of battery.

The season's loudest new weapon is the Akimbo Wingman. Looting a second Wingman automatically pairs them, doubling the magazine and firing each gun one after the other in a quick burst, with further bursts on a held trigger. The Wingman moves from Sniper to Heavy ammo, takes Heavy magazines, and spawns at Heavy Arsenals, with base damage dropping from 50 to 45. In Akimbo form the headshot multiplier falls to 1.25x (56 headshot damage), fire rate rises slightly, and reload time and recoil both increase. The pair shows up in ground loot and at Heavy Arsenals.

Strongholds are the new mid-match objective. These locked, bunker-style structures airdrop near the middle of the game — one drops as Round 2 closes, alongside two Care Packages at Round 1 close and one more at Round 2 close — and anything underneath one when it lands is crushed. A Stronghold deploys up to four indestructible barriers and two Hardlight frames, and cannot be entered, looted by Loba, or breached by Alter until it is captured. Capturing means controlling the zone around it: progress builds only while a single team is alive inside, stalls when contested, never decays, and moves faster with more teammates present. The team standing in the zone at 100 percent opens the doors and roof hatch, levels up every living member, and claims a Care Package weapon, three gold guns, three amps, and two corrupted attachments.

Ranked changes the most it has in a while. Diamond+ matches now open with Legend bans: every player requests one ban, a Legend's chance of being banned matches its share of requests, and two Legends are banned per match, with last week's most-played Legends filling the pool if fewer than four unique requests come in. Scoring for wide-skill matches is adjusted too: squads two or more tiers below the lobby median get a 30 percent entry discount (Challenger matches), while squads two or more tiers above pay 50 percent extra (Goliath matches). The Ranked screens also show squad and lobby tiers, entry costs, RP on every kill, and a new Ranked tab in the inventory, with Ranked Ladders arriving later in the split, running November 10 through December 13.

The rest of the Legend roster gets a balance pass. Lifeline's D.O.C. now heals her while gliding, her Tactical cooldown drops from 25 to 15 seconds, and her upgrades add a revive shield and a 60-second ultimate cooldown cut. Revenant's Tactical cooldown falls from 20 to 15 seconds with a faster charge, his Ultimate from 180 to 150 seconds, and three new upgrades add an extended ultimate on knock, a silencing leap pulse, and a Tactical refresh on a marked enemy. Loba goes the other way: her Tactical cooldown rises from 25 to 30 seconds and her Ultimate from 120 to 150. Axle's October 1 hotfix changes are folded in as well, trimming slide control and the Kickstart drone.

Weapons and maps round out the notes. The L-STAR returns to floor loot with lower damage, fewer shots before overheating, a smaller stockpile, and no Redline hop-up. The Hemlok Burst AR is back in burst and single-fire form after its Breach era, and the Prowler takes a targeted range nerf with more recoil and no Selectfire hop-up. The Akimbo Mozambique enters the Care Package with a damage bump and an Executioner hop-up, and the EVA-8 trades Double Tap for Disruptor Rounds. Across Storm Point, Olympus, and World's Edge, 99 map fixes land, more than 35 hiding spots are sealed, and E-District's night lighting is reworked for visibility. Disk usage also drops by roughly 30 GB against Season 29 on most platforms, about 17 GB on Switch 2. Wild Cards are now granted at the start of Rounds 1, 2, and 3, with Replicators removed from the mode.

Watch the official Cipher gameplay trailer above, and read the full patch notes through the source link below. Cipher is free to play on every platform listed above.

Apex Legends: Cipher launches today with a Crypto rework, dual-wield Wingmans, and Strongholds

Facts gathered from

More on this