There are some rad changes coming to Ubisoft’s online shooter very soon.
As part of a livestream this afternoon — the archive is right here — the company revealed a bunch of changes coming to The Division‘s endgame.
First and foremost, there’s incursions, which seem similar to Destiny‘s raids. These extremely difficult challenges can be played over and over again for more loot, and require players to work together to have any chance of surviving. The first incursion, set in water treatment facility hidden in the sewers, will go live with the game’s big update on April 12.
A big reason the incursion might kick your arse? No checkpoints!
The gameplay Ubisoft showed didn’t highlight the kinds of unique mechanics and situations Destiny‘s raids have become known for, instead focusing on fighting off waves of enemies. However, the developers promised there were tricks to the encounter, stuff they didn’t want to spoil.
One key difference with The Division is that players are allowed to use matchmaking for incursions. The incursion’s default difficulty, hard mode, will have a “recommended” gear level to ensure people don’t get wrecked when they try it, while a required gear level for “challenge” difficulty.
Gear level? Yep, The Division is adopting a system similar to Destiny‘s light level. (I think this is standard in most MMOs, though?) Even though the level cap is 30, players can acquire gear that essentially pushes them past level 30. During matchmaking, the game checks your inventory, so players can’t lie about gear level, and people are getting matched appropriately.
There are a bunch of other small but important changes, too:
- Gear sets are being hidden throughout the game, via loot and blueprints, and equipping a certain number of pieces will get you a unique talent. (Individual gear set pieces will not have talents.)
- Players will be able to trade items with one another, but only within the group that generated the drops, and with a two-hour time limit. In the dark zone, players must head to a gate in order to trade items.
- A new daily mission system, assignments, are meant as “bite-sized” experiences, such as killing 10 cleaner enemies.
- The dark zone is getting hourly supply drops, where high-level gear will drop somewhere in the area, and only the first group there can have it. It will be surrounded by high-level enemies, though.
I’m still working through the main missions, but this all sounds awesome.
Comments
25 responses to “The Division’s Endgame Is About To Get A Lot Of New Stuff”
Whilst it does sound awesome, I’m at that frustrating stage where My gear is not yet up to scratch to get through challenge missions without other strong matchmade team mates. DPS of about 80,000 and health of 55,000 is more than enough for the Daily Hards, but it seems like in every daily Challenge I’m 1 of the strongest out of all the people I get matched with and I’m barely strong enough to look after myself, let alone carry a team. I’ve been lvl 30 for 3 days and managed to complete the first days challenge, but the last 2 I have had to walkaway after multiple tries, always with rotating teams from people dropping out.
Dark zone solo kinda sucks, only lvl 15, can’t deal with mobs that have 3 or more yellows (well, probably only a 50% win rate on them) and good gear just aint dropping, so with all this in mind, it sounds like I have a hell of a grind to go before I can even try these incursions. Ah well, just keep doing the 2 Daily Hards for now I guess.
Yeah, the initial few hours as a fresh 30 are pretty damn rough. Your health isn’t TOO bad – I run about the same, but I do get a lot of Armor from my gear. Your DPS is where you’re really going to struggle though. When you just can’t put down enemies quickly it can get overwhelming.
Honestly my recommendation would be:
– Keep doing the Daily Hards. Save up your Phoenix Credits and buy the Vector ACP .45 blueprint from the Special Gear Vendor at the BoO. It’s arguably the best gun you can craft as a fresh 30 given how “easy” it is to obtain.
– Keep an eye on the Safe House vendors. You can get some pretty solid purples from them. I’m 30 and DZ Rank 46, but I still use a purple M1A I bought from a vendor because it was an amazing roll.
– Stick at the DZ, but stay in DZs 1 and 2. The subway tunnels are great as they offer named bosses, lots of yellow enemies and lots of chests, but the layout of them makes it very easy to kite the enemies. They’re a comparatively “safe” way to get gear and EXP. Try to extract from the two DZ01 extraction areas, as they’re much easier than the DZ02 car park.
– Once you feel you’re at an OK-ish level, try the Challenge Modes but stick to either Lexington or (especially) Lincoln Tunnel. They’re by far the easier two. You’ll get lots of Phoenix Credits, a guaranteed Yellow as an end mission reward, plus high chance at more Yellows from the boss.
Hope that helps!
that’s awesome DZ advise thanks! I actually bought the Yellow ACP .45 straight up and am using as a primary, secondary is a purple SOCOM M1A, also have a gold set of armour.
What annoys me about the DZ is you get no real guidance on where to go or what to do (probably the point but SOME hints would have been nice), so I’ve roamed around the streets of DZ01 DZ02 and DZ03 but half the buildings are empty and the streets just have random mobs that don’t do a lot plus all the containers are locked until DZ rank 30 so I’ve just been a bit like wtf??
But the tunnel advice is gold, I will go and try to find some names bosses and see if I can at least get to DZ rank 30 and get my DPS up (presumable with mods on armour or armour itself??).
What sort of DPS is a good number to get stuck into challenges?
110-120K DPS is pretty solid for challenges, and try and get your health a bit higher while your at it. 65-70k is a good baseline 🙂 Its not great, but thats about where I started feeling a bit more at ease with challenges. Some challenges are just plain hard though, Powerplant and Russian Consulate are difficult even with decent gear lol Get yourself a nice SMG or assault rifle, and your DPS should make a nice jump. There are gold blueprints you can buy upstairs in the tech wing with Phoenix credits, and I’d reccomend getting either the Vector of the Black Market AK, as they are too great primary weapons with solid DPS.
Also, don’t be scared to matchmake when your in the DZ, I do it occassionally when I’m solo and whilst the people I meet up with aren’t very talkative, they will still back you up in a fight and its usually exactly what you need to give you the edge. Solo players usually come with a big target attached to them in lvl 30 DZ, but if you are in a group, even a small one, other groups usually won’t bother with you. Boss’s are usually in the landmark areas, and subways and a few others scattered around, but they always respawn in the same places 🙂
This article has a good map of where the bosses are located: http://gamerant.com/division-dark-zone-boss-map-guide/undefined
Honeslty though, you are on the cusp, and once you turn that corner with your DPS and Health, you’ll find everything a lot easier
yeah I haven’t tied match making in the DZ, I’m usually chatting to mates (who are at different stages of the game) on Skype so I figured without effective means of communication (PS4 so no K&M) that it would be a bit weird roaming aimlessly with strangers (didn’t help that I have had no clear direction in the DZ until todays advice). But maybe I’ll give it a run.
This is actually pretty comforting to hear and helps motivate me to charge on!
Honestly, it doesn’t matter 🙂 Last night we had 3 of us in a party, and we match made to find another randy, and ended up going through the DZ with him for nearly an hour without saying a word. If it was a challenge mission, i’d say you might need to talk, but in DZ you don’t really need to co-ordinate that much, so you can get away with it 🙂 I’m not a big talker myself, so I prefer it that way
Ah there you go! Sounds like you’re well on your way then.
100K DPS is probably an acceptable amount for Lexington and certainly Lincoln. Either pump up your armour or try to get to 60K health as that’s about the threshold for not being one shotted by Challenge Mode snipers. The shotgunners are still Satan though.
Warrengate is basically nothing but a DPS check and Russian Consulate is insane. So leave those two for later!
Yeah, the DZ doesn’t really hold your hand, but that’s kind of the point. The purple landmarks and especially the subway tunnels are your friend. In DZ01 and 02, I’d run the subway tunnels near the westernmost extraction area, plus the Blockade and Construction Site landmarks. Sports Store and Library are also great but are a bit tougher. Also check the contaminated areas, especially the one that’s I think in the north west of DZ02. You’ll often find a named Cleaner there.
DZ01 and 02 are great for upping your rank. If you want better gear drops, do 03 and 04 as they have a higher drop rate for yellow items. But for the love of God avoid the big park extraction area haha. Again, purple landmarks and subway tunnels are your friend. 05 and 06 will be beyond you at this point.
ok cool, well i’ll forget the challenges for now, keep up my daily hards, and run a few good sessions through DZ01 & 02 and see how I’m travelling with phoenix credits and gear in general after that. I’ll aim to add at least 20k dps and 10k health before trying DZ 03 & 04 and maybe start trying the challenges again for Justin (case).
Challenge snipers do leave me with about 1/4 of 1 health bar, but the shotgunners can just eat so many dicks
Haha, did you get that Purple M1A with extreme accuracy from the Advanced vendor? That thing is the best gun I’ve ever found in 80 hours of gameplay even with 130K DPS haha.
I actually bought it once when it first came on sale at level 25 and then ground up to level 30 and then bought it again for the upscaled stats. Something like 80K damage on headshots xD
Edit: I’d just like to say, I run challenge missions with 130K DPS and I run with just my partner so I’d like to point out that 130K DPS might be enough with a group of 4, but definitely not enough for 2 people. It can take us hours sometimes haha.
Yeah, that’s the one! It has Balanced and Accurate, it’s just so insanely good for an ilvl 30 purple haha. Mine crit headshots for ~230K which is silly for how stable it is and the ROF.
That’s some dedication buying it twice, but totally worth it.
Two manning a Challenge Mode is pretty nuts. I had to do that last week when everyone else dropped out except for me and this one Portuguese dude. I’m at around 170K DPS but it was still pretty time consuming, so I can’t imagine it at 130. Props!
Sounds like I’m definitely buying this gun! Given how hard challenges are with a full team atm, I just imagine doing them with 1 other haha
Unfortunately it was a daily vendor reset, so you can’t buy that exact gun right now 🙁 But I’m sure a similar one will appear again! Just keep an eye out for any M1A with the perks Balanced or Accurate and you’ll be guaranteed an amazing gun.
EDIT: there’s an absolute hero on the Division subreddit who posts the full list of daily vendor reset items every day – that way I always know if the vendors have anything worth buying that day. I recommend checking it!
hahaha i bought it like 4 times too, pretty much each time I leveled up. Unfortunately it reset before i got to lv30 so its only a lv28… still a great gun though!
Im 170k dps, 65k Health, challenge modes are walks in the park now, Hards are laughably easy dont even use cover in hards any more.
I suggest if you are new 30, buy the Pakhan (Yellow/gold/high end item) from the Vendor in your base of operations, its an LMG that shreds Named and Elite mob’s, while the damage is lowish (mines 140k dps fully moded) the armour Pen and bullet numbers make up for it.
cheers I’ll give it a crack, can swap it as a secondary with M1A.
keep in mind as well that the vendor will rotate the weapons occasionally, it will always be the same gun, but the primary DPS stats do change. so sometimes you get that gun with 70k dps, mines currently 85k base unmodded, but thats the highest ive ever seen it.
Buy the Pakhan LMG from the advanced weapon vendor and get the talents active, that thing rips through the gold enemies. Well it does if you keep the recoil under control and land enough headshots which is easier than with most LMGs since it’s just an RPK so it’s more or less an assault rifle with a larger magazine
I recommend you to craft the high end extended magazine and craft the vector submachine gun, that should bring up your dps to over 100k.
If you are looking for quick high end, do that Lexington Challenge mode constantly. With a good team you will complete it within 30 minutes and each run guarantee an equipment yellow while the main boss have chance to drop yellow as well.
DZ low level is very slow for high end loot. It should be easy sailing from there. I did not get anything useful from DZ at all and im DZ 40. All my gear is crafted, bought from advanced vendor and Lexington drop. I’m sitting at 230k dps, 60k hp, 11k skill.
In addition to all the other advice:
Make sure to utilise skills appropriately to make the challenging missions far more achievable. Smart cover works wonders (with my electronics, it gives a 40% boost to outgoing damage and a 50-60% reduction on incoming damage, plus faster skill recovery) especially when combined with the use of the pulse skill to boost critical chance and damage, and the ammo restoring mod for the healing station helps immensely. Having a mix of crowd control skills is a must, with gas seekers and flame/shock turrets being used to delay or otherwise divert the attention of enemies.
Also use your grenades and other consumables to turn the tables. A rapid fire weapon with incendiary ammo can tie up a whole heap of enemies, allowing your teammates to focus fire and down them.
I’m liking the sound of a lot of these changes, especially the assignments and OH MY GOD ANOTHER WAY TO GET DIVISION TECH.
The Incursions do sound pretty interesting, and one thing I especially like is that the “normal” mode Incursion looked like it was mostly Level 31 purples, which would put it somewhere between the current Hard and Challenge Modes – which is great.
Current Hard Modes are too easy, but the Challenge Modes can be incredibly frustrating. I can pass them relatively easily, but it annoys me the difficulty comes from the enemies one shotting you, having massive health, and grenade spam. They’re not hard because of mechanics, it’s just all the numbers turned up to 11.
Whereas the normal mode Incursion looks like the enemies won’t be super spongey, but they’ll be difficult because of mechanics. Which is how it should be.
TL;DR: cautiously excited.
haha we were doing the hard missions last night and everyone kept asking me if I was sure I had it on hard lol am glad to hear there will be something in between, as the difficulty jump from hard to challenging is crazy
And this is just a free update too! I’m almost optimistic 😛
Yeah, it’s actually pretty funny how easy Hard modes get when you’ve got decent gear. You can just steamroll them without taking cover haha. So yes, agreed – the jump from Hard to Challenging is like a chasm.
Pretty cool to see Massive offering updates like this for free! And another one in May. Gives me hope for the paid DLC.
This is kinda big news in relation to the first Incursion/update:
Looking forward to the update, is a good sign of the things to come 🙂
Will find it hilarious if the incursions are dropping better weapons… i finally rolled a decent vector so would be typical if that became obsolete lol
you people need to stop using “DPS” from the division as a measuring stick of ANY kind.
The displayed DPS ammount means jack shit in the game and the mathematical calculation the game uses is all kinds of screwey.