48 Dredge

"6-round auto-burst machine gun. Each burst fires at a rapid fire rate."

- Description

The 48 Dredge is a Light Machine Gun in Call of Duty: Black Ops III. It is the first LMG in the series not to be automatic, instead being an auto-burst weapon.

Report
''The 48 Dredge is a medium machine gun in service with military units around the world. Intended as a squad fire support weapon, the Dredge includes many design features allowing it to be carried and operated by a single soldier, unlike its crew-operated predecessors.''

''The Dredge was built to fulfill a specific battlefield role: Allow a single operator to deliver a high volume of fire accurately without the need for a fixed mounting. To achieve this, the Dredge uses a unique trigger group and cycling mechanism to fire seven-round bursts. Its burst-fire design provides two additional benefits: overall ammunition consumption is reduced, allowing the operator to be effective while carrying less ammunition, and overall wear on the weapon is reduced, allowing the weapon to remain in the field longer without requiring extensive maintenance.''

''While the Dredge is capable of a very high sustained rate of fire, it was determined during prototyping that rounds fired after the seventh were almost always too off target to be effective, even in a suppression-fire role. For its high rate of fire, the Dredge has been adapted by several militaries as a vehicle mounted weapon with a non-manufacturer fully automatic trigger group, however in this configuration, it is prone to feed and cycling failures.''

The Dredge is available in a number of configurations for handheld operation, and supports a variety of attachments and modifications to suit more specific operating parameters.

Specifications

 * Ammo: .308mm
 * Length: 1263mm
 * Weight: 11.6kg
 * Barrel: 630mm
 * Production Years: 2048 - Present
 * Country of Origin: United Kingdom

Multiplayer
The 48 Dredge is unlocked at level 34.

The 48 Dredge is a low damage per bullet LMG. Generally speaking, the 48 Dredge will take four shots to kill for the majority of gunfights, or two thirds of a whole burst. The 48 Dredge has the potential to drop to a five shot kill (or a two shot kill in Hardcore game modes), but this is practically only possible if using a Suppressor. The 48 Dredge, for the most part, be a fairly low damage per bullet LMG, making it so it relies on the player's accuracy more than other LMG's would. The 48 Dredge, like other LMG's, possesses great penetration power, being able to shoot through many objects with ease. However, the 48 Dredge isn't the most effective LMG to shoot through objects, as its low damage per bullet makes it so it will be less effective than others. The 48 Dredge should generally be a one shot kill at all times in Hardcore game modes, but two shot kills are possible.

The 48 Dredge's rate of fire is astounding for an LMG. The 48 Dredge fires in a six round burst configuration, and possesses a fire rate of around 1000 RPM within the burst. This speed is extremely fast, and gives the 48 Dredge one of the fastest time-to-kill ratios out of all LMG's should the player get a one burst kill. The 48 Dredge has a burst delay of about 80 milliseconds between bursts, making it so the 48 Dredge can easily maintain this fire rate. The 48 Dredge also features the auto burst function, making it so players can manually cycle between bursts by simply holding the trigger instead of manually pulling the trigger again once the burst delay is finished. The high rate of fire makes the 48 Dredge more forgiving than other LMG's in close quarters, as its overall rate of fire makes it so a player, with some luck, can hip-fire to get a one or two burst kill against an enemy.

The 48 Dredge possesses poor accuracy. Its iron sights are extremely bulky and obstructs a large portion of the player's screen while aiming, and its recoil is inconsistent. The 48 Dredge kicks almost exclusively upwards; however, the severity of the kick varies. Due to the high fire rate, there will be times where the 48 Dredge will climb a very high amount upwards within the burst. Due to the burst delay, the weapon will recenter between bursts. The 48 Dredge leaves a lot to be desired in terms of accuracy, and as such, several players will use attachments to improve its accuracy deficiency.

The 48 Dredge's handling characteristics are poor overall. The 48 Dredge will aim slowly, limit the player to move at only 90% of the default base speed, and the hip-fire spread is quite large, making hip-firing, under most circumstances, ineffective. The 48 Dredge also has one of the longest reload times of all LMG's, taking at least about six seconds to reload the entire belt.

The 48 Dredge's belt capacity is fair, at 60 rounds. However, due to the 48 Dredge's burst fire configuration, this is equal to ten whole bursts. The 48 Dredge effectively has a very small magazine capacity, and an inaccurate player can easily find themselves evaporating ammunition reserves with ease. The 48 Dredge allows the player to spawn with three belts total upon spawning in, or 180 rounds total/30 bursts.

The 48 Dredge has the standard selection of attachments available to it. The optical attachments are extremely popular and helpful on the 48 Dredge, as its iron sights obstruct a large portion of the player's view, and replacing them with a sight makes target acquisition, and overall combat, easier for many players. The Foregrip is also extremely helpful, as it helps dampen the inconsistent recoil the gun possesses. This makes sudden lurches upwards less severe, and less likely to make the user miss the target.

The Suppressor is an odd fit on the 48 Dredge. Typically, the LMG's experience such a range reduction that a practically unobtainable damage drop-off occurs, and it does so on the 48 Dredge as well. However, since the 48 Dredge is a six round burst, and that the 48 Dredge takes at most five shots to kill an enemy, the Suppressor's range reduction isn't as big of a penalty on the 48 Dredge unlike any of the other LMG's. This makes the 48 Dredge by far the best LMG to suppress in core game modes. In Hardcore game modes, however, the 48 Dredge will, for the most part, deal two shot kills with a Suppressor, making it inadvisable for said game modes.

The Quickdraw Handle and the Adjustable Stock are both useful attachments to improve the 48 Dredge's poor handling characteristics. Both work quite well on the LMG's, including the 48 Dredge. The Laser Sight works quite well on the 48 Dredge, as it will increase the 48 Dredge's hip-fire accuracy, making the 48 Dredge much more competitive as a close quarters weapon thanks to its high rate of fire.

Rapid Fire will reduce the burst delay of the 48 Dredge, allowing it to fire faster overall, but not faster within the burst. The 48 Dredge is already a high rate of fire LMG overall, so using it is up to the player.

Extended Mags and Fast Mag both help soften the pain of reloading the 48 Dredge. Both attachments are extremely useful in the case of the 48 Dredge, as its effective magazine capacity is small, making the user reload often. Extended Mags will increase the effective capacity and give the user more starting ammo, whereas Fast Mag will reduce the reload time.

FMJ is a good, natural fit for the LMG's, and the 48 Dredge is also capable of putting the attachment to good effect. Only the thickest of barriers can protect enemies from the 48 Dredge's incredible penetration power with FMJ equipped.

Zombies
The 48 Dredge can be found in the Mystery Box for 950 points in Shadows of Evil, The Giant and Der Eisendrache. It has high damage, a large magazine size, and a high rate of fire per burst, but a slow reload speed as well as low mobility. It fires six rounds per burst, which can be good when facing a large group of zombies but can be wasteful when only facing one or two. Out of the light machine guns in Call of Duty: Black Ops III's Zombies mode, the 48 Dredge has the highest magazine capacity, a trait which is very handy in the mode. However, the Dingo has an 80 round magazine (which becomes 120 when Pack-a-Punched just like the 48 Dredge), a faster reload speed, higher mobility, and it fires in full-auto mode, which makes it a heavy competitor to the 48 Dredge.

When Pack-a-Punched, it becomes the Trapezohedron Shard, gaining an Extended Mag as well as more reserve ammo and damage.

Attachments

 * Reflex Sight (unlocked at weapon level 2)
 * Quickdraw (unlocked at weapon level 3)
 * Grip (unlocked at weapon level 4)
 * Recon Sight (unlocked at weapon level 5)
 * Suppressor (unlocked at weapon level 6)
 * Stock (unlocked at weapon level 7)
 * Varix 3 (unlocked at weapon level 8)
 * Laser Sight (unlocked at weapon level 9)
 * BOA 3 (unlocked at weapon level 10)
 * FMJ (unlocked at weapon level 11)
 * Fast Mag (unlocked at weapon level 12)
 * Thermal Sight (unlocked at weapon level 13)
 * Extended Mags (unlocked at weapon level 14)
 * ELO (unlocked at weapon level 15)
 * Rapid Fire (unlocked at weapon level 16)

Trivia

 * According to the Data Vault, the 48 Dredge has a default magazine capacity of 105, despite it never being able to achieve a magazine capacity of 105 rounds in-game except when Pack-a-Punching it in Zombies.
 * In addition, the Data Vault refers to the 48 Dredge as a seven-round-burst machine gun, despite it being six-round-burst in-game.
 * Both of the elevation measures to the sides of the rear sight are always set at five.
 * In first person perspective, there appears to be a lot of dirt on the weapon, particularly on the receiver and the rear sight. As well, there are three finger wipes on the receiver where the dirt is.
 * The 48 Dredge's serial number is 280614.
 * The 48 Dredge was also known as the "Ares" in the beta files before the gun came out. It had a default magazine size of 147 rounds and was a 7 round burst, like it states in the Data Vault.