Fariha Bhatti 
Top shooter games can be extremely cutthroat, but sometimes, a loss isn’t entirely the player’s fault. For those situations, some shooters have systems in place that help mitigate the impact of an unfair loss. Activision is now among them, with Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 adding a new loss forgiveness system to ranked matchmaking.
Multiplayer games, especially team-based ones, are highly complex. Factors like communication, coordination, and each player’s effort can make or break a match. Unfortunately, sometimes teammates don’t give their all, or even quit during a ranked game. In such cases, dedicated players often get the short end of the stick, facing penalties or ranking losses through no fault of their own.
This is quite common in team-based shooters like Counter-Strike 2, Valorant, and similar titles. While not all developers give players any kind of recompense for this, some games are starting to go easier on players, offering features like loss forgiveness to soften the impact of unfair losses.
Multiple popular shooters offer loss forgiveness
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 joins a number of major multiplayer shooters in offering loss forgiveness in ranked play.
Here are some of the top shooter games that offer loss mitigation in some way or form:
- Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
- Fortnite
- Valorant
- Apex Legends
Black Ops 6 is the latest game to join this list, and it arguably has the best loss mitigation plan of them all. In fact, it goes beyond typical mitigation, as Activision lets players keep all of their SR after losing the first game of the day. The loss forgiveness feature still hasn’t entered Black Ops 6, but fans are already impressed with Activision’s approach to making the game more player-friendly.
In Black Ops 6, Activision has introduced the ultimate answer to “first game is just warm-up” excuse. After season 1, first game losses in the game won’t count, and SR deduction will start from the second game of the day. While it’s certainly impressive, Activision is not the first to implement loss forgiveness.
Black Ops 6 now has one of the most generous loss forgiveness systems in gaming
Black Ops 6 joins Fortnite in having one of the most generous loss forgiveness setups among shooters.
This “first game is just warm-up” rule already existed in Fortnite’s battle royale mode. In 2023, Fortnite introduced Daily Ranked Loss Protection, which forgives players’ first losses of the day. Resetting at 8:00 PM ET, this feature ensures that SR remains the same after the first loss, even if the player performed poorly.
In Valorant, loss forgiveness is situational but it exists nonetheless. Riot doesn’t forgive legitimate losses, but it does refund RR lost if a cheater is later detected in a game. This can happen at any time, so when players receive unexpected RR gains, it likely means they previously lost a match against a confirmed cheater.
While Valorant doesn’t have loss forgiveness like Black Ops 6, it does go easy on players who’ve just ranked up by giving them a buffer game to avoid immediate deranking. For example, if you lose a match while sitting at 10 RR in Diamond, it would technically be your derank game. However, instead of dropping to the lower rank, you’re set to 0 RR in Diamond, giving you one last chance to stay in your current rank. This is about as forgiving as it gets in Valorant when it comes to loss mitigation.
Apex Legends has a similar setup that forgives a loss in certain situations. If teammates quit the game, excepting premade squads, or if the game crashes unexpectedly, players won’t lose points. Even when starting the drop sequence and teammates are missing, the game won’t penalize those playing shorthanded.
Similar features exist in other games, but these are the most popular shooters that forgive losses. Many major titles, like Counter-Strike 2, Overwatch 2, and Rainbow Six Siege, still lack these forgiving options, leaving players to bear the full impact of every loss regardless of the circumstances.
Black Ops 6 now has one of the most generous loss forgiveness offerings in all of gaming. Whether that makes it “too easy” is up to the individual player, though.
