User:Awesumness/What is a Raid

"What is s RAID?" Documentary:

There is not a clear line between strikes and raids. Moreso, there's a spectrum from "DPS golem in a plain white circular arena" to something like Wing 5, and strikes fall somewhere in between. This spectrum can even shift over time as Anet adapts content to internal workflows and player desires. Some quick definitions: Encounters are essentially anything that gives KP or locks the squad to a specific arena, including but not limited to: bosses, spirit woods, escort, rainbow road. Puzzles/Traversal are essentially anything that provide some friction between encounters: w4 shovels, w4 4keys+door, trash mobs, jumping puzzles. I'll try to lay out the qualities that shift content on the spectrum based on impact in descending order.

Instance Structure (crunch)

Raids have multiple encounters with Traversal between them. Encounters and Puzzles may also build upon each other leading to mechanic reuse, like how W1's traversals all build into the next encounter (VG splits, Gorse walls, Sab launchpads), W4 lock and key into Samarog, and Eater of Souls greens into Dhuum greens. This is current precedent as no strike has two encounters, however there are some strikes that inch toward "raid" because they have traversal before their encounter: Freezie and Shiverpeaks. Zoning between each IBS or EoD strike is a crunch implication that really detracts from a desired "raid experience." Progging an instance and returning to where your left off before a reset is part of this structure.

Instance Flavor (fluff)

The instance tells a cohesive story for which encounters and traversal build upon. Current raids have an easy time checking this off since they were designed as such, but explore what an instance would feel like if the base 4 EOD strikes were separated by traversal into a single "raid." Each boss would still be too disparate to deliver that cohesive "raid feeling." Again, Freezie and Shiverpeaks get a little credit here because their traversal does play into the overall theme of their content. Also, consider fractals like Sunqua Peak nail both Structure and Flavor.

Arena crunch

Encounters deep on the raid spectrum tend to have arenas that interact with the fight in parallel with the boss. These interactions range from new structures or entities (Adina pillars), area denial (MO CM), player transformations (slublings), or sub-arenas (Lamp). Some strikes deliver on this front like Whisper of Jormag's sub-arena against the players' doppelgangers, or AH CM's bomb phase.

Arena fluff

Again, fluff is typically closely tied to crunch, so most strikes don't have enough crunch to inform noticeable fluff credit on the spectrum. Not even all raid encounters have decent fluff. Cairn has probably the weakest arena fluff since it's on a rather boring circular platform and the mechanics barely add much flavor. I'd even say the KO Sniper+Mech phase alone has better arena fluff than Cairn.

Other Qualities:

1. There is something to be said about Raids feeling like unique content, separate from the Commander's story. I'd say this has some impact, but it varies between player much more than the above qualities. Bonus points, again, to Freezie. 2. Player count of 10. This is solely precedent and somewhat arbitrary, so Anet could buck the trend at any moment. Spoilers: Triple Trouble. 3. Qualities that are incredibly low priotiy for the spectrum: Difficulty; Number of mechanics; Unthemed Rewards like gold, mats, currencies; Time. 4. Time needs a break down: SMALL SCALE — Raids hold weekly progression, so players can piecemeal their clears throughout the week without needing to clear a wing in one session. EoD Strikes are encroaching or even surpassing individual raid boss times. WEEKLY SCALE — If only clearing for Normal Mode rewards, weekly minimum time in strikes will likely eclipse minimum weekly time in raids as we get more strike content.

Food for Thought:

1. Some fractals (especially CMs) are closer to being raids than some strikes. 10-player-ness and restricted-arena zones aside, they tend to hit all aspects crunch and fluff. Shout out to Sunqua Peak, Thaumanova, and Deepstone. 2. Most time saves and high level skill expression in raid speedclears tend to come from non-boss content. W2 traversal skips, fast escorts, twisted castle optimization, dialogue skips. 3. Squad Spawnable events (Dragonstorm, Marionette, Triple Trouble, etc.) are fun to place on the spectrum! They don't quite delineate encounters the same way as raids, but they have phases that congruent to different encounters/traversal and otherwise nail all the other qualities. Thus I'd place them closer to raids than most strikes.