On the lousiness (or not) of raid rewards

Drew_Fornier

By and large the general consensus here on the forums is that the raid rewards are awful and encourage infighting and competition within the guilds instead of promoting teamwork. And it would seem to be the case when you look at the prize tables, even accounting for the T5-T7 unobtainable gear bonus.

But the data from my main and alt accounts, doing raids from T5-T7, suggests that the raid reward structure may not be as awful as it seems.

Firstly, from Tier 6-7 there is a chance for a full pre-craft, regardless of your position, and it doesn't seem to be affected that much by your ranking. I have benefited from this as a bottom dweller in my alt account, not advancing past rank 30 in Tier 7 with a brand spanking new Mk7 Nubian. I have also received a Mk5 Furnace for my main in a Tier 6.

Secondly, the disparity in guild currency, which seems to be the more reliable method of obtaining the unobtainables, between 1st place and 50th place is not that large, amounting to about 400 guild currency - the equivalent of one 5-shard purchase.

Thirdly, there is no floor of performance in a raid to get something. All you have to do is enter the raid one time, even if you end up not doing any damage at all, to be eligible for a prize. It may not be the best prize, but for doing nothing, it's not bad.

Fourthly, I believe the best performers should be getting a little more than those who contributed less, because it is through the significance of their contribution that the raid was finished in the first place. Especially important in Tier 7 - if everyone only had my roster for the alt account we would never finish Heroic. Why should I deserve the same prize as someone who contributed 7 times the roster?

So the way I look at raid rewards now is somewhat different:

1. I get guild currency, which helps me to buy the raid-only gear.
2. I get credits, which are always important because of their scarcity.
3. I get a chance to receive raid-only salvage or a fully crafted raid-only gear item.
4. I get a chance to receive some other purple gear that is almost always helpful, especially for my F2P alt account that needs all the help it can get.
5. Tier 7 gets me Han shards. Sure it will be a while but with the guild running Heroic at least 3x a week I could have Han inside of a few months, which isn't bad for such a difficult character to get. And all this time my characters get stronger.

Could it be better? YES, of course, but only in the way that everything could be better - higher drop rates for stuff, more credits, etc. In comparison to everything else, raid rewards don't seem to be that awful.

I know this is an unpopular opinion, and in the spirit of fair discussion I am willing to change my stance on this if convinced otherwise through reason.