In the grand scheme of things, the only reason we play dungeons is for the skins of armor or weapons. There are a couple that you may need to run, I think the Magic find from CoE may be only place to get that but I am not sure as have not checked. Other than that you can make / karma any gear in game. So we play for the skins of the armor.
If you are starting out and cant make or buy armor, can always get into AC and farm Pow,Tough, Vit gear which is good starter set, and some builds use it at end game anyways. This allows you to gain survivability to progress to other dungeons and it does not take much. If you have run the zones that are listed in game that end level is 70 or higher and run a zone complete, you will get exotics and some money as well. You can sell or breakdown exotics to sell the materials and sigil/runes to buy gear as well. So getting close to the end game gear you feel you have to have is not hard when it comes to stats.
So we run dungeons for skins. Some dungeons are a joke, some are imbalanced in time. CoF P1 takes 8 min or less with a group that knows how to run. Not a dungeon really, a minor inconvience between me and my tokens. Compare to CoF3 same tokens, longer boss fight in CoF3 than a complete run of CoF P1. CoF is desired because it is so fast and easy and has flames on armor and is a berserker set, yet as far as dungeon progression it is the 3rd to last you unlock and it may be the easiest.
Arah is a challenge, bosses are very easy, just some areas you have to fight the trash and they are very hard at times due to where you position to not agro more. A lot of Arah can be run skipped by which is good because even those parts that are not able to be skipped are pretty rough. Most run just P3 as it is fast ie 30/40 min or so. Path 2 is long, unless there are shortcuts and I don’t know em. Alot of people wont run P2 as it is so long, but I don’t have a problem with that, if they dont want to then fine. I have not completed P1/4 yet, tried 4 a couple of times. Just never done P1 as only so much time in day.
So I run for skins, but if I want a dungeon grind that is a challenge I can try Arah 1/2/4 and if I want just speed to say I am cool I can do CoF 1/2 in the time it takes for one Arah P3 good run. Not everything has to be as easy as CoF or AC, if you get a coordinated group you can farm Arah P3 daily and get em 60 at a time. It will make you much more appreciative of the armor when you do get it.
Three other quick things:
I wish there we some EASY way to tell what dungeon story mode had been completed on EACH character.
Allow tokens to be auto deposited, with like maybe 8 slots per dungeon or something as it takes more than one stack to buy certain armor or weapons.
Certain classes, such as a guardian running with Soldier Runes (need 6 for remove cond ability), cant really use Magic Find in a dungeon and thus get bad drops, where as my mage can go full magic find if I want to increase loot drops. Most of time though I am not worried about magic find as I just want them done nice and smooth and hope for enough loot to cover any repair bills I may have.
Tips…Elems cans create Frost bows for them and another, great at taking out dens and other things.
Sometimes easier to just kite mobs on keep alive timers than fight them. Basically any mob can be snared or rooted in place, it is your friend. Big attacks generally have slow animation times, sometimes instead of running out of range, just step behind the mob. Pillars, rocks, boxes good to get out of sight. Dodge when you have to, but keep moving mostly and save dodges for when you have to have. fyi, torches CoF 3 I think, just kill 2 at each spot leave one, then all go to a separate one, kill the one and light it and done.