Covenants are one of the strongest features you need to know about in Call of Duty Vanguard. There are unique abilities that can alter your playstyle when built correctly.
These covenants complement your perks and weapons. Knowing the best combinations for your current build will be important to maximize your potential and reach the higher rounds.
This guide will cover the best covenants in CoD Vanguard Zombies and show you a few builds you can combine to create the ultimate zombie-killing loadout for your playstyle.
What Are Covenants?
Covenants are unique abilities you can utilize to improve your damage output or provide some utility for your build.
There are a total of 11 covenant abilities to choose from. Each one will have three tiers of rarity (rare, epic, or legendary). The covenants that show up are completely random, and they will reset in each round.
How to Get Covenants
To get covenant abilities active, you will need to go to the Altar of Covenants. It is located in the center of the map near the exfil portal and the Pack-A-Punch machine.
The Altar of Covenants will offer you three different covenants at a time. As mentioned before, these covenants are entirely random, and they refresh every round.
When you have selected your covenant in the Altar of Covenants, you will have to turn in Sacrificial Hearts to gain a covenant ability.
How to Get Sacrificial Hearts
Sacrificial Hearts are a type of currency specifically used to gain covenants and nothing else. They are earned through progressing rounds and finishing objectives.
You will have to advance through the rounds to gain covenant abilities. As a good tip in the early rounds, you can get one or two random covenants to help you reach round 10.
Once you reach round 10 and above, you have already gained a surplus of Sacrificial Hearts to buy any covenant you want throughout the match.
How to Get Legendary Covenants
Each covenant has three different rarities. From rounds 1-10, you will mostly find rare covenants with a mix of a few epic ones in rounds 8-10.
Epic covenants will appear more frequently from rounds 11-15. Legendary covenants will start showing up but at a low rate. In rounds 20 and above, only legendary covenants will show up, and this is where you can find the most broken upgrades in Vanguard.
List of All Covenant Abilities
| Covenant | Rare | Epic | Legendary |
| Death Blow | Critical kills have a chance to return one bullet to your clip | Critical kills return a bullet to your clip | Critical kills return two bullets to your clip |
| Resurrectionist | Revive allies faster | Revive allies much faster | Revive allies much faster and automatically revive nearby allies |
| Brain Rot | Chance to turn a normal enemy when shooting it | Chance to turn any enemy when shooting it | Chance to turn any enemy when shooting it. Death explosion turns nearby enemies |
| Bloodlust | Melee attacks do more damage and heal you | Melee attacks do more damage and heal you | Melee attacks do more damage and heal you |
| Ammo Gremlin | Stowed weapons refill ammo from stock automatically | Stowed weapons refill ammo from stock quickly | Weapons refill ammo from stock quickly |
| Cull The Weak | Deal more damage to slowed or stunned enemies | Deal much more damage to slowed or stunned enemies | Deal much more damage and massive critical damage to slowed or stunned enemies |
| Cryofreeze | Chance to slow a normal enemy when shooting it | Chance to slow any enemy when shooting it | Chance to slow any enemy when shooting it. Death explosion freezes nearby enemies |
| Dead Accurate | Successive shots on the same enemy deal more damage | Successive shots on the same enemy deal much more damage | Successive shots on any enemy deal much more damage |
| Unholy Ground | Deal more damage when shooting while stationary | Deal much more damage when shooting while stationary | Deal much more damage when shooting while stationary and for a short time after you start moving |
| Splatterfest | Enemies killed by explosions have a chance to explode | Enemies killed by explosions have a high chance to explode | Enemies killed by explosions have a very high chance to explode |
| Mother Lode | Small chance to keep equipment after using it | High chance to keep equipment after using it | High chance to keep equipment after using it and a small chance to receive additional equipment |
Best Covenants to Get
Since these covenant abilities are extremely dependent on your weapon, team, and perks, I will list down a combination of the best covenants you can complement your build with. They will all be explained as to why they are great and how you can utilize these covenants properly.
Ammo Gremlin + Death Blow
Ammo Gremlin is underrated and overrated at the same time. If you read the rare and epic version of the Ammo Gremlin, it is essentially worthless. However, getting the legendary upgrade is completely broken.
The legendary Ammo Gremlin covenant will refill the current clip of the weapon you are holding while you are shooting. You will never have to reload ever again.
The Death Blow covenant gives you ammo back to your clip with critical kills. All versions of the Death Blow covenant are useful, from the early rounds to the higher rounds.
For the weapons, pump-action shotguns and bolt-action rifles can have unlimited magazines with just the legendary Ammo Gremlin.
For semi-automatic shotguns, semi-automatic rifles, and powerful LMGs, you will need both to spam your magazine on the enemy freely. Make sure you are hitting your critical shots to maintain your bullets inside the clip for Death Blow.
Cull the Weak + Cryofreeze
The combination of Cull the Weak and Cryofreeze is a bit broken. Combine this with the best perks in the game; your damage output can go up tenfold. Cryofreeze gives you a chance to slow an enemy with every shot.
This bonus works well with shotguns as each pellet is counted as well. When the enemy is slowed, this is where Cull the Weak activates.
Cull the Weak deals much more damage and massive critical damage to slowed or stunned enemies. With the Diabolical Damage perk maxed out, the critical damage will stack.
Killing zombie bombers will also help you kite and freeze enemies when you are getting overwhelmed. You can get this bonus from the legendary Cryofreeze covenant.
Shotguns and powerful rifles will be your best bet for the best weapons to use for these covenants. Rifles will need a mix of recoil control and firepower to sustain your critical hits.
If you are pushing to rounds 20 and above, do not use the stun grenade to activate Cull the Weak. Decoy grenades and Monkey Bombs are pretty much mandatory to complete objectives.
Zombie hordes will be coming non-stop, and the only way to get Runestones and deposit them will be by distracting the zombies.
Splatterfest + Mother Lode + Resurrectionist
This combination revolves around Splatterfest and Mother Lode. Mother Lode will help you sustain the number of throwable equipment you have and blast the whole stage off.
It is crucial to get the legendary version of the Mother Lode to sustain the build. Your playstyle will revolve around throwing grenades and decoys everywhere.
Splatterfest will cause a chain reaction of explosions once you throw your frag grenades. Gammon Bombs work well too.
You will have to be efficient as replenishing your equipment is not 100%. It involves a lot of randomness and luck.
This covenant combination might be unpopular, but it will work best as playing the support for your team. Your goal is to control the enemies first and blow them up with an offensive equipment.
Others
There are a few covenants that are worth mentioning.
Unholy Ground (Legendary) – Deal much more damage when shooting while stationary and for a short time after you start moving
The keywords here are “for a short time after you start moving.” You can increase your damage output if you maintain a stationary stance while you unload your whole magazine.
Moving out to reload and unloading the magazine again will retain the whole bonus as long as you have the increased reload speed perk at tier 4.
Dead Accurate (Legendary) – Successive shots on any enemy deal much more damage
The rare and epic versions of Dead Accurate are underwhelming. However, the “any enemy” change allows you to increase your damage output without even thinking about which target to shoot.
Final Thoughts
Some builds are significantly more powerful than others. It all depends on the weapons you use. Each build has specific strengths and weaknesses, but shotguns with the right covenants will always deal the most damage in any build.
Support builds are also suitable for casual players who want to reach rounds up to 50. It is a mix and match of what your team needs. If you are playing solo, you can even reach round 50 with the Einhorn Revolving shotgun combined with Ammo Gremlin and Death Blow. It is a great way to level up fast in CoD Vanguard too.
