My first raid was like all of the subsequent ones, rife with cheese. That's not really the issue though. I was three quarters of the way into explaining what those are, but it really comes down to us having fundamentally different experiences because I'm stuck without gaf raid buddies(dat old gen hardware).
I would like to note one thing however: the onus in the raid is not on skill in any traditional(shooter) sense of the word. It's about consistency from the whole team and having the right gear for level 30 runs and some other stuff... but it has very little in common with a legendary level in Halo, for example. That's the crux of the underwhelminess I'm feeling here, I like quality shooter design, this is something else.
Cheese, last gen, and unreliable teammates will definitely make it underwhelming, sorry to hear that but thanks for the reply. My first raid was actually non-gaf rando's but turned out to be a decent group. It was the first day the raid was released and we knew absolutely nothing, let alone any cheese strats. Beating the Templar with 4 25s and 2 26s was a huge thrill.
A lot of my more recent fond raid memories, especially flawless stuff, have been strongly dependent on the Gaf community though. I agree that gear and team consistency is hugely influential in raiding, but I think it can include a lot of shooter skill/execution too. E.g. Oracle phase balancing between 3 weapon classes for the 3 main enemy types (HCannon to crit goblins, sniper for hobbies, heavy for Minos). Not the same as Halo for sure, but still really compelling if you find a good team (admittedly a big "if").
As much as possible, I highly recommend people find a good group to run the new raid blind. I really think it puts the game in the best light possible.
