Raids and how I got there.

[Armen.1483]

So each time I come to this subforum I see people talk about so called "toxicity" and barriers that prevent them from getting into raids. Here is a post that may be a help for those people.

Here is my personal story on how I got into raids.

When I came to GW2 and leveled up my 1st character to lvl80 I immediately wanted to start raiding. Little I did know about the raiding, lfg message meanings and general stuff and after many kicks from raid groups I started to question myself. Sometimes people were complaining or joking but nobody really flamed me, anyway I was silent to all negative attitude. So in the end I have downloaded arcdps found out for myself that I was a complete leecher and the big damage numbers on my screen when I punch mobs mean absolutely nothing and are just there to distruct me. Went back to learning how to gear myself up, looked many guides on my character builds and got into fractals. Grinded fractals to tier 4, got myself full ascended gear, practiced golems, got my keybinds ready and got comfortable with my combos and found out that I am doing ok compared to others. So it is about time to go into raids as I feel more or less confident that I can carry myself to entry levels of raids.
The discord training communities didn't help me much as it was quite difficult to get into raids like that because they were always full, but nevertheless with patience and constant stalking those discord channels I got into some raids eventually and even did a couple of kills.After that I found out that sometimes in LFG there are so called "training" runs. Those were actually no trainings, It was people that wanted to get into raids or carry their friends and didn't want to ask kp. With watching some guides on internet and getting into those fake trainings was actually what let me start raiding. Fail after fail with those "training groups" I discovered for myself most of the mechanics I saw in the videos. I wasn't going for the kills, but for trainings. My goal was to find as many "training" groups as possible in different unique raid bosses so i see all the raid bosses at least even if I don't beat them. Asking questions in those "training" lfg groups was also beneficial.After a month of casual "training" runs I still didn't have many kills or KP but I felt more confident now and thought that I can start thinking about clearing those bosses. And one day while stalking the raid lfg for those no kp/training groups I found a guild that was recruiting new raiders for their roaster. Messaged them and voila. They kindly got me in, I made my first raid buddies. It was quite a casual guild, we were doing some raid runs every week, there was always a spot for me, they have tought me many mechanics, the voice chat was very beneficial and made raiding much more interesting and fun. Eventually I made myself more classes by grinding gold in fractals and I have learnt key mechanics in raids. My guildmates tought me all of that.

The moral of this story is that despite all odds you can get into raiding quite easily by getting into raiding community. There is learning your class that you can do solo and learning raid mechanics that you can't. And until some point you only have the option of leeching it. Every new player is a leecher . Yes, if you are new YOU ARE LEECHING ! But hey, we have all been there. And it is better to leech your way into learning in a guild with people that you know than in pug lfg where people won't teach you and want fast clears and will not want you with them for that reason, and in worst case flame you or kick you. So question yourself instead of questioning others, find yourself buddies that will help you.

Conclusion: best way of getting into raids is making friends !

[Tseison.4659]

New to raids myself and have done a couple of runs so far. However, with that said, there are very MINIMAL people who actually are patient and helpful. But to be brutally honest, the raid “community” needs to do better and needs to dial the toxicity level way down! Especially when it comes to yelling at people who made a small mistake/mis step and telling them to go die of covid. Definitely not cool...

[flog.3485]

A lot more people would play raids if the incentive to join guilds was here in the first place. Sadly, it is not the case.

[Rodrick.1942]

Those who kept complaining about raid, they are actually afraid to make mistakes. Part of them don't like to be seen as burden. Part of these people just don't want to put too much effort on it (like open brain again to learn new stuff ) , because "we are here to rest ".

Raid itself doesn't have any problem, people's attitude cause these problems.

[Touchme.1097]

Best way to get into raiding is joining a raid training session and learn the mechanics or, if there are no guilds who can offer you this service, start your own guild and read raid guides. Before entering a raid make sure your build and equipment is raid ready, and this means full exotic with the best stats for your raiding build and a decent raid build. Simple as that. Raids are no very hard in this game, once you clear a wing 1 or 2 times you will be ready to raid in pugs.

[Solitude.2097]

Just create Open world , like just like the transision of PvE > Strike MissionAnd Whoever wants a harder version or more rewarding , they should join a Guild , where it unlocks that "Hard Version" .

Or scatterd across the map there are 3 'flower'' ,on the ground , , with different colors .You can get a device that auto-loot th specific colored flower , or specific button picks up specific flower .3x Red unlocks the LFG of that specific Strike Mission (with the usual results) .3x Blue Reduces the damage Taken by the Bosses3x Yellows Increase damage Taken + chance for a skinIf enought people chooses the blue/yellow flower (both goes into the same Mission) , a message in Map will pop up , saying " The Gates of Heaven are open" and you should go there manually .Or events with 2-3 people will lead to other events , (with extra 2 more people) and utimetly a raid will be formed .Or you manually search in the LFG , faster , skipping the events

Or allows them to fund new Raids , with real money from a specific page:)Each time you buy 800 gems with real money , Training Guilds gets ''Call of the Mists'' (4x rewards , rather than double rewards will be)The buff is increased , if the do the first bosses of Wing5/6/7 , and manage to lower his HP to 80% and even more increased buffed for 60% hp.When the instance is completed once per week , you will also get random loot (maybe the Game of Throne Chair) , or he manually join that day too in that raids for double chance .Or they can join he PvP and offer the same buff , but they can demote people (the ones that harash) , so they dont benefit for it .

When the GW2 steam will be released ... even with 2-3 raids released ... it will meet the same fate:)

[GAB.9340]

Saw this thread and liked your story, wanna share my way into raids as well.I played this game almost since launch, mainly as a wvw and later pvp player with the occasionally pve on the side though mostly fractals.I played in various WvW guilds especially before HoT expansion and is still in the one which slowly died during HoT as we stopped raiding in WvW.Since then us few remaining players of that guild have been playing together.We were 3 guys which decided we wanted to raid, 1 guy which pugged the raid w1-w4 back when those raid wings came out, another which had killed a couple of bosses and me which had done VG twice.We didnt want to pug the raids and wanted to create a static where we could progress on the raids, so we put up an advertisement for a static, stating we were 3 guys wanting to create a static raid group. We stated that we were mostly new.
It didnt take long before we got some ppl joining (a week if I remember correctly), and we quickly starting raiding. The first few weeks we pugged since we werent full yet, and even found ppl through this pugging which wanted to join. We looked up guides on the bosses and then went in, as we got going we have 1 day where we trying to clear wing 1-4 and then a second day where we mainly progress on especially wing 5-7.The only bosses which we havent killed is Dhuum and Quadim 1, we are still in a learning process on wing 5 and 6.We have had to replace various members during the time. Furthermore not all who joined the static was completely new which also helped alot.

Lastly I enjoy raiding in a static and probably wouldnt have begun raiding if we didnt create a static group to do it. Afterall in my opinion thats what a mmo is all about playing together.

[maddoctor.2738]

@"Armen.1483" said:Conclusion: best way of getting into raids is making friends !

I agree completely, making friends is the best way to start raiding.

I started raiding many years ago, in a different game, but it all happened the same way I started in Guild Wars 2. I was playing with a group of friends, friends I met in game mostly, that we all wanted to see what this "raid" thing was. Then we started playing together and created an actual good team. That's how I prefer to do my Raids, I'll FIRST join a community, then Raid with that community. Even if it was never created in order to run Raids to begin with.

Fun fact: out of the 10 people in my original Raid squad, the one I cleared all Heart of Thorns Raids with, 4 of them never run Fractals, not even T1, and never run Arah either. Their first introduction to instanced content in the game was Vale Guardian on its release day. Another 2 never reached T4 in Fractals and had very few Ascended pieces. And we killed Deimos with CM active with that same team.

And that was the same in every game I raided in. I've never joined a training run, a raid discord or a raid community in any of the games I've raided in. I joined a guild (not a raiding one), found friends and raided with them just fine.