The Division 2 Title Update 9.1 Is Finally Here And There's A Lot Of Nerfs

By Jason Nieva @jnievaplayerone Published 05/14/20 EDT

The Division 2 is finally releasing Title Update 9.1. We say finally because it was supposed to be launched last Tuesday, as revealed in this story. However, a decision was made to delay it for a few days in order to make sure that as few hitches as possible were encountered once fully released.

Now that Title Update 9.1 is here, what can players expect? For starters, according to a statement by the developers, the balance changes are meant “to eliminate outliers with NPC weapons, abilities, and behaviors.” Specific fixes have been made to balance these outliers and if additional adjustments are needed, they’re going to be implemented with Title Update 10.

In general, Title Update 9.1 introduces a series of nerfs. However, let’s go over the buffs for a bit. The update hopes to improve the toolkit of the players when it comes to countering NPCs. Changes include:

Buffed Player Skills Survivability:
- Reduced how much damage Player Skills take from NPCs.
Buffed damage of Player Status Effects:
- Increased damage caused to NPCs by Bleed status effect.
- Increased damage caused to NPCs by Poison status effect.
- Increased damage caused to NPCs by Napalm Ensnare status effect.
Buffed In-Cover Blindfire for Players:
- Reduced size of Player's hitbox (against NPCs) when they are in cover and are blindfiring.

The new update also includes Instant Season Level unlocks. This means players can now buy Instant Season Level unlocks with each level for 100 Premium Credits.

Now let’s move on to the nerfs, along with developer comments, because there’s a lot of them. These are:

NPC Status Effects
- Changes:
  - Reduced damage caused to players by Burn status effect.
  - Reduced damage caused to players by Bleed status effect.
- Developer comment:
  - Certain NPC status effects were too strong and the update adjusts the damage they can inflict to players.
  - These changes though also affect the status effect damage when it comes to PvP.
NPC Weapon
- Changes:
  - Reduced damage and out-of-cover accuracy of SMG used by red-bar Hyena Assault.
  - Reduced range of Cleaners Tank's flamethrower.
  - Nerfed Hyena RC Cars:
    - Reduced damage of Hyena RC Car explosion.
    - Reduced duration of lingering ground fire from Elite Hyena RC Car explosion.
    - Reduced duration of Burn/Confuse status effect applied by Elite Hyena RC Car explosion.
    - Reduced how often Hyena RC Cars are deployed.
  - Nerfed Black Tusk Suicide Drones:
    - Reduced damage of Black Tusk Suicide Drone explosion.
    - Reduced how often Black Tusk Suicide Drones are deployed.
  - Fixed issue where NPCs could throw a Firefly variant which did an excessive amount of damage to Players.
- Developer comment:
  - Certain NPC weapons dealt significantly more damage than others. These changes should bring them more in-line with other NPC's damage output capabilities.
NPC Grenade Throw Accuracy
- Changes:
  - Reduced grenade accuracy with distance to target.
  - Reduced accuracy of:
    - Hyena Thrower's Airburst
    - Black Tusk Mini-Tank's Grenade
    - Cleaners Turret's Napalm Airburst.
- Developer comment:
  - It was observed that NPCs were too accurate with their grenades and hopefully with the update each NPC should have an optimal distance when it comes to their grenade accuracy.
    - The further away the NPC's target is the less accurate their grenades will be.
    - The optimal distance varies based on faction and veterancy.
    - However, the distance from target has less of an effect on the accuracy of Elites, Hunters, Rogue Agents and Legendary NPCs.
NPC Blindfire Accuracy
- Changes:
  - Reduced how accurate NPCs are while blindfiring.
  - NPCs no longer blindfire with a Shotgun or Sniper Rifle.
    - NPCs instead switch to a pistol to blindfire with.
  - Tank archetypes no longer blindfire their weapons.
- Developer comment:
  - The NPC Blindfire was found out to be too effective and the changes should lower the damage output while blindfiring.
NPC Ability Nerfs
- Changes:
  - Black Tusk Support Station Tuning:
    - Support Station no longer heals mechanical NPCs (Warhounds, Mini-Tanks, etc).
    - Support Station no longer heals destructible props (which are objects Players must destroy in a mission).
  - Legendary version of Support Station now checks line of sight and has healing cap amounts like normal version.
  - Armor kits no longer completely heal Bounties and other bosses.
    - Hunters still heal completely.
- Developer comment:
  - Some NPCs had healing abilities that were too strong and the update should reduce their strength.