Ready to say goodbye to an old friend.

For the fanboys and haters let me preface; this is not a “I hate the game post”, I have enjoyed many aspects of Path of Exile, have generously supported the game since 2012, but do not understand the direction the game is going... From fun, fast paced action to a boss crawl slug fest (act 4) and now core content gated behind back and forth puzzle games with ridiculously over tuned hardcore gameplay in a non-hardcore league… If you enjoy the current state of the game; great! If your build can one shot merci Malachi; Great! I am happy for you! Keep playing and hopefully you support since you enjoy it so much, but this post is probably not for you unless you can be maturely objective.

For myself, the game is going in a direction that is not fun anymore; it feels less like entertainment and more like work... First came act 4 with its seemingly never ending boss slug fest and content (Koams) that is so hard to look at, culminating in a severely over tuned final boss fight that is ridiculous to the point of trolling the typical player base... Seriously I believe there are people at GGG that derive some weird pleasure knowing what players facing act 4 for the first time are going to experience… Seems like a strange strategy for a game funded largely by popularity and retention… I get that there are those certain builds that can power through; however, not everyone enjoys “that” build… Yet, being able to skip most of act 4 merciless and jumping into maps at the end of merciless act 3 along with normal and cruel rush by high-level friend made act4 somewhat tolerable.. basically “just get through it”.
Now comes the labyrinth; gating the much hyped ascendency skills and abilities behind 10 zones of hardcore play on unstable servers, an unstable client (I have to disable my anti-virus to play, really…), and yet again a ridiculously over tuned boss that you must fight 3 times in a hardcore setting while playing softcore mode... Let me just say, those of you that play hard core without cheating, I salute you, I am not sure if you have 8 arms, are part cyborg, or just blessed with luck, but you have done something that just seems impossible to me…

Admittedly I am not an elite player, pretty average in most aspects of Path of Exile, and yet I cannot seem to finish the merciless labyrinth… I have tried a variety of builds and finally gave up on my last build a level 80 ranger with 9000+ evasion and 4200 health… There is no need to mention the build because I was one shot so quickly that I didn’t even notice what killed me, let alone get a skill off… This was the result of 10 hardcore zones (in softcore), praying that each screen load of the labyrinth was not a disconnection, that I have enough flasks to get through the tedious traps, and not too many back and forth gold doors. Not only was it disheartening to be one shot instantly, now I have to start the labyrinth all over, even though I am in a softcore league… Agreeably 9000+ evasion and 4200 health is not all that great, but this is a level 68 zone, not a tier 15 endgame map… furthermore seeing that it must be completed to access ascendancy points, a core component of the game and part of the leveling process, does it need to be so difficult? It seems to me the game is always being tuned for those few elite players who still blaze to 100 every league anyway.

I want to start a new build to try and complete the labyrinth, but the thought of having to do it yet again in normal and cruel, along with normal and cruel act 4 just kills any motivation that I have…

Thanks for reading

Hm. Read up on how to do the Lab or buy the kill. Izaro is actually not that hard once you learn his patterns and how his specialties work. If you fail on the first two phases, the last phase does get very hard though.

My Standard ranger has probably less evasion than you have, and 4.8k life, and can do him without any problems. Admittedly though, I do have a lot more damage than you most likely, and Vinktar's for instant leech.

Sorry to hear that, OP.

You're going to get a lot of "git gud"-type responses, which don't really help you.

My advice is this, especially in relation to act IV: Practice, practice, practice. Learn the mechanics of the fights, and suddenly they become easy.

For example, when Malachai first came out, I was flabbergasted. There was so much going on at once! How does anyone survive? But then I ran it a ton on overleveled characters (mainly to help others get past him), and I learned over time what to avoid and what I could tank.

The trick with the labyrinth is to build characters with life regen, movespeed, and a good movement skill. With Izaro, you HAVE to manage his buffs (until you're way overleveled and geared out). Don't just kill him, manage the extra mechanics. Be sure to kill the golems and gargoyles. You might want to let the portals live so you have more mobs to leech/get charges from.

Once you've gotten through it a few times, it become easier. Trust me :)

To me, the labyrinth is boring and not fun. I could never even stomach getting up to the final boss. It was so boring, tedious and not fun going through the labyrinth, I just quit after running around in big circles for 15 minutes. I hope that GGG eventually gates the ascendancy points behind something else besides the labyrinth. That way people like me and the author of the OP may be able to enjoy this game in the future like we did in the past.

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empathise wrote:

I want to start a new build to try and complete the labyrinth, but the thought of having to do it yet again in normal and cruel, along with normal and cruel act 4 just kills any motivation that I have…

Find one or two people who can rush you through quests and normal/cruel rinth. Or just the rinth part of things.

Not ***** who take payment for that though.

"

Maswasnos wrote:

Sorry to hear that, OP.

You're going to get a lot of "git gud"-type responses, which don't really help you.

My advice is this, "git gud"

This is basically what you were saying. :P

"

empathise wrote:

... I have tried a variety of builds and finally gave up on my last build a level 80 ranger with 9000+ evasion and 4200 health… There is no need to mention the build because I was one shot so quickly that I didn’t even notice what killed me, let alone get a skill off…


...Agreeably 9000+ evasion and 4200 health is not all that great, but this is a level 68 zone, not a tier 15 endgame map…

well. maybe it is a good idea you actually mention the build. was it a bow ranger? character than can offscreen pretty much everything and take hits back only when the player falls asleep? character that does not really care if the map is Tier 1 or Tier 10 - because it has SO MUCH DAMAGE pretty much for free and doesnt care about mobs' damage output because dead mobs do no damage. bow builds in this game are a big fat developers' mistake - they are too strong and allow undergeared and underskilled players to reach content they should have not even see - not mentioning attempt. lab shows this - lab is a content (both layout and final boss) that is pretty difficult to bruteforce if player and character are not up to par.


4.2k life is not a lot. with bad flasks - it is pretty much nothing. 9k evasion is nice and most probably can help you evade some Izi hits.

im not going to say 'git gud' but there are things you can learn from this failure. go watch guide about Izaro - he is really easy when you know what is going on. few of the more popular streamers/youtubers have made one so there are plenty to select from.


as for the traps - dying to them is pretty unfortunate but once you get the grip you wont die to them ever again. these are that easy.

Sad to see yet another one of those threads :(

I personally don't mind the lab (even though I still think life-based has quite an edge in there). I can understand the OP, though. Bringing that Indianna Jones mini-game was quite a ballsy move, apparently.

It´s deffenetly not your fault, izaro is overtuned for life-builds.
I also got one-shot several times, with 5200live +400mana(mom) +fortify and he had no buffs.
I would say his Hammer-form is the easyiest followed by Shield-form and the least is Dw-form.
His Duelwieldform one-shots me and no a melee with multystrike cant dodge, because you are locked and no endurance-charges do nothing unless you have 7+.
I could kill the other two forms with my eyes closed (so pro O.o), because there Spezial attacks only deal around 3000-4000 with fortify.

If you want to have an easy final fight, just dont allow him any buffs in the prior stages. I've done the lab on my glass cannon crit bow ranger in Std, without any problems. Not even 4k life, 11k eva, acro & phase acro. Blink-arrow over him & spam. Just saying.

If you want to be 100% safe in your run, just go any tanky build. Life regen for traps + insta staunching pots makes it almost impossible to die. Leap slam is much better than WB for safety, because you can jump over things, up+down & through doors. For Izaro have fortify + lots of armor or high block (max block/spellblock Gladiator just laughs at Izaro).

But I understand why some people don't like the Lab. I have mixed feelings too. It's not because they cant "git gud", but because its a different playstyle than what we were used to & general Lab purpose, which is speed-run enchant hamster wheel.