The best Black Ops 6 maps for XP-grinding finally got a 24-hour playlist, so now you know what to use

Stakeout is the smallest map in Black Ops 6 and is essentially a single apartment. Call of Duty players love small maps, because they reduce the already tiny time-to action from CoD to literally zero. Stakeout is a 2v2 sized map, but you can also find it in Face Off, which is a 6v6 playlist that consists of only small maps.

Stakeout, one of four maps available in Face Off is so popular that players leave the lobby when it's not there. Treyarch probably created a Stakeout 24-7 playlist because of this dedication. This honor is usually reserved for fan favorites such as Nuketown which just went live.

I think Stakeout is most appealing because of the small map. It has the greatest XP potential. I was able to level up nine times in just a few hours playing (double XP), Face Off, with friends on Saturday. I also unlocked more attachments and guns than I could have done over several days of standard mode. If grinding Black Ops 6 camos and leveling weapons are a priority for you, Stakeout 24-7 is the best way to go.

The map is similar to Modern Warfare (2007)'s Shipment with its square-shaped footprint and straightaway kill lanes, but I still like it. The map is similar to Modern Warfare 2007's Shipment, with its square-shaped foot print and straightaway kill lanes. However, I still think that Shipment is an awful map with too many exploitable sights, while Stakeout takes this blueprint and makes it more fair and dynamic.

The first smart move in Stakeout is to put a roof above everyone's heads. This reduces the effectiveness of grenade-spreading a lot. There's also the division of sightlines. The north and south halls in Stakeout don't have an exact line of sight from one end to another. They can see a great deal, but walls, doors, or entire rooms stop them from camping like in Shipment or Rust.

There's nowhere to hide or hunker. The same doorways that block the line-of-sight also create lethal bottlenecks, which produce multi-kills unlike anything I've seen. This is still a small map, and you will sometimes respawn only to die immediately. Chalk it up to BLOPS 6's poor spawns combined with the small map.

Stakeout gives me options. No matter where I am in Shipment, the central meat grinder is always with me. In Stakeout the loop of halls is a constant chaos, but there are cool side paths which allow me to temporarily avoid it. You'd think that the open terrace in the middle of the map would be a popular spot, but to get there you have go through two bedrooms on either side, and then you have to shimmy across roof shingles. On the outer edges of the map, mirrored balconies form a crossfire. In the ventricles of south hall, a crouch height ventilation shaft connects two rooms.

This is a really fun map design with a lot of personality that's easy to miss. Shipment's entire schtick revolves around its small size and simplicity. This is fine if your Super Smash Bros. game only accepts Final Destination/No Items, but Stakeout fits in distinct spaces which encourage different playstyles. This is what makes a map memorable.

Stakeout 24 hours a day will be available in BLOPS 6 at least for the next week. There's no double-XP this weekend but I'll be there.