‘The Division 2’ Reveals Massive, Paid ‘Warlords Of New York’ Expansion – Forbes

I have recently wondered about what it was going to take to bring me back to The Division 2 again, as small seasonal updates and raids weren’t getting the job done. Little did I know that a bunch of journalists and influencers (who were not me) were invited to San Francisco for a preview event for the next phase of The Division 2 that sounds like it’s going to be just the trick.

The Division 2 will be rolling out a huge, paid expansion called Warlords of New York, a break from both its free content model in year one, and also from its Washington DC setting, returning players to the original city from the first game.

The storyline seems to be like a miniature, condensed version of The Division 1. We are headed back to Lower Manhattan to hunt down rogue Division agent Aaron Keener. But naturally, he has four lieutenants we have to kill first, each controlling a portion of downtown, with two of them working with the Cleaners and the other two, the Rikers, both old Division 1 factions that will be making a return. But you will also have old allies back to help you like Faye Lau and Paul Rhodes.

I know what you’re thinking, that The Division 2 is just recycling old crap from The Division 1, and yet from everything shown off in the preview, that does not seem to be the case. While back in New York, these are not old zones, as the old map did not reach all the way down to Lower Manhattan which includes the Financial District and Battery Park (where I used to live! I wonder if I can see my place). Past that, though they have one skill brought back from the past, the sticky bomb, there are new ones like the trap and hologram.

This isn’t quite a standalone expansion, you do have to buy it on top of The Division 2 (still looking into price), but Massive is rolling out bundles that will put the base game with the expansion for probably not all that much, if I had to guess. And since The Division 2 lets you create a level 30 character from the start this late in the game, you can jump right into the New York content from the get-go.

Warlords of New York raises the level cap of the game from 30 to 40, meaning that everyone, regardless of playtime, is going to have to farm new gear, so you’re close to the same playing field as everyone else. It seems like Massive has done a ton of work on revamping the inventory system, the UI, the gear stat system and have included things like talent banking where you can pull talents out of gear to use them later. There’s also a new tier system for skills that shows you more clearly how much their power and effectiveness is increased by your gear.

Back in DC, they have revamped the Dark Zones to make going Rogue a bit less complicated, and now you get rewards for helping fellow players too. And the preview ended by showing that Hunters are returning to the game as well, though in what capacity, we’re not quite sure. They may have something to do with the upcoming seasonal model which gives you targets to track down during a specific period of time.

The free Episode 3 of The Division 2 has new story missions and a new specialization and launches on Thursday. It serves as a lead-in to the events of the Warlords of New York expansion which launches a bit later (but still very soon) on March 3.

What do I make of all this? Well, it certainly sounds like something that it will be easy to jump into even though I haven’t played The Division 2 in many months. All the streamlining changes sound solid and I am interested to test out the new skills and systems. I don’t know if this is an update that will get me grinding The Division 2 longer term going forward, but I had no idea something this huge was coming, and I am happy to see Massive putting in so much work here. At the very least, I’m certainly going to buy it and play through the story and as much of the new endgame as I can manage.

Cool to see a huge step forward for the game like this, and this is definitely the level of an update I needed to see in order to jump back in myself.

Follow me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Pre-order my new sci-fi novel Herokiller, and read my first series, The Earthborn Trilogy, which is also on audiobook.

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I have recently wondered about what it was going to take to bring me back to The Division 2 again, as small seasonal updates and raids weren’t getting the job done. Little did I know that a bunch of journalists and influencers (who were not me) were invited to San Francisco for a preview event for the next phase of The Division 2 that sounds like it’s going to be just the trick.

The Division 2 will be rolling out a huge, paid expansion called Warlords of New York, a break from both its free content model in year one, and also from its Washington DC setting, returning players to the original city from the first game.

The storyline seems to be like a miniature, condensed version of The Division 1. We are headed back to Lower Manhattan to hunt down rogue Division agent Aaron Keener. But naturally, he has four lieutenants we have to kill first, each controlling a portion of downtown, with two of them working with the Cleaners and the other two, the Rikers, both old Division 1 factions that will be making a return. But you will also have old allies back to help you like Faye Lau and Paul Rhodes.

I know what you’re thinking, that The Division 2 is just recycling old crap from The Division 1, and yet from everything shown off in the preview, that does not seem to be the case. While back in New York, these are not old zones, as the old map did not reach all the way down to Lower Manhattan which includes the Financial District and Battery Park (where I used to live! I wonder if I can see my place). Past that, though they have one skill brought back from the past, the sticky bomb, there are new ones like the trap and hologram.

This isn’t quite a standalone expansion, you do have to buy it on top of The Division 2 (still looking into price), but Massive is rolling out bundles that will put the base game with the expansion for probably not all that much, if I had to guess. And since The Division 2 lets you create a level 30 character from the start this late in the game, you can jump right into the New York content from the get-go.

Warlords of New York raises the level cap of the game from 30 to 40, meaning that everyone, regardless of playtime, is going to have to farm new gear, so you’re close to the same playing field as everyone else. It seems like Massive has done a ton of work on revamping the inventory system, the UI, the gear stat system and have included things like talent banking where you can pull talents out of gear to use them later. There’s also a new tier system for skills that shows you more clearly how much their power and effectiveness is increased by your gear.

Back in DC, they have revamped the Dark Zones to make going Rogue a bit less complicated, and now you get rewards for helping fellow players too. And the preview ended by showing that Hunters are returning to the game as well, though in what capacity, we’re not quite sure. They may have something to do with the upcoming seasonal model which gives you targets to track down during a specific period of time.

The free Episode 3 of The Division 2 has new story missions and a new specialization and launches on Thursday. It serves as a lead-in to the events of the Warlords of New York expansion which launches a bit later (but still very soon) on March 3.

What do I make of all this? Well, it certainly sounds like something that it will be easy to jump into even though I haven’t played The Division 2 in many months. All the streamlining changes sound solid and I am interested to test out the new skills and systems. I don’t know if this is an update that will get me grinding The Division 2 longer term going forward, but I had no idea something this huge was coming, and I am happy to see Massive putting in so much work here. At the very least, I’m certainly going to buy it and play through the story and as much of the new endgame as I can manage.

Cool to see a huge step forward for the game like this, and this is definitely the level of an update I needed to see in order to jump back in myself.

Follow me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Pre-order my new sci-fi novel Herokiller, and read my first series, The Earthborn Trilogy, which is also on audiobook.