Slick movement has been a staple of XDefiant since it launched, seeing the best of the best jumping and crouching all over the place, much to the dismay of their opponents. So when Ubisoft announced its intentions to nerf bunnyhop and crouch spamming in the upcoming XDefiant patch notes for the Y1S1.5 update, it naturally sparked some debate from the community. Well, it turns out it’s not a massive nerf after all, as the developer has now come out to explain its intentions.
As teased yesterday, Friday August 23, the upcoming XDefiant update is set to include significant changes to the competitive ruleset, bunnyhop and crouch spam nerfs, and more to improve the FPS game during its debut season. The original post was light on specifics but it clearly outlined that air strafing would be nerfed, jump/crouch animation transition speeds reduced, an aim sway penalty from spam, and a jump height and speed cap following three jumps. On the surface, these certainly sound like major nerfs to cheeky movement tech that would shake up the overall gameplay flow, especially at higher ranks.
To quell the heated debates over how strong – or needed – these nerfs were, executive producer Mark Rubin and developer Patrick Price have revealed more about the update. Rubin explains that the “changes to jump coming in 1.5 are mostly around smoothing out the animations and actions so they look better in 3rd person making them less jarring,” rather than outright nerfing the tactic.
That’s not to say that jump and crouch spam hasn’t been nerfed though. It certainly has, it’s just not as drastic as it first sounded. As Price goes on to reveal, you can “still very much air strafe” despite the reduced speed. Plus, it now feels and looks smoother in motion.
Likewise, the penalties for spamming these actions have been brought down so it’s less jarring for players. Previously, your jump height and landing speed would decrease in stages from three to five consecutive jumps. Now though, your fourth kicks into high gear, rather than gradually increasing. This is to better align it with the max sway now applied to your fourth jump.
So, the patch is clearly not putting the breaks on fast-paced movement. Instead, it’s a slight balancing nerf that also makes the gameplay smoother for both you and other players.
The other key aspect of this update is the changes to Ranked, which include:
- Faction skill limit
- No RP loss in Bronze
- Faster RP progression
Though progressing in Ranked will be quicker than ever, you’ll still want to bring the best XDefiant loadouts with you, especially as the new XDefiant factions limit could mean you can’t play your main in every match.
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