SET FREE THE ASCENDANCY POINTS (or rework the lab) [New ascension methods/lab rework ideas]

It's like 31 pages of tears at this point.

I'm not saying don't complain, but at least recognize that most of these complaints are completely unmitigated whiny crap.

A) No, you do not need to Ascend. My buddy playing for the first time on HC breezed through the entire game without ever Ascending. He didn't make it into high tier end maps but for his first time playing, and on HC nevertheless, I would say it's pretty clear you can run through the game without Ascending.

B) The Ascendancy classes were added WITH THE LAB. The design intent appears, on the surface, to be allowing only players with sufficient skill to achieve these very powerful and very specialized builds. Why there is an expectation that you should be able to get the new classes without clearing the new content is a complete mystery.

C) The game content WAS NOT MODIFIED TO ACCOUNT FOR ASCENDANCY. A hard map pre-Ascendancy is the same difficulty now. The only difference would be that if you CAN ASCEND said map will no longer be as difficult for your Ascended character. That does not make the map less manageable on a non-Ascended character. If you were clearing maps in 7 minutes on your pre-Ascendancy build you still can now. Ascending might shave some time off but realistically unless your goal is the top of the ladder a minute here or there per map is really irrelevant.

*DISCLAIMER* The lag associated with the lab is pretty terrible but this is an optimization issue that plagues all of POE so while I respect lag complaints I do not respect attributing them only to the lab.

Saying it again because it's worth saying.

WHAT GGG SHOULD DO ABOUT LAB
1. Fix the stability issues.
2. Fix the stability issues.
3. Make it so you only have to run each Trial once per character, not once per difficulty. Repeating tutorials suck.
4. Nerf Normal and Cruel Izaro.
5. Keep Merciless Izaro as-is.
6. Keep Ascendancy points tied to the lab.

"

Dos_Fafner wrote:

It's like 31 pages of tears at this point.

I'm not saying don't complain, but at least recognize that most of these complaints are completely unmitigated whiny crap.

A) No, you do not need to Ascend. My buddy playing for the first time on HC breezed through the entire game without ever Ascending. He didn't make it into high tier end maps but for his first time playing, and on HC nevertheless, I would say it's pretty clear you can run through the game without Ascending.

B) The Ascendancy classes were added WITH THE LAB. The design intent appears, on the surface, to be allowing only players with sufficient skill to achieve these very powerful and very specialized builds. Why there is an expectation that you should be able to get the new classes without clearing the new content is a complete mystery.

C) The game content WAS NOT MODIFIED TO ACCOUNT FOR ASCENDANCY. A hard map pre-Ascendancy is the same difficulty now. The only difference would be that if you CAN ASCEND said map will no longer be as difficult for your Ascended character. That does not make the map less manageable on a non-Ascended character. If you were clearing maps in 7 minutes on your pre-Ascendancy build you still can now. Ascending might shave some time off but realistically unless your goal is the top of the ladder a minute here or there per map is really irrelevant.

*DISCLAIMER* The lag associated with the lab is pretty terrible but this is an optimization issue that plagues all of POE so while I respect lag complaints I do not respect attributing them only to the lab.

I suggest you read the OP (again, if you already believe you have done it) and the rest of the thread, and stop making assumptions. The points you have made have been analyzed both in this as well as the other similar threads bashing on labyrinth's bad design overall.

But since you probably wont, let me make this clear for you: there is no difficulty/skill issue with the labyrinth, people who know the game can ascend, those younger players might face some spikes in difficulty with Izaro but thats it, claiming anything more than that is absurd. I know i dont need to ascend and i did not, because i find the labyrinth content boring and tedious and not even in the slightest fit and deserving to be in a masterpiece like PoE, and i was ofcourse able to clear up to t13 maps (higher than those didnt drop)
(regarding that matter, a friend recently linked me to this and i was surprised https://www.reddit.com/r/pathofexile/comments/4d9q1l/top_2000_phc_ladder_ascendancy_class_breakdown/)

I hope after you read the OP you understand whats this is all about. There is absolute no downside in ungating the AC points, people who like the lab will still run it, and people who dont can enjoy the only highlight of the Ascendancy expansion. We aint talking about freebies here GGG can surely find where to put AC.

P.S. : Claiming that feedback and suggestions in a well constructive manner is tears is derogatory and an indicator that you havent comprehended the basic notion of the thread.

"

Regulator wrote:

Even though gating is a dick move, its sometimes needed to make something feel more important. What is the problem though here is that GGG decided that the gate is a completely different game inside PoE. A series and combination of 80' arcade games with 90' action-adventure, aka Indiana Jones meet PoE meet Contra. This has the negative effect of alienating many players who feel excluded from this expansion because they do not find that - obviously different - playstyle fun and/or engaging. PoE can have experimental content, thats fine from and for everyone, but gating something so important behind that is a dumb move from the company

So the move is both a "dick" move and a "dumb" move but calling your obviously whiny complaint "tears" is too derogatory for you? While you may not like the lab, I personally do not enjoy it myself, that is only your opinion. The basis of your entire statement is that you FEEL/THINK the ascendancy points are unnecessarily "gated" behind "dumb" content. Vocalization of your thoughts does not make them fact.

"

Regulator wrote:

Guess what? there is more. GGG labeled the labyrinth as hard, difficult, skill-based content that will prove to be an alternate end-game. Well they couldnt be more wrong. First of all there is no difficulty issue whatsover, maybe some feel izaro is overtuned for his level but thats easily countered with overleveling or knowing the game mechanics. Second the only skill that someone needs, is to know how to press quicksilver pots or use movement skills. Wait, see pattern of the trap, quicksilver pull lever, and level cleared (just like playing hardcore mario).

No other way to say it: I 100% disagree. While I do not find the lab to be overly difficult there are many that do. If it was not at least a little challenging then there wouldn't be 30+ pages of crying about how "unfair" it is that not everyone can Ascend. If it was a matter of clicking 1 potion or paying 1 chaos this whole thread would disappear. Put briefly, I think you are being dishonest with yourself. If it was so easy as to be irrelevant no one would complain, well some people might complain that it was "too" easy but it would certainly be less.

"

Regulator wrote:

But it gets worse. In a game like PoE where the skill tree and character creation is the main attraction surely people's choices must be (and are) very important. Well... labyrinth and especially traps say FUCK YOUR CHOICES, if x person used 50points on his basic skill tree to get hp and armour while y player used 20 points for hp and armour, regarding traps the person with the less hp has actually an easier time in case he gets hit by a trap. WHAT???? How is that possible you may ask, well its easy, healing pots restore higher percentage to the player with the less flat hp pool. Yeah that happens, and its even worse for certain hybrid or pure ES characters. Ofcourse one's players damage and movement choices are unaffected by the labyrinth. So traps ignore and negate specific mechanics while they allow others to trivilize them.So yeah very well thought and fair system.. not.

I happen to agree with you that certain builds and styles are favored by the lab, however, the lab is not the only content in the game that favors one build over another. I'v made it through the lab on life based characters, armor characters, melee characters, casters, ES hybrids, and basically every conceivable combination of build so to imply that the game is telling you "fuck" your build is a gross exaggeration to say the least. If someone is SKILLED at running the lab their SKILL would trivialize the traps and it would not matter what build they used.

"

Regulator wrote:

Its pretty obvious that the labyrinth is dividing the community and for a lot of right reasons. If we take into account PoE's notorius performance issues the matter gets even worse.

This is not relevant. It's fluff and you should always edit your work to remove fluff. The community is always divided. Take out the lab and we'll find something else to divide over.

"

Regulator wrote:

So what im suggesting here is for GGG to consider at some point to remove the ascendancy points from labyrinth. Not make them completely free, but remove that tedious, frustrating and unfun playstyle as a requirement to acquire them. There have been suggestions about the matter both in this as well as other similar threads, and its up to GGG to decide how and where Ascendancy Points might fit without causing so much discord.

Again, this is your opinion. You personally do not like the lab; you find it unfun/unfair/unsuited to the game. So what? The game is not tailor made to your tastes so I do not think your expectations should include every aspect of the game being appealing to you personally. I also do not like the lab, but I don't whine when content isn't exactly what I expect. I learn, adapt, and move on OR I play something else.

"

Regulator wrote:

Spoiler

some stats for the second week of ascendancy

Maps 3,935,376
Merciless Dried Lake 1,188,825
Merciless Docks 732,380
Merciless Solaris 1 667,079
Merciless Labyrinth 235,415

Not including time in Hideouts and Town, the breakdown looks like this :

Normal 40.3575%
Cruel 20.4968%
Merciless 20.4086%
Maps 12.6867%
Labyrinth 6.0503%

Its only natural that the maps percentage and runs will go up as time passes, the same is supposed to happen for lab too. What if though the only reason lab has that "much" attendance is cause of the ascendancy points? they are obviously very strong and they are a reason to lure players to do the new experimental content. The right time to remove AC points from the labyrinth is when they implement the daily rewards for the fastest runners. Lets actually see what is the real percentage of people who are interested in the lab itself.

Your opinion is that the skills gated by the lab are apart of why people run the lab; you present statistics that show no evidence as to why anyone is running anything in the game. It is, however, probably true but your statistics do not prove this. Your reasoning for the AC points being removed from the lab is absurd. You want to take part of the incentive for running the new content away from said content to see if it causes a decrease in people participating in the content. OF COURSE IT WILL and it will prove exactly nothing regarding the design of the lab and its introduction to POE.

Just because I do not agree with you does not mean I did not read your post. Most of these "complaint" threads are similar so no, I have not read them all and I do not intend to read them all. The short answer to any complaint is always "If you don't like it don't do it." - [Atziri, Merciless Malachai, End-Game maps, etc] What floors me about these particular threads is the expectation that the entire game should be tailored to your idea of what is fun. There are opposing threads that love the lab on here as well, but they do not ask for the rest of the game to be changed to incorporate more lab-style play so your feeling that your complaint should be taken seriously enough to redesign an entire section of the game is ludicrous.

Complain away just refrain from thinking your complaints have a basis in fact as they are founded in your opinion and therefore cannot be interpreted as anything else.

"

Regulator wrote:

I understand GGG has put a lot of effort on the expansion and what im asking is too much, but ascendancy points should be freed from the labyrinth's tyranny. In no way im asking for ascendancy points to be completely free but freed from labyrinth playstyle, meaning that GGG can put them as rewards for someting else.

Oh No, It absolutely kill Labyrinth idea !

"

Dos_Fafner wrote:

No other way to say it: I 100% disagree. While I do not find the lab to be overly difficult there are many that do. If it was not at least a little challenging then there wouldn't be 30+ pages of crying about how "unfair" it is that not everyone can Ascend. If it was a matter of clicking 1 potion or paying 1 chaos this whole thread would disappear. Put briefly, I think you are being dishonest with yourself. If it was so easy as to be irrelevant no one would complain, well some people might complain that it was "too" easy but it would certainly be less.

There are other two subgroups: those with technical problems (but I wonder if it makes any sense to say the labyrinth sucks because of that, rather than PoE sucks) and those that hate that kind of gameplay so much that they'd rather quit playing the game (irrational, but whatever floats their boat).

"

NeroNoah wrote:

There are other two subgroups: those with technical problems (but I wonder if it makes any sense to say the labyrinth sucks because of that, rather than PoE sucks) and those that hate that kind of gameplay so much that they'd rather quit playing the game (irrational, but whatever floats their boat).

I did address the lag issue in my original reply and I agree with you it is an overall detraction from POE as a whole not just the lab. I am not certain new content would ever make me quit but I guess if people feel they must to make a point then it is what it is.

"

Dos_Fafner wrote:

I did address the lag issue in my original reply and I agree with you it is an overall detraction from POE as a whole not just the lab. I am not certain new content would ever make me quit but I guess if people feel they must to make a point then it is what it is.

It's weird, because the people that complain about leveling have been more civil about it generally (they despise a part of the game, or dislike it enough, but it has been less incendiary generally). For example this.

@Dos_Fafner I hate repeating myself so many time but it seems that it is truly needed, cause rebutalling every argument ten times instead of one is obviously the only way to stop people posting nonsense that already have been answered.



Firs of all you fail to see what the argument is here, and you adress something totally irrelevent to the OP's presence and reasoning. Focus mate, here how it is. GGG decided to gate AC behind labyrinth right? Labyrinth's playstyle being different from the rest of the game is NOT my personal opinion, its a fact or a truth (pick what word you like), its not my problem you (and many others as it seems) lack the experience or insight to realise that. The labyrinth playstyle resembles that of the arcade games of 80' and 90' and GGG decided to lock the whole focus of the expansion behind that, thats dumb or if you prefer to play with words a completely unthought decision.


As i said there is absolutely no difficulty issue except maybe Izaro that at least is true to GGG's boss designs. What you are describing is what every new player feels with the game in general. As ive explained in my previous post, new players have difficulty with the game as it is, its only natural that they find the labyrinth at least as difficult as the base game. An experienced player like yourself or myself have literally zero issues regarding the labyrinth (except the performance ones). Not only we have zero issues, but we can trivilize the content with cheesy tactics GGG allowed inside the labyrinth for the shake of speedrunning (!?!?) Anyway, the point still stands, the original estimations of 45minutes runs for experienced players were totally off, cause the labyrinth for an experienced player is in the worst case scenario 20minute chore (with loading times).



But again you lost the most crucial point made here mate. Besides labyrinth favouring certain builds AND playstyles, what the real issue is here is that the mechanics used NEGATE our CHOICES in the SKILL TREE. Thats foundamentaly wrong in the ARPG genre, when your character traits are fully nullified. And again if you cant see or realise how this is wrong, then it is time for some reading again.




Responding appropriately to this would only infuriate you (and probably regarding how GGG tries to silence satire and sarcasm when it speaks the truth, would also evoke my probation) and i do not wish any of those to happen.



Its the SUGGESTION i made, as a solution to what i see wrong, offcourse it depicts my opinion.... Are you going to bash on my suggestion on the feedback forums? Or are gonna respect it and add something constructive (negative/positive/neutral) to it though? Cause i cant quite get what your point here is beside's shitposting (honestly i dont believe there is any to begin with)


On the last part, besides disregarding that those facts are actually from GGG and not mine lets see what we have. The rest is fluff you should refrain from posting as by your instructions.

"

Dos_Fafner wrote:

Just because I do not agree with you does not mean I did not read your post. Most of these "complaint" threads are similar so no, I have not read them all and I do not intend to read them all

Bye

P.S. Ill leave this here to help you (my whole suggestion about labyrinth gathered in one place for your pleasure, posted in this thread too), cause assuming things all the time is humiliating


P.S.S @NeroNoah something to add to the OP or casually passing by to derail the conversation? No hard feelings luv, but refrain from posting if you have nothing of importance or new to say on the matter. If that means i should bid you farewell then fine, au revoir!

double post removed