Throttle the loot, of course, but please make explore mode raids a thing. Only low stat armor, weapons cannot drop with deep sight or have resonators used on them, and of course the exotic and adepts cannot drop. But even that level of challenge and loot would be a Godsend for so many players who can't experience raids for whatever reason.
I personally don't need an explore mode to earn raid loot, but a matchmade explore mode would make raiding a lot more palatable for a lot people who don't have many friends, have a hard time with more difficult challenges, or don't want to run difficult raids when they're subject to bad rng and only want a single item. Accessibility gets a huge boost, while the actually good loot that top players want is still exclusive to master mode, or just normal mode if you only want the crafted versions.
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Agreed, explore mode, 3-6 person fireteams. Matchmaking or private. Base raid gear, not the shiny ultimate stuff, but def the gear as a solid step to do the full raid on the next difficulty. Having more people trained up on how to do it, makes the community have a better pool. Even hints on how to maximize your build for raids, as you go through the explore mode would be awesome.