Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's first big patch takes aim at the FFAR1, sniper rifles and Scorestreaks
Hold your fire.
Treyarch has released Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's first big patch - and it makes some significant weapon balance changes.
First in the firing line is the FFAR1 assault rifle, which has been nerfed. It now has increased recoil, max damage reduced by 3.5 per cent (28 to 27), and max damage range reduced by 34 per cent (38m to 25m). That's a significant nerf to one of the most popular guns in the game at launch.
Meanwhile, Treyarch has nerfed all sniper rifles by adjusting sprint to fire times "to account for early blend/interruption allowed via animation system". The developer has also adjusted movement speed impact when firing sniper rifles to intended values "to make each shot feel more powerful". And finally on snipers, barrel attachments have been fine-tuned to improve idle sway "to provide a unique feel on each gun".
That's pretty vague language from Treyarch's patch notes, but thankfully the ever-reliable Call of Duty YouTuber Xclusive Ace has dug into the detail and unearthed stat changes, which confirm the sprint-to-fire speed on snipers has been slowed from 400ms to 450ms, and the speed you move while firing has been slowed from 7.59mph to 5.13mph.
Also of interest is a significant balance sweep to Scorestreaks. Every Scorestreak in the game has been touched in some way, either increasing or reducing the cost required to use them. The Care Package, for example, has seen its cost go up from 1800 to 2000. The Napalm Strike, Artillery and Cruise Missile have also seen their cost go up (the Cruise Missile by 900 points!).
I touched on the issue with Scorestreaks in my Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War review. Certainly there's Scorestreak spam in the game, fuelled by the fact you retain your score even after death, but beyond that, there's a lack of variety. You tend to have Scorestreak moments pop up at around about the same time during your typical competitive multiplayer match as all players unlock the same Scorestreak. Hopefully this change mixes things up a bit.
And the other change I think is worth mentioning is the addition of Aim Response Curve Type options to the settings, if you fancy tweaking your aim between standard, linear and dynamic.