CoD Warzone introduces a new system in a blog post aimed at combating cheaters. The RICOCHET Anti-Cheat tool not only bans cheaters but also trolls them in some cases: It significantly reduces their damage, turning them into a laughing stock in CoD Warzone.
This is the situation:
- CoD Warzone is an extremely successful free-to-play game with high player counts for Activision Blizzard. However, since its launch, cheaters have plagued the game: When they were banned, they simply created new accounts. It was a nuisance.
- Cheating in CoD Warzone became so severe at several points that streamers openly said they just couldn’t play Warzone anymore. It was ridiculous.
- But since December 2021, things seem to have turned around. Warzone is now protected by a new tool, “RICOCHET,” which has shown significant success, as initial banning waves indicate.
This is what CoD Warzone says now: In a blog post on Friday, February 18, the team introduces a measure to learn more about cheaters while frustrating them at the same time: the Damage Shield (via callofduty).
The idea of this tool is: When the system detects that a cheater is tampering with the game in real-time, their damage is drastically reduced. This allows the team to gather further information about them.
The team states: They are careful to ensure that the “Damage Shield” is not mistakenly applied. They do not want to interfere in firefights between honest players under any circumstances.
The system is now “active” and being deployed “worldwide.”
“One of the funniest ways they troll cheaters”
The results of this: How this looks in the game is shown by the well-known streamer TimTheTatman in a video: Tim is flying in a helicopter and is being shot at accurately, but Tim stays relaxed despite constant hits, as he takes almost no damage and explains:
“The kid’s cheating, he can’t deal any damage. This is really one of the funniest ways they troll cheaters.”
In the comments on the video, someone explains: If RICOCHET detects a silent aim cheat (you shoot at people without having to aim at them), a rapid-fire cheat, or a no-recoil cheat, it drastically reduces the cheater’s damage – similar to a shadow ban.
It looks like CoD Warzone has found a method to make honest players much more satisfied:
