TL:DR - The raid mechanics are bad making the raid not fun. Increase the difficulty for the prestige players but remove some of the buggy unforgiving mechanics from the regular. Disclaimer: I do like this game and have had fun with everything outside of the raid. I believe that this game can be made better for all camps of players (casuals, grinders,hardcore). The raid needs to be made easier on mechanics for the entry level and the prestige harder and less forgiving; and of course loot appropriate. The underbelly can also be adjusted for people who want to grind towards something. [u]Wall Of Text[/u] I know I'm not the first to state all of this but want to rant even if no one reads it. Never played D1 but some of my friends talked me into D2. I enjoyed nearly everything up until the raid and still have fun, but even as mostly a casual time wise I can see why the Internet forums moan about lack of content. Some of the people in my clan are not the most hardcore gamers and simply cannot do some of the raid mechanics. It's leaving the rest of the team frustrated bc we cannot pick up the slack for some of the fights due to these stupid mechanics. I will not leave my friends behind for another clan or group, and I don't have time to LFG. For everyone saying how this game was meant more for casual players they really screwed that up too. The regular raid needs adjusted to allow more clans that have tried it to complete it. We don't all have the headsets or home environments for lag free, child background noise free, crystal clear communication. Make the prestige harder for those that want more hardcore, white knuckle, you better make every psion headshot or you wipe the group, can't carry less skilled, 6 hour wipe-fest everyone wants. Give them higher power level gear, exclusive shaders, emblems, and more tokens. Just make it so my friends and I can carry 2 of our lesser skilled friends. The whole raid feels counter to what should be in a FPS game. Rarely does it matter how good you can kill things, or shoot straight, or manage cooldowns. And these are the parts of the game where you can easily resurrect fallen teammates bc the dps needed isn't hard to match. Overlapping counter intuitive mechanics are not fun. Constructive Criticism Time [u]Lockout Reset Hold[/u] - make it so we can continue from where we left off. Less skilled players need more chances/hours to learn mechanics. Sure it might take us a month to clear the raid 1 time but it would allow real life to happen without progress getting wiped. This may be the hardest to make happen. [u]Baths[/u] - this fight was the only one tuned correctly. It had enough mechanics to make people communicate the important info but still be able to chat a little. Everyone had a job to do but it wasn't overly complicated. It was easy enough to correct for a slip up with getting a rez in. Didn't feel like you were required to use specific guns and classes. Didn't require having to use a computer to figure it out. Dogs - this one is close, but having to rely on a map made outside the game to memorize locations is not player friendly. Luckily 3 of us could carry the others but it stiil required too much time off screen to even to get everyone used to where the dogs spawn. Without the maps made by other players this fight would have taken much much longer to learn. [u]Gauntlet[/u] - multiple people calling out at the same time is not friendly for all raiders. Get rid of the opposite call communication. If a ball runner calls out a symbol that one needs shot, simple. Many ways to keep the others busy outside including more minion spawns, or every pillar needs occupied at all times. It's not the ball runners needing the people outside to keep them alive that's not fun, it's how the communication and synchronization of it confuses people. This one is close but did take a while for people to learn their job. [u]Calus[/u] - ugh, the timing of bubble guys, psion bouncers, and calling out symbols is too much for some players with slower reflexes. Mix in the standing locations and abnormal movement and you have a recipe for headaches. This fight is very unfriendly to casual players and the least forgiving. I didn't find it hard but I also could not make up for others slower responses in the shadow realm and dis not enjoy the shadow realm. At least here it feels we might be able to carry 1 person or two who will have to do the only thing you should have to in a FPS. Kill the minions quickly outside of shadow. Simple fix for this fight would be to get rid 'bouncers' and compensate that with 1 bubbled for each person inside (maybe even more health too to make up for it). Add more minions to the outside to make it feel like 1 person out there isn't just sitting around. This fight just feels really lopsided with too much going on for 1 group and the other group not really feeling any pressure. Requiring 4 people to communicate in such a short period of time causes any issue with chat to break down and wipe. No room for friendly chat or banter. No forgiveness during the hard part but complete forgiveness during the rest. If my group cannot get together and finish Calus tomorrow night I may not raid leviathan again. Too much time spent with very little fun had. I'd rather quit playing altogether than step foot in there again.