That "get kills on enemies affected by tacticals" camo step is the one that makes you question your life choices, and if you've ever looked up a CoD BO7 Bot Lobby just to dodge the headache, yeah, you're not alone. On paper it's simple. In a match, it's messy. People slide out of your stun, your timing's off by a blink, and somehow the "blinded" guy still deletes you first.
Don't overthink the gun. Pick something you can snap with and that doesn't punish you for missing one bullet. The real fix is the utility loop: run Tac Expert so you spawn with two tacticals, take Scavenger so you're not empty after the first fight, and toss on an Assault Pack field upgrade if you've got it unlocked. You want to be throwing stuff every life, not "saving" it and dying with two grenades in your pocket.
Stuns and flashes can work, sure, but they're inconsistent. Angles, cover, weird hit markers, teammates pushing the same doorway, all of it. The EMP Grenade is just easier to live with because the effect lingers long enough for real gunfights to happen. You tag someone, you swing, you finish it. No panic spraying. No "I think it hit?" guessing game.
If you're doing this in Core, you're signing up for extra problems: longer time-to-kill, more chances for the target to recover, and more trades that don't count the way you want. Hardcore cuts through that. You land the EMP, round the corner, and the fight's over fast. Flank routes matter more than perfect throws, which is exactly what you want for grinding.
A lot of people waste tacticals by hurling them into the middle of nowhere and hoping somebody's there. Don't. Aim for places players can't ignore: small doorways, head glitches, the side of a hardpoint, the top of stairs. Bounce it off a wall if you have to. The moment you see the hit marker, don't admire it—push. Hesitation is what turns "free camo progress" into another death.
This is the part that feels almost silly. With the Season 1 update, non-lethal streaks can count as "affecting" enemies, so kills during Scout Pulse, UAV, Counter-UAV, and HARP uptime can move the challenge along. So build for cheap streaks, keep them cycling, and you'll notice the camo bar climbing without you forcing weird grenade plays every single spawn.
Best rhythm I've found is simple: run low streaks, pop them the second you earn them, and keep tossing EMPs whenever you're about to take a close fight. If you're still stuck, it's usually because you're playing too "fair" and taking long-range duels where tacticals don't help. Stay in the routes where people bunch up, keep the pressure on, and if you ever decide you'd rather speed up the grind in a BO7 Bot Lobby, at least you'll know exactly what you're trying to optimize for.
