With the release of the Apex Legends Season 1, Respawn has now introduced their latest legend Octane into the arena. The adrenaline junkie character brings an array of new abilities into Apex Legends, introduced alongside the new Battle Pass rewards for Season 1. Our Apex Legends Octane guide explains how to use his abilities for reckless flanking attacks, inflicting major damage, and living to tell the tale. Read on to find out how to play Octane, guiding you in how to best use his abilities, ultimate, and build the best team comp.
Apex Legends Octane guide | Tips and tricks
Octane is built for speed, and his best approach to combat can be likened to guerilla warfare. His primary Stim ability drives unlimited boosts of speed and health, which enables him to recklessly outpace and flank enemy squads. Using his agility, press enemy characters from unexpected angles, then withdraw to reload, recuperate, and reassess your situation.
By darting in-and-out of combat, even the heaviest tanks won’t be able to keep up. As such, Octane is best suited to close-quarters, high rate-of-fire weapons; these weapons are easy to handle in tight situations, but quickly inflict damage when used effectively up close. The Wingman is another solid choice for Octane, an equally easy-to-handle weapon with high damage, and better range than his other high rate-of-fire weapons.
Apex Legends Octane guide | Abilities
The three abilities in Octane’s arsenal enable him to play far more aggressively and recklessly than any other hero. Used well, the adrenaline junkie can make the most of his agility to circumvent the enemy’s cover, inflicting serious damage from unexpected angles. His abilities won’t provide much support to the squad, but his speed boost can help him get to downed teammates quicker than anyone else.
Overall, the tactical Stim grants you unprecedented speed and agility to outmaneuver and ambush enemy squads, similar to Bangalore’s speed boost. The passive Swift Mend ability then helps you to recover from these pushes, slowly regenerating health over time. Finally, his Launch Pad ultimate can be useful to gain vertical distance when traversing through the world, but it can also be a death sentence when used on the battlefield.
Tactical | Stim
The tactical Stim ability differs from any other Legend’s abilities, in that it costs health, instead of time. Using your Stim grants you a 30 percent boost to your speed at will, which gives you versatility across a wide range of scenarios. In combat, use this to get out of enemy fire, and exploit the speed to quickly flank enemy squads behind cover. This ability lasts six seconds, so use the speed boost wisely before finding somewhere to hide.
Bear in mind that spamming this ability can carve away your health, especially if you’re under fire. In addition, Octane also fires his weapon only using one hand when using this ability, with the other used to activate the Stim. Thankfully, this doesn’t seem to have a great impact on accuracy when aiming down sights, but it looks like weapons might have a greater spread when fired from the hip.
Passive | Swift Mend
Octane’s Swift Mend passive ability is what enables his reckless play style. This ability slowly regenerates your health over time, negating the impact from enemy gunfire or from your Stim’s health cost. While this isn’t enough to survive outside of the zone, it can give you a few extra hit points when you’re out of their line-of-sight, taking enough time to recover from the hits you’ve taken.
When you’re in cover, focus on restoring your shields, and your health will creep back up at the same time. This can give you a helping hand when recovering from reckless maneuvers, giving you just enough of a respite to push the enemy from another angle. Otherwise, you may not notice the impact of Swift Mend, as you’ll still need to use healing items if you take serious damage.
Ultimate | Launch Pad
While the Launch Pad looks like an inventive way to take on enemy squads, it can be a recipe for disaster in practice, and is the least useful ability in this Apex Legends Octane guide. When you use Octane’s ultimate ability, you throw out a handheld jump pad, which launches you into the air for a few seconds. During this time, not only do you become an easier target as you float through the sky, but your own gunfire spread also increases significantly
As such, you won’t survive long in the open, making the Launch Pad difficult to use in combat. If you’re in a built-up area, buildings can help give you cover while you’re in the air, so don’t be afraid to experiment with this verticality. You can use the Launch Pad to gain some vertical accessibility outside of combat, and it also works for your teammates.
Apex Legends Octane guide | Best team comp for Octane
Octane’s abilities help make him an excellent guerilla combatant, but his abilities can combine with those of Caustic to great effect. Caustic’s gas canisters are some of the best area-control abilities in the game, which can block off areas for enemy squads, and provide useful misdirection. As Octane, use this to your advantage, pinning down unaware enemies, and forcing them to fight on multiple fronts.
Likewise, Bloodhound’s ultimate ability to track enemy locations can really unlock the potential of Octane’s agility. With sufficient communication between your squad, you can use Bloodhound’s ultimate to turn the tables on enemy squads, identifying and exploiting the best flanking approach before they’ve even noticed you.
10 Weapons You Want in Apex Legends
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10 Weapons You Want in Apex Legends
One of the true rushes of the battle royale genre is not knowing what you'll be dealing with in any given round. Being able to succeed with any given setup early on separates the pros from the amateurs, but there are still some weapons you want to see in your first drop location. -
Devotion
The Devotion is a light machine gun that chews through Energy ammo with gusto. When you hold down the trigger, it starts to spin up, like a minigun in the hands of your favorite Heavy. The rate of fire continues to increase, making it a monster in certain situations. -
VK-47 Flatline
A close to mid-range assault rifle, the Flatline works best when you're aiming for the head. Dealing more damage than your standard AR thanks to the heavy rounds, you can switch between single shots or full auto. It only really loses its luster if you need to tag a sniper across a wide canyon, although that's still possible with the right scope. -
Havoc Rifle
The newest addition to Apex Legends, the Havoc rifle is a full auto assault rifle that uses Energy Ammo. It's also the first weapon to use two hop-ups to modify its potential. It can either be turbocharged to negate the gun's spin-up or get the Selectfire Reciever to select the hitscan beam fire mode. -
Kraber .50-cal Sniper
One of two Legendary weapon drops, the Kraber is a powerful sniper rifle that shoots off unique .50 caliber rounds. One of the weapons appearing from Titanfall 2, you can only grab this gun if you go after the supply drops and survive the hordes of other players with similar intentions. -
Mastiff Shotgun
The Mastiff Shotgun is the other Legendary weapon currently found in Apex Legends. It also can only be found from airdrops and it also has its own unique ammo that can't be replenished. You'll want to get up close and personal with the Mastiff, which has an amazingly narrow spread when you aim down its sights. -
Peacekeeper
If you don't want to chase Legendaries, the Peacekeeper is a good runner-up for "Best Shotgun." You can even get a similar aim down sights bonus with the Precision Choke add-on. Generally speaking, if you are going to charge into battle in Apex, you'll want one of these bad boys handy. -
Prowler Burst PDW
The Prowler is an SMG that fires in five round bursts. Due to its resemblance to a P90, you might wonder why it doesn't also fire fully automatic, and it does if you find a Selectfire Reciever. Either way, it's a great option if you need to get a lot of bullets into an opponent in a very short amount of time. -
M600 Spitfire
If you want to get a lot of bullets into an opponent over a long period of time, may we suggest the Spitfire? The premier light machine gun of Apex Legends, the Spitfire lives up to its name by spitting fire at a tremendously fast rate. If you can keep it fed with Heavy Rounds, it will keep your kill count looking very healthy. -
Triple Take
A sniper rifle that shoots Energy Ammo, the Triple Take brings its unique charge fire mechanics over from Titanfall 2's Double Take. It fires three projectiles at once at a full charge, letting you be a bit off with your aim when it comes to headshots. -
Wingman
Until they bring over the Smart Pistol as a Legendary Drop, the Wingman is the weapon to wield in your back pocket. A futuristic six-shooter revolver, the Wingman rewards skilled players with devastating headshot damage, improved even more by the Skullpiercer Rifling hop-up.
