Call of Duty Cuts Killstreak Spawn Rates Across Resurgence and Battle Royale

Call of Duty changed things up just when it looked like the terrain would stay the same. Black Ops 7 and Warzone both got a surprise update today that made some changes to the gameplay and nerfed some weapons. It also gave us our first official look at the highly anticipated Blackout update for Season 2 Reloaded. On paper, the changes may seem small, but they could have a big effect on how games play out in the coming weeks.

February 27 patch made global changes to the way weapons are tuned in Black Ops 7, which affected both online and Zombies. The XM 325 with the Titan Wield aftermarket extension is the one that gets the most attention. The two-person light machine gun setup was winning close to medium-range battles because it could fire laser-focused hip fire and do a lot of damage. Players called it a monster, even though having two LMGs makes you move more slowly.

With the new update, it does a lot less damage at all levels.

There were cuts from 23 to 13 in the first damage area. The least damage went from 16 to 10, and the medium range damage from 18 to 11. The goal, according to the developers, was to keep the weapon usable while making it more obvious when shots miss at long range. Instead of changing the spread of the bullets, the focus was put on damage output to keep certain build combos that are tied to prestige attachments.

More changes will likely be made to improve its performance against scorestreaks. People also paid attention to sniper weapons. Because of a problem with the 2 milliwatt adaptive tac laser, better transfers from hip-fire to ADS accuracy were made without meaning to. The mistake that gave that player an unfair edge has now been fixed, closing what some players saw as a hole.

More balance changes were made to the multiplayer games. In Safeguard, the escort robot's speed has been slowed down a bit while its strength has been raised. This could change how you defend and attack. In overload mode, players can only carry pistols when carrying the goal device. This gets rid of the old workaround that allowed heavier weapons be carried. The Fang Hoverpoint optic was also made available for assault weapons in Ranked Play, though it still slows down ADS a bit.

The game's controls were also tweaked.

The Trophy System's charge rate is now in line with normal multiplayer settings, and it's now clear that players need to hold down the input for the vote-to-forfeit message instead of tapping it. A small bug in the Zombies mode's user interface was fixed so that the Gobblegum widget would work again after moving loadouts.

At the same time, Warzone got its own set of changes, most of which were aimed directly at killstreak spam. Sources say that players were getting angrier and angrier about how often precise airstrikes and cluster strikes were used, especially in Resurgence and Ranked modes. As a result of the change, killstreaks will appear 50% less often from supply boxes in Resurgence and 25% less often from ground loot. Precision strikes, napalm strikes, clusters, and streaks tied to bunkers all get a 10% overall drop in Battle Royale modes.

The new rules on airspace may have a bigger effect. Killstreak call-ins can now be made from 150 meters instead of 255 meters away. Since then, the most active streaks in that area have been dropped from three to two, and only one of each type can be active at a time. Also, each squad can only use one current streak of the same type every 20 seconds.

The goal is clear: give people a chance to breathe and stop matches from becoming endless bombardments. Will this bring back strategy pacing, or will players just get used to it and find new ways to win? The last part of the Warzone update is bug fixes. Problems with ranked elimination splash notifications, tracking development for the Absolute Zero mastery camo on the NX Ravager, and players sometimes abusing map geometry to fall below it have all been fixed.

Aside from the patch notes, people are getting more and more excited about the Blackout update for Season 2 Reloaded. A new piece of key art, which was allegedly found in the PlayStation database, shows what's to come for the first time. Even though it's just a picture, it shows some important things.

There are a lot of grapple hooks, which makes me think that the fast-paced traversal techniques that made the original Blackout experience so great are coming back. Wing suits can also be seen, which means that players can use better movement to launch from the air. The picture shows red gas and explosive effects in the environment, which has led to rumors about possible dangers on the map or unique ways to play.

There are still doubts about how closely this mode will resemble the original Blackout recipe.

Players will be able to find individual devices like optics and suppressors on the ground. Or, the system will likely lean toward Warzone's custom loadout structure. Sources say that more specific information will be released closer to the release date of Season 2 Reloaded, which is presently set for March 12.

People already say that this future update will be one of the biggest mid-season updates in recent Call of Duty history. With weapon balancing changing how competitive games are played and Blackout about to bring back old-school gameplay with a modern twist, the series seems to be moving into a new phase of development.

Things are changing on the battlefield. The sky is less busy now, and grappling hooks may soon be able to fly again. With Season 2 Reloaded coming up, there's one question that won't go away: Is this the fix that Call of Duty needed, or is this just the start of an even bigger change?