The Division PTS 1.8 Update Goes Live with New Changes

Players of The Division can get a look at the next round of updates for the game, thanks to the release of the PTS 1.8 update to The Division across all platforms. The patch is available now for users to check out, providing that they have access to the PTS servers, including those on console alongside the Friday release of the PTS update to PC players.

Included within the update are some tweaks that The Division players will no doubt be glad to see. In terms of general tweaks on 1.8, player turn speed has been improved, while the amount of D-Tech available has been increased through the deconstruction of gear and weapons, as well as through various caches and through clearing Landmarks.

Of course, the most exciting additions coming through the 1.8 update are the two extra gameplay modes, with one co-operative and one competitive mode being brought to the multiplayer title. The full release of the update is currently scheduled for this fall for all platforms.

Although it's been some time since The Division's release, Massive Entertainment and Ubisoft have been trying to keep the community going through the release of updates and attempts to both entice new players into the game and coax lapsed players back to the fold. One such example was The Division's free to play PC weekend that hit last month, attempting to show people what they were missing out on.

It will certainly help that the PTS is now available to console gamers, albeit in a less open way than it is for PC. However, allowing console users will no doubt help Massive Entertainment get a better grasp over what works and what doesn't work for the game, as the developer aims to keep the community happy for the foreseeable future.

Here's a rundown of the full PTS 1.8 update:

Gameplay

Deconstructing High End gear, High End weapons, Gear Set items, Classified Gear Sets, Exotic armor and weapons now have a chance to reward D-Tech.
West Side Pier Alerts, Resistance caches, assignment caches and clearing Landmarks now reward D-tech. The amount of D-tech in Dark Zone D-tech crates has been increased.
Six new restock crates have been added to the West Side Pier areas.
The amount of time between West Side Pier alerts have been increased.
The player turn speed has been increased slightly.
Fixed an issue where after an item was optimized the increased stats would not be properly applied.
Issues with the Hunter’s Faith 4-piece bonus damage not reaching higher amounts of stacks with high RPM weapons have been fixed.
Fixed a bug where players could fire quicker than intended with any Bolt Action rifle.

Rogue 2.0

The key binding for Go Rogue is no longer called Use Medkit in the key binding menu.
Go Rogue now has a default key binding. Shift+R for right hand users, Shift+U for left hand.
Fixed a potential exploit where players would use the Cut the Rope functionality to level up their Manhunt status and get Manhunt caches much faster than intended.
Fixed an issue where a non-Rogue player could use melee on a downed player to kill them without having to toggle on Rogue first.
Fixed an issue where a non-Rogue player would not receive a pop-up to accept a Manhunt mission.
Fixed an issue where non-Rogue players would not receive any optional objective to intercept a Manhunt, even if they were in a 200 meters, or less, radius from the Manhunt objective.
Fixed an issue where players on a Manhunt did not see the Pulse outline of non-Rogue players within a 50-meter radius.

Skirmish

Fixed an issue where the UI in Skirmish would reference Last Stand.
Fixed a bug where a player would get stuck on the Skirmish loading screen.
Fixed a bug where a player joining a Skirmish match already in progress couldn’t join the match unless a certain amount of time had passed.
Fixed a rare bug in Skirmish where a player could spawn in at the enemy’s spawn points.
Fixed a bug where a player in combat could accept a Skirmish invite.
Fixed a bug where the Last Stand introduction would play at the start of a Skirmish match.
The rewards for reaching PvP rank 40-99 have been tuned.
Fixed an issue where the Personal Best Score in Skirmish would not update and would remain at zero.

Optimization

Players will no longer be able to share weapons and gear that have been optimized at the Optimization Station.

Classified Gear Sets

Fixed a potential exploit where players could use the Banshee’s Shadow Gear Set to replenish ammunition anywhere in the Dark Zone.
The wording on the D3-FNC 6-piece bonus has been clarified.
Path of the Nomad 6-piece talent has been changed:AlphaBridge
- Set Bonus (5 pieces):
  - +25% Health Regen
  - +10% Weapon Damage
- Set Bonus (6 pieces):
- Talent: Improved AlphaBridge
  - Inactive personal versions of all Signature Skills are rotating every 6 seconds and can be activated by killing enemy players of Veteran/Elite NPCs. The Signature Skills that is up on rotation when an enemy is killed is activated for 10 seconds when all Primary Stats are balanced between each other. These times are shortened depending on the difference in the ranges of your Primary Attributes. You can no longer activate Signature Skills or be affected by Ally Signature Skills.
Tactician’s Authority
Set Bonus (5 pieces):
- +5% Skill Haste
- +5% Skill Power
Set Bonus (6 pieces):
Talent: Improved Tactician’s Authority
- Using a skill while at the max bonus will reset the skill power buff but will raise the cap to 60%. Using a different skill at 60% has a 50% chance to set the buff power back to 30% and to keep the cap at 60%. This chance is increased by 10% for every 2000 Electronics.

Talent: Nomad’s Luck
- 50% chance to have no cooldown for Path of the Nomad. Take 60% less damage for 10 seconds after Path of the Nomad is triggered.

FireCrest 5 and 6-piece bonuses have been changed:
- Set Bonus (5 pieces):
  - +1 Incendiary Grenade Capacity
  - +5% Flame Turret Range
  - +10% Flame Turret Damage
- Set Bonus (6 pieces):
- Talent: Improved FireCrest
  - Bullets have a 2% chance to cause an enemy to burn. Burning targets can cause a fiery explosion when killed by bullets once every 10 seconds. NPCs set on fire by your flame turret will burn 25% longer for every 2000 Electronics.

Exotic Weapons

A special Exotic Cache that contains the new Exotic weapons has been added to the Special Equipment Vendor for the PTS. Note that this will cache not be added to the Live game.
Fixed a bug where the swap bonus from Devil to Heel would not activate.
The Devil exotic weapon now has its own buff icon.
Big Alejandro’s damage has been lowered.
Big Alejandro’s stacks will only increase when shooting near a target.

Gear