Can someone please explain raid drama...?

[Xorekle]

Derubael is correct, I cringed a little reading the high end raiding situation, as I've been there done that, but velious should correct most of it. Before velious I can only think of a handful of "worthy" targets for gear farming overall, which leaves most of the raiders I'm assuming bored. Within that, I'd say there's only 2 or 3 tiers of raiding currently too.

Original Raid Targets (5):

Lady Vox (7 days)
Lord Nagafen (7 days)
Plane of Fear: Cazic Thule (7 days)
Plane of Hate: Maestro (3 days)
Plane of Hate: Innoruuk (7 days)

Original Raid-level Zones (3):
Plane of Fear
Plane of Hate
Plane of Sky (7 days?)

Kunark Raid Targets (7):

Chardok: Royals (2 hours)
Dreadlands: Gorenaire (7 days)
Emerald Jungle: Severilous (7 days)
Karnor's Castle: Venril Sathir (7 days)
Old Sebilis: Trakanon (3 days)
Skyfire Mountains: Talendor (7 days)
Timorous Deep: Faydedar (7 days)

Kunark Raid Zones (1):
Veeshan's Peak (7 days?)

Total, that's 4 major raid zones, and 12 major raid targets/nights I'd consider, pre-velious; that's not really all that many for 1200+ concurrent players. Even if you say each one of those targets currently requires 50 people to engage (which it shouldn't), and you were to somehow, evenly distribute it; so that only one person, raided one target per week, that's enough for 700 people to hit one target per week. Most people would be pretty upset with that arrangement too; as only hitting one target per week, your chances of getting loot in a 50 person engagement is low, and chances are between epics, and gear, you need/want multiple loots.

I'm missing a lot of the minor raid targets, but even including those, you're only going to make a subset of people happy, and there's probably no more than 30 or 40, and that's being generous.

Top that off, I can't think of any high end kunark quested sets that don't require raiding; meaning the only high end gear is pretty much farming group camps, cultural crafted sets, or raids.

Most of the above raids are also on a 7 day timer; which even with the enhanced spawns, is not often enough for most raid guilds.

Compare the above to Velious, major targets (15):

Cobalt Scar: Kelorek`Dar (7 days?)
Dragon Necropolis: Zlandicar (3 days)
Icewell Keep: Dain Frostreaver IV (7 days)
Kael Drakkel: Derakor the Vindicator (8 hours)
Kael Drakkel: King Tormax (7 days)
Kael Drakkel: The Avatar of War (5 days)
Plane of Growth: Tunare (7 days)
Plane of Mischief: Bristlebane (7 days)
Skyshrine: Lord Yelinak (7 days)
Temple of Veeshan: Dozecar (3 days?)
Temple of Veeshan: Vulak 'Aerr (3 days?)
Velketor's Labyrinth: Velketor the Sorcerer (3 days)
Wakening Land: Wuoshi (7 days)
Western Wastes: Klandicar (3 days)
Western Wastes: Sontalak (2 days)

And more importantly, major zones (10)
Icewell Keep
Kael Drakkel
Plane of Growth
Plane of Mischief
Skyshrine
Sleeper's Tomb
Temple of Veeshan: Halls of Testing (East Wing)
Temple of Veeshan: West Wing
Temple of Veeshan: North Wing
Western Wastes: Dragons

This means there more targets, and more zones to raid in velious alone, and the Kunark raid targets will still keep everyone busy since epics won't be outdated, and won't go away.

I don't think the highest of guilds in the raiding scene will go away, but the average person's raid experience should get much better. With nearly twice as many targets, and three times as many zones; there should be no shortage of raid targets anymore.

Also the entry experience for most guilds in Velious is MUCH better as most of the lower level raid zones, or targets, respawn on a much faster table, giving them a lot more to hit. Halls of Testing in ToV for instance is nearly impossible to keep clear. Respawns in Growth and Mischief are pretty quick. Respawns of the West Wing of ToV are pretty quick. There's a few cycled/triggered raid events. There's several smaller raid targets I didn't include above, much more than you find in Kunark. Skyshrine, Kael, and Icewell also have very low respawn timers, and all drop nice gear sets.

Which brings two other points up, Velious has several high end gear sets that can be obtained through a combination of high end grouping and raiding, with low respawn timers on most of it, allowing for very little competition overall. Second, for the lower end guilds and players especially, there's several group targets, or zones in velious that can easily become a "raid night" for them, as it'd otherwise be very hard for all but the best geared groups to hold that zone. Siren's Grotto, Tower of Frozen Shadow, and Crystal Caverns come to mind immediately. Overall, I think the low, mid, and high-end grouping/raiding scene in Velious will be far better than whatever you're experiencing now in Kunark.