Expertise & SHD Levels
Welcome, Agent! As you venture deeper into the post-pandemic Washington D.C., you'll encounter two crucial progression systems that significantly boost your power: SHD Levels and the Expertise System. Mastering these will transform you from a capable agent into an unstoppable force, allowing you to tackle the toughest challenges The Division 2 has to offer.
SHD Levels: The Infinite Power Grind
Once you complete the main campaign and reach World Tier 5, you'll unlock the SHD Level system. This replaces the traditional level progression and offers an infinite source of stat bonuses, making every activity you undertake contribute to your character's growth.
How to Gain SHD Levels
- Experience Points (XP): Every action that grants XP will contribute to your SHD Level. This includes:
- Completing main missions and side missions.
- Eliminating enemies in the open world, Control Points, and Dark Zone.
- Finishing Global Events and Leagues.
- Participating in Countdown and The Summit.
- Collecting collectibles and completing commendations.
- Control Point Reset Farming: Capture a Control Point, then reset all Control Points from the Global Map (requires completing all Control Points in a region). This allows for repeated, quick captures.
- The Summit: Floors 90-100 on Heroic difficulty with all directives active offer immense XP. Focus on speed-running these floors.
- Challenging/Heroic Missions: Missions like Lincoln Memorial, Jefferson Trade Center, and District Union Arena are popular for their enemy density and relatively straightforward layouts.
- Global Events: When active, Global Events often provide significant XP bonuses for specific actions, making them prime SHD Leveling opportunities.
SHD Watch Allocation
Each SHD Level grants you a point to allocate into your SHD Watch. These points are permanent and provide passive stat increases across four categories:
- Offense:
- Weapon Damage (e.g., +1% Assault Rifle Damage)
- Critical Hit Chance
- Critical Hit Damage
- Headshot Damage
- Defense:
- Armor
- Health
- Explosive Resistance
- Hazard Protection
- Utility:
- Skill Haste
- Skill Damage
- Skill Repair
- Status Effect Duration
- Miscellaneous:
- Scavenging (Resource drops)
- Accuracy
- Stability
- Reload Speed
Strategy: Prioritize maximizing your core offensive stats (Weapon Damage, Crit Chance, Crit Damage) first, as these offer the most immediate and impactful power increase for most builds. Once these are capped, consider investing in defensive or utility stats based on your preferred playstyle and build requirements.
Expertise System: Mastering Your Gear
The Expertise System allows you to permanently increase the base stats of your favorite weapons, gear pieces, skills, and even brand sets. This system is a long-term investment, but the power gains are substantial, pushing your builds to their absolute peak.
Understanding Proficiency Ranks
Before you can increase an item's Expertise Level, you must first reach Proficiency Rank 10 with that specific item. Proficiency is gained by:
- Using the Item: Equip and use the weapon, gear piece, or skill in combat. The more you use it, the faster its Proficiency Rank increases.
- Donating Materials: You can donate unwanted gear, weapons, and materials directly to increase the Proficiency Rank of a specific item.
- Navigate to the item in your inventory or Stash.
- Select the "Proficiency" option (usually indicated by a small shield icon).
- You can donate various materials:
- Standard Materials: Steel, Titanium, Ceramics, Polycarbonate, Electronics, Carbon.
- Printer Filaments: From deconstructing gear.
- Field Recon Data: From Control Points, bounties, and open-world activities.
- Exotic Components: From deconstructing Exotic items (highly efficient for Proficiency).
- Unwanted Gear/Weapons: Any item of the same type (e.g., donating an AR to increase AR Proficiency).
Strategy: To efficiently gain Proficiency, equip items you want to level up while farming XP. Simultaneously, donate all unwanted loot and materials to items you want to max out. For example, if you're aiming to max out your "Chameleon" Exotic AR, donate all your excess Assault Rifles and Exotic Components to it.
Increasing Expertise Levels
Once an item reaches Proficiency Rank 10, it becomes Proficient. You can then increase its Expertise Level using specific materials. Each Expertise Level grants a small, permanent increase to the item's core stat (e.g., +1% Weapon Damage for a weapon, +1% Armor for a chest piece, +1% Skill Damage for a skill).
- Required Materials: Increasing Expertise Levels primarily requires:
- Exotic Components: The most valuable and often bottleneck material. Obtain these by deconstructing Exotic weapons or gear, or as rare drops from high-difficulty content.
- Field Recon Data: Found in Control Point supply rooms, bounties, and open-world activities.
- SHD Calibration: A rare material primarily found in The Summit (especially higher floors), Countdown, and as rewards from Global Events.
- Expertise Cap: The maximum Expertise Level an item can reach is tied to your overall "Expertise Score," which increases as you make more items Proficient. The higher your Expertise Score, the higher the maximum Expertise Level you can achieve on individual items.
Strategy: Prioritize increasing the Expertise Level of your most frequently used and build-defining items first. This includes your primary weapon, core gear pieces (chest, backpack), and essential skills. Farming Exotic Components is crucial for this stage, so run activities that drop Exotics regularly, such as Countdown, The Summit, and targeted loot missions.
Synergy Between SHD and Expertise
Both SHD Levels and the Expertise System work in tandem to empower your agent. SHD Levels provide a broad, passive stat increase across your entire character, while Expertise offers targeted, significant boosts to individual pieces of your loadout. A well-rounded agent will actively pursue both, ensuring they are always pushing the boundaries of their power in The Division 2.