All weapon buffs and nerfs ahead of Black Ops Cold War launch

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is almost ready to launch, but that hasn’t stopped Treyarch from spicing things up with a lengthy list of changes, which includes many weapon buffs and nerfs.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War has enjoyed a successful beta, and the official version is set to launch on November 13. It’s an exciting time for console players in particular, as they’re ushered into a new generation with the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.

But while players have been getting stuck into the game, Treyarch has been busy taking their feedback on board and taking notes on which weapons need to be changed and balanced.

The official patch notes boast many changes and improvements, and a lot of them have to do with weapons. In fact, every weapon class has been changed in some way, but while some have been buffed, others have been nerfed.

Weapon Nerfs and Buffs

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is about to have its meta turned upside down ahead of the official launch.

Treyarch has implemented many weapon changes to balance things out, including nerfs to assault rifles, pistols, snipers, and submachine guns, buffs to light-machine guns and launchers, and more.

Assault Rifles

• General assault rifle performance has been tuned to be closer to Krig 6 and XM4 performance in the beta. This should make assault rifles more balanced in general.
• AK-47 recoil has been increased.

Submachine Guns

• SMGs have been made less effective at longer ranges to make them less dominant.

Light Machine Guns

• LMG damage has been increased to make them more effective.
• LMG ADS has been increased to prevent them from being too overpowered with the damage increase.

Sniper Rifles

• Aim assist has been made to feel smoother and require more skill and precision.
• Sniper rifle ADS times have been slightly increased.
• Sniper scope glint has been changed to display more often.

Pistols

• Burst-fire pistol hip-fire accuracy has been decreased.
• Burst-fire pistol max damage range has been reduced.

Shotguns

• Semi-auto shotgun fire rate has been reduced.

Launchers

• The inner damage of launcher rockets has been slightly increased. This should allow for lethal damage when placed precisely.

Melee

• Sprinting speed with the Knife equipped has been slightly reduced.

Attachments and Other Changes

It’s all well and good to balance out the weapons. However, everyone knows a weapon’s true potential lies in the attachments.

Fortunately, Treyarch hasn’t missed a beat. They’ve made some changes to attachments in Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, as well as some other bits and pieces.

Additional Attachments

• More attachments have been in the Gunsmith.

Attachment Balance

• Balance for half of the attachments has been updated across all weapons to increase viability across the board.
• Bonuses and penalties on Barrel attachments have been reworked to better reflect the relationship between ranges, muzzle velocities, and barrel length.
• There are now Barrel attachments that offer shorter Barrel length for increased strafe speed movement, either when hip-firing or ADS-firing. This provides players with greater options for leaning into movement as a kit option.
• Enemy reveal range when using the mounted light attachment has been increased.

Attachment Descriptions

• Names, descriptions, and statistics categories for weapons have been updated to provide a clearer picture of functionality and authenticity.

Dual Wield

• Added the ability to dual-wield pistols.

Weapon Levels

• Increased primary weapon levels from 40 to 55.

Stationary Turrets

• Increased use radius of stationary turrets.

Aim and Recoil Changes

Last but not least, Treyarch has changed some of the mechanics surrounding aim assist, aiming down the sights, and recoil and sight alignment.

Players will be thrilled to know that aiming down the sights has been made smoother and recoil should feel more natural.

Aim Assist Tuning

• Aim assist parameters have been tweaked to provide a more expected feel across weapon classes.

Aiming Down Sights (ADS)

• ADS transitions have been adjusted to make them smoother and more fluid.
• ADS sway has been altered to provide a more dramatic feel while reducing weapon rotation.
• Weapon pushback when firing in ADS has been changed to address cases where optic models could get too close to the player camera.

Recoil and Sight Alignment

• Cleaned up issues with bullet direction and recoil to feel more intuitive and responsive.
• In the Beta, the location of the player’s bullet was always based on the direction of their weapon, which could have a slight deviation to their eye-view perspective through the sights. These should now line up better across all iron sights and optics, providing more precision when ADS-firing.

As you can see, Treyarch wasn’t messing around in the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War beta. They’ve been keeping an eye on every little detail, and now we’re seeing them iron out flaws ahead of the launch.

• Read more: Every multiplayer mode in CoD: Black Ops Cold War

Of course, it’s still only the beginning. You can count on more balance changes happening in the weeks to come. Still, it’s good to know that they’re on the ball, and doing their best to fine-tune the game.