In a win for clumsy players everywhere, Epic Games is removing death by fall damage from Fortnite, although the alternative isn't exactly a buff either.
I'm sure its a universal experience for anyone who has played Fortnite that you'll be playing a match and going on an absolute tear through the battlefield. '10 kills on the board right now, just wiped out Tomato Town' level domination, only for you to make one wrong move, fall off of a cliff and instantly die, ruining everything. While multiplayer games in general are hotbeds for frustration, there's a special type of frustrating that comes with the dreaded fall damage death, and clearly Epic Games knows this, as it's killing off that type of death entirely.
As reported by Fortnite leaker HYPEX, Fortnite is removing fall damage deaths from its regular Battle Royale mode, and – the actually good mode – Zero Build. Given that part of the strategy in build mode is to destroy opposition structures and give them a big fall to contend with, this could have a massive effect on the game's balance. Although thankfully, Epic has seemingly balanced it so that falling during battle is as good as death anyway.
As the leaker notes, fall damage will now send your character into a "splat" animation, which – as the name implies – splats them onto the ground, with a delay before they get back up. Your health and shields will also be fully drained too, leaving you with 1hp to survive with.
I'm actually all for this, and think it's a perfect example of a good way to rebalance the game, effectively removing the frustration of dying to fall damage when wandering around the map by giving you a chance to recover, while also not removing the threat of dying to fall damage when you're fighting someone.
