As revealed earlier this month, the 30-30 Repeater will soon be available in Apex Legends as the first new weapon to appear in the game in two seasons. The rifle is slated to drop on February 2, which coincides with the beginning of Season 8. The initial reveal didn’t give off too many details as to what the new rifle was capable of, but a new gameplay video from Apex Legends content creator, Dazs, shows off exactly what players can expect from the newest addition to the heavy weapon class. And, honestly? It looks like we're in for an absolute treat.
The default single-shot rifle comes with six rounds, which can be increased up to 12 with the different levels of magazines. A charge bar is displayed on the gun’s sight, allowing you to charge up your shot for dealing more damage, with a fully-charged headshot dealing 100 damage and a fully-charged body shot dealing 57 damage. A non-charged body shot deals 42 damage, which speaks to the strategy you’ll need to consider when deciding whether or not to charge your shot.
You likely wouldn’t be charging a shot in close proximity battles, but if that’s what you were thinking of doing… stop. Charging a shot isn’t statistically significant enough to make it worthwhile, since you could nearly double the amount of damage dealt by just spamming a second non-charged shot.
As Dazs states in the video, the 30-30 Repeater falls somewhere on the spectrum between the G7 Scout and the Longbow. It closes the gap between the two rifles with a faster rate of fire - like the G7 - AND an increased amount of damage dealing potential - like the Longbow - making the Repeater a solid choice for medium to long-range shots. That said, the rifle is limited with its scope compatibility, allowing only up to a 3x or 2x4 scope. In terms of bullet drop, the 30-30 Repeater is more similar to the G7 than the Longbow, which you’ll need to keep in mind for long-range shots.
One of the largest considerations you’ll need to keep in mind when using the 30-30 Repeater is its reload speed. You won’t be switching an empty magazine for a full one. Instead, you’ll be reloading one round at a time, which will eat up a considerable amount of time. As such, reloading should only take place while enemies are far off in the distance. Reloading won’t do you much good while in a close quarter skirmish when you’ll just want to pull out your other weapon.
One new consideration, however, comes with the new Gold Extended Magazine. If you’re fortunate enough to have one of these new magazines equipped, all you’ll need to do is switch weapons for 5.5 seconds. Switching back to the 30-30 Repeater will show your rifle as having been automatically reloaded. This means that when in a pinch, you can put away the repeater, unleash hell with whatever weapon you’re carrying, and as long as you’re able to stay alive for those 5.5 seconds, you’ll have a Repeater that is fully reloaded and ready to go.
Apex Legends hasn’t necessarily been hurting for concurrent player counts, but the 30-30 Repeater will certainly breathe fresh air into the game that hasn’t received a new weapon in two seasons. It will be fun to see how medium and long-range strategies shake out over the course of Season 8 with the addition of the 30-30 Repeater. Possibly even more so with the Gold Extended Magazine that can be used on any gun that is compatible with the top-tier attachment.
Apex Legends Season 8 will kick off on February 8, 2021.