Raiding has made a huge impact for those players willing to break away from traditional toon building "rules". Unfortunately, I see so many players ingrained in the old way of building, where you either had to patiently wait for an eternity to develop a strong toon, sacrificing play time, enjoyment, and overall power as other players level past you, or spend a large amount of money to allow you the freedom to level without outgrowing your power base. Raiding has given us the ability to level almost with impunity and actually grow our toons as we do. No more are we required to level into empty levels which then need to be filled with powers. Raiding has allowed us to gain powers as we level.
Now, to be fair, Raids are far better for players as they increase their levels than they are early on for developing toons. This is because experience points are given for each hit, rather than the amount of damage done. Since lower level toons tend to be weaker, their hits tend to do less damage. So they are going to be gaining more experience for the same amount of damage as a toon that does more damage per hit, because the other toon is using fewer hits for the same amount of damage. Because of this, lower level and weaker toons will have a lower reward per experience ratio than stronger hitters. But as your toon gets stronger and learns how to do more damage, your rewards per level increase will increase dramatically.
Before we get into how to do more damage or get more rewards, let's take a minute to look at Raid Etiquette.
In order to be successful at raids, it's important to find a like minded group of players to mob up raids with. These players don't have to be part of your team or league. They can be anyone your group of raiders feels is right for the group.
Aside from just hitters, you also want players who can hunt down summon items and AMA parts for raid tokens. In my own group, all of us fit this category. Try to do your part in collecting tokens and summon items. Many players use multiple utility alts for this purpose.
Once you have a good group together, you'll discover not everyone is adding summon material for every raid. That's ok. As long as they all are always trying, it will even out over time. Some days you will hunt all day long and get back minimal returns. Other days, summon material will seem to be behind every corner. That means some days your friends will carry you, and some days you will have to carry them.
BUT........ when this happens, pay careful attention to who has added summon material to the raid. Learn what their damage requirements are and let them get what they need before claiming any for yourself. That doesn't mean wait till they are done. It simply means that if each of the 3 players that added summon material want 200k damage a piece, make sure there is enough left over when you are done to allow them to get that damage in, and a little more for an overages cushion. How much damage you can do should be agreed upon beforehand with your raid team. You should also consider what your own needs are from the raids, and discuss this with any potential raid partners. This will be critical on how much damage you need to do, and how much damage you need to do is critical in determining how many toons can be in a raid and everyone effectively get everything they want. Some players are looking for gear. Some are trying to fill their decks with every card they can. Some are hunting specific cards. How much damage they need to do plays a huge factor on building raid teams. Generally speaking, the gear is by far the 1st thing most players really hunt for. But most of the gear require huge damage at low return rates. But, even though the cost is high, the premium gear from raids very much hold their own against uber gear from the Nova Shuffle. And for players that already have their fill of such gear, the MP resell value can put some decent MP in your toon's pocket. The power cards and cons are also of great value. In order to get your best chances at getting ALL the drops, I recommend doing 1/3rd of the total damage required to kill the raid. But if you are only looking for specific pieces, you'll need to do a little math. Look at the piece you want 1st off. What is the damage requirement to obtain a chance at it? The Windswept power gives a 2% chance per 6000 damage done. That means for the 1st 6000 damage I do, I get a 2% chance to win that card. But thanks to progressive rewards, those odds increase each time the reward threshold is met. So when I get to 12000 damage, I now have made a 2% roll and a 4% roll. If this is the card I am hunting for, I want to do damage in damage increments of 6000, because 6000 is the damage requirement for a roll to get it. IDEALLY, you want to get to a 50% roll. That's not going to be easy. For Windswept, that would be 25 x 6000 for 150,000 damage. But if you want all 5 that are available, you will have to do that 5 times, for a total 750,000 for the absolute guarantee. But I have found that 11x for 5% drops, 26x for 2% drops seems to do the trick. After deciding what kind of rewards you're hunting and which raids are best to get them from, start tallying up your damage requirements per raid with your raid team. You don't want a team that needs more than the raids provide. So limiting participants is important. Only have enough members on your raid team so that they can all get what they are looking for. After an agreed upon time limit or after all members have gotten their desired damage in, go ahead and share with others.
While it might seem like a good idea to make these raids public by inviting everyone on your friends list, consider instead leveraging these raids to other raid teams, in return for the ones they are finished mining. Your team is your 1st raid wave. Your raid trade partners are your 2nd wave. And vice versa. If you still need more hitters after 2 different raid teams have taken their swings, go ahead and release the raid to the rest of your friends list, or list it on the player's page, or finish it off with utility alts.
The biggest problem with being a successful raider are the massive energy requirements. You only have a maximum of 48 hours to do all the damage in a raid as you can get in. Daily energy gifts only give 480 energy. You're probably going to have to start looking at upping your energy stat skill points. Mine has 100 sp in energy. That gives me 110 energy. Combined with my HQ bonus, I get 120 energy. Using the 5 point energy refill option, now becomes worth using. Furthermore, the mp cards and gear I get from raids, that I don't want, can be sold for the MP I buy refills for. Between the gear and the large numbers of power cards, using raids to build a strong competitive toon is extremely possible. My main toon is almost entirely built off raid and bux cards. The amount of power cards one can acquire is relative to the amount of work one is willing to put in towards it. The gear is absolutely great.
Raiding certainly isn't for everyone, especially those who wish to polesit in the lower levels. But if you plan on taking your toon to over level 500 cheaply, Raids certainly are a great way to compete cheaply.
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