Lab is terrible

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Zaludoz wrote:

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

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Zaludoz wrote:

Exactly right.

Besides the boss fights and trash clearing, to refill flasks, that do follow the rules (which is why one of my suggestions as an alternative to the Labyrinth is a short-cut system of just fighting Izaro 3 times on one map without traps) the tiresome and chore-like parts of the Labyrinth are the trap gauntlets that ignore stats in an effort to be challenging and "fair to all builds" but end up being anything but fair, simply dismissive - and that is where they fail an aRPG based around stats and builds and intense itemization.

Regarding traps, you have very few stats that matter. The "rules" change in this mini-game:

Movement speed is still king, along with movement skills (on PC, I waltzed through the Labyrinth with Blink Arrow - I have yet to try it on PS4 without quick precision destination control), then damage reduction and flasks that provide that, and massive regen. Flasks that remove bleed are essential. A minor hurrah could be given to fire defense against burning floors and evasion *might* help against slowing darts. Normal armor/defenses do little against the percentage damage, compared to normal combat with enemies in the rest of the game.

Having high HP without high regen is a liability in the Labyrinth, as flasks do not scale well with health at the same rate as traps deal damage. (Lower HP can be healed entirely by a single flask charge for some builds, while higher hp builds would take several flask uses against the same damage a trap inflicts.)

You cannot do anything to traps to influence them (beyond damaging the aura traps)...
* no chilling/freezing them so you can slip by
* no melting a switch to keep a door open...
* your temporal chains curse aura? doesn't slow down mobile traps
* your enfeeble curse aura? doesn't make them do any less damage that I'm aware of.
* you can't destroy them, so all that damage you're gearing for? worthless.

And those are just off the top of my head, in addition to those I quoted. Maybe you can get the idea from those examples.

(Edit: typo)

cant do anything about traps?
uh? what about.. hmm.. timing and not stepping on them?
is it too hard to time a trap while its under ground?

And your reply has anything to do with traps ignoring our stats how?

That only goes to show that the Labyrinth is a mini-game built around avoiding traps, rather than our stats and builds interacting with them. They ignore our stats, so we have to "ignore" or dodge them entirely...

Talking to people who support this is like banging my head against a wall... oh wait, percent damage, I'd better avoid that.

told this before.
only stat traps care about:
phy reduction. u r welcome.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

im not gonna buy 200$ worth of games just to try how they feel :D
that is just ridiculous.. and i ve seen gameplays. you once finish them and poof. its gone with the wind :D right into steam trash game dump i ll never play again^^
im sry but i ll never try an arpg that is not free2play.

Not every, most definitely, true, but not every single one.
Much like PoE which is a Live-Service model, there's also highly successful games out there which go with the 'traditional' model of buying it and then having that fun. Grim Dawn is probably the best example there. Highly successful in the ARPG genre, engaging game-play, very big long-term viability. Not to speak about offering a very engaging gameplay.
Clearly made to focus on single-player though, so that much has to be said there.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

about defending the game based on my personal experience:
chris explains it so well here: https://youtu.be/pM_5S55jUzk?t=1562
players watch some1 and wants to be as strong as they are in the game.remove this challenging content and every player would be a casual. There is nothing at stake after that. Just running around collecting points. WTF is that mario?

You seemingly don't read properly what I'm saying, that's the ABSOLUTE CONTRARY of what I'm suggesting. I WANT MORE challenging and engaging game-play. I WANT LAB to be in the game personally.
That doesn't mean thought it has to be there as MAIN-CONTENT, which is MANDATORY to do a well-build character. We're talking about core-experience here, not min-max phase.
I'm completely on the side of Christ about providing the engaging content which streamers are able to show off. Doing so while punishing everyone who isn't able to play 30 hours a week though is not the way to go. You shouldn't feel like you're only progressing if you play a lot, the feel of progression needs to be in a game from start to end. A player should be content playing the game when reaching act 5 as much as when killing shaper. Right now that 'feel' is skewed because GGG didn't put effort into making sure that the game until that described stage is well done. It was, isn't anymore comparatively.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

I get it some people might not like it the way i do and would want instant gratification instead of taking their sweet time. but this was what i meant when i said this game is not for everybody.

Sure, some do, I don't. Still the point about lab stands though.
There's a very important distinctive between 'instant gratification' and simply 'frustrating RNG elements' or 'messed up pacing'. As an example: Dark Souls is extremely punishing, very hard unless you're used to a specific area of the game and nonetheless one of the best games in its genre. Why? Because it's straight-forward. While different enemies need different tactics, you don't just suddenly need to clear any sort of puzzling mechanic or jumping stage to move further along the core-progression. Those things are hidden as side-content. In PoE that's not the case, hence... frustration and people being unhappy.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

about lab being fun: every player has different sense of FUN in this game. we are at a point where you can choose the content you can focus on and go crazy with it. different parts of the game has different small communities that like those parts. like lab farmers or challenge providers like myself.

You can't choose content freely. You are forced to run maps and hope direly the right content present yourself, par the league-mechanic.
-Want to run temples regularly? Good luck unless you're farming Quarry.
-Want to Delve mainly? Better have deep-deep pockets for Sulphite scarabs.
-Want to run Syndicate? Well, good luck with doing it regularly.

On the contrary you want to keep away from the content you don't like (YOu know, player choice and such, which is a good concept). Forget it. If you just want to focus on mapping then you'll be fairly screwed. Map returns have still been nerfed and feel unrewarding. It's hard to sustain without any side-content at all. Also, you're FORCED to run syndicate, they don't let off, there's no escape. You're also FORCED to deal with bestiary, some of them kill you by being nearby, rare, but happening.

That's what the issue is, not removal of a mechanic, nobody speaks about removing lab whole as content, and those who do literally don't have a clue what they're speaking about. Lab has it's place, just not... the one it has right now.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

this is the tricky part of maintaining a game with this large content, you can NEVER please every single player with every part of the game.
after this comes ''we dont wanna do the lab but we have to'' part.
some power dynamics are locked behind some sort of a gate in every other rpg.

You're fine without a helmet enchant, also enchants can be gotten on rare helmets via fossils, there's an alternative. The only reason to run lab is to enchant unique helmets. Perfect niche.
The only other mechanics which you're forced to deal with are: Invulnerability shrines, silence tormented spirits, Bestiary and Betrayal. All of them have no place in maps as common spawns. The are hard-counters to quite a few builds depending on the content they spawn, those are generally bad design-choices.

People want challenge, people don't want frustration. Hence you need to have the choice to choose challenge or the lack of it, rewards pending on your choices. Nothing more, nothing less. It's not rocket science there, simple concept followed by the majority of well-received games.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

these are special and valuable skills. you cant just hand them out for free. if u do that your players lose the sense of progression. when they do that game become meaningless and they leave asap.
last thoughts; experience is whats important when it comes to poe. lab is just another obstacle that gets easier as you experience it.
dont expect it to be removed. that will never happen. if it gets easier, i ll be the first one to protest.

Once again missing the point though. Nobody said that specific content can't be gated behind RNG, or specific items can't. It's the amount of RNG layered on top of each other, as well as the presentation.
Nobody would complain about lab if it can be skipped.
Nobody would complain about Betrayal if it can be skipped.
Nobody would complain about silence tormented spirits or invulnerability shrines if it can be skipped.

The issue is, they can't, and neither the tormented spirit nor the shrine offer any reward for beating them. The spirit literally nothing, the shrine a short buff which is sometimes even bugged and doesn't work, hence not reliable and therefore a bad reward.

Untangling such mechanics from the CORE is important. You can still have it on the SIDE... like Temple, Delve, Trials, Abyss, Breach. All of those won't be triggered unless you actively do so, you have CHOICE.

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Zaludoz wrote:

Besides the boss fights and trash clearing, to refill flasks, that do follow the rules (which is why one of my suggestions as an alternative to the Labyrinth is a short-cut system of just fighting Izaro 3 times on one map without traps) the tiresome and chore-like parts of the Labyrinth are the trap gauntlets that ignore stats in an effort to be challenging and "fair to all builds" but end up being anything but fair, simply dismissive - and that is where they fail an aRPG based around stats and builds and intense itemization.

Exactly that, hence as: Side-content. Issue resolved. Different game-play can be in side-content upon choice, no need for rework then.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

cant do anything about traps?
uh? what about.. hmm.. timing and not stepping on them?
is it too hard to time a trap while its under ground?

Not the issue in itself, as mentioned so often. The difference in main-style is the issue, hence not core-viable, only as side-content. Once again.

ofc i dont read what u r writing. r u kidding me? look at its length.
i cant read longer than 2 of ur sentences.its boring af
+ i am pretty sure about how lab will never be a side content.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

ofc i dont read what u r writing. r u kidding me? look at its length.
i cant read longer than 2 of ur sentences.its boring af
+ i am pretty sure about how lab will never be a side content.

Sad that you lack the attention-span to read more then a snipped from a newspaper, a short snippet.

Might be the reason as to why you're talking about things you got no clue, you know, reading causes one to understand, blaring into a thread without even knowing what's written there... not.

So, change that or keep quiet, you seemingly don't have to add anything to a discussion if you're unable to follow it remotely.

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Kulze wrote:

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

ofc i dont read what u r writing. r u kidding me? look at its length.
i cant read longer than 2 of ur sentences.its boring af
+ i am pretty sure about how lab will never be a side content.

Sad that you lack the attention-span to read more then a snipped from a newspaper, a short snippet.

Might be the reason as to why you're talking about things you got no clue, you know, reading causes one to understand, blaring into a thread without even knowing what's written there... not.

So, change that or keep quiet, you seemingly don't have to add anything to a discussion if you're unable to follow it remotely.

yes yes ofc i have no clue :D
buddy nothing can make me go through even 1 of ur paragraphs :D
heres the catch about understanding tho. i dont enter this forum thinking ''these people will add something to me''.
i am here to be sure casuals are not trying to make the game easier :D
+i can trashtalk whenever i want. you cant do anything about it ^^
++i forgot when u write ''you got no clue'' to some1 else on the internet you come across as a shallow human being :):)
+++on top of that u are writing that to a player who did 100 uber labs per league for the past 5 leagues :D

The lab is fine for me.
I mean I hate it, but it feels so damn rewarding when you finally beat uber lab izaro after he killed you the first few times. I think it's a cool element that makes this game feel really mean or "hardcore" (playing poe in actual hardcore is insane imho).

Only thing I'd change is:
- make the missing trials have a higher chance of spawning.
- give us more keys or at elast make the chest drops better, they totally pale in comparison to delve or synthesis chests.

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MrsDeath_ wrote:

yes yes ofc i have no clue :D
buddy nothing can make me go through even 1 of ur paragraphs :D
heres the catch about understanding tho. i dont enter this forum thinking ''these people will add something to me''.
i am here to be sure casuals are not trying to make the game easier :D
+i can trashtalk whenever i want. you cant do anything about it ^^
++i forgot when u write ''you got no clue'' to some1 else on the internet you come across as a shallow human being :):)
+++on top of that u are writing that to a player who did 100 uber labs per league for the past 5 leagues :D

Why do you think I'm writing those posts? To amke the game easier?
I'm providing options for GGG so they can finally re-implement challenging content. The game has gotten to a stupidly easy degree while the only 'challenge' presented is having lightning reflexes while the graphics hide the attacks.
Proper challenging content is rare, more then ever, that won't change unless GGG finally shifts how they 'fix' their shit.

Great design.

Hard to be shallow towards someone who lacks respect, it's the same as 'not listening'. And self-proclaimed trash-talking.

Also the amount of labs only accounts for how much of a fan you are of it, skewed perception? Try to see it from another perspective first.

I couldn't stand lab back in the day when you had to friggin repeat it on every character and I strictly played and did all testing on hardcore....

Back after a year and half or so break and I now like it. I enjoy doing it and the Izaro fights. I also like the fact that it lets me know if I have weaknesses in my build I need to patch up or move on to a new build if that isn't possible.

If you don't have a movement skill set up, phys reduction, and a way to deal with bleeding you are making a failed build regardless of lab that will never last in bloodlines corrupted maps, no regen, et cetera at end game. With these three things in check your lab experience and enjoyment will vastly improve....

I do not think lab is too hard or at all unbalanced. I have taken many characters now since coming back through Uber. It feels very balanced like most class starts and all the acts.

I have done lab on multiple characters, even pure es chaos inoc as soon as I had enough skill points to get it. I had no problems on all of the character starts so far and play styles. I also have done all hybrids on all classes, but duelist.

Very polished if you ask me compared to when they dropped.

Miss death is really annoying

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johnce6 wrote:

If you don't have a movement skill set up, phys reduction, and a way to deal with bleeding you are making a failed build regardless of lab that will never last in bloodlines corrupted maps, no regen, et cetera at end game. With these three things in check your lab experience and enjoyment will vastly improve....

Yes, you need to have a movement skill set up.
Yes, you also need to take care of bleeding.

No, you don't need phys reduction on most characters nowadays. The third one is leading this thesis into oblivion sadly.

Why?
Evasion-based builds. You can neither stack ES nor Armour. Both are viable options for lab. ES because of the vast EHP-pool, Armour for the phys reduction inherent.

So, 1/3 of builds are massively hindered compared to the others, that's an issue. Lab itself still is fun, though for a beginner - once again, beginner, important - these issues are frustrating.
The same goes for anyone who isn't enjoying the 'style' of lab. It goes against the policy of 'play what you like' which comes with many choices. Sadly GGG interprets that quite awkwardly, forcing people into specific styles rather then getting them to build a wide range of viable characters. That is changing vastly compared to a year or 2 ago even, and it changed back then already to an unhealthy degree.

If it goes on in the same direction we'll only have 3-4 viable builds each league, all others being utter garbage in comparison. That's sad.