The Division 2: How To Reduce Your Skill Cooldowns and Why It Matters

Ubisoft does not pull back punches in their cover-based shooter, The Division 2, when it comes to player’s skill cooldown

Ubisoft encourages their players in The Division 2 to use their skills, as they can turn the tide in substantially turn the tide in a fight. However, as powerful as these skills are, they come with hefty cooldown timers. These long timers are meant to encourage players to think about using their skills, well before they toss them out around. Each one needs to have a proper placement, and it needs to count, else it’s going to feel like a waste. There are a few methods players can use to lower these timers, however. Here’s how.

Lowering Skill Cooldown

Destroying the Skill Early

The quickest way to reduce the skill’s cooldown is to detonate the skill earlier than set. For example, should you throw a turret down in the middle of a group of enemies, and you make short work of them, the mission may have you move on to the next room. That’s a waste of your turret skill because it remains on the ground. By holding down the button attached to activating the skill, you can detonate it and have it go on a shorter cooldown timer. You’ll reduce the timers down to a third or so of its full cooldown.

You should still use this method even for skills that follow you from room to room, such as the Firefly drone. While it does hover nearby and protect you, the talent does not serve any purpose. It’s better to have it protecting and fighting for you for the most extended period.

Gear Mods

The second way to reduce your overall skill timer is to attach modifications to your equipment. Several of these modifications could lower your skill cooldown timers, allowing you to use them more frequently.

These modifications build on the previous technique of detonating your skills earlier, because even though you’re already lowering the cooldown timer by a substantial amount you’re still on a timer. The more skill mods you have attached to your Division agent, the more useful your skills become, especially if you can heal your squadmates.

Learning Your Cooldowns

When you next return to the White House, speak to the quartermaster for a hot second and doublecheck the skills you have equipped. If you hover them, you can learn vital information, such as the cooldown timers associated with the ability, along with the skills damage, duration, health, and other useful information. Unfortunately, you cannot learn this information until you unlock it.