Weapons

Call of Duty features a plenitude of World War II-era weapons, with each nation getting its own unique arsenal from which to choose. Each individual weapon has varying degrees of accuracy and power. In the multiplayer game, you'll also need to consider a weapon's mobility factor: a heavy weapon, such as a machine gun, will weigh more and thus slow your movement while you carry it. Weapons don't impede your movement in the single-player game, however.

German Weapons

You'll be using German weapons for most of the single-player experience in Call of Duty; although you never play as a German soldier, your default weapons will usually run low on ammo within a half-mission or so, leaving you to scavenge weapons from amongst the trail of dead you've left behind you. This isn't a bad thing at all, however, since the German weapons are very dependable arms.

Luger

Accuracy: 5/10
Damage: 5/10
Mobility: 10/10

The Luger is a dependable sidearm, but with the cornucopia of powerful submachine guns and rifles in Call of Duty, you shouldn't be switching over to a pistol very often. In multiplayer, a pistol is the weapon of last resort, except perhaps for snipers, but even they will be better off picking up an automatic weapon rather than sticking with a sidearm. Soviet troops, in addition to the Germans, wield Lugers.

Steilhandgranate

Accuracy: 7/10
Damage: 9/10
Mobility: 9/10

The distinctive "potato masher" grenade of the German army is a useful tool to startle your enemies into leaving fortified positions, abandon machine gun nests, or otherwise flee for their lives. You'll come across these fairly often in the single-player game; they come in packs of ten.

MP40

Accuracy: 4/10
Damage: 6/10
Mobility: 9/10

The MP40 is the Wermacht's standard submachine gun, capable of emptying an entire 32-round clip at a target within seconds. SMGs are not renowned for their accuracy, and indeed the MP40 shouldn't be a primary weapon for multiplayer maps that will require firing across distances, such as mp_brecourt. At mid-range, though, the MP40 is probably the best submachine gun in the game, due to the fact that there is virtually no recoil whatsoever; if you aim down the sights at a target, you won't need to fight against a kicking reflex, as you will with every other weapon capable of automatic fire. This alone will help you land more bullets on quick-moving targets. In the single-player game this is going to be your best friend when paired up with a rifle in your other weapon slot, since you'll be finding enough ammo to keep yourself topped out through most levels.

MP44

Accuracy: 6/10
Damage: 7/10
Mobility: 7/10

The MP44 was one of the earliest mass-produced assault rifles, and its utility in battle inspired such weapons as the AK-47. Its most notable feature is the lack of a tradeoff between precision and rapidity of fire: while it admittedly fires a bit more slowly than the MP40, it is by far that weapon's superior when it comes to mid-range or even long-range targeting. It's no sniper rifle, but is fairly accurate when single shots are fired at distant enemies. Unfortunately, there's little ammo to be found for this weapon in most of the single-player levels, but its strengths are usually worth the effort of preserving your ammunition.

In multi-player, choosing between the MP40 and the MP44 can drive good men mad, but most players will be better off with the MP40. While the MP44 is capable of better accuracy at extreme range, the MP40's recoil-less firing will make a huge difference when attempting to aim down the sights at a moving target. This choice depends on your style of play, though, obviously.

FG42

Accuracy: 10/10
Damage: 9/10
Mobility: 7/10

The powerful Fallschirmjagergewehr 42 is a German paratrooper weapon, and is by far the most deadly weapon in the single-player game, as it combines the rate of fire of a fully automatic weapon with the precision of a sniper rifle. When aimed from the hip, it can be accurately fired at medium range, while the 4x scope will let you pick off distant targets with ease. It's so powerful that it appears in the first three levels of the game, and then is never seen again, and isn't available as a choice in multiplayer. (You may find it in boxes in some multiplayer levels, as with the Panzerfaust). The FG42's main drawback is a vicious climb when fired in automatic mode, but with the game's auto-correcting aiming, it's fairly easy to fire off short bursts without worrying about straying too far off the mark.

Kar98k

Accuracy: 8/10
Damage: 10/10
Mobility: 9/10

The Kar98k is your basic bolt-action rifle: excellent accuracy when aiming down the scope, horrid rate of fire. It's further hamstrung by the small five-round clip, and thus won't be of much use to anyone. In most single-player missions, you will either possess a sniper rifle, or one of the superior Allied rifles.

Scoped Kar98k

Accuracy: 10/10
Damage: 10/10
Mobility: 7/10

You'll possess a Scoped Kar98k for only a single mission of the single-player game, but it will be the weapon of choice, out of necessity, for Axis snipers in multiplayer. It functions exactly the same as the other sniper rifles, with a powerful scope attachment for long-range headshots. Unfortunately, its ammo isn't compatible with the regular Kar98k, for whatever reason, and it requires rounds to be individually reloaded, unlike the Kar98k, which lets you insert a magazine of five rounds when reloading.

Panzerfaust

Accuracy: 2/10
Damage: 10/10
Mobility: 3/10

Call of Duty possesses few methods of destroying tanks, a task at which the Panzerfaust is the most useful. These are single-round weapons, which are discarded from your inventory after one use, so if you intend to snap off a few high explosives towards a tank, you'd best not stray far from a well of infinite Panzerfausts that are found near likely tank targets during the single-player game. The weapon is highly inaccurate, however, even when aimed down the scope, so you'll need to be fairly close to a tank in order to use a rocket launcher on it.

Panzerfausts are found in multiplayer, as well, even though there are no tanks to destroy. In online games, the PF is used to kill opposing players, obviously, but it's rarely worth the trouble to pick one up, due to the inaccuracy and the way you'll be opening yourself up to enemy fire as you drop your expended launcher and switch to your primary weapon. It obviously packs quite a punch, but then, most weapons will kill an opponent in a few hits anyway. On wide-open maps, like the surface of mp_rocket, you can sometimes garner cheap kills by firing blindly towards a concentration of enemies, or by simply following behind a rifleman or machine gunner and snapping off a shot towards wherever he aims.