The Season 4 Reloaded update for Call of Duty Warzone, Raven Software’s free-to-play battle royale shooter, is finally here and there is – as always – more to this update than meets the eye. In some kind of effort to shake up the emerging two-gun Warzone meta, the development team behind this battle royale experience has decided to once-again nerf the ever-popular NZ-41 and newcomer Marco 5.
It might look like minor changes when you peruse the newly-published Warzone Season 4 Reloaded patch notes here, but the NZ-41 is going to be quite a lot worse going into the second half of this season. Raven Software has decreased this weapon’s sustained recoil control alongside a reduced max damage range, lower minimum damage, and decreased neck damage multiplier.
In addition to this, the Marco 5 SMG is going to offer players a lower max damage range, a lower mid damage average, and a lower neck damage multiplier. While this nerf shouldn’t impact the weapon’s performance too much, it’s going to feel much less effective at any sort of distance going forwards. Looks like we might need to check out and change up the best Warzone Marco 5 loadouts available right now.
If you’re the type of player who’s not fully committed to his Warzone NZ-41 loadout, you’ll be pleased to know that weapons like the CR-56 AMAX and Kilo 141 from Call of Duty Modern Warfare – and Warzone’s early days – have been buffed slightly. Changes like these have been a long time coming and it could mean that the dominance of Vanguard-originating weapons is coming to an end (at some point, anyway).
Elsewhere in the Warzone Season 4 Reloaded patch notes, Raven Software has slightly buffed the Nikita AVT’s movement speed, nerfed the KG M40 assault rifle, and reduced recoil control for a number of BAR attachments. It also looks like almost every shotgun in Warzone has had a 26% max pellet damage increase – which feels unnecessary.
If you’re not too fussed about the changes this update has made to the Warzone meta, we have everything you need to know about the raw content right here.
Portable Redeploy Balloons are going to start showing up in the loot pool as a new Warzone-limited Field Upgrade that, as the name suggests, will help you traverse Caldera with ease. In addition to this, the Armored SUV vehicles on Caldera are getting a bit of a boost with deployable Nitrous following the update.
In addition to this, the Rebirth of the Dead playlist is coming to Rebirth Island. In this mode, players will find a fresh take on Verdansk’s popular Zombie Royale mode where players will need to struggle against an undead horde to earn rewards like the Last Alive Calling Card – which is actually quite cool. This game mode is something of a precurser to the Warzone Titanium Trials event challenges that will pop up on August 11. This game mode is a fresh take on Iron Trials, with an even-more-limited loot pool and a custom loot pool to fit the strange Terminator-theming of the event.
It’s also worth checking out our guide to unlocking the Vargo S assault rifle in Warzone, as that is now available in-game. You can read up on all of the above on the Call of Duty Blog right here.