Idling in Moorcroft Manor
I'm sure someone other than me gets frustrated trying to find a party of people to play tier 2 with only to endlessly get dumped into rooms of people taking half an hour to trade materials in the moorcroft lobby.
PLEASE, if you are going to trade, do it somewhere other than moorcroft.
A good solution to this would be for party leaders to be able to change their parties status between an "idling/trading" status or a "forming party to play" status.
Also, its possible to get put into a party of tier 1 players who can't cross the barrier yet, this is a simple fix as well.

I'd like a listing of all available parties before joining one.
And I an option to make a party private/public in dungeon. (might have missed that if it's allready there)

"Perhaps auto-eject to Haven after a certain amount of time in lobbies?"
This is a terrible idea - someone could have a legitimate reason to go AFK and get booted out of their run. And, if they skipped there without doing previous content, this costs them 200cr.
It should just be implied as better social etiquette to lock your party if you're going AFK or idling.
Why would you go AFK in a lobby and not just in the Arcade? Also, why would you enter the gate if you didn't intend to go ahead and get started? Even if something unexpected came up, if it takes longer than ten minutes to take care of and get back, you're probably going to get idle-kicked by the game no matter where you are.
Agree about the etiquette, though.
@Talbian: Why would you go AFK in a lobby and not just in the Arcade?
Because I need to go to the toilet before I continue on my run from Haven to Emberlight, then I decided to make some food and drinks while I'm at it? You shouldn't need a reason not to get booted from Moorcroft. :)
Better insight in available parties before joining one would be very helpful and would fix the real issue.
I think the main problem is Kozma. She keeps so many newer players there, just standing around, looking at items they don't have the mats for and can't afford, not knowing what to do next.
The 200 crown cost for Tier 2 (and 500 crown cost for Tier 3) becomes 0 for each gate that you travel from Tier 1 to the beginning of the Tier that costs you money to "quick travel" to via Haven.
You can check what gates you've done this for by opening the Character screen then clicking the "Progress" tab.
L0L @ halycon, I thought the same thing.
But I can't say I'm completely innocent, I tend to sit around Emberlight chatting up a storm with my friends/guildies after jelly king or what have you.
Most of the players in our guild tend to give a quick list of the recipes found during or after a run, as we like to help each other in our search for items.
However, I definitely agree that if you plan on sitting around chatting, simply locking the party should do the trick.

The party leader already has the option to lock down the party, preventing others from joining, at any time - open social tab, then select party options.

Yeah but endymion barely anyone is ever willing to lock the party when they go AFK...

I still say this idea...
http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/2156
It's more intended for people who go AFK in dungeons though more so than Moorcroft.
Now ON TOPIC, I don't think its so bad joining a "useless" party in Moorcroft because you can still continue on alone if need be, and when you do, you can become the new leader and as long as your party is open, usually someone will join. Now you do still lose the 10 energy BUT I consider this the same as losing 10 energy and joining a group that mostly finished a level by the time you show up, its a waste, but a waste that's an accepted risk when you choose join party. So joining a party that's already 4/5 the way through a level vs joining a party that refuses to continue down deeper, is almost the same waste of energy (the pro in the moorcraft case is that you can go on by yourself to make your own party)
I'd like to get a prompt that warns if I'm about to join in a sub-town rather than a game in progress, but I think this will prevent people from organizing in the lobby legitimately because everyone will be joining games in-progress to shortcut to the terminal vendors.
Perhaps auto-eject to Haven after a certain amount of time in lobbies?