Massive has announced after months of silence that it will now rip the bandaid off the wound of “The Division 2”. The item reset will hurt, but it seems necessary. Additionally, the power level 2020 is finally increasing.
This is the situation: In The Division 2, the loot system is not working: The tactical shooter floods players with loot during a mission, the “seemingly good” loot, the stuff with high item level and best quality. But only professionals understand which loot is really good. A fan wrote once that The Division 2 is a “tedious stat salad.”
Because after an instance, The Division 2 expects players to sift through the mountains of loot, examining each item closely, checking:
- whether the item is useful
- whether it fits into their build
- whether it is mediocre, good, or very good within set parameters that are not clearly visible.
For this, players need to have tables in mind regarding how good the gear actually is. Players must know where the caps for each item lie to have a clear idea of what values they actually want to achieve with their item build.
Experienced agents can do this: They have the numbers in their heads or the spreadsheets at hand. They see whether they need an item.
Those who are not as experienced or are just returning to The Division 2 after a long break are at a disadvantage: They cannot recognize this and are not inclined to invest so much time to become familiar with the intricacies.
This creates a player problem in The Division 2:
- Once someone is out, they can’t come back.
- Beginners find it difficult to navigate the endgame and recognize what items they should actually farm.
The Division 2 plans a big bang
This is now the solution: Yesterday, Massive announced they would radically change The Division 2: The entire gear system will be overhauled.
This won’t happen “step by step,” but with a big bang.
The big goal is: to give players less loot, but better. And to make gear “more readable”: Players should recognize whether they have a good item in front of them.
This will hurt: After Episode 3, sometime after February, the day will come when the gear will be switched. The players’ previous equipment will be transferred to the new system. This means that the “carefully arranged builds” of the frequent players and their item collections are likely not to be as perfect and useful as they have been so far.
At the same time, the power cap will be increased, many new items will enter the game, and the item hunt will start over.
This is a classic case of a gear reset, as it is customary in Destiny 2 or WoW with new expansions: You can still “play with” the old optimized gear at the beginning, but you will quickly replace it with new, non-optimized gear to start collecting items from scratch.
Here’s how it will continue: Once the item system is changed, The Division 2 will introduce a new “recalibration system” and will further revise skill power, which are two additional major conflict points in the guts of the The Division 2 mechanics.
What are the pros and cons?
What could be advantages? The new system offers newcomers or returning players the opportunity to start anew with The Division 2 without feeling the need to read intensively beforehand.
The item reset allows veterans who “were actually done with The Division 2” to start afresh with the items and build up a new arsenal.
Additionally, Massive can fix many minor issues of the old system. Certain perks that caused problems, like “damage to elite enemies,” can be removed. Furthermore, Massive can further enhance the cool aspects of the loot system like “Named Items”.
What could be disadvantages? The motivation for players to play The Division 2 now and search for new items is likely to decrease considerably, as it is clear that they must start over soon.
There is also concern that “the new system” might offer less depth than the old system.
This is what lies behind it: The situation for The Division 2 was complicated. It had a complex system in which veterans invested a lot of time to perfect it. But newcomers or returning players could not get into the system at all.
Now Massive has decided to break this knot. This will hurt veterans who invested a lot of time. But since the power cap is rising, it is time for everyone to look for new items and start from scratch.
If the new systems work, Massive will likely next need to address the content poverty and replayability of The Division 2. This remains an obstacle to the success of the game.
Read more about the details of the overhaul here:
