We managed to beat it 4.5 hrs after release. Truth is, your going to need a goto Raid team, dedicated players. Not just casual hey buds, not just cheesers, but a combination of both. My raid team, which ironically is really 3 to include myself, are really good at what we do, we have have played enough times to know our style and we beat raids legit and cheesed them to know everything inside and out. Thats the kind of fireteam you need, elitist, but not stuck up, friendly, yet know when to put up when the time comes. Find a good team and stick with them, always play with them.

my raid team is a group of people who all have over 600 hours into the game. we beat aethon day one, and Crota the day after it came out on normal. all legit here. but we just couldn't get the groove and beat hard mode. we had 4 gallys, a black hammer on boomer duty, and out swordbearing. we just couldn't get it dude.

Damn man. Its funny though because after we brat him twice on HM, we waited till the weekend, Sunday, to finish off my Hunter an my buddies Titan, we actually had a tough time, it seemed that all those glithes people talked about during the raid started coming out the wood work, not to mention we were down 2 ppl, so we had to rely off LFG, the first 2 dudes were both 32 and horrible to say the list, more like casuals then dedicators, not bad, but their heart was not in it. After 10 wipes they left, so we got another 2 in one 32 and one 31, we ended up getting it in 2 games. Imagine that huh? It really boils down to dynamics, new strategies and just keep doing over and over again. What gets you the most? The sword bearer dying? Boomers or enrage? Alot of people don't know that they have to time their attacks with the sword, so as to not enrage his ass and not have the sword anymore. We do 2 full cycles plus a super, then half a sword run, then hit up lower right boomer tower for orges, after which depending on how fast we get done with orges, we will go for the final swings that first run or second. Hope you guys get, you sound like you know what your doing, its really team dynamics in a tougher environment that gets groups killed, what worked here doesnt work now kind of thing.

I beat it 8 hours after it came out with the same raid group the whole pretty hectic