Raid
“Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns™, introduces the ultimate challenge: our first raid, which is made up of three distinct raid wings. Raids are 10-player, instanced, elite dungeon content that's a challenge unlike anything we've previously released in Guild Wars 2. These raids are meant to put you and your teammates to the test and challenge you to grow your skills as Guild Wars 2 players. Raids are our answer to what skilled PvE players have to look forward to at endgame—the ultimate test to overcome and defeat.
Raids are 10-player squad-based PvE instances designed for level 80 characters, usually comprised of several boss 'encounters' that focus on challenging combat and mechanics. Along with Strike Missions, they are a core pillar of Guild Wars 2's PvE endgame. Each raid encounter typically utilises multiple phases with several unique mechanics, which test the squad's coordination, damage output and positioning, as well as the player's builds. Many encounters include an enrage timer: if the encounter isn't finished by the time it runs out, the incoming damage will greatly increase. Certain masteries may also be required for some encounters to complete. Downed allies can be revived or rally, but defeated allies cannot be revived during the encounters and Revive Orbs are disabled, along with other similar consumables such as boosters. There are three difficulty tiers, Emboldened mode, Normal mode, and for select bosses a Challenge mode, offered for players who want to test their skills even further.
Raids are split into multiple wings, each in a separate instance and with different encounters. While corresponding wings tell a progressing story in a specific order, each wing can be entered and completed independently and in any order. Most raid areas appear on the world map and have entrances from the neighboring zones. The Lion's Arch Aerodrome functions as a lobby for organizing a raid squad and includes portals to all raid wings.
Special rewards for finishing each encounter are limited to once per week, with a weekly reset at Monday 07:30. Progress within a raid wing is saved for players even after leaving the instance, and it's reset weekly along with the rewards. Restarting the raid instance later will recall the progress made by the instance opener, allowing you to continue with the same raid wing across multiple sessions in a week. There are no waypoints inside raids, but instead they use a checkpoint system which players can use to revive themselves and which most of the times resets skill recharges when everyone is defeated. The /resign command or one of its alternatives can be used to restart an encounter faster.
Getting into raiding[edit]
Unlike a lot of Guild Wars 2's endgame content, raiding is intended to require certain amount of time and dedication in order to learn each boss's unique mechanics and ways to counteract them, but in return offers a large variety of rewards. You’ll need to face each boss many times to learn how to defeat it, continuing to develop your strategies, refining your communication and honing your tactics through practice, in order to execute to a high degree with the hope of eventually conquering it and moving on to the next encounter in the wing.
Many solo players begin their raiding journeys by joining a free community ran raid training guild or by joining dedicated training groups listed in the LFG tool (under Raids (Training)) in order to learn the basics of each encounter and accrue kill proof. Each week Emboldened mode becomes active in a single raid wing, effectively lowering the difficulty of encounters and giving you the chance to familiarise yourself with each boss's mechanics without the heavy reliance on damage and healing.
Strike Missions are also a great way of getting used to 10-player encounters that bridge the gap between open world and raid difficulty, and to learn about certain mechanics and telegraphs found in raids.
Accessing raids[edit]
- Expansions required
Heart of Thorns raids are accessible by entering their respective portals in the open world or Lion's Arch Aerodrome.
- The Heart of Thorns expansion is required.
- Automatically unlocked upon owning the expansion.
Path of Fire raids are accessible by entering their respective portals in the open world or Lion's Arch Aerodrome.
- The Path of Fire expansion is required.
- Automatically unlocked upon owning the expansion.
The Janthir Wilds raid is accessible by entering the respective portal in the open world or Lion's Arch Aerodrome.
- The Janthir Wilds expansion is required.
- Automatically unlocked upon owning the expansion.
List of raids[edit]
(CM) = Optional Challenge mode available
(LCM) = Optional Legendary Challenge mode available
| # | Raid / Wing | Encounters | Achievements | Currency | Release date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Heart of Thorns
| |||||
| 1 | Forsaken Thicket: Spirit Vale |  Magnetite Shard |
November 17, 2015 | ||
| 2 | Forsaken Thicket: Salvation Pass | March 8, 2016 | |||
| 3 | Forsaken Thicket: Stronghold of the Faithful |
|
June 14, 2016 | ||
| 4 | Bastion of the Penitent |
|
February 8, 2017 | ||
| Path of Fire
| |||||
| 5 | Hall of Chains |
|
Magnetite Shard |
November 28, 2017 | |
| 6 | Mythwright Gambit |
|
September 18, 2018 | ||
| 7 | The Key of Ahdashim |
|
June 11, 2019 | ||
| Janthir Wilds
| |||||
| 8 | Mount Balrior |  Gaeting Crystal |
November 19, 2024 | ||
Emboldened Mode[edit]
- Primary article: Emboldened
Each week the Emboldened effect becomes active in a single raid wing, effectively reducing the difficulty of each encounter by negating the heavy reliance on damage and healing. This gives players the chance to familiarise themselves with each boss's mechanics.
Upon entry into the raid wing, players gain their first stack of Emboldened, which grants additional health, damage output, and improved healing to aid in their battle against each encounter. Each time the raid group fails a boss encounter, they receive another stack of Emboldened, granting players up to 100% additional health, 50% increased damage, and 50% increased healing output. Upon successfully completing the boss encounter, the stacks of Emboldened will reset. Emboldened can be deactivated by pressing on the mote near the entrance of each wing.
Defeating a boss whilst Emboldened is active yields the same rewards as normal.
Emboldened Mode Schedule[edit]
| Raid | Next up |
|---|---|
| Spirit Vale | December 2, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Salvation Pass | December 9, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Stronghold of the Faithful | December 16, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Bastion of the Penitent | December 23, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Hall of Chains | December 30, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Mythwright Gambit | January 6, 2025 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| The Key of Ahdashim |  Active
|
| Mount Balrior | November 25, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
The effect rotates among the raids every week on Monday 08:30, effectively changing one hour after raid rewards reset.
Click here to purge the server cache, this forces the server to update the contents.
Rewards[edit]
Normal mode[edit]
Most of these rewards are once per week (per boss/encounter):
- 2
per boss. (doubled with 
Call of the Mists active). - 200,025
per boss. (doubled with Call of the Mists active). 
Compendium of Knowledge to progress mastery tracks.- 10,000
per boss. This is affected by karma boosters. - Magnetite Shards (Wings 1-7) or Gaeting Crystals (Wing 8). These can be used to purchase rewards from Scholar Glenna or the Basic Magnetite Exchange Operative.
No Reward - If the currency cap (300) has been reached that week, killing a boss will award this instead of a currency bonus.
Legendary Insights for crafting PvE legendary armor and Coalescence.- One random Exotic weapon or armor piece
- Unique rewards to each boss chest:
- Ascended equipment - including Raid weapons with unique skins.
- Miniatures.
- Decoration tokens (commonly used as kill proof).
Challenge mode[edit]
In addition to normal mode rewards, once per boss per week:
- 2
- Magnetite Shard (10)
Provisioner Token (2)- 133,350
- One random Exotic weapon or armor piece
Call of the Mists[edit]
- Primary article: Call of the Mists (raid effect)
Call of the Mists is an effect that doubles the amount of gold and experience gained from raid boss kills, rotating every week between each raid wing in order of release date.
| Raid | Next up |
|---|---|
| Spirit Vale | November 25, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Salvation Pass | December 2, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Stronghold of the Faithful | December 9, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Bastion of the Penitent | December 16, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Hall of Chains | December 23, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Mythwright Gambit | December 30, 2024 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| The Key of Ahdashim | January 6, 2025 08:30 UTC+00:00 |
| Mount Balrior |  Active
|
The effect rotates among the raids every week on Monday 08:30, effectively changing one hour after raid rewards reset.
Click here to purge the server cache, this forces the server to update the contents.
Related achievements[edit]
Community: Carry the Creator — Complete a raid boss with an ArenaNet employee. (0
)
Weekly Raids: Top-Tiered Terror Toppler — Complete five unique challenge mode raid encounters. (0
) (Historical)
Notes[edit]
- At this time players cannot use transformation tonics or potions whilst in raids.
- It is possible to enter the raid with a player who has already cleared the wing to do certain achievements that do not involve combat, such as Loot Finder, Piecing It Together or My Hero!.
- A squad can concede defeat faster by using the /resign, /surrender, /concede, /forfeit, /gg, /qq, or /ff commands.
- In the LFG tool, players often advertise in shorthand what other players they seek. Common codes include:
- "xx li": Players with at least that many Legendary Insights, to indicate raiding experience. Players can "show" the number of Legendary Insights they have to others in chat by ctrl or shift-clicking on them in the inventory, but this can be faked by manually inputting the appropriate chat link format codes. Some commanders require spamming them in the chat with ctrl-click or splitting the stack with alt-click to mitigate the chances they are faked. Players posting this requirement will usually also accept Perfected Envoy armor or the precursor sets, since the collections required to get them, include items that drop from almost all of the raid bosses.
- "kp": Players with "kill proof"--one of the items that can only be looted by someone who has defeated a boss, to prove they've beaten it at least once before. This can include the decoration token received from that boss, or any of the gear items (such as these) that can drop from that boss's chest (or unlocked as purchases from Scholar Glenna only after defeating it).
- "w1", "w2", etc... : While technically only 3 raids are wings of Forsaken Thicket, raids are commonly shortened to w# with # being the number of the raid in release order, as shown in the list above.
- "fc": LFG group intends to do "full clear" meaning clearing every boss starting from first boss/event in that particular wing.
- In-game description:
“Raids offer the ultimate challenge for you and nine of your friends.
— Level 80 rewards.
- The Challenge mode rewards were changed with the July 19, 2022 game update. Previously, the Top-Tiered Terror Toppler achievement was awarded for a certain number of CM kills per week.
- The same update also removed Gaeting Crystals and Legendary Divinations and standardized the raid currency to Magnetite Shards and Legendary Insights for all raids.
External links[edit]
- Raids in Guild Wars 2
- Designing Challenging Content
- Raid Rewards in Guild Wars 2
- Community-ran Raid Training Guilds
