I can understand that you want the best possible chance of having a smooth raid, but it is not necessary to have all 30s in the raid to do so. I have a 30 titan, but have already done hard mode on him so I was looking for a group on my 29 warlock. There were plenty of groups looking for people, but it literally took me over an hour to find one that would accept me simply because they were all looking for 30s. It didn't matter that I have over 20 legit clears under my belt or that I have all the maxed weapons needed to be efficient in the raid; I wasn't getting responses from any of the people I was messaging. I finally found a group which consisted of 2 30s and 4 29s including me. We breezed through to gatekeeper and only had a bit trouble there because one of the 30s was not comfortable using the shield. When it got to atheon, the 30 admitted he was not comfortable with the shield, so I stepped up. At this point, the two main people to pick up the relic were the first 30 that is comfortable with the shield and me. I ended up being the main person to pick up the relic because the main 30 had gjallarhorn so it was a better move to have him do damage. Even with me being a 29 warlock, I had absolutely no trouble staying alive and taking out the minotour/adds was a breeze. All I am saying is, give 29s a chance. Not all of them may be as competent and as geared, but how can 29s hit 30 if they can't find a raid to get that last piece or two that they need to be 30? Take a minute to put their GT/PSN into the bungie database and look at their gear. You would easily be able to tell whether or not they are experienced from the number of characters they have, their levels, and how upgraded their weapons are. Edit: Everyone knows that you don't need to do hard mode to be level 30, but for those that don't want to use an exotic helmet, that is not possible. Yes, you can use the helmet and be thirty before doing hard mode, but there are still people (including me) that have an exotic helmet and still don't have boots/chest/gloves. After running on normal mode without getting the gear needed, the only hope of getting gear the same week would be to run hard mode.