Wondered if anyone feels/experiences the same of Labyrinth in 2020.

I know they haven't changed much since the second year or when they added the racing. But I have noticed the labyrinth is even duller and less engaging. As much as flying mounts are useful in most instances I have noticed they kind of ruin our experiences IMO in these events sometimes.

Like an example is when you surgical strike mining candy corn or carving it makes the large groups less likely to form. I've noticed what happens now most just fly get their stuff then leave so the players without mounts are left behind while trying to do the Door events even, someone can just fly there while the others have to navigate through the hordes. I feel this year has been a lot more dead in this area. Just wondered on the thoughts of this I tend to not see anyone doing much whenever I'm in there.

If you've been playing for years, then it stands to reason that you will get tired of it.

Ya I have been playing since GW2 came out but I still like doing big battles with random people like world bosses. I just find it's dwindled more within these past two years since mounts but maybe it's just that as you stated it's fatigue. I myself seem more bored because there are less players roaming or are in guild private sessions maybe.

Actually, my own experience is very different than yours. I'll use lfg to find a group farming the way I like to, then will run with them. I rarely see people using mounts. Most folks are running and tagging as many of those hordes as they can along the way. It's a fast moving, fluid battle that I really enjoy, like a Dothraki tidal wave smashing over everything in its way. :)

I'm not sure what you've been doing for all this time, but if you open LFG you will see a ton of squads for farming lab, most of them with 20+ players. Are you just zoning into lab and staying on the overflow map you zoned in to? If so, you're just doing it wrong. Lab is being farmed quite a lot and squads run on foot except when individuals need to catch up with the group. If you attempted to use a mount, you wouldn't be able to tag, defeating the purpose of the farm.

Speed diving through the labyrinth on a Griffin has made it more fun in that respect

I do understand why after so long the labyrinth would lose its lustre though. I feel like that with SAB now

I think it could use some extra pizaz. Some new monsters, different mechanics, more madness (like random teleportations). It isn't actually an instance like a dungeon or raid, so it should be able to have a meta. A meta based on madness ? I'm fairly sure they could work with something like that.

Word of advice: Join no mount Labyrinth runs. It is a lot better and feels much more like pre-PoF Labyrinth. Plenty of commanders run no mount squads, myself included, and will kick mount bombers :)

@Chichimec.9364 said:Actually, my own experience is very different than yours. I'll use lfg to find a group farming the way I like to, then will run with them. I rarely see people using mounts. Most folks are running and tagging as many of those hordes as they can along the way. It's a fast moving, fluid battle that I really enjoy, like a Dothraki tidal wave smashing over everything in its way. :)

Using mounts also have its limitation if it is a flying mount as you will get teleported back when you cross some borders on mount in air. Land based mounts work better and is good tool to catch up to group when there is no close WP to respawn at if you get killed. Land based mounts do their work to keep groups alive and get less aggro then pure no-mount group. There are profession that have superspeed (AoE), so it the same problem for those that are too far getting any buff from mobility speed (swiftness or superspeed).

The real issue is that some people don't care when they aggro Steve and bring him into a Door boss to get rid of its focus on that player. My impression is also that it is hard for a very small group to actually kill Steve and Candy corn boss as they do a lot of damage (combined with re-apply condition very fast). I run gear with vitality and condition cleanse and then it is really hard to avoid getting hit by ranged AoE from Candy Corn boss. Steve are also very mobile and disappear and show up very fast, so it is hard to keep that boss in place or even hit it enough before you have to start all over with his HP that start to regen as some player don't have enough soft CC and hard CC to keep it down.

In this instance I have found that a Scrapper with a lot of hard CC, some AoE cleanse and heals help groups best. Barrier (which most LFG seem to ask for from Scrapper) isn't best solution for this type of Instanced game play as most get hit with condition and it seem that it is a lot player that ignore to equip condition cleanse (probably think damage is more important and get carry from other player to even stay alive). There are also a lot of Rangers as far as I can tell that stay ranged (meaning my AoE can't reach them and they also loose boons from being too far from the rest of group).

If you're not already using the Looking For Group Tool to find people to run with I strongly recommend doing that. It means you can join an existing, active group rather than hoping one will start to form on whichever copy of the map you happen to be on, and also means you can choose a group which fits how you want to play.

My personal preference is to find ones which ask for no mounts, but don't mind you using them to catch up. If I've stayed behind to gather candy corn nodes or carve pumpkins, or got interrupted by real-life things it's really helpful to be able to jump on the raptor or jackal and use the speed boost and evasion/leap to catch up to the group. Before PoF I'd often have to wait for them to loop back round closer to me or try to guess where they were going, take a short-cut and hope I could get through before the group went past. So for me it actually makes it easier to keep the group together now mounts exist. I still prefer the groups that ask for no mounts though because that means no one using them to rush ahead of the commander and other players to open doors first, or using mount engage skills to wipe out enemies as soon as they spawn.

My other preference is to look for groups who are doing all the door events, including the bosses. I know it means fewer ToT bags per hour or whatever, but I find it breaks up the monotony and makes the overall run more fun, plus it's often the thing which gets people talking and again makes it more interesting. Ones who say it's a casual or chill run and they aren't going to be super-strict about staying on the tag or using exact builds are nice too.

Bit of a loner always have been to be honest avoid talking at all costs I just usually drop into most things without formed groups, I just didn't have issues with population for quite awhile it was always full without a LFG. But I'll take all this into account thanks for the replies either way.

I know I'm supposed to be playing this more socially but never been one to be talking much, kind of just been in the background on this game not the way to play it I know. Was doing dungeons with a guild but eventually I fell out of it, been solo ever since unfortunately and silent. Wish things were different but it's a overwhelming social fear for me in every game.

@DarkReign.4503 said:...I know I'm supposed to be playing this more socially but never been one to be talking much, kind of just been in the background on this game not the way to play it I know...When running the lab I'm usually moving too fast to do any chatting. A few people do make comments in chat but unless it's the commander or someone else making combat suggestions I just ignore the chatter. Much of my game time is spent in open world pve and I can go days at a time without saying anything in chat. When I'm solo roaming, I generally don't bother with chatting. The one exception is doing dailies. If it's doing events on a map I'm comfortable with, I will throw up a mentor tag and make a chat announcement, including the nearest waypoint, if I come across an event someone hasn't already called out. To me this game can accommodate both social and solo play and I like that.

@DarkReign.4503 said:Bit of a loner always have been to be honest avoid talking at all costs I just usually drop into most things without formed groups, I just didn't have issues with population for quite awhile it was always full without a LFG. But I'll take all this into account thanks for the replies either way.

I know I'm supposed to be playing this more socially but never been one to be talking much, kind of just been in the background on this game not the way to play it I know. Was doing dungeons with a guild but eventually I fell out of it, been solo ever since unfortunately and silent. Wish things were different but it's a overwhelming social fear for me in every game.

When you're in a big group for things like the Lab you don't need to talk, in fact some groups would probably prefer if you don't because it means you're not stopping what you're doing to type and other people don't get distracted reading and reply to comments. It's just a way of finding enough people to kill enemies faster than they kill you, and to scale up doors so there's more enemies and therefore more loot.

Yep2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020Having issue where I join a squad, map is fulljoin a squad map is fulljoin a squad map is full...3 minutes later...join a squad map is fulljoin a squad map is fulljoin a squad map is full...join a squad map is fulljoin a squad map is fulljoin a squad map is full..........Same experience in 2020.Meanwhile my instance...No commander...15 minutes later...Still no commander.

Again...I bought a commander tag for this very reason. I log in, tag up if there isn't a commander in that area and in under 5 min I have a full train. You don't have to buy a tag, BTW. There is the free tag that you can use (the apple training one) that people will follow if you use it and post to LFG. I did that for a long time before I just bit the bullet and bought my own tag.

Loved the lab in the past, still loving it, and there's a huge number of squads running it.So fine as-is IMO

@Naxos.2503 said:I think it could use some extra pizaz. Some new monsters, different mechanics, more madness (like random teleportations). It isn't actually an instance like a dungeon or raid, so it should be able to have a meta. A meta based on madness ? I'm fairly sure they could work with something like that.

Seconded, I've made many posts over the years asking for stuff like that.