Dark Zone Stories

[Innocent_Bystander]

the dark zone is a harsh place to run solo, you get punished for being a loner. As crazy as it sounds I feel safer in dz 05/06 because agents up there mostly just want to pick up loot and extract and fight the NPC's. I find that if you are solo in the lower zones there are always a group of 200+ gear score agents just running around terrorising the less geared players. I don't like putting faith in PUGs as they could just send you rogue when you don't want to be and then you have to deal with that sh*t

I generally run/hide and trust no one in the DZ, but I was so tired of running that day! Thanks for the tip .. I never really felt confident about roaming zones 05/06 but I'll give it a go tonight in the hope of picking up some high end loot without being set upon too often by gangs of a-holes! 

 

[MurphDog6]

Would highly recommend using pulse when running solo in dz 05/06 too. You will want to pop your pulse at the landmarks (for example the pit) and locate the named boss. If there are other agents there then your 1st action should be to lay some bullets into the boss. Doing this will ensure you get the high end drop. If you don't do it this way by time you fight through the NPC's the boss may already be dead and you miss the drop. Doing this has worked okay for me and most of the time you get an invite from a group. But also be careful, some agents in groups don't like solo players joining in when they are clearing landmarks so just keep your wits about you and have survivor link ready Incase things turn sour.

 

[RimBlock]

So a bit of a strange one a couple of nights ago.

I convinced my son to join me in the DZ as I needed to kill some Rikers for the weekly challenge.

We ran around a bit but it was fairly dead with odd rouge signs popping up every now and then.   We found nothing particularly good loot wise and no AI under level 32 (a little hard for the two of us at the moment) so we went tot he library to wait for a respawn.

After killing the named machine gunner boss there, he dropped an ok gold and so with the other blues and purples we had picked up along the way we decided we may as well extract.  Every guy and his dog seemed to be extracting at any extraction site we headed for though.....

We decided to run to the right side mid point extraction zone when we got the airdrop warning.  We ignored it and moved off the road into a shop to cur through when 6 or 7 Rikers came charging past us (ignoring us).  We then discovered the air drop was on the road right behind.  So we took cover in the shop and fired through the windows as two teams of AI attacked each other.  

After killing them and deconstructing some blues, we collected the gold from the Riker boss and the airdrop having all fingers and toes crossed at the time (first air drop). After the claim, we turned to run back to the shop and saw a couple of players coming towards us.  We just ran past them thinking they would just move on, good sportsmanship and the like what, what.... but they just opened up into our backs and killed us both.  Strangely they had the decentcy to leave our stuff.  Not sure what was in the supply crate but the golds were still there so we picked up and carried on.

We found an extraction point and extracted then went back looking for some more Rikers to kill.  Along the way, somehow gathered a posse of 3 Chinese guys (they have open voice coms).  Whilst a little irritating, they were doing no harm and fighting the AI with us so we just ignored them.  My son speaks some Mandarin and would comment on what they were saying every now and then.  We killed a few bosses in the mid DZ levels and had enough to extract so ended up going to the L1 DZ extraction on the right hand side by the gas station.

Clearly with these 3 hanging around we were very cautious and stayed in cover / behind them as much as possible but the extraction went off without a hitch.  After the extraction things changed though.  Whilst we were standing around thinking about where to go next, my son told me they were saying what a cool dude I was.  I smiled just as the first SMG bullets tore in to my agents back and they killed us both from behind.  My son then admitted his mandarin is not great and he may have difficulty understanding everything they said  :1_grinning: .

Anyway, we respawned and killed a few more Rikers, completed the weekly and then left for the night.

One thing I did feel though was that if someone killed my agent then I really didn't care anymore.  There was no real loot I found I wanted to keep for more than material parts and I could just grab that again anyway.  That realisation was a little sad TBH.

 

[Xeromaus]

@RimBlock: Nothing ever goes well when you're in a group running the DZ and another player or group starts just tagging along. Either your group or theirs ALWAYS gets shot at some point, whether intended or not, and someone becomes a (often unwilling) rogue.

Don't be sad though, we've all reached that point of "oh well, at least they waited" at some time or another lol.

 

[RimBlock]

@RimBlock: Nothing ever goes well when you're in a group running the DZ and another player or group starts just tagging along. Either your group or theirs ALWAYS gets shot at some point, whether intended or not, and someone becomes a (often unwilling) rogue.

Don't be sad though, we've all reached that point of "oh well, at least they waited" at some time or another lol.

Yeah.  Bit hard to get rid of them though without logging off and on again.  Tried going up and down ropes / round and through buildings :10_wink: .

The sadness is more due to the fact the loot is currently so poor compared to what I have so if my agent gets killed it has become kinda like 'Meh, whatever'.  I am only at a GS of 160 so that should really not be the case.  I am loosing the connection with the character and caring if they live or die.  

 

[Xeromaus]

Yeah.  Bit hard to get rid of them though without logging off and on again.  Tried going up and down ropes / round and through buildings.

The sadness is more due to the fact the loot is currently so poor compared to what I have so if my agent gets killed it has become kinda like 'Meh, whatever'.  I am only at a GS of 160 so that should really not be the case.  I am loosing the connection with the character and caring if they live or die.  

Losing tag-a-longs is easiest through a safehouse. Enter through one door, leave through another after a minute or two.

If you're in the 160 bracket, I'd imagine the loot is lower than whats dropping in the 161+ DZ bracket (though I was past that GS when brackets began to exist). Alternately, running challenge mode PvE content should give you much better drops, and currency to spend on even better ones.

 

[RimBlock]

Sorta going off-topic so have created another thread here to continue receiving great advise  :12_slight_smile: .

 

[RimBlock]

Back on topic.

Had a fun time trying to complete the dailies with Oh-Daesu the other day.  The task was to kill 10 or so LMB.  So we went to The Pit to find 3 or 4 other squads all loitering around waiting to complete the same daily task  :1_grinning: .  I think they really should make the dailies a little different for each player.  Spread them out a bit.

Extracting on my own from the extraction zone by the gas station was great.  I had AI spawn in and attack me from the front, left and behind all at the same time and there was no one else around to help.  trying to keep total situational awareness was a nightmare.  Kill one at the front and one will pop around the tent behind me then kill them and two more come from the gas station.  My gun-fu was strong for that extraction  :10_wink: .  Very hectic but great fun.  The MP7 was a massive help.  Wish I would have video'd it....

 

[donny the dealer]

bit off topic

fellas we have started a group for all our division Australia agents who want to just join a group for general discussions, shit talking, sharing your build and all that good shit just send us a join request and thats that https://www.facebook.com/groups/274462256224588/ 

 

[Tinkkz]

Back on topic.

Had a fun time trying to complete the dailies with Oh-Daesu the other day.  The task was to kill 10 or so LMB.  So we went to The Pit to find 3 or 4 other squads all loitering around waiting to complete the same daily task  :1_grinning: .  I think they really should make the dailies a little different for each player.  Spread them out a bit.

Extracting on my own from the extraction zone by the gas station was great.  I had AI spawn in and attack me from the front, left and behind all at the same time and there was no one else around to help.  trying to keep total situational awareness was a nightmare.  Kill one at the front and one will pop around the tent behind me then kill them and two more come from the gas station.  My gun-fu was strong for that extraction  :10_wink: .  Very hectic but great fun.  The MP7 was a massive help.  Wish I would have video'd it....

You say gunfu, all I can think about is gun kata, or like someone using unarmed guns as a weapon mixed with martial arts. Applying that to the division is a funny mental picture ?

 

[Xeromaus]

You say gunfu, all I can think about is gun kata, or like someone using unarmed guns as a weapon mixed with martial arts. Applying that to the division is a funny mental picture ?

OMG...a tank set inspired by Equilibrium...I'd never get new gear again!

 

[Tinkkz]

OMG...a tank set inspired by Equilibrium...I'd never get new gear again!

I'm dead  :8_laughing:

 

[RimBlock]

You say gunfu, all I can think about is gun kata, or like someone using unarmed guns as a weapon mixed with martial arts. Applying that to the division is a funny mental picture ?

Mission accomplished  :10_wink: .  I swear it felt like that..... front, back, side, side, front, front, dodge,dip, duck, dive, dodge, front, front, front, back ..........  Having a small mouse pad didn't help...  Time to clear my desk I think and get a bigger one.

 

[g1nt3r]

OMG...a tank set inspired by Equilibrium...I'd never get new gear again!

lol omg that movie... I love when they like fight with guns, I mean like hand to hand but with guns.

 

[RimBlock]

I suspect this is not meant to be my day to day personal DZ encounters blog so please lets hear some other peoples stories  :12_slight_smile: .

With that said....  :1_grinning: .

The night of the Aussies.....

Jumped on last night and did the dailies PvE and then went solo in the Dark Zone.  As usual, lots of stuff already cleared out even though there didn't seem to be that many players on-line.  As I am just trying to get over lvl 50 (currently 47) I was happy enough to wander solo and shoot the AI I found in DZ 1-3.  I got a couple of golds (ACOG sight and heavy spring mag) and just picked up blues and purples for crafting materials.  Extracted a couple of times but on the second one, a team of 3 shot me as I was loading the extraction rope.  Seriously, talk about no hope of loosing for them  :12_slight_smile: .  Presumably they enjoyed the two blues and one purple I dropped publicly for them  :1_grinning: .   On respawn, @Oh. daesu hooked up and we ran back, I was hoping to catch and take revenge on them, but they were gone and another 4 person team was there.  Had no issues with them but some lone wanderer came in and went rogue on all 6 of us.  He was hiding in one of the containers and so despite our best efforts, got away down the rope behind but failed to kill anyone.

So we went farming.  Up to The Pit for the weekly LMB tally.  Cleared it once and then encountered, by chance, two rogues in the underground mall by the Pit.  We were destroyed by them in a few seconds although we did get the leader down to 50% health.  The leaders name...... "The Aussie" (possibly with some numbers / characters after it).  The rogues were on a manhunt in the area we wanted to farm in so we skipped servers and continued.

Back to The Pit and someone (not pointing any fingers  :10_wink: ) shot the other agent by accident around and we went rogue.  Luckily it was only for a very short time and the other guy was fine as we did not continue shooting.  So fine in fact that we all teamed up, did a couple of gold runs, extracted and then he left.  As luck would have it, another guy from the land of the wallabies was also extracting and we teamed up with him and then gained another Aussie on the way so we had a 3 Aussie team and me.     

The other two new team mates were level 200+ and just were on a run and gun cycle.  Picked up a few more golds but found myself in a bit of a sticky situation when I got a bit behind as they were just going after bosses and chests and leaving the wandering groups alone if they were not in the way.  I round a corner running hard to see a group of lvl 32 cleaners in front and know I have to quickly find a door off the corridor I am now in to follow the group or be cut-off.  Please remember, at my current equipment level, a full clip from my MP7 is unlikely to take down one lvl 32 AI and there are 4+ in front of me pretty close.  Somehow, on fire I manage to make it through the door and the team finish off the pursuers.

Well after a couple of cycles of trying to keep up, we finally go to extract.  I have around 5 golds from lvl 32 bosses so am feeling quite good until the extraction is called and I get the 'your stash is full - unable to extract message'.  Damn all you blue and purple items I extracted earlier.....  I had to deconstruct 4/5 items but, to be fair only one was anywhere near what I had already.  

We extracted and then separated and I cleared my stash......

Results of the night ?.

GS 182 holster which is better than the GS 163 I had but only had 3 stats and not 4 so I lost 500 health to get my GS up and everything else ended up getting deconstructed as I had better already.  I used the Phoenix credits to get a Storm GS 182 BP and then just crafted one to get rid of my GS131 pistol and so my GS has jumped although I feel my actual stats and abilities have dropped.  Guess we will have to so what happens next time  :10_wink: .

So come on ladies and gentlemen.  The only way this thread is not going to get filled up by only me is with others joining in.  Post up your encounters.  Would be great if 'The Aussie' was on here to post from his side at completely destroying us  :1_grinning: .

Happy hunting.

 

[Xeromaus]

So come on ladies and gentlemen.  The only way this thread is not going to get filled up by only me is with others joining in.  Post up your encounters.  Would be great if 'The Aussie' was on here to post from his side at completely destroying us  :1_grinning: .

Happy hunting.

I would LOVE to post stories here, but we only ever experience the same two:

1. We ran into the DZ and wrecked everything on a fast cycle to 30/30 stash, then emptied it and went back for more.

or

2. We ran into the DZ, then were accosted by a 4 man squad that, for whatever reason, we had no hope of competing with (*coughcoughcoughhackerscheatersglitcherscoughcough*).... so we changed phases, and resumed story 1.

We're kinda boring over at clan Believe The Hype. We just shoot the breeze, faceroll over NPCS, and gain loot. Doesn't make for a good read.

 

[RimBlock]

Just a short one (yes I hear the cheering from the back of the room)  :10_wink: .

Rogue-slapped - and not in a good way....

Worked a bit on the lower DZs  last night solo and generally transitioned between the lower left subway and the library in order to get my DZ level up.  Al was good, took out some groups coming from different sides at the same time  and had some cleaners spawn with me in the middle at one point but managed to survive.  Had seen a few players around, mainly solo or in twos and so decided to see if one I encountered wanted to team up.  Sent the guy ("Raven" a join request and he shot me in the face..... Turns out he was level 97 and was running with someone else I had not seen.  No big deal, your bound to run in to an a-hat every now and then.  Respawned and went to the library.  Saw two players up on the roof and hear them talking (Russian would be my guess) so gave them a 'Hi guys' from the bottom of the rope.  They come down and guess who is in front of me.  Yep. Same guy, same reaction.  Double a-hat.

At that point, with lvl 97 guys running around the server shooting anyone I jumped to another server.

With a bit more confidence, I decided to move further up to the lvl 31 guys.  Did some running around and then decided to go to the parking lot extraction as it was AI populated and I could get some more XP.  climbed up the front-right rope and hid by the open container.  Started shooting and got grenade spammed to oblivion.  4+ grenades all landing around me at once.  Respawned, collected my stuff (only one AI left for some reason) and extracted before moving on.  Not wanted to be trapped in the mid level tunnels I went to the plaza just above the big oval extraction site, checked for AI placement to make sure I was fairly safe and started working my way through each AI with my marksman rifle.  Spot another player jump the barrier I am hiding behind and go rushing in and then boom, dead again.  Their partner decided to kill me from behind.  Different players this time I think but again, lvl 90+.

Did a bit more farming after respawning at the lower DZ levels again and got some crappy gold but hey, crafting materials.  Got the xp up a bit as well so should go up to lvl 48 tonight.  

Not the best time but hey, ups and downs.  Maybe it will be a bit better when the new patch hits and the high GS guys get pushed in to another category :1_grinning: .

 

[RimBlock]

Yep, worst night so far but more for the pointlessness of the lvl 90+ players killing my agent.  The XP would be tiny for their level, DZ keys are pretty easy to get, the cash would be tiny also so it seems to be done out of boredom or a power trip.  I actually laughed when I saw the same lvl 97 guy at the bottom of the rope before he killed me a second time in 5 minutes :8_laughing: .

'Need to get a bigger gun'  :1_grinning: .  I can craft a M44 GS182, I just find it a bit slow, even with a RoF mod.  I am very much bottom of the GS 182 level equipment wise it seems (give or take the mp7) so a bit more PvE challenging mission match making I guess.

Wish we knew when the patch was due (a rough idea at least) as there is a feeling that all the time and effort going in now maybe wasted depending on the changes they bring in.

 

[ThePassionateGamer]

Just yesterday we went into the DZ with a 4-agent-group and we were busy doing nice boss/DZ-chest runs in DZ 5-6 and extracting loot till our stash was full. As we neared the end of our DZ loot hunt, we came across a rogue group of 3 who already all had a manhunt going. We were unsure if we should engage them or not with our DZ bags half full of HE loot and no bad luck on that day till that point one of us finaly went into the building poped his survival link and ran up the escalator to engage the rogues. Since we started to fire upon them from below and out of cover they took cover aswell and did not manage to concentrate fire on one of us so they just manage to scratch us a little while we stormed their position. We managed to kill 2 of them and then began to hunt the last one down. It took us halfway through the DZ before we managed to catch up with him. Just before we got him one of his dead friends managed to take one of us down from behind before I could kill him a 2nd time...then we finaly caught up with the last guy.

Felt incredible good to finaly get some kills back on those rogue agents that usually bother me each time I visit a DZ. :10_wink:

 

[RimBlock]

Nice one.  

Last night was unexpectedly enjoyable, even if my loot bag was pretty empty.

I wont bore you with the pairing up with two others and trying to cycle the DZ 5/6 only to find other squads blasting through cycling so we ended up hiding, running or just finding everything gone but two of us had a go at the Russian Consulate on challenging with the hope of getting a better weapon for myself (I seem to be on low borderline GS182 at the moment).

We teamed up with two others with matchmaking so have GS's of 200, 200, 190 and me at just 180 or so.  

We stormed in and almost all died in the first wave  :8_laughing: .  Playing a supporting role, luckily I was able to use the support station to revive others who could then revive others and so we were back up again.  Man it is hard in that mission.  We worked our way through but succumbed around the safe room.  After a couple of attempts the other we made it to the final courtyard but one team member bugged out leaving us with 3.  Those 4 shotgunners just ripped us apart and after a couple of attempts the second match made team member also bugged out but we continued at it.  We found that using the seeker mines and liberal use of support stations, we could lure one or two of the shot gunners down through the saferoom and in to the library where we had a better chance to pick them off.   Voice coms really helped coordinate and sometimes my cold dead body gave me a great vantage point to give 'insider info' to my team mate before he could come back and revive me.  We even got down to only having the final boss to kill at one point (Hornet) but a couple of mistakes later and lots of his seeker mines mashing us and we went down for the final time.  I don't know how long we had been working at this mission with just the two of us but by the end we agreed to get some more guys and try again.  We failed this time two and the other match making guys bugged out again.  I finally had to call it quits for the night to discover it was now 1:30am and I had work the next day. 

It was not particularly sucessfull but it was great fun.