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It’s not a secret that everytime a new season launches, Activision and Raven Software are tuning the weapons in order to better balance the meta and shake things off a little bit. Remember that i keep a complete history of all nerfs and buffs on this page.
Season 4 is introducing a complete new map call Fortunes Keep that will replace Rebirth Island for a while and then there will be a rotation between the two resurgence maps.
On this article i’m going through what i would like to see happening in terms of weapon balancing to further balance the meta and reward skills.
In any case, make sure to follow my Twitter account cause i will cover all nerfs and buffs as much as possible in the easiest way possible.
A more skill rewarding long range meta
Current long range meta is very clear and in my opinion not rewarding skills enough. The STG-44 and the NZ41 both have almost no recoil despite having really good damage profiles. It’s not the first time we are experiencing this kind of meta and it clearly seems to be a strategy from Activision. Remember the Kilo, Bren or Grau meta that were all allowing you to have insanely powerfull guns with no recoil. The truth is, this type of meta is great for casual players and we have to remember that the vast majority of the player base are not demons or content creator able to control recoil.
However, the issue i have with the current meta is that it is not rewarding the skills of individual players. In my opinion, the Warzone meta should follow the following standards:
- Weapons with recoil should have great damage profiles.
- Weapons with low recoil should have lower damage profiles.
it’s as simple as that and all linked to overall easiness of use of the weapon. An easy to use gun shoud not have the same damage profile as a weapon that is harder to use (Recoil, Fire Rate, Mobility, etc.)
The nerfs i want to see for Assault Rifles:
| STG-44 | – Increased recoil for the 50 and 60 mag. – Reduced bullet velocity. |
| NZ-41 | – Increased recoil –> Keep the new pattern, but increase the magnitude. – Deactivate the ability to set the burst barrel in full auto |
I’m not considering touching the Bar, due to the low fire rate that makes it very unforgiving and therefore skill rewarding.
After this nerf you will have some guns like the Cooper Carbine, M13 or KG M40 that are easy to use but with lower damages and skill rewarding guns like the Bar and hopefuly some LMG too. I would love to see the DP27 or Whitley come more into the mix of competitive guns too even if mobility is downside. Automaton would also become a very good choice after this nerf.
Reduction of flinch for Kar98k and Swiss k31
Modern Warfare Kar98k and Swiss K31 were for a long time the absolute meta without any questions. It was so powerfull that for months people were complaining and Activision finaly decided to nerf them when Caldera arrived.
They slowly increased the flinch of those quick ADS snipers so that if you are getting shot, it’s really hard to land your one headshot required to down ennemies. And it was a relevant nerf cause flinch should be a key elements of quick scope snipers.
But people kept complaining and therefore the devs decided to burry them into the ground by removing the one shot headshot capabilities after a certain distance. A very controversial decision but for sure reduced the frustration of getting headshot sniped all the time.
The problem we are facing now is that we have snipers that require multiple shots but with an insane amount of flinch. And this is making them pretty much not usable against a low/no recoil Assault Rifle meta. Reducing Flinch to quiscope snipers would make them more usable, but still not back to the meta they were. At least they would be worth trying.
Reduction of snapshot radius (especialy vertical)
What is more frustrating than getting snapshoted in the middle of a fight and knowing your ennemy has a huge advantage? Snapshots and Restock combo is probably one of the best tactical advantage any player could have right now and is in my opinion too strong.
Increasing the restock time for snapshot could be an interesting way to nerf and balance them a little bit. But there is something else that the dev could do: reduce the radius of detection. Horizontaly it’s fine, even if it could be reduced a little bit. Vertically however is completely broken cause it’s unlimitted. This means that if you are at the bottom of peak, you can highlight people on the roof as long as they are in the same horizontal radius as you are. Great to highlight campers yes, but in my opinion an advantage way too important.
