Familiar

By definition, Distorted Zones were technically Unique Zones to begin with. Unique Zones were Zones where outside influence changed the initial difficulty. Distorted Zones were Zones warped by outside influences as well, it was just that their difficulty didn't tend to change much at all…

However, there wee exceptions to this rule, and that was reserved for Zones formed as the fall of an Empire neared or its formation was nigh. 

At these two opposing points in an Empire's history, its impact on the timeline was the greatest, making any attempted distortion very difficult. The result would be a Unique Zones whose difficult was far and above away what it should have been. Not only would the distortion fail, but the likelihood of death would skyrocket.