The Division developers wouldn't reveal all of the changes coming with update 1.6 and The Last Stand expansion, but they did say Alpha Bridge is getting a nerf.

Earlier today developer Massive Entertainment gave The Division players their first official look at The Last Stand, the next DLC expansion coming to Ubisoft’s RPG looter-shooter. For those that might not have heard, The Last Stand’s major addition will be a new 8v8 tactical mode that will take place in the Dark Zone.

Alongside the launch of The Last Stand, however, Ubisoft Massive will also release update 1.6 for The Division, which will introduce some changes to the game. Since the focus of today’s announcements was on the DLC expansion, the developers didn’t have too much to say about the update and what it will entail, but they did tease one substantial change: a nerf to the Alpha Bridge gear set.

A nerf for the Alpha Bridge gear set has been a long time coming, and most regular players of The Division knew it was only a matter of time. While there are plenty of viable gear sets in The Division, Alpha Bridge is the cream of the crop thanks to its 4-set gear perk. With it, players can stack 6 weapon talents on a single gun, thereby making it a PvE shredding machine.

Unfortunately, The Division devs wouldn’t say what changes will be made to the Alpha Bridge set, but they did say that the set will still be good. If one were to take a guess, there’s a strong possibility that the Famas will be corrected so players can no longer exploit its unique weapon perk, and it's possible that the health regen percentage on Alpha Bridge will be tweaked as well.

If The Division were to change the 4-set perk on Alpha Bridge, however, it would fundamentally shake up the current meta in the game. Players would likely flock to new sets, perhaps whatever is introduced with The Last Stand DLC.

For now, all we know for sure is that Alpha Bridge is changing, and the changes are likely going to lead to some resistance from the more diehard players. But the good news is that more recent Division patches have had their share of balance – nerfing certain items and buffing others. It’s entirely possible that while Alpha Bridge loses its status as top tier another gear set takes its place.

Division players that are curious about the changes in update 1.6 will be able to see for themselves on PC when the Public Test Server goes live at some point in the future. There they will also be able to try out the new Last Stand mode prior to it going live on all three platforms simultaneously.