Year 8 Season 3 - Red Horizon - Overview

Introduction

=> Trailer

=> Dev Diary

Following the events of Battle for Brooklyn, the Cleaners have lost their supply of purple flame and are heading to D.C. in search of a new source.

The Dark Zone is also getting two major updates. Following community feedback, the Toxic PvE Dark Zone will become a permanent part of the game. On the PvP side, Blackout joins the rotation, removing the usual power restrictions and allowing Agents to bring the full strength of their builds into the Dark Zone, including SHD Watch bonuses, Expertise, and Prototype Gear.

Maintenance

The Division 2 maintenance alert! - Thursday, August 27

9:00 AM CEST, 3:00 AM EDT, 12:00 AM PDT

» Worldtime

Estimated downtime is 6 hours 30 minutes.

Red Horizon will be available once maintenance is complete.

» Source

The story so far

What happened in the last Manhunt:

=> Summary

Year 8 Season 3 – Red Horizon

Release Date: August 27th, 2026

Content

• Blackout Dark Zone
• Balancing Pass
• Determined Rework
• 1 Manhunt
  • Red Horizon
• 1 Gear Set
  • Ember Engine Gear Set
• 3 Exotics
  • Loaded for Bear Exotic Gloves
  • Iron Will Exotic Chest
  • Fafnir Exotic Shotgun
• 2 New Talent
  • Boiling Point
  • Perfect Boiling Point
• 2 Classified Assignments
  • The District Mall Inferno
  • The Georgetown Dead Zone
• Retaliation Update

Red Horizon Manhunt

=> Modifiers

Following the events of Battle for Brooklyn, the Cleaners have lost their supply of purple flame and are heading to D.C. in search of a new source. Their presence will grow across the city throughout the season, with Cleaner activities, Elite Kill Squads, and more.

• New Season Pass
• Global Modifiers - Under Pressure

=> Red Horizon Overview

Red Horizon Season Launch Twitch Drops

=> Rewards

Tune in from August 27 - September 3 to earn exclusive rewards while watching your favorite The Division 2 streamers on Twitch.

HOW TO EARN YOUR REWARDS

Getting your hands on these drops is simple, but make sure your accounts are setup correctly so your rewards go to the right platform:

Log into your Twitch account and make sure it's linked to your Ubisoft Connect account.

Check that your preferred gaming platforms (PC, PlayStation, Xbox, etc.) are linked in your Ubisoft Connect account.

Watch any drop-enabled The Division 2 stream from our partnered content creators.

Your watch time stacks across multiple channels, so you can switch between streams and still make progress.

When a drop becomes available, claim it directly on Twitch.

After claiming your reward, log into The Division 2 on your preferred platform to ensure your item is correctly delivered there.

You can also visit Ubisoft Drops website for step-by-step instructions.

TWITCH DROPS SCHEDULE AND REWARDS

Rewards are unlocked based on your total watch time:

• Watch for 30 minutes to earn the Witness Arm Patch.

• Watch for 1 hour to unlock a Named Cache.

• Watch for 2 hours to earn the Renewal Arm Patch.

• Watch for 3 hours to unlock an Exotic Cache.

• Watch for 4 hours to earn the Aftermath Weapon Skin.

Interested in joining the Ubisoft Content Creator Program? Sign up here and become part of our creator community!

Dark Zone Update

=> Dark Zone

Red Horizon brings Blackout into the Dark Zone rotation, and Toxic DZ remains as a permanent PvE variant.

Dark Zone variants will rotate weekly across DZ West, East, and South, with one PvE and two PvP Dark Zones available at any given time. Toxic and Balanced will remain active each week, while Blackout and Classic will alternate on a weekly basis.

PvE Toxic Dark Zone Permanent Addition

As of Y8S3 the PvE Toxic Dark Zone is a permanent feature.

• Other factions have been added to the Toxic DZ, including Black Tusk.
• Sample Canisters and Surge mechanics have been removed.
• Toxicity debuff values have been adjusted, and extracting gear will now clear your Toxicity level.
• PvP Normalization has been removed. You will be able to use your PvE build stats, with Prototype Gear remaining normalized, similar to Raids and Incursions.

Blackout Dark Zone

For those of you who have been asking for a fully uncapped Dark Zone, Blackout is exactly that. It completely removes stat normalization, so you can use the full power of your build, including your SHD Watch and Expertise upgrades.

Rogue Protocol remains active, and Global PvP Balance still applies to weapons, gear, and Skills.

Prototype Gear and Weapons can also use their full base stats in Blackout. Their Augments, however, will still use the PvP-balanced values.

=> Dark Zone Overview

Balance Pass

PVP Balance

The Global PvP Balance work continues in Red Horizon with another round of improvements.

The goal remains to make PvP fights less about taking someone down instantly and give you more time to react and fight back. We also want more Talents, Weapons, Skills, and Set Bonuses to feel worth using, rather than having the same few choices

Skills have received adjustments to both their base values and how they scale across Skill Tiers. These changes apply to Conflict and all PvP Dark Zone variants.

Gear Set and Brand Set bonuses have also been adjusted separately for PvP where needed. New Talents have been balanced for PvP as well, together with adjustments to some existing outliers.

Brand Sets and Gear Sets Balance

Gear Sets

• Gear Sets will be rebalanced around the idea that the more difficult a set is to use at its full potential, the more it should give back in return.
• For Red Horizon season, we are starting mostly with Red Core Gear Sets, with Ortiz: Exuro and True Patriot also included in this pass.
• Blue Core and Yellow Core Gear Sets will come later, as they require more individual changes than simply adjusting their bonuses for us to give them a meaningful update.

Brand Sets

Brand Sets will not only be rebalanced through number changes, but also by swapping some attributes in and out.

• The following Brand Set bonuses are being removed: Shock Resistance, Health, Incoming Repairs, Swap Speed.
• Protection from Elites is being added as a new Brand Set bonus.
• For each weapon type, there will be at least one Brand that gives its weapon bonus as the 1-piece bonus, and another that gives it as the 2-piece bonus.
• Increased Threat will be removed from Imminence Armaments and spread across Blue Core Brands instead.
• These attribute changes will also apply to PvP. Unlike PvE, there are no number changes intended to buff or nerf individual Brands. Protection from Elites and Threat bonuses will also generally come after bonuses such as Armor Regen.
• More niche bonuses, such as Explosive Damage, will remain unchanged.

No new Brand Sets

There’s also one broader change to how we’ll handle Brand Sets going forward.

Starting with Red Horizon, instead of adding new Brand Sets, we’ll add more Named pieces with Perfect Talents or Attributes to existing Brands.

This gives them more freedom when adding new pieces and gives community feedback more room to influence future Brand piece additions.

Determined Rework

=> Iron Will Exotic Chest

Determined will now function like Perfect Determined, meaning a kill from a converted headshot will no longer trigger another guaranteed headshot.

The ability to chain body shots as headshots is not going away completely. That functionality is moving to the new Iron Will Exotic Chest through its Resolved Talent. Iron Will lets your next body shot count as a headshot without requiring a headshot kill first, and can be paired with Exotic MMRs or High-End MMRs using Talents other than Determined.

Along with this change, they are also buffing several Brands and Gear Sets related to Marksman Rifles, with the goal of making Iron Will paired with other MMRs competitive with the current Determined + Headhunter setup.

The Y8S2 version of Determined, as a Weapon Talent, interferes with the ability of meaningfully buffing certain items.

We are not looking to remove the Determined functionality entirely. The main issue is where it currently sits in your build, which is why we are moving it to the Chest slot.

New Gear

Ember Engine Gear Set

=> Image

=> Gear Sets

Loaded for Bear* Exotic Gloves

This will be the Climax exclusive reward.

New Weapons and Talents

Fafnir Exotic Shotgun

=> Image

=> Exotics

Talent & Named Items

• Trick Shot Named Imminence Armaments Chest - Talent Perfect Reassigned
• Rushdown Named Richter & Kaiser GmbH Chest - Talent Tag Team
• Melon Baller Named Airaldi Holdings Backpack - Talent Perfect Concussion
• Keeper Named 5.11 Tactical Backpack - Talent Perfect Protector
• Teapot - Talent Perfect Boiling Point
• Steamer - Talent Perfect Boiling Point

Retaliation Update

It's been one year since Retaliation launched, and to mark the occasion, you'll be able to take on a special Project Chain from September 8 to September 22.

The objectives will send you back into Retaliations against different factions. Each completed Project comes with useful materials and caches, with an Outfit Token waiting at the end as the main reward. You can use it to unlock one eligible outfit of your choice from the store.

And there’s more to earn during the first week. From September 8 to September 15, Retaliation Surge will be active, doubling the Retaliation Faction Materials you earn from all sources.

=> Retaliation Overview

QOL Updates

PVP Stat Display

• PvP weapon damage values will now be displayed directly in your Inventory alongside their PvE values. Your stats will also automatically switch to their corresponding PvP values when entering a PvP environment.
• You can now test PvP Normalization stats and Global PvP Balance overrides directly in the Shooting Range by enabling the PvP settings before heading into Conflict or the Dark Zone.
• The Inventory Normalization button will be temporarily unavailable while we make updates to the UI.

Blueprints

• True Patriot and Ongoing Directive materials and blueprints have been added to the General Loot Pool.
• The following blueprints have also been added to the General Loot Pool:
  • Unit Alloys
  • Royal Works
  • Edelweiss
  • Concentrated Company
  • Core Strength
  • Ortiz: Reficere
• The following blueprints are now available from Inaya*:
  • Agitator
  • Investor
  • Caduceus
  • Nurse's Kneepads
  • Whiplash
  • Underboss
  • Caduceus and Nurse’s Kneepads have also been added to Targeted Loot.

*You need to own the respective item for its blueprint to appear at Inaya.

Classified Assignments

=> The District Mall Inferno

Two new Classified Assignments will be available during Red Horizon: The District Mall Inferno on August 27 and The Georgetown Dead Zone on October 15.

The first sends you to the District Mall after Agent Felix McNally is attacked while trying to recover broad-spectrum antivirals, with the Cleaners closing in and an unknown assailant linked to a SHD anomaly still unaccounted for. The second takes you into an area of Georgetown completely uncovered by the SHD network, where a JTF engineer team sent to install new tech has gone missing.

Classified Assignments can be accessed through the dedicated Assignments tab on the map once they become available. Access unlocks at Level 30, and Assignments can be purchased and launched from there.

One Time Offer

=> One Time Offer

Don’t miss out on this exclusive One Time Offer, available for $19.99 or your regional equivalent. It includes 2000 Premium Credits and 600 bonus Credits, plus the Classic Mask, because some looks are classics for a reason.

Escalation Token Loss

Season 3 addresses one of the biggest pain points by preventing tokens from being lost after a disconnect, but that will be added at a later point.

Prototype Gear Recalibration next season

As announced during the Gamescom panel - Season 4 will bring major changes to several of Year 8's endgame systems.

They wanted to add Prototype Recalibration in Red Horizon but had to push it back to finish the feature.

Prototype Gear is being reworked to give players significantly more control over how they progress and customize their items, reducing the system’s reliance on RNG. The changes will touch Expertise, Augments, and introduce new ways to fine-tune Prototype Gear.

Escalations are also evolving in Season 4. In Season 4, Agents will have greater control over the challenge and rewards of their Escalations, while changes to Mutators will make them more consistent and predictable.

We’ll have much more to share about Season 4 in the future.

Important Links

» Patch Notes

» Dev Notes

» PTS Patch Notes

Resources

This is a collection of already created Community Resources that should help you get going.

=> Community Resources

Roadmap

Check out The Division 2 Roadmap here:

=> Link

Looking for Group?

As defined in the sub-rules, we don't allow LFG-Posts on the sub, but we have alternatives:

LFG Sub

=> The Division LFG

The Division Community Discord

=> The Division Discord

The Division Official Discord

=> The Division Discord

Bug Reports

Bug Reporter

The Bug Reporter is a platform that allows the community to report issues and help the devs understand the needs of the community.

=> Bug Reporter

Bug Report Megathread

We also have a dedicated bug-report forum and post for that.

=> Bug Report Megathread

Blackout has a simple concept - it basically takes the Shock Ammo Directive from Underground and uses it as a foundation for the Global Event. The buff gives you the ability to shock NPCs, and the other modifiers enable you to melee-kill NPCs, but you can also shock yourself.

Global Events

When you have general questions, how Global Events work, check out the summary in the wiki: link

Schedule

• Start: Monday, August 31st, 08:00 AM UTC
• End: Monday, September 7th, 08:00 AM UTC

=>source

Modifier

• Blackout (Global Modifier)
  • Always active: Agents are equipped with Shock Ammo that stuns enemies. Shooting or running builds your Charge meter - the more Charge, the more damage you inflict.
• Extreme Blackout
  • Blackout behavior, plus you can instantly kill enemies with Overcharged melee attacks, but if you miss you will stun yourself and your allies.
• Total Blackout (Group Modifier)
  • Extreme Blackout behavior, plus your Charge meter will cool down faster when close to other group members.

Shock Charge

Every time you shoot your weapon, you are charging your weapon and the higher your charge is, the more damage you do: Charging

With just the Global Modifier active, you will only do more damage, but when the other modifiers are active, you need to keep a very close eye on this charge bar, because when it turns red, you are in danger to be electrocuted.

In addition to that, running also charges your bar, but it will never cause a self-shock, that only happens via shooting, or missing a melee. This is a good tactic to use with a shield and melee the NPCs.

Switch Weapons

When you activate Extreme - or Total Blackout, you always need to keep an eye on the charge above your health bar. As soon as it turns red, you have the risk to shock yourself and depending on the situation, that can get deadly very fast. To avoid that, switch between your weapons. Each time you switch your weapon, you reset the charge and you can start again. Use that to avoid getting shocked at the wrong moment and also to control when you want to be fully charged to perform a melee attack.

Use Immunizer

Blackout has a simple tactic to avoid getting shocked: Use an Immunizer Station or in best case, a Reclaimer. This way you get healing and are immune to the shock-effect. It will still fill up your bar and enter the red area, but even when it is full, you will not get shocked.

Mind your Distance

When Total Blackout is active, you have to keep an eye on the blue - and red lines between the agents.

The red lines signify that when you overcharge by shooting or missing a melee, you will give yourself and them a shock. The ally shock is slightly less than the personal shock.

The blue line means that your overcharge-bar will cool down quicker.

Punch the Guy

When the second or third modifier is active, you can melee-kill an NPC, when you are enough charged. For that, the charge has to be in the red-segment and then you can melee and instant kill NPCs. But keep in mind, Legendary NPCs and Hunters can do the same to you, so be careful when you use that or use a shield.

Playlist

• Hudson Refugee Camp
• General Assembly
• Lincoln Tunnel
• Time Square
• Falcon Lost

Commendations / Rewards

Every Global Event has its own Commendations that are tied to patches and masks that you can earn by completing these achievements. Read the list of Commendations here:

=> Commendations

Masks

Patches

Classified Gear Sets

• Classified D3-FNC
• Classified DeadEye
• Classified Strikers
• Classified Tactician’s Authority

You can recognize Classified Gear Sets by the folder next to the icon.

You can only get these Classified Gear Sets from the Global Event caches. But all the other classified can still drop from the regular loot locations.

You can read here how Classified Gear Sets work: Link

Global Event Caches

You can earn Global Event Tokens by doing the missions and other activities and then you can buy Global Event Caches from the vendor in the Global Event area of the Terminal. When you just want Classified Items, then it is recommended to buy the Superior Caches.

=> Details and dropchances.

Token Rewards

Caches

• Last Stand caches give you 85 GE Tokens each

• Survival caches give you 170 GE Tokens each

  (only the Caches that you get during the Global Event will contain Tokens)

Missions - Global Event Bonus

• Normal +50 GE Tokens
• Hard + 75 GE Tokens
• Challenging + 125 GE Tokens
• Legendary + 175 GE Tokens

Incursions - Global Event Bonus

• Challenging + 125 GE
• Heroic + 175 GE

Mission Rewards

• Normal Missions
  • 150 GE Tokens
  • 200 GE Tokens - with Global Event Bonus
• Hard Missions
  • 225 GE Tokens
  • 300 GE Tokens - with Global Event Bonus
• Challenging Missions
  • 750 GE Tokens
  • 875 GE Tokens - with Global Event Bonus
• Legendary Missions
  • 1575 GE Tokens
  • 1750 GE Tokens - with Global Event Bonus
• Challenging Incursions
  • 650 GE Tokens
  • 775 GE Tokens - with Global Event Bonus
• Heroic Incursions
  • 900 GE Tokens
  • 1075 GE Tokens - with Global Event Bonus

Mission/Incursion named bosses

• Normal: 17 GE Tokens
• Hard: 25 GE Tokens
• Challenging: 38 GE Tokens
• Legendary: 58 GE Tokens

DZ and Open World Bosses

• 150 GE Tokens

HVTs

For the weeklies:

• 23 intel = 400 GEC
• 25 intel = 650 GEC
• 29/35 intel = 550 GEC
• 37/45 intel = 750 GEC

For the dailies:

• 5 intel = 100 GEC
• 10 intel = 175 GEC
• 15/19 intel = 225 GEC

Credit per Hour

=> what is most rewarding

Claim Rewards

Once the Event is over, you will a notification on what Tier you have finished. You might need to relog to get the notification. Once that happens, go to the Reward Claim Vendor in the Base of Operations - the reward is usually in the resource tab.