As I don't bother with multi-player I don't do raids so I've found www.destinypublicevents.com to be the best way to "grind" vanguard marks. All three of my characters have a full set of max lvl33 armor items and a lvl36 exotic armor item each. I bought most with marks from public events. In the game it says the +6 marks from Tiger Strikes is the fastest way to get marks but the fact is that a strike can take 20+ minutes. In that 20 minutes I can do 3 public events with +4 from each and get +12 in the same time. You also get tons of engrams and other drops doing public events so every now and again you get a legendary or even exotic item that way too. That will eventually upgrade a level with the cryptarch and you'll hopefully get some good stuff in the upgrade package. Oh and while waiting for events to start do bounties and patrol missions and farm the chests in caves too. The XP/bounties should boost your vanguard rep and as you upgrade a level you'll get a decent upgrade package there too. PS sorry to make a positive post - it will disrupt the flow of other replies here ;-)