Plot Armor

Plot Armor (also known as Magic Bullet Shield, as seen in map scripts) is an informal term referring to a character's unusual ability to survive infinite damage, due to their importance to the story.

In the Call of Duty series, this can be seen when certain NPCs such as commanding officers and characters notable to the story can survive normally fatal attacks in combat. They typically stagger at any incoming fire and fall down as if they died when taking enough damage, but will soon get up and resume fighting.

Characters without plot armor (such as randomly generated soldiers) can die from any fatal event, including accidental death at the hands of the player.

In addition to friendly NPCs with plot armor, certain enemies throughout the series may have plot armor if their actions are significant to the plot.

Call of Duty

• At one point during "Ste. Mere-Eglise- Day", Martin's squad is pinned down by Tiger tanks. Sgt. Moody is still visible to the enemy despite taking cover, and is repeatedly shot at by the second tank's machine gun.
• After protecting Sgt. Moody in Brecourt, Pvt. Elder will also lose his plot armor and can be killed like any other NPC.
• During Pavlov's House, Sgt. Pavlov has plot armor until the final defense stage of the mission. He loses his plot armor, but still has more health than the other Russian NPCs.

Call of Duty: Finest Hour

• Oleg Puskov is invincible until he is scripted to die by sniper fire during "The Flag Must Fall".
• In the British campaign, Bob Starkey has plot armor.
• In the American Campaign, Benny Church has plot armor.
  • All of the American soldiers NPCs in "Into the Heartland" have plot armor.

Call of Duty 2

• In the American Campaign, Randall has full plot armor. Other characters, such as Braeburn and McCloskey have plot armor until "The Battle for Hill 400".
• In the mission "Retaking Toujane", the German soldiers carrying Panzerschrecks cannot be killed until they destroy the Crusader tanks.
• In the mission "The Battle of Pointe du Hoc", there are some German soldiers that cannot be killed.
• In the mission "The Tiger", the titular tank cannot be destroyed.

Call of Duty 2: Big Red One

• Andy Allen survives the German defenses and makes his way clearing the town along with Roger and the rest of the 3rd squad, until he loses his plot armor near the end when German reinforcements arrive, killing him and almost getting Roger killed by a mortar.
• In the mission "Baptism By Fire", the Italian with Panzerschreck in the tower cannot be killed until he destroys the half-track.
• In the mission "Desert Fox", the last Tiger tank cannot be destroyed until reinforcements arrive.
• Bloomfield cannot be killed until his plot armor loses in the final mission, as well as Victor Denley that lost his plot armor in "Farewell to Friends".
• Saunders and Blackburn cannot be killed when clearing the beachhead until both are scripted to die by mortar at Gela beach. Also, on the same level, Rutherford can't be killed until the point where they storm outside of one bunker. At this point he's scripted to die at the hands of an Italian soldier.

Call of Duty 3

• In the level, Falaise Road, the randomly generated Canadians that come over the wall have plot armor.
• Richter has plot armor until the end of the level where he is killed.
• In Mayenne Bridge, a German in a house has plot armor until he finishes shooting away the railing that blocks the player's way.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

• Vasquez, Griggs and Gaz have plot armor until their scripted deaths.
• Captain Price and Nikolai has plot armor that lasts throughout the game.
• Massey has plot armor until the player clears the initial target building in "Charlie Don't Surf".
• In "Safehouse", the Loyalist assisting the SAS has plot armor.
• Also in "Safehouse", Al-Asad and his bodyguards have plot armor. The guards lose their plot armor when Captain Price opens the door and shoots them, while Al-Asad's plot armor is removed when the interrogation begins.
• In "Heat", Barton and Arem cannot be killed.
• In "Crew Expendable", Wallcroft, Griffen and the final trooper are invincible.
• In "Game Over" the Mi-24 Hind that pursues the player cannot be destroyed until it is shot down by a Loyalist Mi-28 Havoc at the end of the level.
• In F.N.G., the three S.A.S. members helping Captain Price test the player have plot armor.
• In the DS version of the game, during the mission "On Approach", an OpFor soldier can't be killed until he has fired his RPG-7.

Call of Duty: World at War

• Sgt. Reznov and Pvt. Chernov both have plot armor, until Chernov's scripted death during "Heart of the Reich". However, if the player points his weapon at Chernov after being burned, his name will still appear.
• Tom Sullivan has plot armor until his scripted death in Little Resistance.
• Pvt. Sprogis and Pvt. Glover both have plot armor in Little Resistance.
• The Japanese soldier that stabs Sullivan cannot die until he has done so.
• The radioman who starts out with the player's squad in Hard Landing has plot armor since he radios command once the airfield is captured. He may die in the counterattack.
• The Japanese soldier who kills the American Flamethrower in Hard Landing cannot die until he has done so.
• Pvt. Polonsky and Sgt. Roebuck both have plot armor. During Breaking Point, depending on the player's actions, one of them loses his plot armor and dies while the other keeps his plot armor.
• When Sergeant Daletski is under MG fire in Vendetta, he just falls down and gets back up when he is shot.
• The German flamethrower who burns Chernov cannot be killed until he does so.
• Both Russian soldiers who are ordered to break open the farm doors by Reznov in Their Land, Their Blood have plot armor and cannot be killed by gunfire nor grenades until they stand on each side of the farm door and are blown off by a King Tiger's shell inside the farmhouse.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

• Makarov and the NPCs that accompany him have plot armor in the mission "No Russian".
• NPCs from the TF141, including Captain Price, Ghost (until his scripted death), and "Soap" MacTavish are equipped with plot armor. In "Takedown", Royce is invincible until Meat dies; in "Loose Ends", Ozone and Scarecrow are invincible until the DSM is connected.
• Soap will lose his plot armor for a short amount of time in the mission "Cliffhanger" if you do not detonate the explosive and will cause for the group of enemies to shoot Soap to his death but this will cause the player to return to the last checkpoint.
• Sergeant Foley and Corporal Dunn also have plot armor. Pvt. Wells, in "Wolverines!", is invincible until Foley carries Raptor to Burger Town.
• A randomly generated soldier guarding the entrance to the rooftop in the mission "Of Their Own Accord" has plot armor. But will lose his plot armor as soon as the player enters the helicopter unless they kill all incoming soldiers.
• Pvt. McCord has plot armor in "Second Sun".
• Private Morgan has plot armor until the player puts a smoke screen around the BTR-80 in "Wolverines!".
• Roach has plot armor when he is being dragged by Ghost to the LZ in "Loose Ends" until the two are killed by Shepherd.

Call of Duty: Black Ops

• Bowman, Reznov, Sergei, Dimitri Petrenko and his squad-mates, Dragovich, Kravchenko, Steiner, Swift, Harris and Clarke have plot armor until their canonical death.
• Woods, Hudson, Weaver, Brooks and Carlos have plot armor that lasts throughout the game.
  • Woods briefly loses his plot armor when Alex Mason is hit by a mortar at the top of a enemy infested hill in "S.O.G.", until he is saved from the NVA soldier.
• Reznov's plot armor is a subversion, as his character is a hallucination in the mind of Alex Mason, excluding "Vorkuta" and "Project Nova".
• The Viet Cong soldier who stabs and kills Swift cannot be killed until he does so.
• The Spetsnaz soldier who destroys the walkway in WMD (which causes the death of Harris) cannot be killed until he performs this action.
• The U.S. Marine in Crash Site has plot armor until Mason eliminates multiple Viet Cong guerillas and a NVA boat, where he is killed.
• The Spetsnaz Operative in Payback cannot be killed when the player pulls out the gun from the VC Bookie's holster. He can only be killed when Mason and Woods see him trying to escape out the wooden door.
• All the Marines in "Rebirth" have plot armor during the tank ride, and the two operatives accompanying the player during the Nova Gas fight are also invincible. The plot armor is removed after leaving the Nova Cloud.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3

Campaign

• Sandman, Truck, Grinch, Kamarov and John "Soap" MacTavish have plot armor in every level that they appear in until their scripted deaths.
• John Price has plot armor throughout the game, except the infiltration part in "Stronghold" and, of course, while he is playable in "Dust to Dust".
• In "Mind the Gap", Wallcroft and Griffen have plot armor, but Griffen is scripted to die at the end of the first part of the level.
• In "Turbulence", Commander Leonid Pudovkin and Sergeant Anton Fedorov have plot armor until their scripted deaths.
• In "Goalpost", Rhino 1 and 2 have plot armor.
  • Carter, the minigunner of Rhino 2, also has plot armor until his death.
  • The gunner and driver of Rhino 2 that accompany the player after the tank is destroyed have plot armor that lasts throughout the mission.
• Nikolai also has plot armor, being capable of shrugging off shots in "Persona Non Grata" and "Return To Sender", though he doesn't participate in combat.
• Sabre and Faucon in "Bag and Drag" have plot armor that lasts until the player enters the van near the end of the mission.
• Volk and Gator in "Iron Lady" have full plot armor.
• In "Scorched Earth", Granite Team has plot armor until their scripted deaths.
  • One of the Leopard 2 tanks, Blutertragen, can be destroyed by the T-90 if the player doesn't destroy it quickly, but the other 2 are invincible until the building crushes them.
• Yuri has plot armor in "Dust to Dust", until Makarov kills him.
• In the level Black Tuesday, Team Anvil has plot armor that lasts throughout the mission.
• Bravo 9's SAS operatives have plot armor until they jump out the window and the Russians open fire.

Special Operations

• The GIGN driver in Server Crash is equipped with plot armor; this also applies for the Over Reactor, Hit and Run, Little Bros and Smack Town helicopter pilots.
• Scarecrow has plot armor when he becomes a bot in the mission Kill Switch, except when the first Juggernaut arrives, and when planting the EMP.

Call of Duty: Black Ops II

• Crosby, Samuels, Manuel Noriega, Jonas Savimbi, Mullah Rahmaan and the ISI Leader all have plot armor that is not lost at any point in the game.
• Mike Harper, Tommy Briggs, Javier Salazar, Raul Menendez, Frank Woods, Alex Mason, Farid, Jones, Anderson, Tian Zhao and Chloe "Karma" Lynch all have plot armor when in third person until their optional deaths. If they are saved by the player's actions, their plot armor returns later in the game, excluding Jones, Menendez and Mason, who do not appear in combat in any other missions after their plot armor is taken away. Farid's plot armor returns after killing Harper, but he later loses it in Odysseus upon his death.
• Jason Hudson has plot armor until his scripted death.
• David Mason, Frank Woods, Farid and Alex Mason have Plot Armor if they are accessing something with the Access Kit.
• Officers Jannsen and Barnes have Plot Armor during Cordis Die.

Call of Duty: Ghosts

• Hesh, Merrick, Keegan, Kick, Rorke and Collins all have plot armor that lasts throughout the game.
  • Rorke lacks his plot armor at the end of "Birds of Prey", though killing him will result in a mission failure.
  • Hesh and Merrick briefly lack their plot armor while breaching the common room in "Atlas Falls". This can be proven by trying to let them kill the enemies in the room in order to get the Trophy/Achievement Piece of Cake. The player will get a mission failure message saying "Hesh [or Merrick] was shot and killed".
  • Hesh also lacks his plot armor when he is downloading the intel in "Clockwork"; if the Federation soldiers manage to kill him, the player will get a mission failure message "Hesh was overrun and shot".
• Riley always has plot armor, except when Logan takes control of him in "No Man's Land".
• Elias Walker always has plot armor until his canonical death, except when he is playable in "Legends Never Die".
• Kyra Mosley and Ajax have plot armor until their scripted deaths.

Extinction

• Black Flag 4-2 has plot armor.

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare

• Gideon, Joker, Ilona, Jackson, Daniels and Ajani all have plot armor that lasts throughout the game.
  • Gideon lacks his plot armor in the mission Manhunt when he gets caught by a KVA guard and after Hades' double dies and he and his teammate needs covering fire from Mitchell's WASP.
• Jonathan Irons, Will Irons, Carter, Torres, Rivers, Knox and Cormack all have plot armor until their scripted deaths.

Call of Duty: Black Ops III

• Jacob Hendricks, Rachel Kane, John Taylor, Sarah Hall, Sebastian Diaz, Peter Maretti, Sebastian Krueger and Corvus all have plot armor until their respective deaths.
• Zeyad Khalil and Minister Said have plot armor that lasts throughout the game.

Zombies

• Groph has plot armor during the interactable flashback during My Brother's Keeper.

Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare

• Nora Salter, Sean Brooks, Evelynn Sotomura, and Erwin Kloos have plot armor that lasts throughout the whole game.
• Usef Omar has plot armor the lasts throughout the whole game until his scripted death in Operation Dark Quarry.
• Laura Gibson, Todd Kashima, Victor "Gator" Diallo, Audrey MaCallum, and E3N have plot armor that lasts the whole game until their scripted deaths in Operation Blood Storm.

Call of Duty: WWII

• William Pierson, Robert Zussman, Drew Stiles, Frank Aiello, Arthur Crowley, Camille "Rousseau" Denis, Augustine Perez, Vivian Harris, Karl Fischer and Howard all have plot armor that lasts throughout the game.
• Claude and Jeanne have plot armor if the player chooses to free them in Liberation.
• Joseph Turner, Rabson and Erica have plot armor until their scripted deaths.

Nazi Zombies

• Peter Straub has plot armor when appearing in the maps due to his Geistkraft experiments. This is cancelled out in The Shadowed Throne, when he is killed by his own creations.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

• John Price, Griggs, Hadir Karim, Nikolai, and Yegor Novak have plot armor throughout the game.
• Kyle Garrick, Alex Keller, and Farah Karim have plot armor when they aren't playable.
• Hoyt, Davis, Gonzavi, Randolf, Myers, Omar "The Wolf" Sulaman, and Roman Barkov have plot armor until their deaths.
• Jamal "The Butcher" Rahar has plot armor during the chase in Old Comrades. Kyle can decide his fate during interrogation.
• In The Embassy, Davidson, Mikey, Stacy Davidson, and all of the Marines (minus the two who assist Kyle and Hadir to eliminate the mortar teams) have plot armor until their scripted deaths.
  • Davidson is killed by a mortar, and the other Marine on the roof with the player can't die until the Al-Qatala fighters breach the compound, at which point he can be killed.
  • Mikey has plot armor until he runs toward the destroyed gate, after which he is shot, and dies shortly after.
  • The Marine attempting to save Mikey will also be killed by the AQ fighters, however he can be killed by the player without penalty.
  • The two Marines with Hadir and Alex on the rooftop have plot armor until they are both killed by sniper fire.
  • The two Marines assisting Hadir and Kyle to kill the mortar teams can be killed before the player reaches the mortar house, however if they are still alive by the time that the player reaches the Ambassador Residence, they can possibly be killed.
  • Stacy can be killed at any time when directing her to safety using the cameras, however this reverts the player to the last checkpoint, as Stacy isn't scripted to die yet. She can be killed (either by the terrorist holding her hostage, or by the player) near the end of the level.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

• Jason Hudson, Lawrence Sims, Perseus, Gorbachev, Zakhaev, and Kravchenko have plot armor that lasts throughout the game.
• Alex Mason, Russell Adler and Frank Woods have plot armor when Mason isn't playable until their optional death in Ashes to Ashes, if Bell chooses to ambush Adler's team.
• Helen Park and Lazar have plot armor until the end of the mission End of the Line, where Bell must save one of them or let them both die. If either of them survive, their plot armor will return until their optional deaths in Ashes to Ashes, if Bell chooses to ambush Adler's team.
• Dimitri Belikov has plot armor when he isn't playable.
• Franz Kraus cannot be tranquilized by Bell in Brick in the Wall, as he is essential in locating Volkov's hideout.
• In Desperate Measures, all non-security KGB personnel (excluding Charkov) have plot armor.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II

• John Price, Simon "Ghost" Riley, Kyle "Gaz" Garrick, Johnny "Soap" MacTavish, Alejandro Vargas, Rodolfo Parra and Kate Laswell have plot armor throughout the entire game.
• Phillip Graves has plot armor until his betrayal in the mission Alone.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III

• John Price, Simon "Ghost" Riley, Kyle "Gaz" Garrick, Farah Karim, Alex Keller, Nikolai and Kate Laswell have plot armor throughout the entire game.
• Johnny "Soap" MacTavish has plot armor until his death in Trojan Horse.
• Vladimir Makarov has plot armor after he has killed Soap.