Fortnite rare weapons removed in massive drop rate shake-up

Guide by Lauren Aitken Contributor

Published on Sept. 6, 2018

Epic has released the Fortnite v5.40 patch notes and amongst the various additions that have been made, such as the Grappler, those with a keen eye will have noticed the removal and modifications of certain rare and legendary weapons.

Rarity colour adjustments have been made, with the notes explaining that "some items have been removed or modified to better reflect their effectiveness. This only affects their colours and other characteristics are unchanged" now that the new Getaway LTM and High Stakes mode have been released.

Weapons removed from play

Common Suppressed Submachine Gun
Legendary Bolt-action Sniper Rifle
Rare Pistol
The Rare Rocket Launcher has also been removed; however, to compensate for this the availability of Epic and Legendary Rocket Launchers increases in drop rate by 18.57% and 2.05& respectively.

Changes to rarity and drop rates

Remote Explosives increased from Rare to Epic.
Port-a-Fort decreased from Epic to Rare.
Dual pistols decreased in rarity from Epic and Legendary to Rare and Epic.
Suppressed pistol decreased in rarity from Epic and Legendary to Rare and Epic.
The Semi-Auto Sniper rifle decreased from Epic and Legendary to Uncommon and Rare; in an exchange, there is an increased the frequency that the Semi-Auto sniper rifles drop to align more with their rarity class with the drop rates for both the Uncommon Semi-Auto sniper and Rare Semi-Auto sniper increasing by 9.29%

Assault rifle changes to penalties and benefits

Burst Assault rifles will also be affected in this patch update:

The jumping/ falling spread penalty being reduced from 25% to 10%.
The crouch spread benefit will be reduced from 25% to 20%.
The sprinting spread penalty reducing from 50% to 30%.

In order to balance this, the spread down the sights benefit will increases from 35% to 40% and when holding down the trigger of the weapon, the first two bursts are more accurate.