‘The Division’ Developers Address Enemy Scaling, Loot Itemization In Latest State Of The Game

Enemy scaling, mode difficulty, and itemization were all hot topics in the latest state of the game for Tom Clancy’s The Division. Although today’s maintenance only provided stability improvements, members of the Massive team discussed many of the game’s issues during the downtime. Players familiar with the game will recognize many of the problems noted in the stream, and the team plans to work on them in coming weeks.

Essentially, today’s state of the game was to inform players that the development team knows about the longstanding issues with The Division. Players can head to the Twitch stream for the full broadcast; however, none of these problems are rectified quite yet. Massive is looking to the game’s players for opinions on how to fix these issues in the coming weeks with the aid of constructive feedback.

The two main topics of the state of the game appear to be enemy scaling and itemization in The Division. Enemies seem to scale fine for players leveling from 1 to 30. However, enemy scaling at the level cap is quite extreme. Foes take many bullets to defeat; to a point where some players run out of ammo before vanquishing their adversaries. This is especially true in challenging and heroic content and the upper levels of the Dark Zone in The Division. Apparently, the developers are aware of this issue and know that it does not make for enjoyable gameplay.

In the stream, they noted that getting killed after one shot from an enemy also exacerbates the issue. Enemies can take hits for minutes while one attack from them can instantly down a player. Both of these problems stem from poor enemy scaling; an area of the game Massive would like to improve. The game is currently not fun for those in a group, and it is especially troublesome for solo players due to enemy scaling at the maximum level.

Alongside enemy scaling, developers of The Division also pointed to the itemization issue as a paramount problem of the game. High-Value Targets mostly drop Lone Star gear set pieces while the Underground DLC often rewards FireCrest and B.L.I.N.D. pieces, for example. Players are often routed to certain activities to obtain specific gear. Not to mention, the larger problem with itemization is that players need the gear from the challenging difficulty in order to complete challenging level content, for instance. Players cannot loot what they need in order to complete harder content without having first completed that content in the first place leaving many players stagnated in particular difficulties.

Both of these issues are said to be top priorities to the developers of The Division; however, many other topics were addressed while the game underwent maintenance. The Dark Zone is said to be a frustrating place where neither PvE nor PvP participants get what they want from the experience, but a PvE Dark Zone seems unlikely. The uselessness of performance mods, the jump in difficulty from hard to challenging, and other major issues are discussed in the stream.

A mission begins in a tunnel system. A new #OperationISAC mission starts Wednesday, 5PM PDT. https://t.co/Qdcv5QhEKQ pic.twitter.com/J1tPTHpUfQ

— Tom Clancy's The Division (@TheDivisionGame) August 15, 2016

Although no official state of the game addresses have been made since late last month, the game’s first paid piece of downloadable content finally released on PlayStation 4 after a one month period of exclusivity kept the DLC only on Xbox One and PC. Underground gives players of The Division a way to complete randomized missions for Underground experience, a chance at loot, and more, as The Inquisitr reported.

Today’s maintenance period, as stated on the official forums, simply provided routine sever maintenance, while the state of the game addressed immediate pressing issues hindering the game. It appears that Massive wants to fix what is holding the game back before talking about the next paid DLC, called Survival. In the coming weeks, players of The Division can expect more news on fixing the game’s current issues including possible solutions to the biggest problems.

[Image via Ubisoft]