One of the things that can test a 10 man raid the most is one in which has a binary result of live or die. Examples of what I’m talking about are mechanics like KT’s Frost Blast (testing your healers), his Shadow Fissure (testing everyone), and Mimiron’s Rocket Strike (testing everone).

Mechanics like this test the spacial awareness of your entire raid. The reason these are such strong factors to go by is that for other mechanics (fire and similar effects), is that if your person isn’t paying attention and doesn’t move out of the way, a healer can usually save them if they are going above and beyond their call of duty. When JoeWarlock decides to stand in the fire on Razorscale, FurryMcDruid can save him by diverting a good chunk of his attention away long enough for him to realize he’s burning alive, however in Mimiron if you don’t move for a Rocket Strike, you’re dead.

This is especially important in a 10 man raid environment. In a 25 man raid, if one player dies, that is a loss of 4% to your raid size. In 10 man its a 10% loss overall, but could be one third of your healer team or 50% of your tank team. Losses like this are hard to tolerate in a small raid and are the cause of a fair amount of wipes. For progression content its absolutely necessary to bring your first string raiders. In situations like this its better to bring your more competent raiders (with awareness and fight knowledge) than your uber DPS that can’t seem to stay alive.