Modern Warfare Update 1.53 Patch Notes (Warzone 1.53) – Official

MODES

Caldera Clash (Launch)

This new take on Clash pits two teams of up to 48 Operators in a Deathmatch with wild events and power-ups. Operators drop in with their Custom Loadout, which can have any weapons from all three Chapters, and a Field Upgrade. Each kill earns their team a point, with the first team to reach a set number of points, or the team that has the most points when the time limit expires, claiming victory for their massive faction.

This mode features:

• Two new events:
  • Double Point zones
  • Bonus Point crates

• Power Zones
  • An event for that can occur instead of the final C Domination Point
  • All kills are worth 2x inside of this zone
  • 100% chance that players drop power ups when they die inside of them
  • Initial spawn of cash and other items at the start of the event

• Point Crates
  • Six Point Crates will drop across the center of the arena.
  • Each Point Crate is worth 10 Points for capturing.
  • They also spawn Nebula V rounds, cash and some power weapons when they are captured.

• Three Power-Ups

• Contracts

• Buy Stations

• Domination Capture

• 6 hand-chosen POI’s where the arena of Clash will take place within Caldera.
• Added an all new post-game scoreboard to celebrate the highest scorers within each team.

Rebirth Iron Trials (In-Season)

The fan favorite mode, “Iron Trials”, makes a glorious return – this time to Rebirth Island!

At its core, Rebirth Iron Trials is a Battle Royale game mode — the last team standing wins, the Circle Collapse shrinks the playable area to promote engagements, and those who die earlier in the game have a chance to respawn if they win a duel in the Rebirth Island Gulag.

However, Iron Trials brings numerous fundamental changes to this traditional Battle Royale formula. All of them are meant to give players the chance to prove themselves as truly elite Operators — which we will detail in future notes closer to the mode going live on March 3rd.

In the meantime, here’s a sneak peek at the Calling Card reward!

Caldera Resurgence (In-Season)

The Resurgence game mode we all know and love returns to Caldera, now with unrestricted access to all Operators and Weapon Loadouts alongside additional improvements – which we will detail in future notes closer to the mode going live on March 23rd.

Battle Royale Adjustments

We’re stripping Battle Royale down and moving back to basics for Season Two. We want Battle Royale and Vanguard Royale to each have their own distinct identities. To achieve this, we are focusing-in on what makes these rulesets unique… the tools we provide our players, the pacing, the objectives, etc.

Here is an overview of the changes Players can expect to see:

• Public Events
  • The Public Events that will be in rotation for selection are:
    • Supply Choppers
    • Fire Sale
    • Jailbreak
    • No Public Events will activate during the infil sequence

• Contracts
  • The Contracts that will be in rotation during matches are:
    • Recon
    • Bounty
    • Most Wanted
    • Scavenger
    • Supply Run

• Loot
  • Economy rebalance
  • Ground Weapons update

Vanguard Royale Adjustments

We’ve been really happy with the response and feedback to Vanguard Royale, with a lot of the sentiment emphasizing how the mode feels fresh and different from the core Battle Royale experience. With that said, we want to go all in on these differentiators and spread the two modes out to offer more variety in how Players choose to experience Warzone.

• Loadout Drops
  • Expedited the first Loadout Drop event from the start of the 2nd Circle to when the 1st Circle begins to close in Vanguard Royale only.
  • No Stun Grenades in Loadouts (restricted)
  • Thermites allowed in Loadouts (unrestricted)

• Public Events
  • The duration of Fire Sale has been reduced
  • In rotation:
    • Fire Sale
  • Jailbreak
    • Resurgence
    • Restock
    • Cash Drops
    • Heavy Weapon Drops

• Loot
  • Dead Silence removed from ground loot
  • Stun Grenades removed from ground loot
  • Thermites added to ground loot
  • UAVs added to Ground Loot
  • Economy rebalance
  • Ground weapons rebalance

• UAV Changes
  • UAVs removed from the Buy Station
  • UAVs are available as Contract Rewards

GENERAL

Before we dive into specific Gameplay additions and changes, we want to outline some changes that apply across the entire game:

• An increase has been applied to Weapon XP earn rates.
• Vanguard Weapons can be saved as a “Custom Mod” in Loadouts.
• The 5 default Loadouts have been updated.
• The amount of cash Players gather through loot has decreased overall.

GAMEPLAY

New Features

• Redeploy Balloon
  • These enable Players to reposition themselves tactically to traverse to new areas. These can be destroyed or repaired for a minor fee. Side note, we recommend steering clear if you’re flying nearby.

• NPC Defensive Threats
  • These new A.I. units can be found at various new locations including in the guard towers that surround the new Chemical Factory and underground labs.

• Portable Decontamination Station (P.D.S.)
  • Stations create a bubble of breathable air when in the gas that lasts 13 seconds. These can be vehicle mounted for new gameplay strategies, but will reveal your map position so use wisely.

• Nebula V Rounds
  • This new ammunition gives players the ability to kill enemies and leave behind a small gas cloud that can be used with any weapon type for multiple interesting combinations.

• Armored Convoys (In-Season)
  • Patrolling Caldera, these Armored Transport Trucks represent a new mobile loot cache opportunity, and are shown on the Tac Map when active.

• Nebula V Bombs (In-Season)
  • One of the rarest items in Warzone, this is a locked briefcase full of deadly gas with an explosive charge. This bomb will detonate after a fixed countdown and cannot be disarmed or destroyed. Its initial explosion deals a high amount of damage in a small radius before the gas spreads outward, where it will hurt any Operator without a Gas Mask. The gas lingers for two minutes before ultimately dispersing or feeding into the oncoming Circle Collapse.

New Vehicle

• Bomber Planes
  • Take to the skies in this new ultimate, armored squad vehicle.

General

• Weapons that spawn across Caldera have been adjusted for the following…
  • Ground loot
  • Supply Box loot
  • Contract rewards

• Dead Silence is now classified as “Legendary” orange loot.

• Update to several modes (Battle Royale, Vanguard Royale, Plunder, Vanguard Plunder) that rebalances the amount of ground loot and caches that spawn, as well as decreasing the size of Plunder cash piles across those Modes.
• The final circle in Battle Royale modes is now much less likely to end on Caldera’s peak.

Gameplay Adjustments

• Aim Assist
  • While stunned on controller, aim assist will now scale appropriately and will not cause unintended increase of aim assist strength

• Armor Plating
  • Armor Plates will now prioritize refilling 1 full plate of armor before filling partially damaged plates

• Ascenders
  • Players can now exit an Ascender with the Jump Button
  • Added a prompt to exit an Ascender while Ascending

• Gas Mask
  • Gas Masks will no longer be auto-equipped when aiming down sights
  • Whilst the Gas Mask will still deplete in ADS, the animation will no longer interrupt and will wait for the player to go back to hip-fire before equipping
  • Players will take damage as normal while they are in ADS without their Gas Mask equipped.

• Gasoline Canister
  • Will no longer detonate when hit by a Stun grenade
  • Can now be thrown through glass windows
  • Players are less likely to accidentally pick them up
  • Kill damage zone is reduced with the addition of fall-off damage

• Gulag
  • Footsteps of spectators are less audible. Further improvements will be made here into the season.

• Mantling & Traversal
  • Increased mantle height for improved vertical navigation and traversal
  • Various map improvements to aid traversal and player leading.
  • Various improvements to visuals and texture streaming when traversing on consoles.

• Parachutes
  • Are now the same speed going forwards as it was going sideways.
  • Can now be pulled at a lower vertical height.
  • Can now be pulled sooner after exiting the infil plane.
  • Can now be cut when closer to the ground.

Vehicle Adjustments

• General
  • Reduced or in some instances removed collisions on various world assets to improve ground vehicle traversal

• Fighter Plane
  • Health has been slightly reduced
  • Weapon damage has been reduced
  • Fighter Planes are no longer able to auto-target skydiving Players
  • Collision has been adjusted to alleviate instant death in some circumstances

• Anti-Aircraft Gun
  • Flak damage range increased
  • All heat is cleared once the overheat has cooled down
  • Heat dissipation rate has been increased

• Squad Transport
  • Improved handling, speed, and off-road performance

• Utility Truck
  • Improved speed, handling, and able to climb steeper inclines

UI/UX

• Updates to the “Play” tab have made it possible for the ‘Rebirth Resurgence’ game mode to now use the squad size drop down box for improved convenience.

• The prompt for dropping a single armor plate now says “Drop Single” instead of “Drop Stack”.

• The pause screen now displays any running events, this can be clicked through to display a summary of the event.

• The moving Tram in the Capital is now shown on the Tac Map for situational awareness.

• Show Controls and fading behavior has now been added on to the HUD on all Warzone vehicles.
  • You can disable this in the options menu, this new option is located in Interface > HUD > Always Show Vehicle Controls.

• Added Pitch up and Pitch down key binds for the airplane.
  • These new keybinds are located in Keyboard & Mouse > Killstreaks & Vehicles > Airplane Keybinds.
• In-match splash screens/messages have been disabled for Spectators.

BUG FIXES

• Fixed collision issues with various elements across Caldera allowing Players to exploit/peek/shoot through them.

• Fixed various issues related to console texture streaming.

• Fixed various issues causing crashes on across platforms.

• Fixed an issue causing inconsistent voice chat connectivity.

• Fixed an issue causing corrupted graphics across platforms.

• Fixed an issue causing some Operator skins to appear invisible at a distance.

• Fixed a timing issue where swapping between guns while looting a gun would replace the wrong gun in a players inventory.

• Fixed an issue that would sometimes prevent the Loadout Drop Event from occurring during the 6th Circle of the Battle Royale game mode.
  • Note: the 2nd Loadout Drop Event has also now been moved into the 5th Circle.

• Fixed an issue causing the HUD to show that a Player returned from the Gulag with fists when they actually had a Weapon.

• Fixed an issue that allowed Players to return from the Gulag with the full Loadout.

• Fixed an issue preventing the Assault Rifle Charlie’s (VG) Chariot 18” Rapid barrel from properly adjusting Recoil behavior.

• Fixed an issue preventing the Sten (VG) from exhibiting its intended Recoil behavior.

• Fixed an issue preventing the Light Machine Gun Charlie (VG) from exhibiting its intended Recoil behavior.

• Fixed an issue preventing the DP27 (VG) from exhibiting its intended Recoil behavior.

• Fixed an issue preventing the Welgun’s (VG) GW 02 and GW 03 iron sights from appearing in the Gunsmith.

• Fixed an issue preventing Sawtooth (VG) Camos from appearing in the Gunsmith.

• Fixed an issue with the RATT’s (VG) .45 ACP 12 Round Mags where it was not properly calculating changes to Damage.

• Fixed an issue with the RATT’s (VG) 7.62 Gorenko 14 Rounds Mags where it was not properly calculating changes to Damage.

• Fixed an issue where the Assault Rifle Charlie’s (VG) Cooper 21” Scythe Barrel was incorrectly increasing damage to the head and decreasing damage to the body.

• Fixed an issue that corrects the orientation of the Combat Shield when it spawns out of a loot chest.

• Fixed an issue causing Weapon Loot Cards to display an incorrect number of attachments for some Vanguard weapons.

• Fixed multiple issues where it would show social contacts playing the wrong title.

• Fixed an issue where invert mouse look for keyboard and mouse on console did not work.

• Fixed an issue where Dynamic Resolution Framerate Target was not displaying the appropriate value.

• Fixed an issue resulting in some Players experiencing on keyboard and mouse after making a purchase at a Buy Station.