The Division 2 : Solo Player Lessons For The Dark Zone 

Solo play in the Dark Zone requires you to be cunning and ready for anything. Please leave DZ tricks and tips below! Thanks Agents

i have had a 4 man rouge team roll up on my extraction and i just deleted all my items , they were so mad . Guess killing me for zero loot wasn't what they expected to happen . : )

Here’s some tips from a DZ and Occupied DZ runner. Personally, I run as a rogue player in the DZ. I’ve learned that if you see one player, there are ALWAYS more nearby. Watch your back. When clearing landmarks, the landmarks becomes contested, being marked red on the map. Rogues are always on the lookout for these locations and will come after you. If you feel like you’re overwhelmed by the AI, get out of there before the players show up. Extracting, try and get high ground. You can always shoot down past cover and they can’t hit you easily. Sniper? Stay down or use cover-to-cover, grenade, something to make it harder to hit you. If you don’t feel comfortable or you can’t reach the rope, fall back. Those players that use the rifle shields to block your bullets aren’t invincible. They’re just buying themself time. Go for legs, use grenades, status effects. Anything that makes it harder for them to shoot you. Or try an EMP pulse, just a warning, it takes a while to charge, like 8 seconds to reach 15m effectiveness, this one might not be that viable though. If a player being shot at goes into cover, they’re healing, use that as a chance to get away or hit them with whatever you have. If you’re being chased by a team and you can’t meet your best friends Shock and Turret, fund choke points. Staircases, hallways, interiors, ladders, etc. always use them to slow the enemy down. Fire turrets or a few grenades might make them hesitate, or at least stop them from hitting you. Once you put up your deterrent (fire turret, frags, whatever) book it, run. If you feel comfortable engaging them as they funnel in, try it, but it’ll likely result in death without a team. Put some distance between you and the enemy if you decide to hold your ground, cover, always. Never let them get close, players close to you don’t need to worry about missing a shot and typically have the highest rate of fire weapons to melt you. Slow their advance with whatever you have. In Occupied DZs, “rogue” players will not appear as rogue. But they can still shoot you. There isn’t a button to go rogue either, you can always catch their bullets. There are no turrets in the Occupied DZs either. Meaning choke points and path lockdowns are the best ways to put ground between you and them. Again, fire turret or grenades. If you get caught in a DZ that becomes Occupied while you’re inside, you’ll be notified by either helicopter patrols flying over, nearby Checkpoint Turrets being disabled, and an ISAC notification “uplink failing” or “Black Tusk are occupying the Dark Zone.” If you’re comfortable, stay inside, if not, move to another DZ. Alleys are really tight areas, usually only having enough room to fit a single car. This makes an ideal choke point. Use corners, staircases, ladders or ropes to your advantage. Either use them to help the enemy lose sight of you, or set up an ambush. Players are vulnerable while vaulting, climbing, using ropes, and healing with armor kits. Cut off an easy access route with a fire turret and watch them as they climb the wall to chase you. Either pop some shots or fall back, again, whatever slows them down. An isolated enemy is weak. If you find a rogue squad had lost a few guys, be aggressive. For them the tensions are high and mistakes happen easily. Lock down a choke point if they’re chasing you, or if you’re on the hunt, set up an ambush between them and the checkpoint. Rogue runners are nearly always trying to regroup so take them out while they’re separated if possible. Manhunt rogues are very aggressive, already having killed 5 players these guys are no joke, and they’ll always be moving as a group. Other players in the server are likely to chase after these guys, so you’ll have backup. Manhunt rogues are either trying to stay alive as long as possible, or trying to reach SHD terminals. Cut them off before they can reach these terminals if you’ve decided to go hunting. The interaction time on these terminals are around 15s each and there’s usually 3 locations. If a team wants to clear their status, they have to get all 3. The ideal time to engage these guys is when they’re missing a person, so if they reach a terminal, one player has to interact, leaving them down to 3 shooters, and they’ll likely be all close thgether. Grenade the guy on the terminal to delay them or just pop shots their way, they’ll likely stop the hacking and start shooting. If they’re stubborn, grenade. I know this is a very long comment and I covered a lot of basic stuff too. Hopefully this helps anyone who may need it. If you can find friends to play with, do it, the game is always more fun with a team in my opinion. Use these tips and tricks to stack the odds on your favor, even more so if you group up.

For me, I always treat extraction as a joke while doing solo in DZ. I usually fool extraction to lure rogue to come and I move on to the next extraction point. I pull this tricks whenever I need to extract. Sometimes the more is better. They will see a extraction point pops up 5 times and nobody is there. Then they get tired of me so I grab my chance to pull out one extraction that I would really put my stuff in.

That's why I won't go. As long as the loot isn't better in the DZ I'm cool just playing the rest of the game. I get frustrated enough with npc's, I don't need to get mad at real people too...

I am a solo player and I loveeeeee the DZ. The new thieves den/loot stealing mechanic is soooo amazing. I have found it best to mind your own business. If you see a big squad, go the opposite direction, someone getting ganked, use this to sneak around. You mission is loot, and nothing else matters.

I go into the Dark Zone solo every time. Sometimes it can get frustrating if you run into Rogues who KOS but more often then not if you jump in and help a player/group kill some enemies from a Landmark, after the fight you will get an invite to join them. I’ve even revived randoms then afterwards you join up and make a squad. And clearing a Landmark or Supply Drop solo is so satisfying when you make all the right plays. It definitely makes you a better player.

As for me, everytime I go to the DZ and come across other fellow agents, I just salute and wish a good game. Believe it or not, i instantly receive an invitation and we all get a pleasant experience. Like you said...DZ is what it is ❤️

I need a 4 man team to farm with tbh lol tired of running around alone in the dz and getting mugged by 4 man teams who emote on my body like killing me was a difficult task lol

Your point of view about DZ is awesome. Keep up the good work

When extracting don't stay at the zone, retreat a bit away and observe. Sometimes npcs won't spawn. Or you can watch other players.

for people who don’t want to go in you really should, it’s a feeling you aren’t going to have anywhere else on any other game. just don’t let dying to a$$holes get to you & it is a unique experience

Great job man. Honest opinion, sage advice, and user-friendly!!! Wasn't a fan of the DZ in Div 1 but am willing to give it another try here in Div 2 after watching your video. Keep up the great work Agent!!!

Great guide man. I really appreciate the positivity. Cheers!

great vid... short, sweet, well articulated with some very nice tips. thank you sir

Incredibly informative thank you for the help man.

Great vid! Especially regarding the attitude...sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but it's just a video game so have fun.

I barelyeven touch the DZ cause of the bs people do.

Grate video! Very informative and practical. I admit that I took things personally a lot in the first Division.

Great advice. Soloing DZ brings a special level of tension, and it's always hard to find a good crew to run DZ with unless you're already in a clan. The fire turret on extraction was a great idea.

Great video thanks for the information about the dark zone

Say man! Good video. Pleasant a good vibe reminding people its a GAME. chive on man!

That was well informed, Thank You very much for the heads up, Cher Bro

Thanks for the tips man, planning to get into DZ once hit max

Great video. Ive been playing for a year and never knew th hashes on the landmark represent difficultly. Cheers

Great vid and advice! I try and solo it out at least every run

Gamer daddy I do enjoy your videos and builds. Keep up good work.

This was a very well constructed and well said video. Thanks for the advice. Just earned a sub! :D

Some great tips.thanks.

Thanks for the video! I'm also a dad so I can relate to the solo play

Good video and it echoes my opinions about being solo in the Dark Zone. I have to say my experiences have been almost all positive. First time I ventured in after the tutorial mission I was fighting a NPCs and a Boss. Someone was cool enough to help me out and we wound up running around to various Landmarks and clearing them. A couple more peeps joined us and we rolled thick through about 6 Landmarks. I went up 11 levels in about 45 mins ! I branched off to attach my stash onto a helicopter and I noticed almost all the people I was with turned Rogue (I saw the blurbs on the screen at the bottom). I high-tailed it out of Dodge ! Bottom line: Have fun but trust NO ONE !

There's a lot of different ways to play the dark zone. I enjoy setting up ambushes for npcs and rogues! When you play at night irl or in game I always get an eerie haunted feeling when I'm there and I love it! True solo here

Clear the DZ landmarks outside the checkpoints; for SHD points. When you get GANKED by rogues in the back; you just respawn at the checkpoint and wait outside the active landmark. The rogues finish off the landmark and you get your SHD points. It's making the rogues work for you.

Perfect...thank you so much😷🤟🏻

Thank you so much your words are helpful

Enemies were melt-city on challenge when I was in there. Easy gear. It’s the scumbag teams of 3 or 4 that have nothing better to do but to pick unfair fights with a solo player.

For the contaminated gear drops, Keen eyed players can identify talents and attribute types the piece of gear has before extracting. The info panel on the right (the area where you see damage, rpm, mag size, talents, etc... But if you look at the Talent icons and Attribute Icons, you can slowly begin to identify what the piece of gear has on it. The symbols will quickly become identifiable, then back to scrambled. Identifiable meaning that it won't explicitly tell you what the gear has, but has a vague shape and maybe some color if it's an attribute. Keep an eye out.

DZ is the wildwest, just went in today for second time, ran into another solo player, we teamed up against badguys at first took them out, he revived me once, then i ran into one those rouge stations u can activate, i had no clue what it was, i activated it and the other solo player automatically starts lighting me up, i ran away as his drone is shooting me and his turret is launching mortars at me, I ran into a Patriot sons hotzone, they started engaging him and i deployed my drone and turret, he was distracted and I was able to kill him and take his loot, lmao then i ran into another solo player, we fought some badguys and invited me to his clan and showed me how to deposit the other players loot lol. The DZ is crazy lmao, I recommend all new players watch helpful videos like these so you are prepared lmao. great video btw bro, very helpful an straight to the point

Definitely enjoying the dark zone more in div 2 then in div1 lol I feel like it's alot more fair for everyone to come in and have a good time lol

very good video, a lot of useful information

Good video man, I love the occupied dz, obviously now in wt5 but running solo is such a rush, bumping into duos and sqauds can be really fun, whether you play it calm and don't attack or if you stalk them until they go for an extraction mwhahaha

"It's just a game" Big respect to you for this mindset. On the gaming end of the internet in these days it's easy to get the impression that many gamers forget this.

I still can't believe how many times a rogue has tried to follow me into a checkpoint, i love to pick my loot back up and stand at the door clapping 😂😂😂

Wow, they have different AI routines for different areas? Thats really cool, the basic open world AI is pretty good. I cant wait to check this area out more.

Exactly, a three or four vs one gank should never bother you, save the ' bothering' for when another solo takes you out instead, then learn from it....solid vid.

Probably the best attitude and approach to the DZ I have seen and heard since the launch of TD. It is shit when you get ganked but it is what it is . I actual think what is anyone proving when three or four plays gang up on a solo players. Good video great attitude. Don't normally comment on RU-vid but felt this deserved it, well said....

Great tips. I'm a solo player but for the most part find if I hear an extraction being called and run to help, most players or groups will let me join them. I get the occasional group or player who kills me for my stuff but like you said, it's a video game and it's part of the draw.

I’m a solo thanks for these tips 👍

HUGE TIP:You can see what stats contaminated gear have. If you look at it for a second its showing messed up versions of the item. You can usually determine the skills and if it holds any value. This saves getting gear with talents you dont need

My first experience in the DZ, when I was extracting loot, 4 other players came up and attached their loot as well, and we all extracted our loot. We then switched from all being solo to grouping up and then ran several landmarks, sharing loot and extracting several times. Completely random people that ran into each other and were friendly, and it worked out perfectly for all of us. Next 4 times, got ganked every single extraction by either 2 or 4 man squads camping extractions.. shit was wack and with normalization really no way to win when you are outnumbered and you get rushed

Dude, this is my first Tom Clancy game EVER as silly as that sounds lmao I play the DZ all the time solo as a lvl 17-18 cuz I have no friends lol thank you for these guides🙏

Hey man thanks for the information! I appreciate it! Ima start uploading videos on this game aswell. 🙂 just got the game 2 days ago!

Man great view on the Dark Zone, really enjoyed all the points you made....great way to put it.

thanks for the video, it really helps when you don't know what to do in this cruel world dark zone, once I picked up one player and after that he killed me)) I'm surprised what evil people are

Thanks for share 👍

Yo i love using that explosive turret idea

PVPers hated the Rifle-Turtle build... for one reason... The WIDDZ build was useless when using the Turtle-Rifle build... that is why Rifle gets nerfed, together with the M700 sniper rifle. Regarding DZ is hostile and all you find is asshats, that is Wrong, at this point I would like to send a shoutout to @xDarkangel420 and @NeyNey who did not gank me or grief me (on PC) they even were nice enough to help me after watching me to try to help them on a tricky situation where I could have stolen the loot and run... being nice sometimes pays off, and having people skills of cause is not a bad thing neither. Big respect xDarkangel420 and NeyNey for respecting a noob and showing me the game

Had literally NO issues with DZ in Div2 solo. Saw a rogues once in the distance, hid, and went to the other end of the zone and never saw them again. Also, met some quite helpful randos.

I call for the extraction that's close to checkpoint then go to the check point until about 30-35 seconds left before it leaves go to it on with a few seconds left

Could you possibly make an updated version?

Very good video

I once met this random and we went manhunt on a squad of 4 who kept coming back to us when we tried to extract, it was such an amazing and memorable moment lmao gave me div 1 vibes

The encoding on the c items is pretty good to prevent backstabbers. But if a person leaves the group dont they get sent back to spawn?

In the first game I only went in the DZ to do the weekly stuff or get Division tech. I never fired unless I needed to and I didn't clear landmarks until I had I good idea of where other people were playing. I had a pve build and didn't care to make a pvp build so I tried to leave the smallest footprint possible.

Question about extracting. Since there is different kinds of loot...contaminated and non contaminated..do I need to extract non contaminated gear as well? If not and I’m killed will all gear be dropped that I’ve picked up?

You really felt the need to tell me that

What can other players loot from you? All your equipped gear or just what you've obtained in thr DZ that current session?

I miss these dzs

I have no idea how to even make a team nor invite a player? I have recieved invites and joined teams. I'm not a talker but I'm a team player. Also how do you leave a team once you joined without turning off your console?

Great vid.... how about some dz tips

I still don't understand why I never run into any peers in the DZ. I clear landmarks solo all the time and have only come across other players a handful of times. Kinda takes the fun out for me. I dunno. Great video!

how do i take over building etc because when i do the enemy takes it back so whats the point ? doing the same thing over and over

Nice video. I don't care about the dark zone but this was entertaining to watch at least.

Ty

you can roughly make out the bonuses on the gear/weapon

This is my first division game so I got really confused with DZ, as fun as it could have been being completely pve, that weird atmosphere of cutthroat subterfuge fits in really well with an apocalyptic setting.

can u find people to play with ? does match make work like for the missions, find people and then go play?

when i went into the darkzone with my friend (as he wanted to get the dz projects done) we never encountered another player. i guess its probably gonna pick up alot more when wt5 comes out. it is a pvp centric area, a wretched hive of scum and villiany. use every dirty trick in the book to win. if your ever not interested in the risks of pvp, the main game and the occupied darkzones are a great way to get good gear and avoid the ganks or the players hiding behind turrets because you want to cut them down ;3

rule #1 truly is DON’T take it personally

Thanks

I love the opening hahaha "wha whaaaaaa"

I go into the DZ solo not to farm gear but for DZ resource. The one thing I don't like are the players that would run up behind you while you are busy under heavy fire from NPC's and they go rouge and put you down. I can tell these guys were going to go rouge on me just by the way they run up, ignoring the NPC's. So If you see another player run up ignoring NPCs and try to stand behind you, move to another cover or drop a hive on them or whatever on them. Even if you can't take them out at least you weaken them and hopefully those NPCs that was shooting at you would finish the job for you.

soloing the dark zone is possible if you know what build to use to take on 4 to 8 players

Are these tips for the dz with the normalized stats areas or for the occupied because I never run the normalized because the gear I get is just trash.

“Whaa, whaaa, wha, wha...” quote of the year. 🤣

My best Dark Zone moment in the first game was when I found a supply drop and there were no enemies so I raided the crate... then they spawned in. Every single enemy that was meant to be guarding that drop spawned in, in one single tight group outside a door. They were basically right next to each other with no spacing. And they couldn't see me for some reason. I wiped them out in seconds with a machine gun and skills. Still don't know quite what happened.

Important question! Why is it when I unload a entire mag On a player and it doesn’t even scratch their armor but they waste half a mag on me and I instantly drop like wet paper

Is there a recommended gear score for the occupied DZ? I went in there at 272 and the mobs melted me.

On Xbox anyway, 4 out of 5 nights in the dark zone were quiet. Only one of the nights was it PvP hot. I solo DZ a lot and sometimes I think I am the only one in there. Tons of easy quick loot. If you playing as SHD and you die in the DZ to PvP it usually doesn't matter, as not much of the gear drops are contaminated. You keep most of not all of the gear.

The other day, my buddy and I found us a random dude. He tagged along with us and helped with the pve. We always kept a close eye on him, nope never shot at us. We even drop our contaminated items together and walked away. What a strange experince it was.

sounds fun and all but every time i enter i get 3 tapped by guys with equal stats as mine, i have no clue where im going wrong.

I like the dz but i miss my good old predator build when im in there😄😄😍

Meanwile in D1 Dark Zone you can hear crickets most of the time. Its almost impossible to die to NPCs and as long as you avoid certain checkpoint left side of Bryant park, you rarely have to deal with rogues. You can easily play there for hours with no-one bothering you, lol. And nobody wants your loot.

What LMG are you using?

I am a TD 1 Player and just started 2. Back in 1 i focused on grinding NPCs and everything i could get Loot, without the need to fly out. For Equipment, back then i focused on Gunplay and resillience, i climbed up to max rank DZ pretty fast. I was a solo Player, just met a few guys, trustworthy, so i stood solo.

Do you still need live subscription for dz?

Dark Zone is way easier solo than going in with a group, ive noticed you rarely see anyone other human player

I meet so many toxic players in dark zone they always take my stuff evan if they are way higher than me

Drops level depending on what? Your normal level or dz level?

A simple question how is it that you can see clearly what youre loot is in the DZ? Is that a option in settings and if yes where is it?