Fortnite v7.40 update: Infantry Rifle, Crossbow, free Season 8 Battle Pass and patch notes for February 14

The v7.40 update for Fortnite Battle Royale finally went live on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and mobile on February 14. Here’s everything we know about the Infantry Rifle, Crossbow, Zipline changes and all other tweaks in the latest patch!

A good amount of information relating to the v7.40 update had already been revealed ahead of time thanks to some Reddit posts from Eric Williamson, the design lead for Fortnite.

However, the highly anticipated v7.40 patch was delayed twice. It was first scheduled for release on February 12 before being delayed to February 13. Another unforeseen issue then meant the patch didn’t go live until February 14, Valentine’s day, at around 09:00 GMT (04:00 EST, 01:00 PST). 

What’s new?

Infantry Rifle

A new ‘Infantry Rifle’ was announced in-game on February 11 and finally went live on February 14.

The old-fashioned looking rifle appears to be based on the famous M1 Garand, but we weren’t sure of its intended use until the notes went live.

Here’s everything you need to know about the new weapon:

Infantry Rifle

• Available in Common, Uncommon and Rare variants.
  • Deals 41, 43, 45 damage. 2x headshot multiplier.
• Can be found from Floor Loot, Chests, and Vending Machines.
• Uses Medium Ammo.
• Fires quick-moving projectiles without damage falloff.

#SharetheLove Valentine’s Surprise

The #SharetheLove event just got even better! Valentine’s Day is upon us, and the developers of Fortnite have an exciting gift for all players:

“Everyone who completes 13 free Overtime Challenges by February 27 will receive the upcoming Season 8 Battle Pass for FREE! If you don’t have an outfit, now is your chance to get several for free. With the Battle Pass, you’ll receive two Season 8 Outfits instantly and you can earn up to five more. Save your V-Bucks, this one’s on us!”

Here are the details we have so far:

Overtime Challenges and rewards:

Looking to earn a free Season 8 Battle Pass? Starting with the v7.40 release, complete 13 free Overtime Challenges by February 27 to receive the upcoming Season 8 Battle Pass for FREE! Additionally, unlock 5 new rewards including the Valentine Wrap and Vines Contrail for completing these Challenges.

And for current Battle Pass owners, the Overtime Challenge rewards will include new unlockable styles for the Trog, Powder, and Onesie outfits.

Ziplines

Fortnite fans have been desperate to see some sort of prompt that gives them an option to use Ziplines, or not, while they’re navigating around the map.

In a post on Reddit, Eric Williamson confirmed that this would soon be implemented, making the chance of automatically using one by accident significantly lower: “Zipline interact prompt added, and using a Zipline will grant fall damage immunity.”

Here’s what the February 14 patch notes have to say:

Changes to Ziplines

• Ziplines are now interact to engage.
• Ziplines grant fall damage immunity.
• Ziplines now have an audio visualizer icon.

Gifting – Limited Time

According to the patch notes, gifting is back in Fortnite for a limited time. It will be available from today until February 22. For Valentine’s day, you can send the Heartspan Glider to your “special someone” for free until Friday, February 15.

Crossbows

While not TECHNICALLY brand new, Crossbows will be returning to the game in time for Valentine’s day on February 14.

“Triumphant return,” read an in-game news message about the Crossbows. “Cupid’s Crossbow will be unvaulted for a limited time. Eliminate your opponents with stealth and precision.”

Here’s everything you need to know:

Cupid’s Crossbow – Limited Time Item

• Epic Rarity.
• Infinite ammo.
• Bodyshot Damage: 79.
• Headshot Damage: 197.
• Can be found in Floor Loot and Chests.
• Does 1 environmental damage.

Hand Cannon

After months of complaints about the power of Fortnite’s Hand Cannon from professional and casual players alike, it looks like the incredibly powerful pistols will finally be nerfed in the v7.40 patch – at least when it comes to the damage they do to structures.

“Hand Cannon structure damage reduced from 150 to 100,” said Eric Williamson on Twitter.

Below, you can find out everything that has changed:

Hand Cannon

• Epic rarity
  • Reduced environmental damage from 150 to 100.

Rocket Launcher

Eric Williamson also confirmed that Rocket Launchers would be receiving some major tweaks in the February 14 patch.

For starters, the powerful explosives will now take significantly longer to reload (increasing from 2.52 seconds to 3.24 seconds). However, the bigger change comes in the form of them no longer being found in loot chests!

Williamson said: “Also worth mentioning we’re making a change to move Rocket Launchers out of chests – though they’ll still be in Supply Drops (and a little more available there than they are now) and Vending Machines.”

Here are the official notes:

Rocket Launcher

• Shifted availability of Rocket Launchers out of Chests and into Supply Drops.
  • Removed Rocket Launchers from Chests.
  • Increased the chance of receiving a Rocket Launcher from Supply Drops from 25% to 50%.
• Epic rarity
  • Reload speed increased from 2.66 to 3.42.
  • Now only available from Vending Machines
• Legendary rarity
  • Reload speed increased from 2.52 to 3.24.

X-4 Stormwing

The controversial Stormwing Planes once again get a minor nerf in the v7.40 update as they will no longer be able to fly through structures and smash them:

• Removed the ability for the X4 Stormwing to break through structures and large objects.

• Small props will still be destroyed from direct hit from an X4 Stormwing.

Skins and cosmetics

Other new content to look forward to, as always, will be skins and various other cosmetics. We’ll keep you updated with any leaks and information as it becomes available.

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Fortnite v7.40 patch notes

The patch notes for the February 14 Fortnite update are pretty lengthy. Here’s everything that wasn’t discussed above:

LIMITED TIME MODE ROTATIONS

As mentioned last week, we’re continuing with rotate through LTMs at a faster pace throughout the week moving forward. The first mode is detailed below, check the in-game client on Thursdays and Saturdays to see what other modes are available!

LIMITED TIME MODE: CATCH!

Summary
In this mode, all guns have been removed. The only weapons are grenades and other items that can be thrown or tossed. Get in there and throw the enemies back to the lobby!

• Available grenades/items:
  • Smoke Grenades
  • Clingers
  • Remote Explosives
  • Port-a-Forts
  • Impulse Grenades
  • Shockwave Grenades

Mode details:

• Chest spawns and Floor Spawns set to 100.
• Can only get consumables out of Chests, Floor Loot, and Supply Drops.
• Increase Supply Drops throughout the game.
• Faster circle times.
• Increased drop stack counts.

LIMITED TIME MODE: TEAM RUMBLE

Summary
Two large teams fight for the Victory Royale in an action-packed mode where the first team to get 100 eliminations wins!

What’s New?

• Reduced likelihood of Storm ending up near the center of the map.

WEAPONS + ITEMS

Improvements to the Bush consumable.

• Now absorbs one instance of weapon damage before being removed from the owner. Fall damage will not remove the Bush.
• Now translucent (for the Bush wearer only!) in order to allow for better visibility of surroundings.

• Unvaulted

Clingers

• Vaulted
  • Grenades

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue causing projectile weapons to fire inaccurately when aiming at other players from very close range.
• Fixed an issue that was causing explosive splash damage to be blocked when players didn’t actually have cover.

GAMEPLAY

• Added Pop-Up Cup settings to default playlists
  • We’re introducing a few larger changes into the default Fortnite playlist as a test. We’ve seen these settings in pop-up cups result in more engaging fights and allowing players to gain more consistent rewards for the risk of engagement.
  • Based on the positive feedback we received during these specific Pop-Up cups, we’re implementing the following adjustments:
    • 50 Health (or Shield) based on your health when the Elimination occurs.
    • 50/50/50 materials dropped on Elimination
    • 500/500/500 Cap on materials
    • Harvest rate increased by 40%
  • We’ll be closely monitoring feedback on this change – play a couple matches and let us know what you think!

• Final Circle adjustments
  • Increased the travel distance by 48%.
  • Shrink time has been increased from 45 seconds to 75 seconds.
• PC, Mac, and console players can now crouch while in Edit Mode.
  • Gamepad players can assign this through custom gamepad controls.
  • Note: This functionality is coming to mobile soon.
• Turbo Building
  • Reduced the initial timer for turbo building from 0.15 to 0.05.
• Added the ability to swap the item in the currently selected slot with a new item by holding interact instead of tapping.
  • Added UI text to show players they’re able to use swap.
  • Not available on touch input.
• Floor traps will automatically build a floor piece for you if needed. You must have the required resources.
• Logitech and Razer RGB peripherals will now react when doing emotes.
• Sneaky Snowmen will be destroyed if they fall from a high distance.
  • Stand on the head of a Sneaky Snowman to avoid fall damage.
• Removed HUD bar for the minigun overheating mechanic.
• Adjusted the distance of the Bottle Rocket sound indicators so that they match the max distance of the sound effects.
• Added a Bottle Rocket sound indicator for the explosion of rockets.

Bug Fixes

• Aim Assist “Snap-To” Adjustments
  • We’ve added a compounding time delay to the aim assist “snap-to” feature when spamming the Aim Down Sight button. Each button press after the first will apply a time delay, up to 5 seconds, before the aim assist “snap-to” effect is applied.
  • We are making this change to prevent situations where players would spam the Aim Down Sight button on enemies, which caused the crosshair to stay locked on to targets indefinitely.
    • This change should prevent the lock-on mechanic from being abused while retaining the same Aim Assist feel. We’ll be closely monitoring feedback about this change.
• Fixed an issue where Bottle Rockets would not align to specific slope angles.
• Cozy Campfire logs no longer block movement.
• Prevent weapon auto-reload from canceling emotes.
• Fixed an issue that allowed traps to trigger through lab tunnel walls in Dusty Divot.
• Fixed auto pickup not occurring when landing from skydiving.
• Fix issue where a player with no traps would switch to the build tool if they hit the button to equip traps.
• Fixed an issue where glider items could be triggered right after teleporting with a Rift-to-Go which would block subsequent skydiving.
• Fixed an issue that would block building beneath a mounted turret.
• Fixed an issue where Snowmen placed on the map would appear invisible or under the map.

EVENTS

• New Tournament Series – ‘Share The Love Series’ (Solo & Duo)
  • Available from February 14 until February 24.
  • Players will compete across any of four division tournaments:
    • Open Division
    • Prospect Division
    • Contender Division
    • Champion Division
  • Earning enough points during any nightly session to receive a pin will unlock the next highest division.
  • Earning a pin during a Champion Division session will advance to Round 2 – the Champion Division Finals!
  • ‘Share the Love Series’ Sprays will be granted based on the highest division achieved, including the Champion Division Finals.
  • All divisions run simultaneously and share the same tournament schedule.  The full schedule for your server region can be viewed from the Events tab.
• New Tournament – ‘Trios One Day Cup’
  • Available on February 17
  • Grab a couple of your best friends and join in for the Trios One Day Cup, going from a fully Open tournament to an intense final round with the best Trios in a single day.
  • The tournament takes place across three rounds – earn a pin during each round to advance.
  • The full schedule for your server region can be viewed within the Events tab.
• Tournaments can now take place across multiple rounds, with players needing to earn a pin in order to unlock the next round of the tournament.
• Multiple tournaments are now able to be running at the same time.
• Reduced the maximum matchmaking time for tournaments from 5 minutes to 4 minutes.
  • This value limits the amount of time a player can wait for a match in a tournament before they create the best match possible at that time.
• Increased the minimum amount of players for tournament matches from 80 to 90.
• Streamer Mode can now be used during tournament play.
• In-game leaderboards are now fully available in all regions, for each tournament session. These can be accessed inside of the tournament page by clicking on any tournament session.

AUDIO

• Add audio when squadmates ready up in the lobby.
• The following audio improvements have been made for Mobile/Switch platforms:
  • Improve skydiving wind audio.
  • Add more variation to gunshot environment impacts.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed the Air Horn emote only having 1 variation on Mobile/Switch.

UI

• Stats v2
  • The ability to track all of your play in one place and view it across all platforms.
  • This includes the ability for mobile and Switch players to view their stats in-game.
  • Breaks up stats by each individual Limited Time Mode.
• Players now receive a pop-up prompt informing them if a player they recently reported has had action taken against their account.
• When eliminated by the Storm, instead of saying “You Eliminated Yourself”, the text now says “Eliminated by the Storm”
• Improved look and implementation of Bad Network Indicator and updated Bad Connection Indicator UI to track bad vs severe ping.
  • Yellow indicates poor status, red indicates severe status, flashing red indicates dropped signal
• Slash commands have been improved and re-enabled in chat windows.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue where you could switch between different tabs in the background if you were in the Player Feedback menu.
• Fixed missing Remove Marker map icon on Mac.
• Fixed Battle Pass info not displaying properly in the lobby in certain cases.
• Fixed an issue where elimination counts and names for teammates were not calculated properly in large team modes.

REPLAY

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue causing weapon animations to sometimes play twice for each shot fired in replays.

SOCIAL

• Gifting returns for a Limited Time
  • The Gifting feature is back for a limited time! You’ll be able to send or receive presents from friends until February 22.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that would result in incorrect or duplicate party suggestion text bubbles to appear in the lobby.

MOBILE

• Adding an optional Targeted Edit button to allow you to edit without having to touch the screen. This allows the player to edit using their crosshairs, similar to other platforms.  
  • The Targeted Edit button can be found in the extra buttons section under the HUD Layout Tool.
• Edit and Edit Reset Buttons will now capture touches.
  • No more editing through the edit button.
• Adding visual feedback to many mobile buttons to allow for better instant feedback and help us better diagnose issues seen in the community.
• Now backing up the most recently saved hud layout to the player’s cloud save.

Bug Fixes

• Fixing an issue with the input blocked message appearing on mobile when leaving a game.
• Fixed an issue causing some key-bind widgets to display incorrectly on mobile with controllers.
• Quick switching from a weapon to a consumable no longer briefly fires the equipped weapon.
• Fixed multiple issues with Turbo Building or weapon firing stopping when switching weapons or switching between Build, Edit, Combat mode.
• Fixed an issue with touch input causing controllers to stop responding when scrolling.
• Fixed multiple issues to support more controller hardware as well as fixed many issues related to parts of the UI that may not be properly navigable by controllers.