In Call of Duty: Warzone, a new contract arrived in the war zone with update 1.20. Although it is actually pretty cool, many players are complaining about it. Because another important contract was removed.
Update 1.5. 10:42 AM: In an emergency patch on April 30th, the change of contracts in Call of Duty: Warzone has been reverted. The protest was apparently too large.
Original announcement:
What is this new contract? Since the huge update 1.20 on April 29th, you can earn the strong rewards of a new contract in Call of Duty: Warzone. If you activate “Most Wanted” you will be visible on the maps for 5 minutes as a small, red crown and thereby exposed to a large risk.
If you survive your bounty timer, the contract grants your fallen team members a respawn. So instead of stuffing the $4,500 into the buy stations, you bring your buddies back to the battlefield. At least if everything goes smoothly – Unlike the CoD streamer “TimTheTatman” who celebrated too early.
In “4 player BR” you can save up to $13,500 with 3 fallen team mates. The highest reward a contract can yield in the Warzone and a strong opportunity for surviving players to give their team a new chance. But the contract hasn’t been received as well as one might think at first glance. Because another important contract almost completely disappeared from the Warzone: The bounty hunting.
“Most Wanted” displaces “Bounty” – Significantly changes the match flow
Why was bounty so important? In the Warzone, matches often follow a certain pattern:
- Landing at a hot spot with full action
- Somehow maintaining concentration during the mid-game
- In the endgame, things heat up every second and opponents can come from all directions
- The obligatory visit to the gulag in between
To spice up the rather dull mid-game and not lose focus during that time, bounty contracts were often relied upon. Here you got a target displayed on the map and could then hunt the enemy specifically. Often, the target was also part of a team, which was almost like a side quest completed at the same time.
This brought several minutes of action that would otherwise probably have been spent camping or with the rather quiet contracts “Recon” and “Looting”. While it could always go wrong, bounty hunting was the best contract to maintain your momentum after a good start. Here again are the contracts at a glance:
How does this now affect the matches? Especially now at the start of the new contracts, the matches are playing out quite differently for some players. Instead of promoting action in the mid-game with bounty contracts, the inclination to camp increases as wounded teams want to revive their members with the contracts.
There were already many ways to participate in the game again after being knocked out:
- Team mates can revive
- There are self-revive tokens
- After a complete death, you go once to the gulag
- Fallen team mates can be bought back for $4,500
Now, there is one more respawn opportunity, and towards the end, even more players are likely to be populated in the match. During a round on the update day, there were up to 7 “Most Wanted” contracts activated simultaneously. In a “BR 3 player” mode, that means potentially 14 opponents returning to the battlefield.
While this could settle down a bit when more aggressive teams start hunting the camped “Most Wanted” players, overall, the mid-game is likely to suffer from this subtle change, making the endgame even more intense. However, this now gives us more time to uncover the secret story about the bunkers.
Pro says “Bad decision” and thousands complain along
What do the players think about it? There is some backlash here, although the criticism is not specifically about the new contract, but about the swapping of the contracts. Even some prominent players voiced their opinions, like former world champion Tyler “TeePee” Polchow from 2014.
He says on Twitter: “Removing bounties from the Warzone is a very, very bad decision and I am not happy about it at all.”
The tweet has already received over 13,000 likes and the comments below speak a clear language:
- @Potthoff: “Most of the time, teams were on the bounty hunt to give the game some meaning until the last circles, sigh.”
- @OlafFBLV: “Wait… They added this [contract] and removed bounties? What a mess, man.”
- “@Maven: “The flow of the game feels really strange now. I was used to hunting from bounty to bounty to bounty, haha.”
There are sporadic reactions that are quite glad about the change. Players who prefer to play quietly, sneak or hide during phases of the match instead of pushing, no longer have to worry about being randomly selected as a bounty target. These players can now execute their tactics undisturbed.
Will this stay like this? If the negative opinions solidify in the coming days, a reaction from the developers is quite expected. It is very likely that we will soon see bounties back in the major BR game modes of the Warzone.
By the way, bounties are still available in the solo BRs. In addition, trucks are back in solo mode. After long complaints, the unfair vehicles that turned the endgame of the Battle Royale into more of a demolition derby have disappeared.
