Fortnite v19.40 Update Live, Patch Notes Revealed

By Tanner Dedmon

Fortnite's latest update dropped this week right on scheduled which means that players have a whole new set of patch notes to look over including changes to various systems, new features, and limited-time events. One of those events includes a mini Spider-Man-themed week with extra quests to be completed while those still playing the game's Imposters mode will now hear other players chatting via proximity chat. The game's Creative mode also received its own separate changes as players have come to expect by now.

Patch notes for Fortnite are typically a mix of a blog post and the bulleted lists players typically associate with patch notes and are further split into the Battle Royale and Creative categories, so they're a bit more abstract than the traditional patch notes from other games. That said, we've combined the Battle Royale and Creative updates below in a set of patch notes showing everything that's new in the update that's now available.

Battle Royale

Amazing Web Week

  • The v19.40 update presents Amazing Web Week! From March 1 at 9 AM ET to March 8, 2022, at 8:59 AM ET, find Spider-Man's Web Shooters as Chest loot on the Island. (In addition to their regular spots!) If you want even more airtime — or just wanna send villains out of your sights — Bouncers will be unvaulted for Amazing Web Week. Find them on the ground and from Supply Drops!
  • While in aerial action, you can complete "Amazing Web Week" Quests for extra XP.
  • A new themed week will begin after Amazing Web Week ends. This week starts March 8 at 9 AM ET, bringing with it a new batch of special Quests. Stay tuned for more info!

Proximity Voice Chat in Imposters

  • v19.40 enhances the Voice version of Impostors! The "Impostors (Voice)" playlist now uses proximity voice chat, meaning who you hear is based on who's around your character. As before, voice communication is split between players who are and aren't eliminated, while mixing both the Agents and Impostors together. Even though eliminated players can't voice chat with non-eliminated players, they can still hear them to keep up with the drama.
  • Players who prefer no voice communication can still select the "Impostors" playlist (which has Quick Chat enabled only).

Adjust the Time of Day in Replays

  • On platforms that support Fortnite replays, you can now change the time of day when playing back a replay! This can be done for replays that take place in Battle Royale or in Creative Islands where the time of day hasn't been set by the Island's creator.
  • To adjust the time of day in a replay, select the camera settings (denoted by the camera with the gear in the middle), navigate to the clock icon, then use the slider to choose the time of day you want. You can also choose to pause the time of day

Competitive Notes

  • The Amazing Web Week loot change and Bouncer addition are not included in competitive playlists.

Major Bug Fixes

  • Fixed an issue involving Outfits sometimes glowing with a bright blue "hologram" effect in the Lobby.
  • Fixed the issue in which POI names would appear on the map only in English regardless of your selected language.

Creative

Island Trailers in Fortnite Discover

  • Big news, island trailers are now live v19.40! Make sure to check out the Submitting your Fortnite Creative island for Discover blog post for all the updated criteria for trailers when submitting your island.
  • If you have ever uploaded an island trailer with your island through the Discover submission form, your trailer will autoplay above the game tile when a player selects your island in Discover. If you need to update your island trailer, it is recommended that you resubmit your island with the updated trailer using the Discover submission form.
  • As an additional note, audio will not be supported at the time of launch. Also, if a trailer is uploaded it will supersede the current render image when a player expands your game to learn more. Both your image and the video are important to bringing players to your game, however if you only want to use an image for your experience, do not add a trailer when using the submission form.

New: Guard Spawner

  • Be on your Guard!  Or at least tell your players to be, since this update sees the full release of the Guard Spawner to Fortnite Creative.  The Guard Spawner shares a lot in common with the Creature Spawner, so if you're used to working with Fiends you'll get to grips with Guards in no time at all.  We'll leave you to discover all the details yourselves, but some of the highlights of the system include:
  • Choose from 8 different Guard skins.
  • Drop a compatible weapon or consumable on the Guard Spawner to have the Guards from that spawner equip it. 
    • Add multiple items to have the Guards select randomly from the available pool.
    • Use the Guard filter on the weapon and consumable inventory screens to find which items are compatible with the Guard Spawner.
  • Control patrol radius around the spawner.
  • Assign Guards to teams.
  • Adjust many of their attributes, including awareness, accuracy and health.
  • The maximum number of Guards which can be active is 30 – this is a separate limit from the limits for Fiends and Animals.
  • Several other devices including the Elimination Manager and Mutator Zone have been updated to allow them to interact properly with Guards.

New: Supply Drop Spawner

  • Incoming!  We've added a new device to let you create your own Supply Drops with a whole host of configuration options.  Now you can rain gifts down on your players for them to rejoice over or fight over – your choice!
  • Add your own selection of items.
  • Configure where and how often it drops.
  • Add class and team restrictions.
  • Extensive trigger/receiver support.

Update: Round Settings – Enable Matchmaking

  • The ability to turn matchmaking off has been available on the Round Settings device for some time now.  With this update we've now added the ability to turn it back on as well!  Combined with the recently released Player Counter device, you can now monitor the number of players in your game and turn the flow of new players on and off to keep your game running at your ideal capacity.

Update: Tracker Device Persistence

  • The Tracker Device now has the option to persist data between sessions, allowing you to create longer, more involved quests or tasks that can be completed over multiple play sessions. 
    • This includes options for resolving conflicts when multiple players have shared trackers with different amounts of progress.

Update: Item Granter

  • The Item Granter has had two new features added:
    • You can now choose to spawn granted items at a player's location rather than directly into their inventory – useful if you want a player to leave a breadcrumb trail or just to allow other players to be able to pick up the item when it is granted.
    • You can now choose to simply not grant items if the player's inventory is full, rather than automatically dropping the excess items at the player's location.

Update: Campfire Stoking, Damage and Repel

  • The Campfire has had several new options added:
    • You can now allow players to stoke the fire (add fuel) while it is still burning, rather than having to wait for it to run out before re-lighting.
    • The campfire can now repel enemy fiends and animals.  Enemies which enter the campfire's area of effect will flee from it for a few seconds before attempting to re-acquire targets.
    • The campfire can now also damage fiends and animals which enter its area of effect.

Other Feature Updates

  • Added some fantasy background music tracks to the Radio device.
  • Added support for larger resource numbers in the UI and increased the maximum resource cap to 2.1 Billion. 
    • This applies to Gold Coins and other resources, but not building materials such as Wood, Stone and Metal.

Prefab & Gallery Updates

  • Added 3 New Prefabs
    • Background Snow Dunes Small
    • Background Snow Dunes Medium
    • Background Snow Dunes Large
  • Added 3 New Galleries
    • Background Snow Dunes Gallery
    • Tall Grass Gallery A – The tall grass featured on the Chapter 3 Battle Royale map
    • Tall Grass Gallery B – A unique Creative version of tall grass
  • Added an International Women's Day flag to General Props Gallery A

Prefab & Gallery Fixes

  • Fixed an issue with a corrupted Trim asset from The Spire set.
  • Fixed an issue with The Spire Base, from The Spire Tower Gallery, from sounding like metal when walked upon.
  • Fixed a resource material issue with the circular rug from The Spire set.
  • Fixed an issue with the Piano Gallery spawning assets outside of the blue preview volume.

Device Fixes

  • Fixed an issue that caused damageable props to be unrepairable.
  • Fixed an issue that caused the Fire Volume to not ignite when above ground level.
  • Fixed an issue that caused the Button Device to not rest the Fishing Zone correctly.
  • Fixed an issue with the ATK vehicle spawner that caused it to remain stuck in place.
  • Fixed an issue with devices that use light beam to properly collide with environments after being scaled.
  • Fixed an issue with the item granter that caused it not to grant items to players when using random setting.
  • Fixed an issue where campfires could not be placed

Gameplay Fixes

  • Fixed an issue when switching teams that caused players to see the change above the players count.
  • Fixed an issue that caused campfires to appear unlit for players joining in progress
  • Fixed an issue that caused players to get sent back to the frontend after the in game matchmaking countdown timer ends.
  • Fixed an issue that caused team select settings in Creative mode to not carry over when the game started
  • Fixed an issue with fires not damaging players in certain situations
  • Fixed an issue with players being unable to repair structures that are on fire
  • Fixed an issue where wildlife was not navigating correctly when indestructible walls were hidden
  • Several issues fixed regarding supply drops

UI Fixes

  • Fixed an issue where XP reward UI was not displaying correctly

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