Rex Infernus: How to Get the Warden’s Hat

The Warden’s Hat is one of four unique hats on Rex Infernus, the final round-based Zombies map in Black Ops 7. Getting it does not involve a puzzle chain. Instead, it comes from feeding a live Web Mother into the Pack-a-Punch machine, which then produces the hat.

Quick answer: Unlock the grapple and reach round 16 so Web Mothers spawn. Grapple onto a Web Mother next to the Pack-a-Punch machine, rack up 30 to 40 kills while riding it, and the machine pulls it in and spits out the Warden’s Hat for you to pick up.

What you need before the hat can spawn

Two conditions must be met before this works. Web Mothers do not appear early in a match, and you cannot ride one without the grapple tool, so both have to be in place first.

Requirement	Detail
Grapple (Void Claw)	Unlock it first. You obtain the Void Claw grapple after activating Pack-a-Punch at the Nexus Forge.
Round 16	Web Mothers only begin spawning at round 16, so you cannot start this before then.
Pack-a-Punch machine	The hat is produced by the machine, so you must work near it.

How to get the Warden’s Hat

Play until round 16 with the grapple already unlocked. From this round on, Web Mothers spawn as enemies, and one of them needs to be near the Pack-a-Punch machine for the next step to work.

Find a Web Mother close to the Pack-a-Punch machine and use the grapple to latch onto it. You will ride the creature rather than kill it outright.

Player rides a Web Mother by the purple Pack-a-Punch altar and fires on red-marked zombies — Grappling onto a Web Mother near the Pack-a-Punch altar and thinning out the surrounding horde. Image credit: Treyarch / via @BrickChef

While mounted on the Web Mother, get 30 to 40 kills. High splash-damage weapons make this much faster because you are clearing groups of zombies rather than picking them off one at a time.

Essence Collected and critical kill points appear as the player fires on a zombie at the Nexus Forge — Stacking kills at the Nexus Forge until the Web Mother is pulled into the machine. Image credit: Treyarch / via @BrickChef

Once you hit the kill count, the Web Mother is sucked into the Pack-a-Punch machine. The machine then spits the Warden’s Hat out onto the ground.

Walk over to the dropped hat and pick it up to equip it.

What the Warden’s Hat does and how to confirm it worked

With the Warden’s Hat equipped, spider webs no longer slow you down. That matters on Rex Infernus because Web Mothers spray slowing webs and cocoon zombies into hazards, so the immunity keeps you mobile during those encounters.

You know it applied when the on-screen message reads WARDEN’S HAT EQUIPPED. After that, walking through web patches leaves your movement speed unaffected.

Common reasons the hat does not appear

You are below round 16, so no Web Mother has spawned yet.
You have not unlocked the grapple, so you cannot mount the Web Mother.
The Web Mother is too far from the Pack-a-Punch machine to be pulled in after the kills.
You have not reached the 30 to 40 kill threshold while riding, so the machine does not absorb the creature.

Line up a Web Mother beside the machine, keep a weapon with strong splash damage ready, and the hat drops as soon as the kill count is met. From then on, the web slows that define these fights stop affecting you for the rest of the run.