I don't think I am crazy to conclude that the number of players has gone down tremendously since launch. I first started noticing it a couple weeks ago when not only were some of my PS4 friends no longer playing, but additionally lag times when searching for pick-up groups took longer and DZ populations overall seemed to be dwindling to unhealthy levels.
Based off feedback I have been getting and my own personal feelings I am here once again offering the Developers of this incredibly well made game some technical support regarding their weapons and gear.
1) The Divisions overly complex and diluted gear & weapon system does nothing but confuse the heck out of players.
2) The lack of more DZ level caps is very frustrating as competition between a gear score 201 and a 218 is ridiculously unbalanced.
Overall I feel at this point the Dev's are throwing garbage at us like Destiny did to keep us playing. My advice is to just keep the friggin' game basic and fun and we will all enjoy it. Adding more crap to keep us busy does not mean we are engaged!
I once again (this is the 3rd time) am offering my assistance as an UNPAID technical advisors. My military background, gaming experience and fresh eyes might help you fix what is definitely broken (regardless of whether you want to admit it or not).
I can tell you right now that un-F'ing your weapons should be a high darn priority! The former military and law enforcement guys I normally play with think your ridiculous with your lack of common sense regarding weapons and inability to balance the system as well as how far off your DPS ratings generally are. It's bad enough that I think most players don't even pay attention to the DPS or gear score and simply look at damage & perks since your RPM's are normally unrealistic.
If your not going to fix this problem please be willing to accept some free help because you guys are absolutely torturing this game at this point.
Not sure about other platforms but 3 months in and I'm still able to find a full squad in under 10 seconds whenever I matchmake for DZ (PC here).
Honestly I hope the developers do whatever they need to to keep this game alive because it's actually a lot of fun for a lot of us, but if they don't and this game is dead in a year, they only have themselves to blame. I'm sticking with TD for now. Most bugs and glitches have been fixed. New content is on the way. Now if they can just find a way to please the majority when it comes to the dark zone and fix the suuuper slow and random RNG system, I think MOST people would be happy.
People are really over exageratting the player drop off. Its only bad on PC. On Xbox and PS4 the population is great
As for duluting the game with gear. Its a loot based game. there needs to be a plethora of loot. Making it "More basic" would kill the game. Wed have less loot to chase thus less reason to play
Uh my friends list is utterly devoid of players that used to play the game. Zero. I have made some new friends in the division but precious few of those are still playing either. The dz feels empty at least as often as I find other players there now as well (not that empty is a bad thing all the time mind you ;P ).
This is on xbox one.
The player base is changing that's for sure. The guns are a different issue. Honestly how can they be balanced? If I was going to take a guess they'll take crit chance of smgs. They should increase the drop of 204 guns and make it equal drop rates. And drop other gear besides lone star. What's the deal with that? We need some gear to play around with, but it's all the same stuff.
I can go with that, the 'majority' is really who they need to keep happy no doubt.
I am basing my thought off observation not my own personal opinion. I can't count how many times I have people in my group pick up a 204 gear score high-end weapon and stand around scratching their heads plugging away on the calculator trying to figure out why their 163 purple weapon is better according to the item numbers?!
I fully comprehend that their are 6 levels of each item in each category. What I don't get is how a 204 high-end can be worse than a 184 purple weapon. Just seems over-thought or something?
Should be simple where if I have a 204 M1 it will ALWAYS be better than any lower gear score weapon of the same make/model regardless of perks. It should require mod's to change that if anything.
Heck, the entire theory behind gear score is to isolate people based on toughness/DPS etc. so why would that not be sensible?
Originally Posted by Mikey_Flies Go to original post
That's because only nerds & teenagers play on Xbox LOL ( jk Mikey)
player perception of population sizes in a game like this mean nothing, you can at max be matched with 24 players in the DZ or 4 players in an incursion or mission. if you think queue times are an example of dwindling population look at games like WoW where queue times for popular activities can be as high as 10-12minutes so that also is invalid without direct knowledge of how such systems work. you only ever see 24 people in the DZ just because it "feels" empty doesn't mean anything 1/2 the players could just be checking vendors that are matched with you or are afk at a safehouse/checkpoint. the only evidence we have of population numbers is steam population charts and that doesn't take into account everyone that plays this game.Originally Posted by kopfjager738 Go to original post
IMO, once they deemed that this was going to be a loot based RPG, instead of a shooter, they basically gave up on the guns being realistic. A sniper rifle should be a 2 shot kill at the very least. Not only that, I hate the whole critical hit aspect. Why do random shots get to be critical, when a shot 1 second later can not. The problem is when people forget that this is not a shooter game first.