[aceman67]

I just got to lv30 (yeah, I'm slow, sue me), and I had some fun last night doing the dailies and getting some decent loot.

But now after the maintenance during the night, daily story missions aren't showing up as playable. The story missions don't have the special highlight for them, nothing.

Am I missing something here?

[Thaeus]

Challenge mode does require coordination between each team member, especially at Russian Consulate and Warrengate. Lincoln Tunnel on challenge seems more doable to me because of the plentiful amounts of cover and elevated areas to avoid getting flanked, though the grenades and snipers can be a pain. Russian Consulate is pretty much flank/shotgun city with limited tactical options because the enemies are first wave Division agents gone rogue using Division tech against you and even hack your turrets and seeker mines.

Which brings me to this question: Why can't players hack enemy turrets like the rogue npc agents can? Maybe I missed it but I have yet to see an in-game explanation.

I don't think there's been an in-game explanation for it yet; it's likely just a game balance choice that forces players to avoid relying on skills that shoot the enemies for them, especially for content that is supposed to be more difficult. In a similar vein, being able to hack the enemies' tech would once again make it too easy.

[Thaeus]

I just got to lv30 (yeah, I'm slow, sue me), and I had some fun last night doing the dailies and getting some decent loot.

But now after the maintenance during the night, daily story missions aren't showing up as playable. The story missions don't have the special highlight for them, nothing.

Am I missing something here?

Unless you are experiencing some sort of bug, I don't think you're missing anything; dailies reset in about 2 hours, and they do so at that time every day.

[aceman67]

was some kind of bug. Logged in and out a few times and they showed back up.

Did all the dailies and got enough crafting mats to get the Damascus and the Phoenix Vendor Crafted Vector 45 ACP.

Looking forward to Thursday night to run the dark zone with you guys and hopefully get better armor and maybe a High-end Socom M1A with the Balanced trait

[O'Neill]

I believe the daily missions refresh every 24 hours and I think that is for the entire server regardless of when you complete the dailies. I could be wrong but it seems that way to me.

I'm sure not being able to hack npc turrets is a balance thing but I guess it's a minor plot hole I can overlook. However, I read in the latest patch notes that the elite npcs will no longer be suppressed by turrets. I think it takes away another tactic that could be used on challenge mode to make up for deficiencies in public teams.

The SOCOM M1A is nice, though I have a First Wave M1A that is working very well for me. It's awesome to see elites going down from headshots.

[Thaeus]

I believe the daily missions refresh every 24 hours and I think that is for the entire server regardless of when you complete the dailies. I could be wrong but it seems that way to me.

I'm sure not being able to hack npc turrets is a balance thing but I guess it's a minor plot hole I can overlook. However, I read in the latest patch notes that the elite npcs will no longer be suppressed by turrets. I think it takes away another tactic that could be used on challenge mode to make up for deficiencies in public teams.

The SOCOM M1A is nice, though I have a First Wave M1A that is working very well for me. It's awesome to see elites going down from headshots.

I read the patch notes too; they specifically pointed out that the turret's ability to suppress enemies made killing named elites too easy, hence why I think they're trying to encourage players not to rely too much on turrets and seeker mines.

EDIT: For reference, http://www.pcgamer.com/the-division-...otes-released/

That being said, I don't necessarily agree with it, since turrets and seeker mines are already too much of a risk to use in the Dark Zone, gimping them for Challenge Modes just takes them out of the end-game equation altogether. This begs the question as to why they bothered giving them to us in the first place; maybe purely for leveling purposes?

Also, IIRC, the First Wave M1A tends to be better than the SOCOM one because of differing mod restrictions, i.e. the SOCOM M1A is only able to take smaller-sized under-barrel mods.

EDIT: For reference, https://www.reddit.com/r/thedivision...irst_wave_m1a/

[O'Neill]

I read the patch notes too; they specifically pointed out that the turret's ability to suppress enemies made killing named elites too easy, hence why I think they're trying to encourage players not to rely too much on turrets and seeker mines.

That being said, I don't necessarily agree with it, since turrets and seeker mines are already too much of a risk to use in the Dark Zone, gimping them for Challenge Modes just takes them out of the end-game equation altogether. This begs the question as to why they bothered giving them to us in the first place; maybe purely for leveling purposes?

Also, IIRC, the First Wave M1A tends to be better than the SOCOM one because of differing mod restrictions, i.e. the SOCOM M1A is only able to take smaller-sized under-barrel mods.

There are elites that simply walk up to a turret and kill it with one stomp. Nerfing them even further would make them almost useless in challenge because the turrets usually need assistance in killing elites and when the turrets do manage a kill it's usually the result of the elite having taken prior damage from other sources. Flamethrower turrets might still be usable in challenge as lighting elites on fire will briefly stop them from attacking but again elites can walk up to it and stomp it to death before it can even light them up.

As far as I know, the SOCOM and First Wave M1A can use all under barrel mods. Which variant of the M1A is better depends on the base damage per shot it does and the talents. My First Wave M1A has the talent where the damage increases when I'm at lower health. The ideal talents I'd like to have on my weapons are the ones that deal increased damage to armor and elites. In fact, I have a SOCOM SCAR-L that has this and it's proven quite useful that at times I swap out my Vector during challenge mode.

Though my biggest concern (or disappointment rather) is the nerf to crafting:

http://forums.ubi.com/showthread.php...s-Patch-Notes?

Crafting

Increased costs for converting crafting materials and crafting High-End items:
10 Standard (Green) materials instead of 5 to craft 1 Specialized (Blue) material
15 Specialized (Blue) materials instead of 5 to craft 1 High-End (Gold) material
10 High-End (Gold) materials instead of 8 to craft 1 lvl 31 High-End (Gold) item

Changed deconstruction yield of Standard (Green) and High-End (Gold) items:
Deconstructing a Standard (Green) item yields 1 Standard material instead of 2
Deconstructing a High-End (Gold) item yields 1 High-End material instead of 2

The video below from a Division player expresses my disappointment quite appropriately and I'll be busy converting as many crafting materials to high-end as I can before this nerf hits, then probably hoard it until they unfix what wasn't broken in the first place.

[Thaeus]

I'll be busy converting as many crafting materials to high-end as I can before this nerf hits, then probably hoard it until they unfix what wasn't broken in the first place.

I wouldn't hold my breath on them changing it back to how it is now...like the guy in the video said, this is their way of trying to make sure people continue to play The Division by stretching out the process to get the best gear.

On a similar note, I will likely be spending some time later, and a lot of tomorrow (before our Dark Zone event), farming for purple drops to break down for crafting materials. If anyone's on, you should feel free to join me. My UPlay ID is: Thaeus.

[aceman67]

I think I might try and use this build, looks like a lot of fun if you're with a coordinated team.

[O'Neill]

I think I might try and use this build, looks like a lot of fun if you're with a coordinated team.

That looks awesome. I frequently use sticky bomb but with the flashbang mod for crowd control on challenge. However, with those talents mentioned in the video I will try it out with the explosive version.

[aceman67]

As bad as the Crafting Nerf is, it won't be all THAT bad. They're upping the drop rate of High-End Lv30+ items from named enemies to 100% across the board, with the item level being determined by the Mob's level.

On top of that, they're upping the drop rate of Division tech to 40% in the Dark Zone.

And considering how high Specialised and Superior drop rates are in Dailies and in the DZ, getting crafting mats won't be an issue, it'll just take longer, but not as long as you thought.

Ubi did put some thought into this.

07/04/2016 06:00 PM

Agents,

As you already know, we will be deploying update 1.1 in a few days. This is very exciting for all of us as it will be the first major content update since the release of the game! With it, we will implement new End-Game activities and a new layer of character progression with gear score 204 (equivalent level 32) items and Gear Sets items.

However, as we add this new layer of character equipment to the game, we also wanted to seize this opportunity to address something that will change your end game experience significantly: the importance of crafting versus item drops.

STATE OF CRAFTING

The Division is primarily a RPG. As such, gearing up your character is one of the main aspects and incentives to keep playing the game once the story missions are completed and max level is reached.

As part of the End-Game loop, players are expected to obtain their equipment by trying to beat challenging activities, and be rewarded for it. As each player develops and perfects their build, he or she will be looking for very specific items that will contribute to that build. Looking for one specific item can be quite tedious, but it should also feel extremely satisfying when the item is finally acquired.


The way our crafting feature is designed is to offer an alternative for players to temporarily complete their gear, by crafting missing pieces of their level. For End-Game we want crafting and our different in-game economies to provide reliable but slower source of gear compared to loot dropped from named enemies. If after many attempts you could not find said item, you should have acquired enough materials to try to craft something similar instead. It will not replace the item, but you will still be rewarded for your persistence.


However, at the moment, loot drops are just too rare and disappointing, putting too much of an emphasis on crafting: you are looking for crafting materials and may sometimes end up dropping an interesting item in the process.


This is clearly illustrated in the following graphs. Here you can see how many Item level 31 High-End items were acquired through crafting compared to items acquired as loot drops.

BalanceGraph

As many of you pointed out in the past weeks, the end result does not provide the level of fun that we had hoped for.


To address the situation, and simply make End-Game more satisfying and more focused towards improving your build one piece at a time, we will be implementing a series of changes with update 1.1, some of which have already been communicated in the Patch Notes, and others that we are about to reveal now.


MORE HIGH-END ITEMS

From now on killing a named NPC will grant you a guaranteed High-End drop! That’s right, you will now always get a High-End item from killing a named NPC of level 30+.


The gear score of said High-End will be determined by the level of the NPC. For example, a level 30 named will guarantee a gear score 163 High-End. With so much more High-End drops, you’ll quickly notice that crafting High-End items, while more expensive, will not necessarily be much more complicated. To make sure that crafting remains a viable alternative, we will also increase drop rates of Division Tech materials to 40% on level 32 named enemies in the Dark Zone.


New drop tables have been designed to grant you just enough control to focus your efforts on specific NPCs, depending on your need. Each named NPC will now have more chances to grant a specific type of High-End item. By discovering the specificities of each named NPC, you will quickly learn which ones you should focus on in order to obtain specific items.


CRAFTING AS AN ALTERNATIVE

You have already seen the changes that will be brought to crafting, but let’s go through them in more details here. Increased costs for converting crafting materials and crafting High-End items:

• 10 Standard (Green) materials instead of 5 to craft 1 Specialized (Blue) material
• 15 Specialized (Blue) materials instead of 5 to craft 1 High-End (Gold) material
• 10 High-End (Gold) materials instead of 8 to craft 1 lvl 31 High-End (Gold) item

Changed deconstruction yield of Standard (Green) and High-End (Gold) items:

• Deconstructing a Standard (Green) item yields 1 Standard material instead of 2
• Deconstructing a High-End (Gold) item yields 1 High-End material instead of 2

By changing the conversion rates, we will encourage players to use their low level materials while they are leveling up, instead of saving them until they reach level 30. It will also bring more decision making between selling and deconstructing low quality items. Most High-End materials should come from deconstructing High-End items, and not deconstructing lower quality items to then convert these materials into High-End ones. Similarly, lowering yields when deconstructing items will also lower the efficiency of items farming.




Once again, we want you to consider deconstructing and material converting as an alternative when you get an item that doesn’t contribute to your build, and not the main mean to develop your build as a whole.


CONCLUSION

To sum up the list of changes brought with update 1.1 in regards to item drops and crafting, we will:

• Increase drop rates of High-End items on named NPCs (100% drop rate, actually)
• Increase drop rates of Division Tech, to make it less of a bottleneck than it currently is
• Modify loot tables for each named NPC, to make the hunt for loot more controlled
• Increase conversion costs of lower quality materials to high quality ones, making it harder to convert low quality materials into high quality ones
• Decrease construction yields, making it less interesting to farm lower quality items in order to obtain crafting materials, and because you’ll get more High-End items as a whole
• Increase cost of crafting High-End items, because High-End materials will be much easier to come by
• These changes will not only make crafting and dropping more coherent towards each other, but will also make it feel much more fun and rewarding.

Balancing an online game is no easy task, and while we believe that these changes are a step in the right direction for the future of the game, we will keep monitoring the situation and address what needs to be modified. But more than that, we will have an eye on all aspects of your experience, and balance things when needed. Sometimes it means making hard decisions that might not be appreciated, and when this happens we will make sure to give you the visibility you need to understand why these decisions are made.


Your feedback is very valuable to us, so keep the discussions going, we will be reading!


-The Division Team

Source: http://tomclancy-thedivision.ubi.com...3A148-76770-32

[Thaeus]

Hope you guys had fun at our first UFP-Division event! I wanted to check in with everyone; was that a good timeslot, or would you prefer if I moved it to Sunday afternoon?

[aceman67]

Weekend would be good for me, I have no idea what my schedule is going to be like once I get working again... Curse you real life!

Also, those that were present for the event were:

Aceman67
Thaeus
Thexpl0r3r
Robert something or other (?)
SGOneil

[thexpl0r3r]

Hope you guys had fun at our first UFP-Division event! I wanted to check in with everyone; was that a good timeslot, or would you prefer if I moved it to Sunday afternoon?

It's been a blast Can't wait for the next Dark Zone incursion!

Unfortunately I work on Sundays... I will be switching to normal days in the next few months, maybe even earlier, but at this point I don't know anything for sure. I'd be OK with Thursday (as today) and Friday evening or Saturday afternoon\evening.

[Britsurfer]

i would go with Saturdays afternoon's as 1 am Europe time is no good for me on a work day.

Can we get it balanced to meet UK and North Americans players