Apex Legends devs explain why they haven’t nerfed Seer despite dominance

Seer has been the talk of the town in Apex Legends with players getting sick of his intel-gathering abilities. There are pleas for nerfs, which Respawn are hearing, but the developers haven’t been able to find the right changes for him just yet.

It’s hard to get into a game of Apex Legends right now without being scanned by a Seer from every direction. While other scan Legends ⁠— Bloodhound, Valkyrie, and Crypto ⁠— have always had their place in the meta, Seer has replaced them all basically.

The chorus of complaints is racking up from players as they beg Respawn for nerfs to the Ambush Artist. Pro players and casuals alike want something to happen, but the Apex Legends team hasn’t pulled the trigger.

There’s a simple reason for it, according to developer Devan McGuire: they haven’t found the right Seer nerf yet.

“Considering Seer’s recent rise into the Meta, we’re noticing the power of Seer’s passive taken to great extremes, and it’s been a big topic of discussion in our balance meetings,” he explained on Reddit.

“We have no updates at this point, but targeting the power of Seer’s passive is something we have been actively looking into.”

Seer’s passive ability, Heart Seeker, can hunt out enemies within 75 meters. All Seer has to do is spin around with his arms out and he can get a sense of who is around. This is incredibly useful knowledge when pushing into a new area on the map.

It was the first thing Respawn nerfed once Seer dropped in Apex Legends Season 10, but it’s still one of the most powerful tools in the game to this day. It’s effectively a no cooldown scan with nearly 100% accuracy on an enemy’s position.

That ability has also been a struggle for the developers to balance from day one. McGuire explained to players originally Seer’s Heart Seeker would notify enemies when they were being scanned ⁠— but it would actually hinder the Ambush Artist more than help.

“Early in Seer’s development we actually prototyped giving enemies feedback when the heartbeat locked on,” he said. “Given that it was tied to Seer’s camera movement and actions it became an irritation to have any notification propagate to other clients and clouded other audio/scan combat information that actively affected the player. 

“It also angered Seer teammates to have enemies jump on them because the Seer was just ‘looking around’ and proc’d the intel to the opponents.

“We even had the heartbeat play in the enemy player’s head at one point that told them they were being tracked. It was terrifying, and induced panic in players to feel constantly haunted by this presence, so we backed away from it.”

The current iteration of Seer’s passive is much more powerful, so there has to be a balance. With pressure in regards to nerfing the wider scan meta too, there’s a lot Respawn has to consider when pushing out changes for him.

The one thing they won’t do is give up his identity though, and until they find a way which includes the best of both worlds, there won’t be any Seer nerfs ⁠— or wider scan meta changes ⁠— in Apex Legends.

“We are actively looking into the frustration that can come from these abilities and finding ways to reduce it without crippling the identity of the Legends who wield them,” McGuire added.