There were 10 of them, standing in the fog.
The raid gate loomed ahead. Beyond it, uncertainty waited for every player.
Above Cragthorn's armored head:
[Cragthorn – Lv. 110 Juggernaut – Guild: Lich Spire]
His plating was dented in all the right places. He looked like the final boss's bodyguard, not the raid team's frontliner.
Around him: Eight other players from his guild, the ninth one being a replacement for someone who didn't get his leave approved from work, in various states of readiness. Meanwhile many other raid teams were beside them in the common area of the new region from the DLC. Some were casting buffs on themselves and the ones that had familiars were petting them calmly. One was drinking a potion. Some were emoting like cracked-out cheerleaders. One from his team was AFK, busy on a smoke break and Rance made a mental note to himself to remind him to scold him later on. He alt-tabbed and saw the time. 2 minutes left.
[SoulSnacc: "yo tank u ready or what"]
[Cragthorn: "Yeah. I have everything equipped. Made sure to take somethings from my vault as well. You got the new spells from the DLC?"]
[Soulsnacc:"holy shit you gotta see them. they might be meta until the next season yk?"]
Cragthorn smiled and wanted to inquire further but the sound of his timer went off. Thirty seconds remaining. It was also good timing that everyone stopped what they were doing, even the healer on the smoke break came back and gazed at his screen.
Rance pressed tab and looked over the map, his mouse pointer laying steadily where the datamined leaks had showed him where it's going to be, which was adjacent to the newest region of the planet.
His eyes flickered as the Raid had appeared.
[???]
[Dwelve in the Deep.]
A smirk spread across the young man's face.
YourWings stood near the portal, balancing on one foot like a smug stork. His robe shimmered in faint violet pulses—an expensive cosmetic skin from the Founder's Pack, which came with a free title and a vastly inflated ego.
[YourWings – Lv. 108 Battle Mage – Guild: Lich Spire]
"Morning, Thorny," he said, with a voice like honey poured over knives. Cragthorn nudged his head to the side the slow precision of a rusted turret.
"Nervous?"
"No."
"Shame. That makes it more fun."
Wings smiled like someone watching a house burn down from the inside. Two faint hands appeared from his ribs, an extension of his mana. They reached behind his back and drew his swords, getting into a stance for whatever waited for them behind the gates.
Cragthorn didn't respond. He just turned back toward the gate, where the portal's light shimmered with static and low whispers only Hardcore players could hear.
Raid releases for the first week were only accessible through Hardcore Mode.
Hardcore Mode: No more revives other than the amount of players you had on your party. Say you have 6 players, so one player can die 3 times and by his teammates reviving him by 3 times, they burned 3 lives.
There were only three reasons any sane person would try Hardcore mode. The top ten teams who completed the newly released raid for the first time would be displayed on a leaderboard showing appreciation by the game devs, which many people would enquired the respected guilds and see the players stats and offer them jobs, like boosting their accounts or grinding something that the player was not good at. You could make a lot of real life money off this despite it being in a morally grey region.
The second reason was that, after slaying the boss, there was a 100% chance of any one person getting the Mythical Drop from the Boss. At the end of every raid, there would be a boss. The boss has a chance of dropping a Mythical weapon that would be completely overpowered for the next year or so, depending on how badly it'd be powercrept by newer weapons. On the first week, Hardcore Mode had a 100% chance of dropping this weapon for any one player, whereas, it'd usually be around 1%.
The third and the most obvious reason is that, it was fun.
"Everyone ready?" Cragthorn asked. His voice was deep in the call, rounded, the kind of voice that expected silence and usually got it.
"Yeah," came the chorus. Some sincere. Some bored. One clearly stoned.
"Then stay close. If you're gonna die, die close for easy rez."
With that, the group moved as one into the portal as Rance clicked on the Raid and loaded them in. The ground underneath them swallowed the players without sound, the opening disappearing with the same speed it's appeared. The Earth had eaten them whole.
They fell.