Thoughts on some dungeons

Keeping this fairly succinct. I play an all-dex elf thief and don't multi-box; I run either solo or with my wife's character (also an all-dex elf thief…)

Forgotten Dungeon
The randomisation is a great concept, especially as there's a wide range of minotaur classes… but it ends up feeling repetitive anyway, save for the handful of captured aegiscians. I'd like to see more creature types (for example, wolves/fenris as battle hounds). Running it for loot is a pain due to the number of necessary fights, and reaching Minos Prime feels like it takes one corridor longer than necessary.

Thieves Hole
The classic and quickly abandoned stepping-stone dungeon. I like the new bosses. I think a few caster thieves would make it less predictable.

Festering Hate Pool
The tweak to the bat fight was a good idea. FHP is fun because of the variety of fights and its peculiar disjointed layout. I'd like to see a proper boss fight somewhere (maybe an enormous medusa?), and perhaps a few high-level fights dropped into the wings to keep the dungeon relevant for longer.

Snake Pit
Even more repetitious than Forgotten Dungeon, due to snakes being such plain enemies. The peculiar Keeper "boss" really deserves to be boosted (and maybe accompanied by hefty caster creatures: dark faeries, ghosts?) At the same time, the earth elemental encounters should either be only one elemental, or they should lose some spell damage/Crushing Boulder. These fights are absurd roadblocks. Also, the loot here is awful.

Fuloran's Abode
Fuloran is easy to run rings around, and there's so rarely any good loot here… overall, feels irrelevant.

Tulor's
Running the gauntlet gets a bit old, and it would be nice to have an optional early side-fight, quite challenging, that allows the player to skip some rooms ahead. (Perhaps at the cost of the KK chests.) Some enjoyable fights toward the end, with the mixed fury/devil/kilrog/KK groups. Tulor himself casts too much CC–without myst immunity, it becomes obnoxious. Otherwise one of the more engaging dungeons.

Imp Haven
Either a peculiar mish-mash low level dungeon or a bland run from one easy King Kilrog fight to another. Needs a revamp.

The Barracks
Decently varied. A proper revamp might put a boss-type before the two chests at the end.

The Foundry
I've only run this once, through the evil wing. The early Harlequin is a show-stopper for solo characters and those without myst spells; the rest of the encounters are much easier (assuming one can handle dwarves) until the Blacksmith, who like Tulor can be obnoxious due to the player's lack of myst immunity. I'm not sure the Harlequin is placed correctly - it would be good for a solo character or weaker group to be allowed further before calling it.

Daemon Home
A vile frustrating dungeon, with only a single deserving encounter (Ezelberoth) accessed through three meandering wings of low-level encounters. Needs a total rework.

Undead Stronghold
I really like the new USH - not much else to say about it. Mother could be given some spell-casting ability, and perhaps shifting, to make her a more interesting adversity.

Others
I've not run a few dungeons on the new server (for example Anvil, Holy Caves). Among the rest, some dungeons (like the Labyrinth) are wandering, dull, and encounterless, and need a serious overhaul; others (like Warrior's Abode or Fenris Cave) just need better progression and a boss fight of sorts. But these have all been pretty irrelevant to my levelling process, as I've spent more of my time in the places above.

curious to hear more thoughts.

Forgotten Dungeon, for me as a solo wiz I usually only do a few fights. I miss the original cave when it was just undead.

Thieves Hole always bored me, so unless I'm looking for something specific, I rarely go in there.

FHP I like how it is, but would like to see a few different fights added like a snake room, maybe a few elementals, just some creatures you don't see around there.

Daemon Home used to be my favorite many years ago. I would solo it when I was between lvl 600 to 750. I liked the storyline quest for the symbol to get the perfect roses.

USH, I like because there are so many different fights. I don't get bored in there.

Faery Caverns could do with something more, including reopening the old magical items stand in there. Maybe we could have it sell some special things, better stuff than Marvin's.

I like Imp City. I would suggest that to be a place to also add a new store stand. It is a city, it makes sense. Maybe add some new decorate items for sale in there and some low level gear.

CoD needs a revamp. I like it, but it's kind of short and could use more.

It's simple for me. I love the redone or new "Rat Labs" dungeons and dislike several of the old dungeons (Or some are not even used: CoD, Faery Caves).

A few notes:

Randomized groups / Rare Mobs / Dungeon Crawlers: More, more, more. Yes please, yes please!
Unique Boss Fights: From the little thieves in TH to Constantine Parmesan in HC. The boss fights are what make the caves fun and give them character. More, more, more.
Clunky Dungeons: DH and SP Where we have primarily a similar power range or feel (Low level undead or snakes/wyrms, respectively) then we have this one fight that's way out of proportion with the rest of the cave (Ezelberoth and Earth Elems). Would love to see caves like these redone for a specific range. Either bring the trash mobs up to snuff with the "tough" fight or bring that tough fight down to match the rest of the dungeon.

Clunky Dungeons: DH and SP Where we have primarily a similar power range or feel (Low level undead or snakes/wyrms, respectively) then we have this one fight that's way out of proportion with the rest of the cave (Ezelberoth and Earth Elems). Would love to see caves like these redone for a specific range. Either bring the trash mobs up to snuff with the "tough" fight or bring that tough fight down to match the rest of the dungeon.

Yes, this exactly. When you are a low level and you walk into something like even Warrior's Abode, you can usually do everything but the Paladins. I think they are too high for that cave. I won't touch them right now at my level, can't get past them to get to a bone pile. Yet the rest of the cave is okay. I feel like the Paladins are too high for that cave, particularly for a low health toon. They heal, they cast, you're too low to use an ammy of DMP because then you're not wearing your endure or an intel or something. You're just not going to make it trying to DW a Paladin in there like that. The WoL in there is hard enough. Their spells hit hard and they heal, too. I had a pretty high Bounty Hunter the other night and he must have healed about twenty times in a row. I did beat him, but that was so expensive in mana. I'd just like to see it evened a bit.

Most people skip Faery Caverns because there's not much in there. It's useful for changing alignment, but there needs to be some kind of okay drop and a good boss fight.

Deamon Home, the Ezelberoth fight is insane. I used to solo it when I was around lvl 600 through 750 or so, but the rest of the cave is much lower. You can sail through the rest at a lower level, but that last fight is for higher.

I think dungeons need not just evening out, but adding something different. Maybe something where the fight is random and might contain different monsters that you don't always see. And maybe something where we use the prayer altars or a lever and it takes you to a random treasure room, like maybe one time it would be one chest, another time it would be three chests, but you just never know. Little things like that just to mix it up a bit.

FHP - Only change I want to see is a Heroic mode. No other dungeon has such a warm fuzzy place in my heart.

… and it would be nice to have an optional early side-fight, quite challenging, that allows the player to skip some rooms ahead.

I really like this concept, if possible introducing level-gated screen transitions so when approaching low level dungeons as a higher level you can clear them faster. That'd make running the early dungeons much more bearable when grinding at 1k~. Potentially OP but it'd certainly help with recycling the content to be rewarding at low and high levels.

Fuloran's Abode
Fuloran is easy to run rings around, and there's so rarely any good loot here… overall, feels irrelevant.

Fufus is actually pretty rewarding, the fights are both very easy, rarely die, very easy to speed-run for decent exp (especially on hot days) and is actually one of the few dungeons I can run for a long long time without getting bored. You just have to realise that dungeon loot is scaled to the size of the dungeon, so don't expect to be able to force loot to drop any time soon.

Mother could be given some spell-casting ability, and perhaps shifting

The answer is never to add shifting. Unless you're someone who only plays throwers then the answer is always to add shifting.

Daemon Home
A vile frustrating dungeon, with only a single deserving encounter (Ezelberoth) accessed through three meandering wings of low-level encounters. Needs a total rework.

Mostly agree, I don't run the place because of exactly this.

Overall most of what you've made note of is pretty in line with my thoughts also. Though Khego summed it up when he said this:

It's simple for me. I love the redone or new "Rat Labs" dungeons and dislike several of the old dungeons

Any dungeons that've been revamped i feel able to run them a lot longer than the older ones, especially The Underground (assuming it's the same as MW).
Personally I prefer more linear dungeons, as with the loot randomly spawning upon dungeon generation and at such low chances it frustrates me when I run dungeons for hours and hours and get nothing.. Most likely because some random little fight that everyone always skips in a cob-webbed covered area of the dungeon is probably stealing all my loot generation RNG. If dungeons are more like The Underground I don't get that heart-wrenching moment when I feel as though I've "missed" loot. — Also add More named bosses

Personally I prefer more linear dungeons, as with the loot randomly spawning upon dungeon generation and at such low chances it frustrates me when I run dungeons for hours and hours and get nothing.. Most likely because some random little fight that everyone always skips in a cob-webbed covered area of the dungeon is probably stealing all my loot generation RNG. If dungeons are more like The Underground I don't get that heart-wrenching moment when I feel as though I've "missed" loot. — Also add More named bosses

I'm seeing this alot in many dungeons lately. It's usually the lowest level small fight you're likely to skip that will drop. You can do an entire cave and if you miss that one tiny flying bat or the lowest level rat, you won't get anything, but if kill it, you might get lucky and get something good.