Missions in MMORPGs can usually be quick affairs. Sure, one or two missions might take a single player twenty or thirty minutes, but with some friends you can lower that time by a decent amount. While quests do offer up some great gear—like in our Destiny 2 example down below—they don’t continuously offer up the best gear you can get. There will be a point that you need to take on raids which unlike missions can be hourly affairs. Games like Destiny 1 and 2 are shining examples of long raids and we’ll explain why right now.

One year has passed since the Guardians’ last series of tough battles to continue to keep Earth safe from those who wish it harm. Now finally it seems as if the Guardians can rest a bit easier knowing that the evils of the galaxy have been downsized. Though as the Guardians will soon learn, evil never stops. The Cabal forces have decided to finally launch an all-out strike on Earth using their deadly Red Legion led by commander Dominus Ghaul. Despite all the experience and strength, the Guardians have, Dominus Ghaul is about to show them what true strength looks like.

The first Destiny that released back in 2014 had several Raids players could take on. Some of these raids were painfully time consuming—we’re looking at you King’s Fall—and others could be just down right brutal. Though despite that, raids in Destiny 1 kept the game alive even after several years of players enjoying just the essentials of Destiny. Destiny 2, however, is our prime example here thanks to its first raid being released known as the Leviathan Raid. With several parts and a very tough climax fight, Destiny 2’s Leviathan Raid is no joke folks and we’re speaking from firsthand experience. You’re going to need team work, high levels, good gear and some spare time on your hands as most likely you’re going to be at it for at least a few hours. Though the rewards at the end make the Leviathan Raid worth every tear inducing death and restart which is what we love about raiding in general, especially with games like Destiny 2.

The biggest problem with MMORPGs is how to keep the game alive once you’ve done what you feel is enough in the game. Exploring worlds, running quests and story missions and gaining new gear is fun and enjoyable, it does become tedious after too long. This is the reason why a lot of MMORPGs—especially the free to play ones—end up dying out after what only seems like a few years of being released. Thankfully games developers like Blizzard Entertainment know how to remedy this issue in their games, namely World of Warcraft. Giving players multiple raids and tough raids gives the MMORPG life beyond when it should normally be at its dying out phase. If you’re still confused on what we mean, don’t worry, let us explain it briefly down below.

Jump online, grab some friends and enter the large world of World of Warcraft. Create your class, join an allegiance and begin to enter a world filled with quests to accomplish, friends to meet and enemies to obliterate. World of Warcraft has several expansions meaning the fun times will continue for thousands of hours. Millions of others have joined the call, will you join them in World of Warcraft?

World of Warcraft, since its vanilla—which means original—release, has used raids to entice players into sticking around. Some of these raids include Ulduar and one of the fan favorites The Black Temple to just name a few. These raids offered teams a feeling of excitement and sometimes overwhelming anger as the difficulty continued to rise as the team got further into the raid. The rewards were worth it though and for many, just the challenge alone made these missions fun even if they took hours of your life. The feeling of accomplishment is something that truly makes raids fun and worthwhile and you can’t find a better example than one of the longest running MMORPGs World of Warcraft.

One reason most people go through raids is for the chance at rare stuff that can’t be found elsewhere in the game. All the games listed above incorporate this theme and most players suffer through the multiple retries needed in a raid for a chance at finding some quality rare items, weapons or gear. However, since we’ve already mentioned Destiny 2 and World of Warcraft in huge amounts of detail for our final examples in explaining What is a Raid, we decided to use a very popular game where raids are exceptionally important to get something elusive and all too exclusive. The example we chose is Pokemon Go, and that may sound silly but it let us explain why Raids are important in Pokemon Go or for that matter any MMORPG out there. Now then, let us dive into our example and explain what we mean.

Attention all Pokemon fans! Have you ever wanted to feel like a real life Pokemon trainer? To experience the feeling of walking around and finding Pokemon in the real world? Well your dream has come true in Pokemon Go. Grab your cellphones and venture off into the world using your town, city or local landmark as a means of finding the various Pokemon and capturing them for yourself. Can you catch them all? Find out now in Pokemon Go.

Pokemon Go has shown the world just how far people are willing to go to live the lives of Pokemon trainers. We fully understand ourselves as there is an amazing feeling of wandering around and hearing that little chime that a wild Pokemon is running around near you. Though for a while getting the Legendary Pokemon was a nearly impossible task in Pokemon Go. Thankfully, developer Niantic included Pokemon Go Raids where players can utilize friends and even strangers to take down powerful Pokemon within a time limit. While Pokemon Go Raids may not be as complex as other Raids, they still require a dedicated team and cooperation to be successful. If you do get lucky and are able to beat the Raid then you’re looking at nabbing a nice Legendary Pokemon making the challenge all the more worth it. Now then if you’ll excuse us, we need to charge up our phones and head back into the world after this article is written up, more Pokemon await being captured.