New Apex Legends exploit lets players quit ranked with no penalty

Despite Respawn’s best efforts at stopping ‘dashboarders’ in Apex Legends, a new exploit has been found, allowing players to avoid incurring any penalties for dipping out of ranked matches early.

Ranked Play in Apex is meant to test players’ true skill level, and reward them with prestigious ranks and rewards for climbing up the tiers.

Of course, for this system to work, it’s crucial that the game can accurately record and track a player’s performance. When Ranked play was first introduced, some exploiters found ways of exiting a match without the game tracking score or receiving a penalty, also known as ‘dashboarding.’

Although it was effective at first, the developers quickly took a harsh stance on it, issuing bans and other penalties for players caught dashboarding.

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But, following the launch of the second split of Ranked Series 3, it appears a new way to dashboard has been discovered, and if not fixed soon, could run rampant.

Exposed by Reddit user u/ChangeThisXBL, it’s shown that after entering a ranked match and then using the ‘return to main menu’ option, they can safely quit out of the match, and incur no abandonment penalty whatsoever.

This will be an issue that Respawn aim to iron out very quickly before more cheaters exploit it and ruin ranked play for everyone else.

Given the harsh stance they’ve taken against dashboarding in the past, it’s possible the developers issue retrospective punishment for anyone caught using this, so we strongly recommend resisting the temptation to do it yourself.

The post has already garnered significant attention, and so it should be on Respawn’s radar very soon, if not already. Although you can report players you suspect of dashboarding, developer Eric Hewitt said in January that they can identify these cheaters themselves.

He also confirmed “judgment day” was coming for these cheaters, and it looks like another judgment day might be in order if more people start using this new exploit.