It was a departure for Borderlands 4 to have one tier of level 50 weapons across all Ultimate Vault Hunter modes with all the same stats, meaning that one dropped anywhere would be the same power as others. The assumption by many players was that high UVHM tiers would have better chances at that gear except…that is not how it works at all. This is how Borderlands does things, although this time around, new additions to the game make this a bit weirder.
Gearbox has now confirmed that not only are dedicated drop rates of legendaries the same across UVHM 1-5, they are also the same in the other difficulties, Hard, Normal and even Easy. Here’s Gearbox’s Graeme Timmins explaining how it works when summoned to clarify by content creator Killer Six:
“Dedicated drops are fixed/not influenced by difficulty/UVH. We didn’t want to “force” players into higher difficulties if they weren’t ready, so anyone can farm dedicated and enjoy the game then UVH. XP, currencies, slightly increased world drops, and Firmware are rewards in UVH.”
This is not unusual for Borderlands, but in the context of the game, it feels strange. There is little reason to farm anything but Easy for dedicated drops, in which boss kills would be almost instant on any halfway decent build, and you can even get BL4-specific “shiny” drops there as well. You are hamstringing your farming efficiency playing on any higher level, given that any level 50 drop is the same power as another across all difficulties. It’s a very odd system.
The reasons to play UVHM, as Timmins lists, are better XP gains, marginally more world drops, and then specific Firmware that appears at those higher levels, but if you’re just going for dedicated drops, you might as well pick Easy to go as fast as humanly possible through these kills, even if you have a build that can stomp through UVHM 5.
This will change to some extent in the future. Invincible Bosses are coming, which will not have an “Easy” mode and will have dedicated loot. Pearlescents are also coming to the game, which I have to imagine will not drop in anything not UVHM, and chances may indeed go up through UVHM levels. If not, Gearbox really needs to figure out more reasons to get players to play higher levels of UVHM, as the current motivators are pretty insignificant, and having most endgame farming be Easy Mode boss kills is a little ridiculous, series tradition or not.
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