Favorite zone? Least? Hardest? Most likely to kill you?

[Delmuir]

I love the Sludgenest.

I love it partly because of the unique design, i.e., endlessly spawning slimes. I also enjoy the tension of the level potentially getting out of control, i.e., too many enemies and being swarmed. There's no "one hit" knock-out, just the dawning realization that you're not killing fast enough. Sometimes that happens early on, usually with a melee character but with mages and similar it generally happens if you stick around too long. The point is... it's a fun gamble.

I think this is the best designed and most fun zone in the game. I'll give a second vote to the alternative Sandworm Lair.

My least favorite is probably Reknor, mostly due to it being sprawling but unimaginative. It'd be fine if it were quick but it's so long. Can't be expansive and dull. I'll give a second vote to Eruan for the same reason.

The most difficult for me is... depends on where I hit the wall but the most reliably difficult zone in the game is Lake Nur.

But Lake Nur is probably not the most likely to kill me as I'm usually very on guard and willing to retreat and come back later. The honor for most murderous zone goes either to Heart of the Gloom or Dreadfell.

I will note that the Weirdling Beast is definitively the boss most likely to kill me, followed by the back up guardian from Daikara, Massok. Screw both of those bastards straight to hell.

[Tryble]

All the zones I like are those with not-too-open layouts and nothing especially awful going on, which is...most everything, except water zones and awful places like crypt. I haven't been to most zones since coming back from 1.4.9 though.
I think my favorite has to be the Old forest, just for how normal and comfy it is.

Above all, Heart of the Gloom is my most hated. It's much too common to drop into a big central opening with a pack of rares or higher. Whenever that happens I immediately leave and refuse to come back until much later. Even when that doesn't happen, being trapped in corridors by enemies teleporting on top of and behind you is super common - it's one of those situations where you have to win then and there, or you die, similar to long corridor sandworm lair.

[Frumple]

If the heart of the sandworm queen didn't exist, I'd skip the lair every single time it didn't generate the tunnel, barring a generally pretty rare early access to controlled teleport and hefty vision-equivalent. Even with the heart existing it's basically the only zone I don't habitually fully explore, instead beelining (well, trying to, anyway) straight for the stairs. I appreciate the design a lot -- it's inventive and in some ways pretty well done -- but I bloody loathe actually navigating it. Some days not even the heart's allure is enough incentive. Tunnel's much less annoying, since it's mostly a one-and-done and you, y'know, know where the stairs are going to be.

Alt form for the maze near about induces a similar feeling. Dunno if autoexplore still doesn't work right with it, but not having an easy way to get to the stairs-down equivalent is just a pain in the hindquarters, and unlike the lair, well. There's no heart in alt-form maze. Sandworm lair is the zone I want to skip, horror maze is the zone I do.

Enjoyment wise... I actually like the gloom layout. It can be hella' mean but I really enjoy the whole "I'm inna' tree" feel. Not-horror maze is nice, too -- plenty of room to maneuver while still being straightforward, with a one-and-done chaff level and tight boss level. It's pretty a'ight. I'd similarly enjoy the EoR sewer level... if it weren't for the water poisoning you and making exploration a complete pain in the arse. Water there should seriously just slow you down or somethin' instead.

Not sure what kills me the most, though. Generally it's not so much a particular zone that kills me as it is particularly lazy play getting me killed. S'like... I could probably win on insane or whatever, but playing attentively like that is just bloody miserable. So I don't, even if it gets me ate occasionally on normal. I'm here to do silly stuff and lazily faceroll the world, not get my shit pushed in for taking two steps out of place.

Crypt's mean, of course. Fight pride entrances used to be notably evil... I already kinda' miss 'em. I generally don't start with any AoA tier one except trollmire (though prior to autoexplore existing, I actually just flat skipped trollmire fairly often -- place is basically a nightmare to navigate without it) or bear one. Urkis or wozzface two squares east of last hope can hurt pretty bad. All I can really think of at the mo'.

E: oh, except the orc internment camp. I skip that, uh. Most of the time, these days. I just leave the orcs there and blow everything else up. Hell, there's been a few times I've just flat not gone over the bridge in the EoR campaign... went straight from the first few zones into dragons and through to victory. Can get pretty rough but it definitely shortens the campaign even further

[Zizzo]

I love the Sludgenest.

Heh. I took one character to the first level of Sludgenest. A few dozen fights with seemingly endlessly multiplying oozes/slimes/etc. later, I said, "Yeah, not doing this," and left, never to return.

I'll give a second vote to the alternative Sandworm Lair.

Alt Sandworm Lair? Wow. I literally wrote an addon specifically to avoid that zone, sight unseen.

My least favorite is probably Reknor, […] I'll give a second vote to Eruan for the same reason.

See, I look forward to those zones, as much-needed breathers after the stress of Dreadfell and Rak'Shor Pride, respectively.

The most difficult for me is... depends on where I hit the wall but the most reliably difficult zone in the game is Lake Nur.

Now, there I'll agree. I dread that zone. I'll push through it, though, because there's good stuff after it. The really bad zones for me are the Orc Prides; that's where most of my characters end up getting abandoned, because it just gets too hard to motivate myself to keep diving back into that unrelenting stress pit.

As for zones I like? Well, regular Sandworm Lair can be fun, though occasionally mildly annoying. I also enjoy the Maze (regular, not alt), and Ruined Dungeon for characters that I think can handle it. I don't usually do the slavers' ring anymore, but it's fun with a stealth-based character, sneaking past the slaves to kill the slavers.

E: oh, except the orc internment camp. I skip that, uh. Most of the time, these days.

Ah, right, almost forgot EoR zones. The bottom level of Ritch Hive can be nerve-wracking, but I can usually manage it with some cleverness, which is fun. I hate fighting Aeryn in Gates of Morning, though, especially the first time. In the internment camps, I just rocket-boot to the back as fast as I can go and smash the Mindcontrol Pillars before doing anything else.

All the zones I like are those with not-too-open layouts and nothing especially awful going on,

Which is exactly what I like about Elven Ruins: nice narrow windy corridors with corners to duck around and lots of opportunities to control the battlefield. I used to go there pre-Dreadfell (all the way down or just first two levels, depending on how strong I felt the character was) in hopes of scoring some early tier-4 gear; that's become prohibitively dangerous in 1.6, though.

I will note that the Weirdling Beast is definitively the boss most likely to kill me,

Ditto. I actually resorted to writing an addon a while back to fix that one. (I should probably get around to releasing that eventually, now that I think of it…)

followed by the back up guardian from Daikara, Massok.

Yeah, I don't even bother with him anymore, except with characters that I think can kill him quickly from range.

[Frumple]

Yeah, it's probably worth noting the internment camp generally isn't hard, it just has an annoying gimmick (lots of stuff you're not supposed to kill, irritatingly tanky miniboss things), fairly annoying (and samey, and sometimes inconsistent) layout you have to pass through the long way to finish, and... no meaningful reward that I've noticed outside the whole let my people go fluff. It's relatively unpleasant and thoroughly skippable, so I skip it. S'like how I'm less bothered by the alt-maze layout than I am the sandworm lair, but I'll skip the former and not the latter. The internment camp didn't have a worm queen heart the last time I bothered doing it

Sludgenest is fun, though. The spawns aren't infinite, exactly, but they're pretty insistent. Clearing out the last level of it entirely is one of those things I like to do with characters that have been going particularly well, heh.

[Zizzo]

S'like how I'm less bothered by the alt-maze layout than I am the sandworm lair, but I'll skip the former and not the latter.

You might actually be interested in the Alternate Zones Option addon I mentioned earlier. You should, for instance, be able to set it for "always generate alt Sandworm Lair, never generate alt Maze".

Sludgenest is fun, though. The spawns aren't infinite, exactly, but they're pretty insistent.

Oh, that wasn't even on one of the "stuff-is-coming-out-of-the-walls" levels; that was on the first level, the one that's just trees and open ground and so. many. slimes that just kept splitting instead of dying when I hit them. I vaguely recall it taking several minutes to clear that fairly small level, at which point I was like, "So… next level I'll have that @#$% all over again and stuff coming out of the walls? Yeah, no."

[whitelion]

Favorite: Lake of Nur - Appropriately dangerous and terrifying with a challenging and memorable boss.

Least Favorite: Sandworm Lair - Nothing worse than getting stuck in a collapsing tunnel with some suicidal enemy who can't actually hurt you but has enough hp that you can't get them out of the way.

[GlassGo]

Less favorite zone is Dominion Port sewerage.
It always has empty rooms on the edge of map, buried in stone blocks, and - at least it happened before - there could be generated entrance to hidden vauilt. So you need to dig if you don't want to skip opportunity.
Also, auto-explore the and movement in general is a nightmare - you need to manually move char through the poisoned water.

It's like... worst zone in game. Ever.

[PseudoLoneWolf]

Dominion Port sucks but the fat loot drops from the chests make me excited to go there anyway.

[Dopaminka]

Dominion ports sewers are quite bad with it's buggy vaults and annoying exploration.
As for hardest it would go to Primal Forest to me. No matter the character I always rip at it's second floor so I just skip it.

Favourite: probably Dogroth Caldera and the parts of Dreadfell that don't have dreadmasters and Aletta, queen of the confuse.
Gates of Morning in Embers campaign are also quite charming.

[GlassGo]

Favorite - well, can't call anything, except Yeek startng zone, the music there so tranquil, so I feel strange impulse to drop everything, and maybe climb a branch and dunno, look for any insects in the hair...
Oh, and Yeekgur.

[Coldbringer]

Favorite zone in Main Campaign: Conclave Vault. I love the artwork, from the tiles to the level design to the monsters. Desert oasis and crystal caverns deserve honorable mention.

Favorite zone in EOR: the temporal dungeon, Pocket of Distorted Time. Again, really unique and interesting level design. A lot of the EoR zones show advanced level design techniques and are so much more fun and interesting than the main campaign zones, most of which are antiquated by comparison. At least the new zones from Cults and the redesigned prides are a big improvement. Honorable mention for EoR: steam vents, Krimbul territory and Gates of Morning invasion.

Least favorite MC: ruined halfing complex. The zone is boring, the undead monsters are boring, the tiles are grey cement which is all too common, the buildings are pointless and bland.

Least Favorite EoRC: all the zones are fun, but the first dungeon to detonate the tunnels and stop the giant invasion is not particularly interesting. I suppose keeping the beginning simple is wise, but how about...Enormous mutant moles and worms disturbed by the digging start tearing the giants apart! And you if you're not careful!

Hardest zone MC: Daikara has a high chance of killing you, especially on Insane where the huge swarms of monsters exhaust your resources in long battles. Honorable mention, Vor Armory with all the cryomancers casting FREEZE!

Hardest zone EoR: Ruins of a Lost City. This is a beautiful and brilliant zone. The difficulty is high, especially when you first have access to it but it's doable if you are careful and lucky. Honorable mention: Sunwall Observatory. This place gets out of control with all the rares and mob packs, and the boss fight is challenging.

Most Likely to kill me MC: High Peak. No explanation needed.

Most likely to kill me EoR: Slumbering Caves. The corrupted giant-horrors have skills that pull my Psyshots and Gunslingers into their own shots. Usually at that point my characters are so deadly they one shot themselves. Honorable mention: Dominion port. Those vaults and sewer grates are very tempting.

[anonymous000]

No one mentioned Dark Crypt so far? Yes it is brutal and a tad bit unfair, but when I first encountered it it really brought me some sense of anticipation. The 3 parts of the flow (1) fighting deadly casters in a small dungeon (2) timed challenge to kill the 4 corruptors (3) escorting Melinda out of the dungeon, each brings you a different challenge each time. It is the main campaign's only dungeon with an elaborated mission design

[Frumple]

Eh... it's been mentioned as a challenge. Design wise the issue with 2 and 3 is the with two, you get something even if you "lose", and with three your "escort" is "dig a hole in the wall and ditch melinda there while you clear the level"

... incidentally, please no one make those walls undiggable. I'd take the boss drop every single time if that strategy didn't exist. Too much chance of something just blowing her up to pass up the guaranteed XP+boss loot.

[GlassGo]

I meant places I like frm an art and artsy point of view. From gameplay DC is one of my favorite places, cause it gives a challenge, and set a goal for early game - to prepare for it.
It's good it's fixed and you can't just delay it.