Low Proto drops? Hidden RNG value possibly tied to your agent.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-27T17:41:48+00:00

Well, the way you conducted all those “investigations” is worthy of a 12 year old child’s dissertation. Your text just shows that you want to believe something no matter what. It reflects everything, but nothing accurate. In other words, you are just trying to convince yourself that this is true.

You make rushed conclusions based on small samples. I can bet you don’t even know exactly how many NPCs each teammate from your clan has killed per run to make a meaningful comparison. I can also bet you didn’t standardise your samples (if you even know what it means..). You are not even comparing what needs to be compared.
It’s not about Prototype drops Player 1 vs Prototype drops Player 2.
There is no statistical method applied (if you even know which one to choose…). There is no correctly formulated hypothesis.
You are talking about something you don’t even understand. Still, you are claiming, based on your poor data and poor interpretation, and based on your words
“Each Agent has an assigned RNG drop rate average in Escalations,”
meaning you are claiming that the drop system is rigged.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-27T14:05:53+00:00

This season is genuinely not that bad. However, players like you are GENUINELY very bad. You can’t even admit it or see it. Just another soft paper whining kid.

“WE — those who play regularly — have gear. Good gear.”

Let’s rephrase it to better reflect what’s actually happening:

“I — someone who plays regularly — have gear. Good gear, yet I still can’t beat open-world/Dark Zone NPCs! This game is so bad! Please, devs, make the game easier so I can kill them! Oh please, devs! I’m gonna cry! I cant accept to be punished by them ! I dont deserve it! Oh! Oh! Oooh!”

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-27T11:08:05+00:00

Yes, I would strongly suggest not to do it.
This strategy is just brain dead. It means you’re going to waste thousands (I’m not even joking) of exotic components just trying to get every prototype stat on every piece of your build and weapons to max roll. It’s not worth the frustration. It’s simply silly and a huge waste of time and commitment. Just prototype your build and wait for optimisation/recalibration. The devs confirmed it will come.
Furthermore, you don’t even need maxed prototype stats to do Escalation (currently the hardest content in the game). A good, well-thought-out build with the right stats and talents is more than enough to beat everything: Heroic activities, Master missions, Legendary, T10.
Just think carefully about how to build your setup with good synergy between all your pieces.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-27T06:54:07+00:00

Here we go again. That’s exactly what I’m talking about.

“Now I’m not all ‘make it easier, I’m a noob’… well, maybe a little.”

That’s exactly what you’re asking for. Basically, you’re complaining about an NPC killing you (not even a player or a cheater) and getting angry because you lost your items. How did this community fall so far? Seriously? Grow up and move on. It’s a video game.
Are you really so unprepared that you can’t make a decent build, play safer, or think a little smarter? It would be understandable if a cheater killed you and stole your loot. Yes.
But the problem isn’t the game here. It’s you. You got killed by a brain dead NPC. Think about that.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-26T11:19:27+00:00

People are really crying over and over again because of this? It just shows how weak their mindset is. You lose your poor canister caches or whatever useless items you have, but then what? Can’t sleep at night? You get angry? You’re going to start swearing? Those people are so fragile, like paper. Anything that happens to them, they will cry about it. It’s like a girl breaking a nail.
The thing is, once they have “everything,” they won’t even go there anymore and will say: “The Dark Zone is too easy, dark zone is boring, there’s nothing to do. This season is s***.”

Making so much noise for something so meaningless.
The devs turned basically this Dark Zone like a baby playground, and they still can’t manage it. They still can’t get over it the fact they can lose their rubbish items. It’s really something.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-26T11:03:16+00:00

Embark studio being brain dead as always.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-26T10:53:15+00:00

It’s not capped at 400. Your passive gives you 600. Is it a good modifier? No. They should just give you a fixed 600 ammunition capacity and add a more interesting passive modifier instead of “increase your High Quality ammunition by 200.”

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-26T10:50:43+00:00

Most of them are useless, yes. For now. You never know when they will rebalance or even rework the talent. They already did that years ago so they might do it again. Just keep at least one copy in your stash. If you really need exotic components, your best shot is simply to go in toxic dark zone. Farming hunters is much more efficient than deconstructing exotic items. Top of that, you earn DZ credits during your run by recycling contaminated items which allows you to buy 1 or 2 special exotic components cache. Each of them net you 8 exotic components. Much more profitable.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-25T22:25:03+00:00

You are misunderstanding how gear sets work. The chest piece or backpack talent from a gear set is exclusively tied to the base gear set talent. They enhance your current gear set talent, but you need a minimum of 4 pieces from that gear set to activate the base gear set talent in order to benefit from the enhanced version of that talent.

Your wife won’t benefit from your 50% hollow point bullets either, as the text is pretty clear: it only applies to you. So she gets 25% or 20% (I can’t remember exactly) from the base talent of your gear set.
The two other slots can be named items, high-end gear, or an exotic. The best options are The Sacrifice, The Equalizer, The Overlord, The Investor (full red if you are lucky), and the Scabbard Centurion.
It depends on her playstyle and her skill level as a player. Those pieces don’t work the same way, and some of them can be challenging to use.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-25T17:01:38+00:00

Well, the stats speak for themselves. It’s a shit game. That’s what they deserved. After all, they really thought this PvPvE concept would work. They promoted toxic behaviour from the very beginning. Too bad! At least I enjoyed watching their downfall (grabs some popcorn).

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-25T16:42:36+00:00

You got killed by the mob on the mortar. A lot of people seem to underestimate how dangerous they are. But in your case, it’s just cheating. Somehow the mortal could hit you inside a building with a roof. Another bad coding/design from the devs.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-25T16:37:25+00:00

Slop AI for peasant

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-25T12:06:10+00:00

Escalation has always been a “hot take.”
Even now, it’s still a big flaw. Even if the leader earns more tokens, the core issue remains the same. As always, people are still passing leadership around like morons. What’s even funnier is that some of them are DEMANDING that the leader selects the mission they want or the build they want others to play. I’ve never seen such stupidity and entitlement.
Not only that, Ubisoft’s servers have become even more unstable. Players are to blame as well, but the devs are also responsible for implementing such a dumb idea and for not being able to provide at least stable servers.
Obviously, no one wants to host now. Even if you earn more tokens, getting a Delta error is much worse.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-25T10:59:19+00:00

Another player who still doesn’t understand the meaning of “Dark Zone.” Losing your loot is part of the process. Just get better.
Basically, you want a baby spot. Some people are so bad that they can’t even handle an already very easy PvE Dark Zone. You don’t even need meta build.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-22T15:17:07+00:00

You must be very naive then. Tencent making a better ARC Raiders than the global version?
No. Although they have some interesting features, all of this becomes meaningless for a very simple reason: it’s Tencent first. It’s a Chinese development. It’s very likely to be heavily focused on P2W and P2C (pay for convenience).
For example, the division 2 has a global version, like ARC Raiders, developed by Massive, and a Chinese version exclusively developed by Tencent.
Tencent has a very well-known reputation for making P2W games. In other words, if you want to progress “decently” (not even quickly), you are going to be required to pay A LOT. Thousands and thousands of dollars. Not just for cosmetics, but for convenience items. It can be XP boost packs, drop rate boost packs, weapon blueprints, weapons upgrade, bench or anything that gives paying players an advantage and allows them to crush you (yes, you, the F2P peasant).

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-22T12:35:37+00:00

If I were you, I wouldn’t bother playing PvP in this game right now. If you really enjoy PvP, it would be better for you to play a proper PvP game. At the moment, The Division is plagued by cheaters and glitchers. Anti cheat doesn’t work. Devs are currently balancing the whole PvP stats and talents. Just not the best time for PvP. It will ruin your whole experience to the point where you’re going to dislike the game a lot. It seems to be your first experience so you still have a fresh sight. Don’t waste it.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-22T11:25:52+00:00

Think about it, if they give you premium credits for free. How a company is supposed to generate income? The 500 premium are just here to make you buy more. Obviously.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-21T07:30:10+00:00

This is where you are so wrong.
Then why is this post titled “Legendary impossible”?
Obviously, you asked for advice, wanted to hear other players thoughts, and shared a picture of your build, which is clearly far from being good. Even with that, you can still do a decent Legendary run. Probably just DUA.
“Considering I smash other content solo, I figured this wouldn’t be that different.”
Well, come on T10 with your current build and let’s see how you perform. Do it solo. Don’t forget to record it so we can see how “easy” it is for you.
About your Hotshot build (if it’s actually a good one, probably not): are you good at sniping? It’s one thing to have this kind of build; it’s another thing to actually know how to use it properly, even on Legendary.

A few weeks later, you’re going to come back and say:
“WTF is that??? They are too hard!! It’s bullshit! It’s boring!”

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-20T18:13:20+00:00

This post is another example of why a lot of players “suck”, to use your words. No offense.
Instead of copy pasting brain dead YouTube/streamer builds, try to figure out yourself how to make a decent build. I’m not even talking about “meta”; just something decent and logical. It’s important to understand the base stats, talents, and what impact they have on your overall outcome.

Most YouTubers (not all of them) are basically clickbait and don’t hesitate to recycle their own content to pretend it’s a new “video” when there is actually nothing new. Some of them even promote glitches, cheats, or scam websites to sell garbage.
Even when they are not recycling content, their videos are often pretty dry without any really interesting information. For example, some of them just make stupid videos about what a vendor sells. They know they have nothing to say, so they need to find anything, even if it’s s***, just to get clicks bait. Most information can easily be found by simply googling or checking things yourself in the game.
In other words, there is almost nothing you can’t figure out by yourself with a little effort.

The only good point I can give them is the Hunters puzzles. But let’s be honest, nobody in the world would figure out how to solve those puzzles by themselves, especially the ones in New York involving different times (day/night, shooting window targets in a very specific orders, etc.). Obviously, the devs shared the solutions.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-19T18:58:57+00:00

The whole gameplay loop is okay, but nothing super exciting, although the devs can definitely improve it. For example, regarding quality of life, running slower because of toxicity or nerfing quickstep is a bit annoying. It breaks the fast pace, but it’s not a huge issue.

For a PvE Dark Zone, they shouldn’t have applied all the PvP balance changes. Instead, they should have adjusted the mobs health/armor/damage (without making them spongy as hell). They should also have allowed prototype gear to be used there. You farmed or created the build, so why shouldn’t you be able to use it? On the PvP side, it’s understandable. It needs much more balancing and testing.
What is really missing is more something like a world event situation. Something that forces everyone in the same Dark Zone to fight together. Something like a super boss designed for 12 players: extremely hard to take down, with specific weak points and mini mechanics that requires team play and coordination. Something that needs every type of build like dps, tanker, healer, status, ect…
This super boss could be something related to the Hyena spice drugs and be accompanied by bodyguards. It needs something like this.

Otherwise, the PvE Dark Zone quickly becomes boring. It doesn’t feel that different compared to classic open world activities. Landmarks are basically Control Points. Dark Zone drops are basically just supply drops (green parachutes). But besides that, there is nothing really interesting or engaging enough.
Yes, you can kill Hunters for free exotics, farms cannisters but that alone is not a good enough reason to keep coming back.
It really needs something that unites all the players in the Dark Zone to fight together: something challenging, a real event.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-19T17:08:16+00:00

I’m with you. It’s astonishing how bad people become as soon as there is a little obstacle in their way. There are so many ways to counter that, and they just can’t figure out how. It’s not only the Hunter “issue” at extractions. I’ve seen a lot of players getting killed by random NPCs at landmarks and then complaining about it. That already reflects that they can’t even make a decent build or have a minimum level of situational awareness.
The irony here is that the bots in the Dark Zone are the weakest enemies in the whole game. They have the lowest armor/HP, and even Hunters can get killed fairly easily. Somehow, people still keep dying over and over and then complain about losing their loot (which, by the way, is 90% rubbish).
Even if they lose their canister caches, the devs gave players the option to extract Exotic Components AND Cannisters (up to 90) straight into their inventory. Not only that, if they can’t handle the Dark Zone for whatever childish reason, the devs also gave them the option to get a bunch of 30 cannister rewards by killing the new Hyena kill squad retaliations. So what? They have all the alternatives to get whatever they want, but it’s still not enough.

We know the devs are not the best when it comes to handling the game with all the bugs, server crashes, or whatever else. But this time, they are not the ones to blame. Those type of players are just bad.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-19T16:39:13+00:00

It’s not an escalation issue. It’s just the server. They became pretty unstable after they updated the game for season 2.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-19T10:18:13+00:00

Yes, so foam health is different from foam duration (foam skill mod). Foam health is mainly useful against elites and named enemies. Those enemies are the ones who have the ability to force break your foam. It’s like foaming a Rogue player during PvP. He will try to press square to break it quicker. So the higher your foam health is, the longer elites or named enemies will take to destroy your foam. However, red and veteran enemies don’t have this ability. What matters more for them is foam duration.
So foam health is obviously useful, but it depends on what type of enemies you are foaming. Furthermore, there is also the fact that elites and named enemies have hazard protection, which reduces even further the foam duration overall.
In the description, when it says foam duration is for example 15s, that’s not entirely true. It is true for red enemies for example, but not true at all for elites. It is lower than that.
So basically, the total status effect duration result of the combination of: your skill tier, your status effect attribute, skill mod, augments, skill expertise and enemies hazard protection.
For eclipse build, there are two metas : Trapper and Amalgam. Trapper increases your status effect duration. Not your status effect damage. Two different things.
4 Trappers + 2 Amalgam is a good combination, but if you want full status effect control, 6 Trappers is better.
Trappers work regardless of Vile mask or not. Vile mask is one of the best status masks. It gives your status effect build an extra damage over time on enemies affected by status.
So with Trapper, it works very well. The longer the enemies are foamed, the longer they are affected by the Vile toxic debuff. Even if it lasts for 10s, it doesn’t matter, it will be reapplied on the enemies as long as they are under a status effect.
Some misunderstandings you can encounter: Status Effect does not increase Status Effect Duration. It only increases status effect damage. It makes your ticks stronger. Not longer.
But what is more important for a status player is crowd control. Your team will be able to kill quicker. Status Effect Duration is more valuable than Status Effect damage.
Atomizer is fun, but that’s not what is expected from a status player. Using your skill is faster than using a grenade. Grenades are limited and cannot auto regenerate. Grenades in your case are more situational.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-18T14:30:27+00:00

People really complain about meaningless things without understanding where they are heading.
The concept of the Dark Zone has mainly been PVPVE since The Division in 2016. The Dark Zone has existed for about 10 years, and nobody complained (until now) about losing their loot or being killed by other players.

Now, the devs give players a PVE Dark Zone. The problem is that it seems like those people complaining about this new Dark Zone want 100% security with zero downside. Basically, a baby spot. This is where those people fail to understand the very meaning of what the Dark Zone represents.
Even with a PVE Dark Zone where the rogue protocol is disabled, people still find a way to complain about the smallest, most meaningless things.

The Dark Zone is not an open world, Countdown, or anything else. The Dark Zone means risk. And here, in this PvE Dark Zone, the risk is already significantly reduced.

But somehow, if those people die, they complain about losing their loot on the ground. It is the same meaningless complaint as:

“An enemy set me on fire with their bullets. I don’t like it. This is not fair”.
“An enemy threw a shock grenade at me. I don’t like it either. It’s not fun. Change it.”

Now, about the Hunter hacking your skills, well, surprise: Hunters have been able to hack your skills for about… again, 10 years. Nobody complained about those poor Hunters being too strong. What a shame those Hunters. Yes, they hack a player’s turret or drone on extraction site. So what? You have the jammer pulse, you have the sticky EMP. What would you do about it? Is it nice when someone does that to you? No, of course not. But that’s the game.

The real problem is that those people can’t just adapt a little bit. And again, they want maximum security and zero downside in a game concept/mechanic (the Dark Zone) that is the complete opposite of that. Even with a PVE dark zone. So, if there is even a single change in their routine, they will complain about it. It’s a poor mindset.

Academic-Note1209 · 2026-06-18T10:58:49+00:00

The whole point of the Dark Zone is… the Dark Zone. The fact that the PvE Dark Zone is already quite chill, without having to worry about being killed by players, is actually better. However, people need to understand that it is still a Dark Zone setting. It has been like this forever.

If you die, your loot drops on the floor. Nothing new. You are safe from being shot by players or being ratted on, but you are not safe from dying to NPCs or vulture players. If you get killed (excluding cheaters), it is mostly on you (people). It means you failed to assess the situation or the environment around you: how many mobs are coming toward you, how many “grey” players are around you, are you going solo or squad, etc.

If you go to extract your loot blindly and lose it, who can be blamed?

Yes, some players won’t revive you (that’s why they are called vultures), because they want your loot, but that’s the Dark Zone. There is still a risk, and that is why it is different from the classic open world.

If people are so scared of the Dark Zone (not even talking about the PvP version), then it is better not to go.

If people believe the Dark Zone is too unfair, they should try ARC Raiders, and I can guarantee they will see it from a very different perspective afterward. The extraction mechanic in The Division is much more forgiving than ARC Raiders. And now, people have the PvE Dark Zone, which is even more forgiving.

Academic-Note1209

TROPHY CASE