Call of Duty Vanguard Prestige Reached!
I finally reached Prestige in Call of Duty Vanguard. I make it aim to at least reach 1st Prestige in each game and thanks to the Double XP bonuses this weekend, I achieved just that!
I figured I'd share some of my stats and also some thoughts on things I liked and disliked about multiplayer in Vanguard, so let's get into the stats first. I will point out that progress is joined with the progress you make in the Zombies mode, so if you reach level 10 whilst playing Zombies, that carries over to multiplayer. That's why although I reached 1st Prestige, the games played count seems quite low:
- Kills: 725
- K/D Ratio: 1.26
- Highest Killstreak: 7
- Wins: 37
- Losses: 34
- W/L Ratio: 1.09
- Total Games: 75
I'm happy with these given I managed to maintain a positive K/D and W/L ratio (just!).
Overall, I found the multiplayer experience in Vanguard pretty fun. There seemed to be a larger selection of maps compared to previous titles as it was very rare you'd get the same map twice, that or they fixed the map rotation so you were much less likely to get the map you played on come up again. The maps ranged in size, from super small maps like Shipment which can be a total ratio killer, to much bigger maps such as Berlin and Castle.
I like the whole voting system at the end of each game, where the team could vote from 3 people on the team, to be the MVP, based on certain stats such as highest K/D ratio, most kills, longest time spend near enemies, most multi-kills and more. It was a good way to round off a game, even if you didn't win. There was also a small XP bonus just for voting! It definitely gave those players that wouldn't usually get any attention, a short spot of fame!
Much like in the Campaign, the new movement mechanics made it to Multiplayer, so things like Tactical Sprint, Gun Mounting and Blind Fire were all usable. This provided a different way to play the game and Tactical Sprint definitely saved me from getting killed a few times!
My favourite feature of Vanguard Multiplayer was something called Combat Pacing. Combat Pacing allows you to choose how "big" you want the game to be in regards to player count and map size. There's 3 to choose from (you can filter down to a specific Pacing if you want); Tactical, Assault and Blitz. Blitz was by far my favourite as there was action throughout the whole game, if not slightly chaotic. It was definitely a way to either bump up or destroy your K/D ratio!
It wouldn't be a Call of Duty Multiplayer mode without kill-streaks of course, my favourite being the War-machine which you get upon getting 5 kills. It's pretty easy to get but once you have it, it's yours until the ammo runs out even if you die half way through using it. I was able to turn my own score around to a positive a few times whenever I got it! You can also summon Guard Dogs but I honestly found this kill-streak a bit useless as the enemy can kill them from a distance pretty easily so I swapped that out for something else after a few games. What you really want is the Attack Dogs kill-streak but that requires 10 kills without dying... I'm not that good 😆
So overall, I think it was a good multi-player experience. I wasn't really expecting anything too different from what we've had before, but the new additions certainly made for an enjoyable experience for sure. The only gripe I have is the destruct-able environments not actually destroying fully, so a window that looks destroyed is actually only half destroyed and then you have to waste time actually destroying it whilst getting shot and killed by an enemy. I think this mechanic could be improved but it's not a deal-breaker.
I feel I've given Vanguard a proper go now what with Campaign, Zombies and Multiplayer so I think I'll be taking a break from it and see what new games Game Pass has to offer as it's been a while since I checked out the selection. I'll most likely jump back into Vanguard whenever they release the new Zombies content!