Black Ops 4: New stash looting system is being tested for Blackout mode

The Studio Design Lead over at Treyarch, David Vonderhaar, has teased a major change that could be coming to the Black Ops 4 Blackout mode. The feature is in regards to stash looting, which is somewhat tedious. When rifling through the stash of your recent prey, players must tab through the items one at a time. I can’t speak for PC players, though I imagine it’s not quite as difficult or time-consuming. In Blackout mode, looting a stash can also be detrimental as you’re basically a sitting duck for any nearby enemies. It’s one reason, in fact, that I’ve typically avoided looting another player’s stash myself. I’ve even seen players watch as others engaged each other and waited for the winner to dive into the stash before blasting them to hell. It’s a great bait system for the patient hunters out there!

Don't tell anyone I tweeted about this. "They" get mad.

… new Stash UX is in dev builds, being playtested, actually tested by QA,, and we are bug fixing. Current design debate: 2 rows of 5 or 3 rows of 5. 3 rows means less tabbing in a death stash, but less uses more screen. pic.twitter.com/WZmspp1jO9

— Vahn (@DavidVonderhaar) January 5, 2019

 

Now, however, the looting system might operate a bit more efficiently. And by efficiently, I mean timely. Vanderhaar shared an early look at the build for the looting system that features two rows of five slots where items are displayed and can be more easily targeted for selection. The dilemma is whether to add a third row of five slots for a total of 15 items on the screen at once. But that also takes up more viewable screen space. In my opinion, a third row is a better option because it’s not like you’re focusing on anything else on the screen other than what you are looting anyway. But effectively, this will drastically trim down the time it takes to loot the items you want the most out of a stash. I’ve shared the image below for a bigger and better look at what Vonderhaar is working on.

The new mechanic to Black Ops 4 isn’t official yet. And by “not official,” I mean it hasn’t been announced for an upcoming update to the game. Vonderhaar did note that the bugs are still being worked out and it is currently being playtested by QA.

So that begs the question: What do you think of this new mechanic? Would you prefer two rows or three? If you do have a preference, maybe reply to Vonderhaar’s tweet. It’s possible that he was fishing for suggestions from players. Treyarch already does a stellar job at listening to the players as they constantly communicate updates. But we’d also be interested to hear what you think of this new mechanic in the comments below.