Agents,
Patch 1.8.2 has been detailed. 2 out of 3 of the Holy Trinity has been touched, with Striker being untouched and Division 2 is out in less than 10 months, yet they will still be "paying attention" to the meta. Classified Striker is as much of a common occurance as are the fundamentals of the game themselves.
I have not partaken in it, but Rogue 29 can be argued as a call for balance. There are 14 classified sets in the game, yet only three were mainly used and with the recent patch, well, it speaks for itself. Was there even a patch that, as an end result, showed more classified diversity throughout the game? I don't even remember.
That poses the question: are classified even worth the effort to introduce in Division 2? And if not, is there an alternative? Exotic mods or better choices in high end mods? This goes for both PvE and PvP. Have the devs showed you that they are capable of balancing gear sets?
This question would have been relevant if The Division was solely a PK/PvP game - it is however not.
People here shout from the rooftops that The Division should cater for the majority.
The majority apparently don’t want nor do they partake in PK.
As such, they don’t care nor do they partake in the ‘meta’.
As a consequence, the ‘meta’ is largely irrelevant and therefore the inclusion of classified sets, or not, as the case may be, is a moot point.
Obviously include them, the more the merrier. More choice is more options for a more varied playstyle/gaming experience when delving into the PvE aspects of the game.
Or is your question addressed solely to the PvP contingent of the forums?
I could do without, personally, but if I can make a prediction, I think we will see something similar as in TD1.
So not at first, but as soon as everyone is geared up, they are going to add gear, gearscores, exotics, classifieds or something new entirely. In a looter, there should always be something to loot, or at least, for as long as possible.
The PvE side is in a good place at the moment. I see a lot of players with different builds, I myself use Firecrest and Tactician a lot. I used to run Striker and Nomad alot, and for the group of friends I'm with I tend to be Reclaimer.
Being the veteran of a lot of games, I suspect the problem is more the PvP side, and not with the sets themselves. The issue is more likely down to the fact it's almost impossible to balance PvE and PvP with the same builds. Division seems to have been more problematic than most though. Possibly down to the design base on the end game Dark Zone of PvEvP.
I think with Division 2 the Devs will have learned a lot on what they need to do to balance the game on both sides, and hopefully it won't be too far off the mark.
That being said ....
Every online game I've played has seen the player base heavily favour DPS and shooting builds, and that's exactly what Striker, Nomad and Pred Mark are. The only way other builds would be more popular is by not including them at all, which would probably drive away a large chunk of the player base.
In short the meta is DPS builds, in every game I've played it's always been that way because it's popular with a lot of players. It's the reason why game such as Division doesn't necessarily need a tank or healer for a lot of the content.
But I believe there were changes to shotgun auto aim which should impact those using SASG or Showstopper? I think Massive will wait until the full impact of those changes are known, before making more changes. And that is a definately a good thing. Too many changes and it gets way to complicated.
No.
Classified gear sets made everything else irrelevant. Including exotics. It killed the build diversity that we had in update 1.6.1. (High end, Hex, Ninjabike builds, etc)
The implementation of classified gear sets was to give us an artificial sense of progression and power instead of giving us level increase. (gear score). It was flawed. It created more problems with balancing and loot. It messed up the economy of the game.
I doubt that they'll start the game with classified gear in the mix. My guess is that they'll hold it back and add them at a later date as a stealth gamerscore increase (just like they did with this game).
Classifieds remove the need to collect and upgrade anything else, so you need to make sure everyone has top level gear first.
It only really matters in PvP. I hope they find some way to level the playing field as needing to collect fully optimized gear before you can even play is a stupid idea![]()
People keep talking about the sequel in terms of the features/constructs we have in the current game: Classified Gear, Gear Score, Dark Zone, etc. Personally, I hope they've changed EVERYTHING and come back with something that resembles TD1 in looks and overall gameplay feel only. Make it a 3rd person, cover-based looter-shooter. Literally everything else, I hope they gave a long, hard re-evaluation before including it in the sequel.
NO. Unless the dev team can do 3 things:
1. Map out the entire catalogue of abilities, talents and other configurable options that provide changes to stats.
2. Identify and determine a baseline among 1.
3. Calculate for each set what the top end and bottom end stats will be with each specialized gearset.
Once you have something like the above you can then identify what primary gearsets you can introduce in a balanced manner. Once you have those you can compose counter sets for the primary gearsets.
I dunno if the dev team on TD2 have a magic formula for new gearsets but with every configurable option: character / wpn talents, skills, mods, major gear stats, minor gear stats, etc you basically have an headache doing number 1)
That makes 2 nigh on impossible. Which renders 3 irrelevant.
......
Which is what has happened through the lifecycle of gearset introduction in this game. First we were asked to grind for basic gear to get to 256. Then we had to grind for green gs which became irrelevant. Then the worst balanced gearsets came out the classifies. Which all point to one gearset worth using in the meta (unless youre in a group.)
If I had a suspicious paranoid mind Id have thought that this was all a conspiracy to get us to play the same game with minimal content changes/additions for over 2years.
Alternatively I would say that all the heartache of grinding and trying out these gearsets (and Ive tried over 30 different ones including hybrids and variants) there is one underlying truth to gearsets: There should only be 1 type for each branch of the RPG branches: 1 dps(striker) 1 skill (healer) 1 security (tank) (d3) and 1 each for pvp and pve. It would mean that if players wanted to play dps they could grind for it. Same for a healer and security builds. Balance would be much easier to work towards with fewer builds. Its what they seemed to try to do with the 3 meta (pvp) builds in 1.8.1.
If players want more build diversity....... I would say to them look..... they couldnt get it right the first time. Though normal gearsets were pretty near to it as they got. The classified just introduced more gimmicks than could be handled. More build diversity just ended up with the unbalanced mess they had pre 1.8.1. Resulting in the absurity of 1.8.2 So there is no point in having more sets. With one excemption..... pve. Specialized sets for pve dont have to be that balanced because ultimately they will be used against ai controlled npcs. So the dev team can knock themselves out.
....
Whatever happens..... if the dev team think I will be prepared to grind again like they did in this game, theyre mistaken. I want to play something that is anchored in TD1 but is new and fun to learn. So the balance needs to be right on day 1. And introducing more complicated **** later on wont cut it with me. Plus it will only be a heavy cross for them to bear later down the road.
But..... thats just speaking for myself. It really doesnt matter what I think. Its pretty clear from the fawning videos coming out from the youtubers that the changes get a big thumbs up from them. And thats fine. It only cements my view of the way gearsets were handled from the start and reinforces the ppl with the view, who have complained from day 1 that the devs only listen to the hardcore pvp crowd. Everything else is just an afterthought.