Apex Legends Season 5 has launched, and with it comes the long-awaited Mirage rework. The new buffs include more invisibility, a longer Psyche Out ability, and a new ultimate inspired by Season 3’s Dummies Big Day LTM.
Mirage has long been relegated to Apex’s bottom tiers. Originally locked behind a small paywall when Respawn’s battle royale burst onto the scene in February last year, the Holographic Trickster has struggled to find his place in Kings Canyon.
The main issue was that it’s hard to fool other players — disappearing is all well and good, but when cloned copies of Mirage blatantly look like AI characters marching across the map like robots, there’s not much room for bamboozling opponents.
Mirage to “get better at bamboozling” with rework
Respawn said it hopes the new rework — which Dexerto revealed was in the pipeline on April 9 — will finally allow players “avenues to get better at bamboozling people.” This has come in the form of more invisibility and a reworked decoy.
The biggest switch-up comes for Mirage’s Psyche Out tactical ability. The cloning part of the ability now mimics every move the Holographic Trickster makes, in a bid to make the copied versions of the player “seem more life-like.”
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The launch-legend’s show-stopping ultimate, Life of the Party, has also been boosted by this Season 5 change. Mirage’s top-level move works similarly to Psyche Out, but sends forth a half-dozen team of copied Elliott Witts instead.
Finally, Respawn has added a healthy scooping of invisibility for the fast-talking Legend as well. He now disappears from sight when using respawn beacons, and reviving teammates — a bonus that applies to the downed ally too.
The devs explained that they were looking to finally add “more depth to Mirage gameplay” with these changes. While it’s not clear how strong the Holographic Trickster will be in Season 5 now, they’re certainly some welcome buffs.
Here’s the full list of updates for Mirage’s abilities, including cooldowns and more:
Passive: Now You See Me…
- Mirage now cloaks while using a respawn beacon and reviving a teammate (the teammate is also cloaked), in addition to cloaking when downed.
- Mirage’s “You got Bamboozled” line will now trigger when you bamboozle an enemy, instead of when you release a decoy.
Tactical: Psyche Out
- Pressing the character utility action button allows Mirage to gain control of his decoy.
- When controlling the decoy, it will mimic Mirage’s every move.
- Decoys now last for 60 seconds.
- Releasing another decoy will remove the previous decoy.
Ultimate: Life of the Party
- Mirage deploys a team of decoys that mimic his every move (think “Emergency Dance Party” from DUMMIEs Big Day).
- Cooldown 60 seconds.