Can we have an uber-urber lab?

I don't mean additional ascendancy points, just level 90-100 lab with ascendancy device only as a decoration and respec station, and a merc enchantment device. This way players who hate lab will not be forced to run it.

I think lab was a good attempt to bring more roguelikeness to PoE. There are some decisions to make (which is lacking in the rest of the game - we make most decisions before we start playing) - whether you will risk killing Argus for an additional key, will you keep essences/fonts/whatever for the last fight or play it safe, will you explore all the rooms for chests and darkshrines or take the shortest route. This is what a good roguelike feels like.

Unfortunately due to the fact that uber lab is only level 75 a specialized build can now run it in under 2 minutes or even less and not care about anything. It turned into an easy currency generator.

Therefore i'd love to see a new endgame lab with more complex layouts, maybe more dangerous traps that hit harder, level 86+ monsters, maybe old-school darkshrines that can buff you OR screw you (preferably buff or both buff and debuff you so that people wouldn't be too afraid to pick them), probably some new (and risky, like having to kill a random heavily buffed map boss) mechanics to get an additional twice blessed, and better rewards in the end.

Yes yes and once more Yes.

I felt like losing something when GGG announced uber lab changes (making it much easier).
I can see why they did this. Im sure huge group of pelayers had a hard time beating Izaro to gain asc. points - something we need/want to fully enjoy build.

Creating one more "uber-uber" lab without asc. points just for lab lovers would be really nice.
Bring back old type of darkshrines. I miss them at most, they made every day different. One day i had to deal with ele weaknes combined with extra elemental dmg, the other day - temp chains and amazing feeling when my corrupted normal amulet rolled good mods.

Good memomiers, hope one day i will be able to feel them once again.

Bazillion posts about how bad is lab, quadrillion users who hate it. And 2 guys who want more pain in the ass. You guys should become a couple. ;D

"

h3llraiserlol wrote:

Bazillion posts about how bad is lab, quadrillion users who hate it. And 2 guys who want more pain in the ass. You guys can become a couple. ;D

Just because people are usually more loud about what they hate than what they like doesn't mean people who enjoy lab don't exist. No one wants to stop you from brainless farming a sextanted shaped strand or whatever the current meta is today all the day long.

I think they should just make Uber lab a real challenge again.. I mean when it come out it actually was something you had to plan ahead and make damn sure you were ready and even then there was a good chance you might not finish. But with all the power creep since ascendancy on top of what it brought alone its gotten to the point instead of needed a certain build to consistently farm lab now lab can be farmed on about any build no problem.

Dont get me wrong i think the changes making normal and cruel easier were a good thing. Ascendancy is pretty important to your character and i could see it being punishing to player who are not into what the lab has going on.. But at the same time Uber Lab was ment to be the icing on the cake for your build for some.. While other builds its not really a big deal even to the point theres some builds ive made that didn't need uber lab what so ever. But for the ones that do need uber lab to top off your build as well as the massive rewards you gain for uber lab... It needs to be a little more work again. Now its pretty much a snooze fest no matter what you play.

Sounds like fun but i wouldn't want the whole lab run incorporated in it, just another high-end boss encounter like ubber atziri.

Let's say the ubber lab chest's have a chance to drop a "offering to the defeated goddess"(similar to mortal pieces for ubber atziri)

Collect four of those and place them in your map device and you open up a lvl 82 aspirants trial.

The izaro in that aspirant trial always has two full random buffs(not shown outside in the aspirants trial room) and is a random weapon type.

He drops 3 key's max to use in the lvl 82 chest zone behind him.

And perhaps he could drop a guaranteed lab unique on death.(combined with the lvl 82 chest's this should be enough reward imo, deaths door boots are already quite sought after)

Peace,

-Boem-

"

Boem wrote:

Sounds like fun but i wouldn't want the whole lab run incorporated in it, just another high-end boss encounter like ubber atziri.

Let's say the ubber lab chest's have a chance to drop a "offering to the defeated goddess"(similar to mortal pieces for ubber atziri)

Collect four of those and place them in your map device and you open up a lvl 82 aspirants trial.

The izaro in that aspirant trial always has two full random buffs(not shown outside in the aspirants trial room) and is a random weapon type.

He drops 3 key's max to use in the lvl 82 chest zone behind him.

And perhaps he could drop a guaranteed lab unique on death.(combined with the lvl 82 chest's this should be enough reward imo, deaths door boots are already quite sought after)

Peace,

-Boem-

Also great idea. I would really like to see something like that (it's always nice to have more end game bosses to fight against) but still it would be amazing to have "old" style lab :)

They should first make "Labyrinth" a real "Labyrinth", with more interesting puzzles, areas etc. etc., but what would suffice for the moment would be the opportunity to actually use several other fragments/offerings to increase the difficulty of the current implementation.

2 Offerings should bring back at a 50/50% ratio the "good/bad" darkshrines, 3 Offerings should also boost HP and damage of rares/uniques enemies, and guarantee a gold door where the key is placed in a multi essence corrupted (4/5) possed mob, and the 4 Offerings run should ALWAYS BE A PERSONALISED RANDOM LAYOUT RUN, along with a further up to 50% increase (so between 75-100% boost versus a regular "Uber Labyrinth" run on HP & damage +some speed/cast increases - let's put those millions of DPS to good use - and also increase the damage made by traps so you're allowed 1 sec of mistakes)...

All these should come with a "fair" incentive, like increasing the monster level by 2 for each additional Offering, and have the IIQ & IIR tuned accordingly...

If last difficulty Uber Izaro would be Shaper/Elder/Uber Atziri equivalent, he should also have a chance to drop interesting "chase" uniques/divination cards...

There, problem solved the easy way, with minimal impact for GGG and a lot of incentives for people to push for another "end game grind"...

"

Boem wrote:

Sounds like fun but i wouldn't want the whole lab run incorporated in it, just another high-end boss encounter like ubber atziri.

Let's say the ubber lab chest's have a chance to drop a "offering to the defeated goddess"(similar to mortal pieces for ubber atziri)

Collect four of those and place them in your map device and you open up a lvl 82 aspirants trial.

The izaro in that aspirant trial always has two full random buffs(not shown outside in the aspirants trial room) and is a random weapon type.

He drops 3 key's max to use in the lvl 82 chest zone behind him.

And perhaps he could drop a guaranteed lab unique on death.(combined with the lvl 82 chest's this should be enough reward imo, deaths door boots are already quite sought after)

Peace,

-Boem-

Briliant minds think alike @Boem, and from both yours and mine ideas GGG could provide further enjoyment for players that would adore more difficulty and danger, but with a fair reward...

From my (SSF HC) perspective uber lab is rather too hard to do with a random mapping build. See also the (low) number of uber lab completions in SSF HC ladders.

But for a specialized build it is (if not doing ele mods on Izaro) far too easy. Its almost impossible to die to Izaro with a tanky build. And this kind of build is also very strong vs traps. On my current lab char I dont even use the anti-trap pantheon anymore.

So making another higher lab version without ascendancy wouldnt be a bad idea. Izaro needs far more EHP so he cant be oneshot in a split second with mines. And more damage and speed so its not quite as easy to defensively outgear him.

Personally I am not looking for the ultimate challenge here but rather something which is somewhat of a challenge for a dedicated build.

"

sofocle10000 wrote:

They should first make "Labyrinth" a real "Labyrinth", with more interesting puzzles, areas etc. etc., but what would suffice for the moment would be the opportunity to actually use several other fragments/offerings to increase the difficulty of the current implementation.

2 Offerings should bring back at a 50/50% ratio the "good/bad" darkshrines, 3 Offerings should also boost HP and damage of rares/uniques enemies, and guarantee a gold door where the key is placed in a multi essence corrupted (4/5) possed mob, and the 4 Offerings run should ALWAYS BE A PERSONALISED RANDOM LAYOUT RUN, along with a further up to 50% increase (so between 75-100% boost versus a regular "Uber Labyrinth" run on HP & damage +some speed/cast increases - let's put those millions of DPS to good use - and also increase the damage made by traps so you're allowed 1 sec of mistakes)...

All these should come with a "fair" incentive, like increasing the monster level by 2 for each additional Offering, and have the IIQ & IIR tuned accordingly...

If last difficulty Uber Izaro would be Shaper/Elder/Uber Atziri equivalent, he should also have a chance to drop interesting "chase" uniques/divination cards...

There, problem solved the easy way, with minimal impact for GGG and a lot of incentives for people to push for another "end game grind"...

I have a strong feeling that your idea of using few offerings at once would be very hard to implement. Maybe GGG could create another system i believe that is a little bit more interesting.
We could use fragments that already exist: atlas, prophecy and vaal to add different flavour to our runs. You could use up to 3 fragments and every one of them would add something both that punish and reward us.

By default each fragment would add:
+2 to to map (lab) lvl
33% increased Unique monster life and damage
some % increased quantity&rarity of items found
33% of darkshrines are from "old" system

While specific fragments would add unique mods (depends on what kind of fragment we use) such as:

Fragment of the minotaur - boost defences of every unique monster, increase quantity&rarity of items found, additional key dropped by izaro, in last fight you must also deal with falling stones.


Mortal hope - huge %increase quantity&rarity of items found, 3 additional key dropped by izaro, Izaro can call Argus to help him during all/any of fights. (huge reward for huge investment and risk)

Sacrifice at Dusk - only default mods

etc. Up to 3 fragments. This way we can decide how hard and rewarding our next run would be.