David Vonderhaar responds to League Play complaints in Black Ops Cold War

Treyarch game design director David Vonderhaar has responded to the litany of complaints about League Play in Black Ops Cold War, promising a more transparent explanation down the line, too.

Call of Duty’s competitive community has been patiently waiting for a ranked playlist since BOCW dropped in November 2020, and it seemed all our prayers had been answered when it was announced League Play would be arriving on February 8.

That said, it quickly became apparent that fans weren’t impressed with League Play when it arrived.

Slamming the mode as “a massive joke,” players in their droves made complaints about several issues with the competitive playlist. The system itself has been questioned, while the lack of correlation between the playlist and actual CDL rules or pro play has left players on all scales seething.

Vonderhaar provides an insight into BOCW League Play

With players wanting an explanation from the devs as to the decision-making process behind this iteration of League Play, Vonderhaar has given us something. Though, we should expect a more polished response down the line.

• Read More: Best League Play loadouts in Black Ops Cold War

Replying to CoD YouTuber SalvationsElite, Vahn tagged community manager Josh ‘Foxhound’ Torres suggesting that the topic would make a good blog topic or Reddit article.

Saying he “doesn’t have enough characters to do it justice,” Vonderhaar notes the keywords would be “Scope. Accessibility. Deadlines. Franchise.”

He then adds that the Treyarch team has “got some work to do to evangelize how it works after we clean up some of the obnoxious bugs.”

What does this actually mean?

Of course, we should wait until the actual blog post until we fully judge their response and understand their position.

• Read More: How League Play works in Black Ops Cold War

That said, it’s easy to break down some of the keywords. They wanted to make the mode as accessible as possible, for example, while still delivering the playlist in a timely manner — perhaps they were told the game couldn’t wait any longer.

As for “scope” and “franchise,” these are a little harder to ascertain exactly what Vonderhaar means. We’ll just have to wait to read their response in full when that becomes available.

Custom classes & GAs

In a response to one complaint, Vahn says that he “hates GAs” and “wants to do fixed classes so it’s not about restrictions/bans but picking a class that everyone can understand.”

This is in response to criticism over certain attachments not being banned that would be in CDL rules, such as suppressors and the SMG Task Force attachment.

Consulting CoD pros for help?

After seeing a tweet from 3-time world champion Ian ‘Crimsix’ Porter regarding League Play, Vonderhaar reached out saying he needed to “ask some questions.”

It’s not exactly clear what he needs to ask, but getting help from Call of Duty pros themselves could be the best way to appease competitive players.

It’s not clear what exactly the result of all of this will be, but Vonderhaar and the Treyarch team are clearly looking through all of the feedback available to them and willing to adjust accordingly.

The question then becomes what changes will be made, and will they be able to turn this negative reaction around?