Black Ops 6: Treyarch explains their patch note process

One of the things we always look forward to seeing during a Call of Duty game’s lifecycle is patch notes. Whether it’s a buff or a nerf, new item, or just quality of life updates, we want to know what is what. Treyarch took to the patch notes section of the Call of Duty Blog, and spent a little time showing us how they plan to disperse their patch notes for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6. What we found inside was quite insightful, and you can check out all the intel below.

Welcome to Launch Week

The launch of Black Ops 6 is almost here! Make sure to check when the game will become available in your region and pre-load now to save time on launch day.

Global launch times across consoles and PC are listed below:

Last month, we shared some key areas the team has been focused on between our Beta and the launch of the game. Today, we’ve got some new details to share as well as a recap of everything you can expect when you jump in this week.

CAMPAIGN

Forced to go rogue. Hunted from within. 

Black Ops 6 arrives with a brand-new single player experience lead by our friends at Raven Software. Our story picks up after the events of Black Ops Cold War and the 1980s flashbacks of Black Ops II to deliver both new and returning players an action-packed narrative experience.

Black Ops 6 brings an exciting blend of familiar and fresh elements. Beloved characters make their return alongside new faces, creating a rich cast for players to engage with. Players will join this cast in a breadth of missions across the globe, with unique decisions to make.

The Rook – our new, customizable safehouse – not only helps players prepare for the next mission but allows for a closer look at each key character as the story progresses. Plus, the Campaign arsenal is packed with both new and familiar weapons and equipment, ensuring for plenty of fun along the way.

As a reminder, there are plenty of great rewards to unlock by completing the Campaign, including a new Operator Skin, Finishing Move, multiple Weapon Blueprints to bring into Multiplayer and Zombies, and more:

For all the intel on Campaign, check out the Call of Duty Blog and prepare to unravel a new conspiracy.

ZOMBIES

Round-based Zombies will make its long-awaited return at launch with 2 brand-new maps: Terminus and Liberty Falls. The Dark Aether storyline continues, where we find three members of Requiem escaping from their prison on Terminus Island with the help of newcomer Maya Aguinaldo, just as dimensional breaches occur simultaneously in both the Philippine Sea and Liberty Falls, West Virginia.

Note: The Main Quest and all Side Quests for both maps will be enabled at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET / 6 PM BST on October 25. Clear your calendar, assemble your crew, and stay on your toes… the Zombies team has made a difficulty tuning pass to increase the difficulty starting at Round 25 and beyond. Der Wunderfizz will also only appear after Round 25. Plan accordingly and prepare for launch.

Looking to bank some Whimsical GobbleGums in-game? You’ll earn these by successfully completing an Exfil at Round 15 or higher:

• Round 15-29: 1 Whimsical GobbleGum
• Round 30-44: 2 Whimsical GobbleGums
• Round 45+: 3 Whimsical GobbleGums

For a deep-dive on ALL things Zombies, check out our recent Zombies Mode Prep COD Blog, and get ready to jump in on October 25… and before you know it, our third Round-Based Zombies map will arrive before the end of the year!

MULTIPLAYER

16 brand-new maps, Omnimovement, Wildcards, Combat Specialties, new Scorestreaks and more… Black Ops 6 Multiplayer is almost here!

Prepare for all things Multiplayer by checking out our deep dive blog here. You can also find map and mode guides here.

Additionally, catch-up on previously announced changes following our Multiplayer Beta.

Weapons

There are 33 weapons at launch waiting for you to unlock and customize. See our full breakdown on weapons at the COD blog.

Weapon Balance

While many weapon balance changes have been implemented across the board since Beta, we consider launch to be our day 1 baseline across the entire arsenal. Weapon balance is always ongoing, so we’ll be evaluating data and feedback, and sharing updates on this regularly.

• In the Multiplayer Beta we tested a change that disabled aim assist at close ranges. While this was a change in the right direction, we felt that this was a bit jarring when crossing that close range threshold, so we’ve adjusted our approach to linearly interpolate aim assist strength. This means that aim assist will be much weaker at point blank ranges and smoothly increase in strength out to a short range. We will of course continue to monitor and assess data and player feedback.
• Improved Pistol and Dedicated Melee swap speeds
• Slight increase to Weapon Butt melee attack speeds
• Adjustments to sway, bob and overall weapon motions to improve point of aim when entering ADS
  • Additional improvements coming in Season 01
• Improved Depth of Field across all Weapons

Movement

• Added a toggle option for Corner Slicing
• Added an option to set the hold time to perform a Dive to Prone or Slide depending on your Slide/Dive Behavior setting
• Added an Intelligent Movement option to set Mantle Assist Angle from tight, medium, or wide

Multiplayer Map Adjustments

Keen eyes have already noticed a handful of changes we have introduced to our Beta maps thanks to everyone’s amazing feedback. Delivering fair and consistent gameplay will always remain our goal, and as such we’ve introduced some additional cover and changes to make firefights a bit fairer, as well as various lighting changes. The below selects aren’t every change we have made, but they’ll help provide an idea of what to expect from Beta to Launch.

Skyline

• Expanded the cover points around the hot tub at the center of the map.
• Added new planters as cover near far spawn point.
• Added multiple cover options throughout the map.

Scud

• Adjusted bullet penetration values on the satellite dish panels to allow additional bullet penetration.
  • The concrete wall at the main overwatch is now broken out, which will allow more bullet penetration to make it slightly less powerful.
  • Panels are doubled up at the side overwatch to still amount a small amount of bullet penetration where there was previously none.
• Made additional cover improvements throughout the map.

Rewind

• Made cover improvements across multiple sightlines.

Audio

• We’re excited to introduce our best-in-class audio experience coming to Black Ops 6 with the introduction of HRTF (Head-Related Transfer Function) via Universal Profile in Enhanced Headphone Mode, which is available to all players for free.
• We’ve also added a setting to disable licensed music across all modes, particularly useful for content creators streaming the game.

For a closer look at our innovations in adaptive audio, spatial reverb, physics-based acoustics, game sound prioritization, HRTF support, and all-new asymmetrical hearing compensation technology, check out our dedicated audio blog.

RICOCHET Anti-Cheat

RICOCHET Anti-Cheat systems activated for Black Ops 6. Upgrades deployed include:

• Kernel-Level Driver (PC) detection and monitoring updates across all protected titles, including Black Ops 6 and Call of Duty®: Warzone™
• #TeamRICOCHET mitigations live in Black Ops 6 multiplayer, including Damage Shield, Disarm, Splat, and more
• Machine-learning behavioral systems deployed to increase speed of detection
• Machine-learning detection models added to analyze gameplay combating aim bots

For more information on RICOCHET Anti-Cheat, check out the most recent blog here.

Adjustments for Future Weapon Damage Patch Notes

Whether you’re new to the franchise or a long-time fan, understanding how your weapon of choice deals damage is an essential aspect of Call of Duty gameplay. In the past, our patch notes used some terms to describe damage values at various ranges that could create some mild confusion for some players.

In Black Ops 6 and Warzone: Season 01, we aim to avoid this confusion two-fold:

• Creating a new Weapon Damage Adjustment table for Black Ops 6 and Warzone: Season 01 patch notes.
• Establishing Weapon Damage Range definitions for Black Ops 6 and Warzone: Season 01 moving forward.

Weapon Damage Adjustment Table 

New in Black Ops 6 and Warzone: Season 01, we’re introducing a new table to highlight the changes a weapon has undergone from one patch to the next. You’ll find it nested within our existing tables in our attempt to keep information as detailed and centralized as possible.

This new table will comprise three columns (Damage Range, Pre-Patch, and Post-Patch) and rows of up to five to account for each applicable Damage Range for a given weapon. In each Pre-Patch/Post-Patch cell, the corresponding Damage and Range (in meters) values will be found.

For easier understanding, we’ll identify “positive” (⇧) and “negative” (⇩) adjustments with an arrow like what you see in-game.

Here’s an example of the C9 Adjustment we made during the Beta.

Now that you have a visual example of what our new Weapon Damage Adjustments table looks like, let’s get technical.

Weapon Damage Range Explainer  

In Black Ops 6 and Warzone: Season 01, not all weapons are created the equal, but all of them respect the fundamental principle that the closer your target is to you, the more damage you will deal to them. Using the following dynamic ranges, we identify how damage works in Multiplayer and Warzone:

Maximum Damage Range 

• This range outlines the maximum potential damage a weapon can output in a single shot up to a specified distance.
• This range will always start at 0 meters and extend outward until a player falls outside of our Maximum Damage Range, where damage begins to “step down.”

Medium and Minimum Damage Ranges 

• Picking up right after the Maximum Damage Range ends, we use Medium and Minimum Damage Ranges to identify how damage will “step down” in potency over distance.
• Remember how we said not all weapons are created equal? Some weapons can have up to three Medium Damage Ranges while some can have zero.
  • In situations where a weapon only has one Medium Damage Range, we will label this Medium Damage range as-is.
  • If a weapon has no Medium Damage Range, we’ll omit over the Medium Damage Range rows.
• Medium Damage Ranges
  • Picking up right after the Maximum Damage Range ends, we use Medium Damage Ranges to identify how damage will “step down” over distance.
  • Reminder: A weapon with Medium Damage Ranges can have a minimum of one Medium Damage Range and a maximum of three.
  • In all future Damage Range Adjustment tables, we’ll identify these Medium Damage Ranges as 1, 2, and 3 when applicable, with One (1) being closest to the player and Three (3) being the furthest within the Medium Damage Ranges.
    • In previous patch notes versions, these were identified as “Close-Mid,” “Near-Mid,” “Mid,” “Mid-Far,” or “Far-Mid.”
• Minimum Damage Range
  • This range identifies the minimum potential damage a player can receive at the furthest distances.
  • This range will always pick up right after the furthest Medium Damage Range ends and will continue indefinitely unless otherwise noted.
    • Reminder: Some weapons can have no Medium Damage Range and will enter a Minimum Damage Range immediately after the Maximum Damage Range.

One Last Thing: As we progress through our future Seasons, the teams at Treyarch and Raven will adjust weapons based on feedback and data to deliver the best experiences possible for Multiplayer and Warzone respectively. These adjustments may include shared Black Ops 6 weapons having different Damage Range values between titles.

Stay tuned for future updates and look for dedicated Warzone Patch Notes brought to you by our partners at Raven starting in Season 01.

COMMS AND LIVE ISSUES

Make sure you are following @CODUpdates for critical live communications and track live issues on our Trello board.

Remember – if you are having an issue, please tag our official channels below and include your platform and any available media of the issue. If you are in a game – your Match ID (the numbers of the bottom left-hand corner of your screen) are also helpful for us to pull backend data.

You can also follow @Treyarch and @RavenSoftware for more information including insight from developers.

We can’t wait to jump in with everyone at launch! From all of us here at Treyarch, thanks for your support over the years, and we’ll see you online.

Stay tuned to GamingTrend for more Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 news and info!

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