15 November 2025

Don’t Start Black Ops 7’s Campaign Without Knowing What Major Abilities to Use and Avoid

By newsgame

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 has finally arrived, and with it comes the franchise’s third go at a co-op campaign. In a franchise first, however, beyond the eleven main levels lies an all-new type of post-campaign experience called Endgame. Here, players take their operators into a 32-player PvE incursion to complete quests, earn gear, and finally extract. To survive the story and Endgame enemies who hit harder and flank smarter, knowing which of Black Ops 7‘s Major Abilities actually pull their weight will be critical.

For context, Black Ops 7‘s campaign and Endgame allow players one Minor and one Major Ability; the Major Ability slot being a central power spike. The choices on hand are unique, but certainly not created equal. So, before you lock in your build, here’s a breakdown of the best and worst Major Ability options.

Best Black Ops 7 Major Abilities

Hand Cannon: Powerful high-damage handgun. Accurate at range.
War Machine: Powerful single shot grenade launcher. Large explosion radius.
Drone Pod: Deployable device that launches aerial drones. Drones seek out enemies and explode.
Crash Cart: Instantly revive downed squadmates within range and provide temporary invulnerability. Can be used to self-revive when downed.

The Hand Cannon, War Machine, Drone Pod, and Crash Cart form the strongest group of Major Abilities for both the campaign and Black Ops 7‘s Endgame because they either dramatically increase your damage output or prevent catastrophic squad wipes. The Hand Cannon earns its spot by being the most reliable ranged burst option, deleting armored targets and boss health bars with ease. In turn, the War Machine is essentially a panic button for clearing entrenched groups or resetting a bad push.

A far cry from its somewhat unimpressive multiplayer counterpart, the Drone Pod is one of the biggest sleeper hits in the campaign. The explosive drones come out much faster in PvE, and they are incredibly effective at covering flanks and negating the annoying melee rushers or zombie-type mobs. The Crash Cart, on the other hand, is the campaign’s equivalent to Zombies’ Quick Revive perk; it may not be all that flashy, but on higher difficulties or in a squad, being able to revive yourself and downed allies instantly is a surefire way to keep fights from spiraling into failures.

Worst Black Ops 7 Major Abilities

Active Camo: Become nearly invisible for a short duration. Gunfire temporarily reveals your position.
Ballistic Shell: Deploy an energy shield that blocks incoming enemy fire.
Vision Pulse: Send out a pulse which visually tags enemies through walls for your squad. Tagged enemies take increased damage.
Shadow Break: Create an energy warping field that teleports and damages enemies.

Active Camo, Ballistic Shell, Vision Pulse, and Shadow Break all sound useful, but compared to the top-tier options, they underperform or fail to impress. Active Camo’s usefulness ends after exactly one stealth-oriented story mission, and in Endgame, the whole point is to engage with enemies, so at best it serves as a method of making a quick escape from an overwhelming engagement. The Ballistic Shell suffers from similar issues: while blocking incoming fire is nice, it’s not ever particularly necessary, and its encouragement of stationary play in Black Ops 7 missions, which are often built around movement, feels incongruent.

Interestingly enough, both Vision Pulse and Shadow Break are held back by serious range issues. Tagging enemies with Vision Pulse can help your squad, but most firefights in Black Ops 7 are either close enough that your targets already reveal themselves, or far enough that the pulse won’t tag them. Shadow Break is more nuanced, though, as while it one-shot most enemies and does a fantastic job of dealing with shielded enemies, in practice, it’s got a range of maybe three feet. Ultimately, all four options feel situational at best and often waste a slot that could have gone to those tools with a higher impact.

Choosing the Right Tools for Black Ops 7’s Campaign

Best Ryden 45K Loadout in COD Black Ops 7

Given how dynamic Black Ops 7‘s missions are, your ability picks should both synergize with your chosen Minor Ability and complement how the game pushes you to move, aggressively clearing rooms and controlling the pace of each fight. The strongest options all support this playstyle by either giving players immediate offensive and defensive leverage or helping them recover from mistakes without losing momentum. Damage-oriented abilities in particular tend to scale best as enemy density increases with more players, as well as when the story progresses. That doesn’t mean the weaker abilities have no place, but you’ll rarely find campaign or Endgame situations in Black Ops 7 where they outperform the more reliable, straightforward picks.