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

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If that is a person's reasoning and goal, it makes a perfectly reasonable basis for a separate post on the forum lobbying for changing the act that you find boring, tedious or un-fun. Thus, making this sort of proposal in a thread about the labyrinth, off-topic.

The thing is... find me a single mandatory part of the game that everyone likes. The issue with that would be that we need alternatives or ways to skip essentially everything the game offers.

The basic option you get is

a) Play the game you get
b) Don't play the game you get

A game is art, and if you don't agree with the artist, then ignore it.

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The_Reporter wrote:

@ Zaludoz
10/10 great post man!

I'll second that feeling. I would also like to thank Zaludoz again for his effort in initially building the individual contributor list.

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Zaludoz wrote:

the labyrinth is not "act 4.5", it's a tacked on mini-game that grants progression of a character in the main game)


Requiring one to play a different (and dis-liked, as personal taste may be) type of gameplay to progress in the rest of the game, is the primary cause for complaint.

The problem with this statement is that the laby doesn't grant any progression in the main game. You can go from A1n to A4m without ever stepping foot in there. You can even move into mapping having never ascended, making the primary cause for complaint baseless.

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Shovelcut wrote:

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Zaludoz wrote:

the labyrinth is not "act 4.5", it's a tacked on mini-game that grants progression of a character in the main game)


Requiring one to play a different (and dis-liked, as personal taste may be) type of gameplay to progress in the rest of the game, is the primary cause for complaint.

The problem with this statement is that the laby doesn't grant any progression in the main game. You can go from A1n to A4m without ever stepping foot in there. You can even move into mapping having never ascended, making the primary cause for complaint baseless.

The primary cause of complaint is that labyrinth trap game play is boring, irritating, tedious, and not fun in order to earn the ascendancy points. I take you meant that you feel that ascendancy points are not required? That is not a reasonable argument from my point of view. Chris Wilson has stated that they were not optional even in the Ascendancy Release and there has been more balancing done sense then. We will apparently just have to agree to disagree on this though because it is a silly and pointless discussion between forum posters.

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Turtledove wrote:

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Shovelcut wrote:

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Zaludoz wrote:

the labyrinth is not "act 4.5", it's a tacked on mini-game that grants progression of a character in the main game)


Requiring one to play a different (and dis-liked, as personal taste may be) type of gameplay to progress in the rest of the game, is the primary cause for complaint.

The problem with this statement is that the laby doesn't grant any progression in the main game. You can go from A1n to A4m without ever stepping foot in there. You can even move into mapping having never ascended, making the primary cause for complaint baseless.

The primary cause of complaint is that labyrinth trap game play is boring, irritating, tedious, and not fun in order to earn the ascendancy points. I take you meant that you feel that ascendancy points are not required? That is not a reasonable argument from my point of view. Chris Wilson has stated that they were not optional even in the Ascendancy Release and there has been more balancing done sense then. We will apparently just have to agree to disagree on this though because it is a silly and pointless discussion between forum posters.

My reply means exactly what it says in response to the statement made by Zaludoz.

Asserting that the laby grants (or gates) any kind of progression in the main game is just flat out wrong. As proof, you can play from the very beginning of the game all the way to "end game" without them. They are optional as to when you get them, they don't gate any of the core game. There are players now who wait until they're ready to map or well into mapping before bothering ascending. I've even tried it myself and waited until I was well into the 80s to ascend. At no point during the leveling process did I feel that I couldn't progress without ascending.

That by definition is "optional".

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Shovelcut wrote:

The problem with this statement is that the laby doesn't grant any progression in the main game.

You can even move into mapping having never ascended,
making the primary cause for complaint baseless.

Depends on what progression you care about.

If all you care about is getting a certain level, or achieving a certain tier of maps, or killing certain bosses, up to this point, you can progress to those points without ascendancies, with certain builds or gear.

If you want certain gear, you can grind for it and trade for it, and that's a form of game progression (and there are enchantments locked behind the labyrinth, so this point could be argued, but it's not even a blip on my personal radar; I ignore it because it's an insane grind doing something I couldn't stand.)

If your character progression IS your build, and the theorycrafting behind it, and it requires the nodes within ascendancies, no, you certainly cannot progress without ascending.

The whole point of ascendancy classes was to give each base class more individuality, to make that choice matter more. Ascending is a core gameplay feature of progression that defines your character and build wildly more impactful than any non-ascendancy build or set of gear can provide.

To claim the game is not balanced for ascendancy classes is ignorant at best, even misleading, and a lie at worst. There have been patch notes that indicated the game having recieved balance changes due to the ascendancy classes. To think for a moment that the game will not be balanced around the power provided by Ascendancy Classes is naive. You think people screaming power creep now are bad? If they didn't balance the game around these, there would be an uproar.

Character progression in an ARPG is NOT optional, thats part of what makes the game RP.

Furthermore comparing it to the rest of the game and its mandatory nature (like someone previously mentioned lets have free or alternative progression till merciless) while in theory might seem the correct thing to do it actually is not. Why is that? Cause the rest of the game is from 1lvl to 100 the same, ARPG, the labyrinth is not, its a totally different kind of game inside an ARPG. And that would be great indeed if this new gameplay didnt actually GATE character progression with its alienating nature.

Im still unsure if the other side can (still after all this time) realise the plethora of reasons why the whole topic is a legit reason to why some changes must be made.

In game terms another similar example would be in any racing game with car modifications (better engine, coolers, nitro etc) the game's creators decided to put a strategy/city builder simulator in the game that gated some car parts that cannot be found elsewhere and are direct upgrades to any car.

You see its a combination of factors that make labyrinth a bad decision overall in the game. Its understandable from anyone here that this kind of power needs an appropriate gate but why does that have to be a different game? I dont believe anyone signed for arcade/platform nonsense when they started playing path of exile, but we also understand that some might find this kind of gameplay intriguing or fun and challenging thats why we believe it SHOULD STAY ingame but as a completely and true side content.

Seriously even if there was no enchants or labyrinth only drops or ascendancy points or chests and shrines, the treasures on the last room alone would be enough to still consider the labyrinth the most rewarding content in the game time and difficulty wise.

Anyway this will fall on deaf ears again unfortunately, tunnel vision and shit like that.

Thanks to the people who are still fighting for a seemigly lost cause, much appreciated. But also thanks the rest who without realising it constantly keep this thread on first page for more people to see and join the cause even if you are (?) against it for your own silly or egotistical reasons.

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The_Reporter wrote:

So, I suppose one must do the repulsive NON-optional thing to reach the optional points. lol

The thing with games nowadays is that they don't really have a clear finish line. When you played Super Mario you had the flag pole jumped in and you won. Nowadays most games give people things to do after finishing it. Technically after killing Malachai you have won Path of Exile, the rest is essentially long time motivation to keep players in the game.

The thing is all those things are mainly meant to power up your character and do additional content with that power. A lot of players though mainly play for those endgame parts, so leveling up a character is annoying for them in general, the lab is just a small part of that.