Apex Legends adding ‘promotional trials’ to Ranked to stop ratters ranking up

To tackle the common tactic of hiding in Ranked play to reach the upper echelons of Apex Legends’ ranks, Respawn is adding new promotional trials, so that players must prove their worth before ranking up.

Ranked is one of Apex’s most popular ways to play, as it provides something to grind for – higher and higher rankings.

But, due to the nature of battle royales, and the emphasis on placing well in the match, some players can simply choose to hide while others fight, hoping to earn points for placement, rather than playing as intended.

To combat this, starting in Season 19, players will need to complete promotional trials before they can rank up to the next tier (e.g. Bronze 1 to Silver 4). Here’s how it works.

How do Promotional Trials work in Apex Legends?

Once you reach the top of a specific tier of ranks, before you are able to move up to the next tier, you will need to complete a time-limited challenge.

For example, say you have reached the top of Bronze, you will then need to complete one of these challenges to progress into Silver. If you fail the challenge, you’ll be sent back down.

The developers gave a challenge example: To progress from Silver 1 to Gold 4, in the next 5 matches you’ll need to win a match, OR place top 10 and get 3 kills/assists at least 3 times.

If you fail to complete the challenge within the five matches, you’ll be sent back down – how far depends on how badly you performed in the promotional trials.

If you do well, but miss out, you’ll only move down a bit, but if you play really poorly, you might get pushed back further. Respawn also explained that failing the trial in Diamond is more punishing than failing it in Bronze, for example.

Respawn knows that these promotional trials will add extra “friction” to ranking up, and so they are also going to be more generous with Ladder Points this season.

But, this should mean that players cannot rank up by simply playing passively – you’ll need to win matches or rack up kills to actually prove you are worthy of being in the next rank tier.

Other ranked changes in the new season include the removal of premade restrictions.

We’ll see how this new system shakes out starting October 31, when Season 19 of Apex Legends goes live.