I did the Raid for the first time the other day, it took 3 noobs and 3 experienced players at 27 around 2 hours to complete without exploiting any of the VoG. [spoiler]When the expansion lands a new raid (should if I read my news correctly) will drop and the level caps (citation needed?) Will be raised. If you join a clan you will be able to find enough people playing on your time to do a Raid at least once a week (any more is pointless) and as you get good you might even start only needing 3 people, trust me, VoG is addictive.[/spoiler] I think they should make the raid gear drops less hit and miss, I was lucky to get raid boots on my first attempt, however the guy who led us in has done it 10+ times and recieved nothing more than ships and shaders. As for obtaining level 30 outside of Raids, having completed one I see them as a massive part of the game and I think that making them redundant would kill it a bit. An open minded alternative could be armour that allows you to get a defence boost at level 29, effectively giving the same damage reduction against stronger enemies as actually being level 30 gives. Or being able to equip more than one exotic piece at a time and limiting xur to only helmets and gauntlets for armour and exotic bounties for torso and boots to make an option for grinding harder solo bosses etc. My two cents.