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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I'd say explore mode should only have world drop gear so that way if you want to actually get the raid gear or exotic you gotta play the standard or master mode, you learn and experience the raid through explore then challenge yourself on the harder difficulties for the rewards, it's the best way to implement this without making standard mode redundant. Also think explore mode should be available later down the line say after all challenges come out.