Epic has released a statement on the future of Fortnite’s Season X Competitive series that will be starting up on August 17th, 2019. The large focus has been surrounding the B.R.U.T.E. mech vehicle that has been controversial within the community. Epic appears to not be overly concerned with how things are playing out in the game currently with it, and it will remain in all core game modes for the time being. They are implementing what can be viewed as somewhat of a nerf to it. The vehicle will be getting a targeting laser for its rockets, which will have a directional audio cue that will indicate if you are being targeted, even when behind a structure. Check out the rest of the information below.
Fortnite Champion SeriesThe Fortnite Champion Series (FNCS) kicks off next week and will be the next step in competitive Fortnite for 2019. Starting on August 17, there will be a three-round Trios event each weekend for five weeks. Similar to how we ran the Fortnite World Cup Online Opens, we will be advancing the top teams each week from each region to the Season X Finals. With the FNCS, however, we’ll also provide a new path to qualify for the Season Finals. Series Points will be awarded based on each team’s final placement every week during the FNCS to determine team placement on the Series Leaderboard. The top performers on this leaderboard will also advance to the Season Finals. This format values consistency over the course of the season, but still rewards the outstanding performance players make when competing in individual weeks. The Season Finals will be held online for each region on September 20 - 22 to determine who will be crowned the Season X Champions.
For Season X, we’ll be giving away $10 million across all regions and competitions within the FNCS. We also have more practice opportunities and prizes up for grabs in separate Solo and Trios Cash Cups taking place Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday each week. You can expect a full breakdown of the official rules early next week. We are excited to see how this season of competitive Fortnite plays out!
TL;DR
B.R.U.T.E.We’ve been monitoring the impact of the B.R.U.T.E. in gameplay and are investigating ways to enhance combat feedback when interacting with the vehicle. In v10.10, we will add a targeting laser that will show the direction the B.R.U.T.E. is aiming its rockets while they are being charged. This laser will have directional audio to help indicate when it’s being pointed at you, even if you’re behind a structure. We’ve also fixed a few mobility bugs that were allowing players to exploit its boost mechanic.
The B.R.U.T.E. remains within the core game modes (Solo, Duos, and Squads), select Limited Time Modes, and in competitive Arena and Tournament play. We’ll communicate any future iterations to the vehicle as we’re continuing to investigate a few more areas where we can improve combat interactions.
Arena Bug FixFrom Thursday, August 1 until Monday, August 5, there was an issue that caused the Arena playlist to use Season 9 matchmaking buckets instead of Season 10. This meant that due to the refactor in scoring, players were not being appropriately matched into the correct skill buckets, causing there to be little differentiation in skill levels. We pushed out a hotfix and were able to get this resolved, so players should see an increase in game quality, but some might see their queue times increase due to the change.
Payments UpdateLast week we updated everyonehereabout the progress that has been made using our new payment system. We’ve seen a lot of new players start the verification process and successfully see their prize distributed to their Hyperwallet account. Today, August 9, we will contact players for Online Open Weeks 7-10 to begin the eligibility and tax verification/payment process with the goal of contacting Xbox Cup and Trios Cup players next week.
With a new system and new players experiencing the system for the first time, we want to make sure we provide tips on how to complete the process efficiently and touch on some rare cases that some players experience due to their country of residence.
