Epic Games is currently going through a balancing and re-balancing period for Fortnite given that the game is still going through the paces on the development front. This includes adding and removing weapons almost every single update. In fact, for the latest update Epic pulled yet another weapon from the game.
Over on the sub-reddit for Fortnite, there's a post from Epic Games explaining what's been added in the latest update. In the post there are a number of issues addressed for the recent update and what the team will be addressing in the next update. In particular, the guided missile is being moved into the "vault" due to an issue with fairness and accessibility.
The major issue is that there were a lot of people complaining that the guided missile in Fortnite was unfair and was a cheap weapon to use in the game. Epic surveyed the responses and decided to listen to the feedback, removing the guided missile from the smorgasbord of available weapons in the game.
A lot of gamers recognized that the guided missiles were actually really good in the cooperative four-player Save The World Mode, because as explained in the comment thread it was balanced out so there would be just a handful of guided rockets on the screen all flying toward a set destination in a short succession of time. The problem with the addition of the guided rocket in the Battle Royale mode was that you could have all 100 players using the guided missile to fire at each other and create an absolutely chaotic and unfair atmosphere where everyone is firing the weapon at once.
A lot of players would fire the rocket after hiding behind a wall and use it to seek out and destroy other players from the safety of their own makeshift bunkers. Epic realized how much of an unfair advantage this created during the Battle Royale mode in Fortnite and decided to put the guided missile in the vault until a better alternative for using the weapon can be made available in the PvP modes.
The guided missile joins a host of other weapons that Epic has stuffed in the vault, including the Wall Dynamo, the Ceiling Zapper, the Jump Pads, the SMG, the Smoke Grenades, and the Zapotron. Just recently the studio also removed the Boogie Bomb from the game due to a bug.
Essentially, each weapon was moved out of circulation in the Battle Royale mode for one reason or another.
Epic Games also took time out to fix some issues with "peeking" in Fortnite, which would occasionally cause players to bug out and shoot some of their own structures while attempting to peek around and shoot at their opponents.
The team has been working on fixing some of the weapon swapping animations and timing. Some gamers have complained about firing or reloading certain guns and the animations not coinciding with the weapon fire rate.
It's interesting when compared to some of the more outstanding complaints from the PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds community, who consistently have asked for changes and requested certain fixes that still haven't been implemented into the PC version of the game. Nevertheless, if you enjoyed the guided missile strikes in Fortnite, you'll have to kiss them goodbye... for now.
