With a new map comes some big changes to loadouts.

On December 8, Caldera will be the new map, Caldera, taking over Call of Duty: Warzone. This new map is quite tropical in nature as it's set in the Pacific after-all, and will release alongside the first season for Call of Duty: Vanguard. Activision says that the new map was "built on learnings from the community."

Alongside the start of the season and the new Warzone map will be the introduction of the Ricochet anti-cheat. This is the internally developed kernel-level driver that will be forced upon all PC players of Warzone. The anti-cheat will then be rolled out to Vanguard players at a later date.

Interestingly, this anti-cheat isn't the biggest issue that fans are up in arms about. Instead, the point of contention for Warzone players is how loadouts will be changed when Caldera drops on the 8th. Players will only be able to use weapons from Call of Duty Vanguard going forward. This means that modern weapons from Cold War and Modern Warfare are unable to be selected in loadouts.

Activision says that this will "(streamline) the meta for more accessibility and (provide more) room for experimentation." This limitation doesn't end there either. Apparently, players will also only be able to select Vanguard soldiers as their preferred Operator.

Ted Timmins, Warzone's creative director, also says that loadouts will only be available at Buy Stations at the end of the first circle, or about five minutes into the start of a match. This means that players won't be able to quickly grab cash and rush to get their loadouts right after dropping in. This is a bit similar to one of Warzon'e prior time-limited events (Operation Flashback) that didn't exactly thrill some players.


Some players are already begging for this change to be reverted. They already feel as though this new system is "a limitation." For others, this means that they will simply have to find better loot on the ground before gaining access to their preferred gear. In the end, it's probably just the vocal minority that are upset about these changes.


Of course, it's important to remember that Activision is the focus of several sexual misconduct allegations along with a lawsuit from the state of California. It was also recently revealed that CEO Bobby Kotick not only knew about several sexual misconduct cases but also actively helped to cover some of them up.