Call of Duty: Warzone recently received a huge update that brought Black Ops Cold War content into the game, adding several new weapons and items into the fray, and a large portion of the playerbase is unhappy with how the Black Ops Cold War integration has been handled. While fans have differing opinions about the majority of the Black Ops gear, content creators and casual players alike have agreed on one thing: the DMR 14 needs some serious changes.
This semi-automatic marksman rifle has been the center of countless discussion posts and YouTube videos, each of them lambasting a lack of balance following the most recent update. People are finding little reason to use any other weapon, and fans are not happy about the current state of the game.
Warzone’s DMR Problem
Call of Duty: Warzone has had problem weapons before. The SP-R 208 marksman rifle and R9-0 shotgun are just two recent examples, but it seems that every new season of the game has at least one gun that dominates the meta in a way that makes a large portion of the playerbase unhappy. Currently, the DMR 14 is that gun (alongside the MAC-10, but that’s a story for another article).
See this popular Reddit post about the DMR, for example. It has thousands of upvotes and several awards, saying that Warzone is in “an unplayable state with this gun.” The DMR 14 has a low time to kill and is incredibly accurate, making it a killing machine in the hands of any capable player. With virtually no recoil and an impressively long range, it’s not uncommon to get downed by someone who’s using this gun before you can even see them.
The gun has become so prevalent that some fans have started referring to the game as “DMRZone.” Of the dozens of new weapons from Black Ops Cold War added to the game, the DMR 14 is basically the only one worth using at the moment barring one or two exceptions. Activision and Treyarch have been silent regarding the issue, continuing to provide playlist updates and patches for both Warzone and Black Ops Cold War but doing nothing to address the DMR controversy. Warzone fans have become increasingly vocal on social media, calling for nerfs of the overpowered marksman rifle so there can be a return to normalcy in the Warzone meta.
Is a Warzone DMR Nerf Incoming?
Despite the heavy backlash against the DMR 14, there is currently no planned nerf for the Warzone DMR. Activision and Treyarch have not commented on the overpowered weapon, leaving fans’ complaints unaddressed for the time being. In all likelihood, the DMR 14 will be nerfed in the next Warzone balance patch, but there isn’t an expected release date for that update yet.
However, a DMR 14 nerf might not solve all of the game’s problems right now. Popular Call of Duty streamer NICKMERCS believes that the community will simply latch onto another weapon once the DMR receives a nerf. Black Ops Cold War has a number of semi-automatic tactical rifles, and NICKMERCS has said that everyone will just start using the Type 63, a close match to the DMR 14, in its place if it ever gets nerfed.
Also, NICKMERCS and other Call of Duty content creators feel that the majority of the Black Ops Cold War arsenal has been neglected and needs serious changes to compete with the game’s best weapons. Black Ops Cold War weapons and the Modern Warfare weapons that already exist in Warzone are different on just about every level, mostly due to the differences in how each game handles recoil and bullet velocity. Adding dozens of weapons from Black Ops Cold War into Warzone was no easy task, and the prevalence of the DMR 14 is just an unfortunate growing pain. Only time will tell if this weapon receives any changes, but fans are growing impatient waiting for a balance patch.
Call of Duty: Warzone is available now on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
