the fall of oriath LABYRINTH

I've long thought/held that the Labyrinth could benefit greatly from the same six-portals system that everything else gets. You get six portals into the Plaza, or whatever they end up deciding. You can only leave the Plaza once, so they still get their weird inventory control thing, but yes - the Forced Hardcore nature of the Labyrinth is one of the big things I've held to be a mistake. Give the player six portals. if they screw up all six of their portals they get to start over, which sucks, but it's a limitation that exists throughout the entire game, so hey.

Monster Meth stations as opposed to standard traps is an intriguing idea, but it screws with the Trial system and would probably be even harder on the sorts of folks who hate traps the most. I'm wondering if a less invasive option, something like a catch code that prevents a single specific trap from fresh-to-deading the player, might be a serviceable patch. Get caught on a Death Roomba or one of those godawful blender pillars due to lag or whatever, and that specific trap can only slice off 75% of your health or some such. Give the player a bit of room to react, stop lagging, and handle his business.

I kind of like environmental hazards like that, and which are slightly more engaging than [X]'d Ground, which is both incredibly lazy and also difficult to communicate clearly (the number of times I've nearly died - or outright died - because I look away from the game for a few seconds without realizing I'm not quiiite off the Desecrated Ground after all...). You know when a floor blade or a Death Roomba or magma grates or whatever are doing their thing; they're easier to deal with than regular ground effects whilst still adding an extra layer to combat in that they're not critters you can just Mathil through in a tenth of a second.

Still, the Izaro room, especially the final, could stand to be less busy, yeah. Even players who know that the best way to fight Izaro is to cram themselves up his zombie rectum (the Goddess leaves you alone if you're right under Izaro's jockstrap, for those who don't know - no giant evil fireball bombardments) can struggle to stay away from the traps in the final room. Especially if one of the traps are the GOD DAMNED DARTS. Every other configuration at least gives you that single small patch of floorspace right under Izaro's spawn to fight him in free and clear, but darts wreck it. UGH. The last time I fought Uber I had to drag his happy ass over to the three little pedestal-plinths his lieutenants spawned in on and fight him there, jiggering around like a cat on a hot plate to avoid slams and shit in half of one corner of the room. I pulled it off in the end, but yeebus that was stressful.

Anyways. I'd like to see a Labyrinth 2.0 sometime, yes. There's definitely improvements to be made, but nobody's going to get them if they knee-jerk short-circuit their every response to the Labyrinth to "KILL IT WITH BAELFIRE!" Traps could be engineered to be more lag-forgiving, the Forced Hardcore thing needs to go (unless you're actually Hardcore, in which case you knew what you were getting into), and the final Izzy fight needs some tidying up...but the Labyrinth and its Ascendancies is still probably my favorite single piece of content they've added to the game in all the time I've been playing it. I'd dearly hate seeing it go, and I'd hate seeing it gutted and left a shadow of its former self only very slightly less.

Lol I remember when during one of my runs I had to bait izaro jump slam right to the entrance of the arena, because due to trap layout (I think it was darts as well), it was impossible to fight him anywhere else.

Anyway, I really hope that lab gets a rework. It has potential, but I, and apparently many others, are not happy with its current implementation. And let me tell you this, the first time I entered lab was when I restarted the game afte a very long break (last time I played was when there were still 3 acts and no lab). I was super excited. I thought "wow, traps, different pathways, cool looking boss, great voice acting, this is the best!" But then, with time, I started to hammer my head against its more questionable design decisions, and that ultimately led me to just detest lab.

Oh, yeah. I love Izaro, the character, and the fact that you're almost holding a discourse with this ancient fifteen-foot zombie man as you run the Lab. It's freaking cool and one of the best atmospheric things about the Lab, and in my opinion one of the reasons that even with its faults, Ascendancy/the Labyrinth is the best single piece of content delivered so far.

Maps got their update, the-rest-of-the-game is in the process of getting its update. Masters next, then maybe we can look into a Labyrinth 2.0 that ties in the new systems and technology GGG's built in the interim. The new minimap alone could be big for better communicating trap layouts to players. I'm always so frustrated that people hate the Labyrinth as much as they do because it is such a cool idea and a lot of the execution of it was super interesting. I'd like more like this, multi-stage zones with multi-stage bosses and interesting systems/rewards strewn throughout, but the huge nasty evil backlash against the Labyrinth makes that a nigh-impossible dream.

If that backlash gets fixed? More please, may I have another?

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1453R wrote:

They've answered how they're handling four different labyrinth difficulties something like seventeen million times now. Jumpin' Jimmeny Jeebus, pay attention.

There are the standard six trials to unlock the base/Normal Labyrinth in A1-3. Acts 4 through 9/10/whenever will have additional Trials scattered throughout them. To access 'Cruel' and 'Merciless' Labyrinths, you need to complete the appropriate Trials and also the preceding Labyrinth. In the Labyrinth Plaza, you can select which Labyrinth difficulty you want and do that one, similar-ish to a map device.

Endgame Labyrinth is unchanged; it's unlocked via Trials in maps and accessed with Offerings to the Goddess.

Normal Labyrinth is shorter (one less Aspirant's Trial, I believe), and GGG is looking at streamlining the Labyrinth process, but no - you don't get an Ascendancy for free outside of the Labyrinth, and yes, you have to do the Labyrinth to get the Labyrinth-based rewards.

I'm really getting mad tired of all the hatred for the Labyrinth and people going apeshit over getting caught up on traps or whatever. I get it guys, the Labyrinth doesn't play as nicely for your Cheeseclear Speedbuilds as 24/7 Shaped Strand rotations do. You have to actually play Path of Exile to clear the Labyrinth and get your Ascendancy points, and it's hard to do that with a Vaal Fireball lootmower Strand-ONLY build that needs a full party to leech experience from just to get to the point where it's able to cripplingly-overspecialize in clearing a Shaped Strand in seven seconds.

I'm terribly sorry that your one-map-wonder build has trouble with the Labyrinth. But you don't get to skip it for free because it inconveniences you.

Nice rant dude. Too many assumptions in there though.
I've never made an overly specialized build and I do all maps because I get bored doing just the "good" ones. That doesn't mean I like lab. I didn't like it even with my berserker that made it stupidly easy. For me this thing has no place in an ARPG game. If I wanted Tomb Raider I'd play that.

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1453R wrote:

They've answered how they're handling four different labyrinth difficulties something like seventeen million times now. Jumpin' Jimmeny Jeebus, pay attention.
...

I guess they were too distracted by the quantity of supporter titles you have to notice that GGG has already explained how Labs work come the Fall of Oriath. I guess throwing money to GGG is better than having a hole in the water that you pore money into or other expensive forms of entertainment (so much for "free to play". Like get real GGG, you play with only 4 stash tabs forever. That's a more severe handicap than playing SSF). To each their own.

"

DRAGONxNOGARD wrote:

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teketoria wrote:

Spoiler

- lab entrance has a WP now and the icon to it is next to your HO icon on map

so when trap kill me in lab i can return by summoned portal scroll or WP?

...?

"

DRAGONxNOGARD wrote:

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DRAGONxNOGARD wrote:

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teketoria wrote:

Spoiler

- lab entrance has a WP now and the icon to it is next to your HO icon on map

so when trap kill me in lab i can return by summoned portal scroll or WP?

...?

I am afraid so far you will still have only one try.

wtf, we still gotta do this shit 4 times?

why do you hate us, GGG?

I hope lab gets harder. /grabspopcorn

"

Powderoff wrote:

I hope lab gets harder. /grabspopcorn

12 trials for each, two times larger, 5 izaro fights, traps during each fight (with more of them on each arena). If you die or leave the area for any reason including dc, you lose a level and all ascendancy points that you had previously. Everytime you touch the ascendacy shrine you have a 20% chance of randomly dying (you are considered not worthy after all). Everytime you want to go to atziri or shaper, you have to "earn the right to it first" by killing uber izaro.