Apex Legends season 11 will soon go live and one of the major changes is a new addition: Ash. Teased for a long time now across various forms of content, fans have long been waiting for Ash to finally arrive in the game. Respawn Entertainment revealed Ash’s abilities in their Escape gameplay trailer. Players are already strategizing ways to make the most of this “Incisive Instigator” role, so we put together a guide on how to play Ash and gain those crucial KP to rank up.

APEX Legends Guide: How to play Ash

Ash’s abilities

In case you need a refresher on what each of Ash’s abilities does, here’s a quick description for each move and how each of them can be used to help take down enemies.

Arc Snare – Ash’s Tactical Ability. Ash throws out her bladed weapon which has a tether, creating an electric circle on the ground. This spinning snare entraps the first enemy that strays too close to it, dealing damage while restricting their movement. Besides dealing a starting blow to an enemy’s health bar, the move serves well as crowd control (except limited to one legend), slowing that character down so the team can close in for the kill. Arc Snare is a single cast on a 24-second cooldown.

Marked for Death – Ash’s Passive Ability. A vital intelligence tool, Marked for Death shows the location of recent deathboxes on the map. Not only that, it alerts Ash to surviving players and team can strategize to hunt their enemies down. Teams can use this move to know where the fights are going on around the map and then swoop in for the kill as third-parties. Note, however, that Ash can only use the tagging aspect once per deathbox.

Phase Breach – Ash’s Ultimate Ability. Phase Breach is all about tactical rotations. It tears a portal through the battlefield so Ash can travel through the void and end up on a targeted location on the map. Repositioning can be useful for escaping death, but for offensive initiators like Ash, it would most likely be best used to target, ambush, and chase down enemies. The portal stays open for 15 seconds and starts out with a 120-second cooldown.

It is pretty rare to have intel-gathering, rotations, and movement restrictions all in one kit, which makes Ash’s offerings unique as a Legend. That also means that players can maximize all these abilities for to make game-changing plays. Read on to the next part of our guide to find out the best strategies and tips to master Ash.

Strategies for Ash gameplay

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One mistake that players could make is to treat Ash as a fully offensive legend. While her role is definitely attack-favored, players shouldn’t think of her in the same vein as the all-out fighters like Octane. She has more strategic nuance to her role, and even initiating shouldn’t be done haphazardly. As such, pick Ash for an aggressive-minded team, but don’t rely solely on her to deliver the offense.

A likely common sequence of events for Ash is to start by using Marked for Death. By gathering intel, the team can identify the weakest enemies to hunt down, especially if fights are going on elsewhere on the map. It’s also useful for tracking the remaining members of a squad after killing one of them. Combined with Phase Breach or other mobility tools, teams with Ash can viably stick to their targets. Then, once the enemy is in sight, you can unleash Arc Snare to slow them down and go in for the kill.

Ash will also excel in closed quarters. As the team charges into a building, Ash can start by zoning out enemies since the Arc Snare’s tether goes out in an area-of-effect circle. It can be combined with other crowd control moves, like Revenant’s Silence, or damage-dealing follow-ups like Caustic’s Gas.

The portal can also move Ash and team to elevated areas, providing a better view of what’s going on. Equipped with long-range weapons, you can snipe down foes from your more powerful vantage point. Long-range shots can weaken foes from afar—especially since Ash can also unleash Arc Snare from a distance—before closing in for a kill with an AR, for example.

Besides the offensive end, though, Ash’s Passive and Ultimate can also be useful defensively. They allow quick escapes if you’re in a losing fight. Arc Snare also helps to trap or deter enemies along doors or corners. Plus, who says repositioning is only about chasing foes? Players can use the portal to scavenge for loot in areas where fights recently broke out. With intel on deathboxes, the team could also carve out a safe path towards the middle of the circle, avoiding gunfights and surviving for a longer time.

In the next and final part of our Ash guide, find out some more tips to take into consideration when playing Ash.

Tips to master Ash

Important to note, Ash will be a bit harder to excel on if you’re not part of a (reliable) squad. Intel-gathering abilities like Marked for Death are only as good as the players’ ability to communicate the relevant information. Only then can the team plan out the next moves accordingly.

Moreover, Ash will rely on additional aggressive threats to follow up on her snare. She will also likely need backup heading through Phase Breach. If the team isn’t ready to follow through, Ash might end up wasting her Ultimate, since the portal only stays open for a brief amount of time. Miss that window, and that’s a fairly long cooldown without such a powerful move.

But if Ash and team are all on the same page, her abilities offer a fantastic strategic advantage to shake off pursuers or disrupt fights when enemies least expect it.

Still, if you find yourself in solo situations, don’t fret. You might have to take a slightly less aggressive approach and be more refined about picking your fights. It doesn’t mean that you become fully defensive, but you’d have to be more strategic about when you engage (or disengage).

For example, with Arc Snare and Phase Breath, you might use them as escape tools to flee if you’re in a pinch. However, enemies can also jump through the portal, so it’s best if you combine it with Arc Snare to trap them down so you ensure that you can get away unscathed. But if you see lower-risk fights or some stragglers on blinking health bars, you can then use them offensively to finish off a quick kill.

The scenarios we just shared actually exemplify Ash’s strategic versatility. She’ll likely more frequently act as an aggressor and initiator, and her kit certainly excels at that. But Ash players may also serve more like scouts, taking advantage of her intel-gathering Passive. You might find use as an enabler, letting key members of the squad escape by delaying enemies and countering movement-based legends.

So there you have it, our initial guide to Ash just showed you how to maximize her abilities to make decisive plays and gain crucial wins. Whatever role you end up serving on the team, Ash will surely bring some powerful strategic points for enemies consider and it’ll be exciting to see what players can do with her.