As a short term returning player who quit shortly after launch because i was not interested in dark zone (Solo) My immediate issue is the gearing up.

I thought logically that i could come back and do underground since that's what everyone was saying best loot is now and it's the new content. I only found out after that you need a gear score of 220 for that 268 gear to drop/caches. um, That's kind of a weird system, why should you have to have a X gear score to get other gear scores to drop, but whatever.

Geared up as best i could, 184/214 gear slots (204 gs), Increased my gear a decent amount from underground. But now to increase my GS to get those 268 pieces, i need to go do older content, like HVT + Challenging missions/incursions etc. Did some challenging missions, didn't get any gs upgrades, spent like 3hrs soloing S&D (58intel) for the HVT eagle mission, Finally got it, picked it up and tried to look for a group, got in a group but mission disappeared (found out why, my mistake i guess for starting it without a group) and lost all motivation to continue playing.

This game seems like it'd be smoother having a group of friends to party and run things and be organized and shit with. As a solo player it's very meh, and the gearing is annoying. Why is the top gear locked until you have a certain gear score, and why am i forced into doing older content. From what i've been reading anyways the gear score/gear doesn't even make you that much stronger, so why's it such a hassle to get?