Of course he needs, it's a matter of hierarchy. Raiden is a protector, but Shao Kahn's treat is something that transcends one realm. The guy invades everybody, he just transformed Edenia in a pile of corpses. He can't interfere, these are the laws of the Elder Gods, and if it's a law, there is a saction for it, we don't know what matters can menace all the gods from interfering on "mortal affairs". But that was beyond, the Elder Gods had to do it since the beginning of time.
For the exact reason he is the Thunder God, he's not omnipotent, he needs some back up.
But Raiden could only save those of the "chosen". What about the rest of the world? Perished by the Elder God's omission.
That's the interesting of this character, IMO, what makes him one of my favorites. He is a god, but he has visible human traits.
He fails, he makes mistakes, he judges things wrong. He is capable of sighting all the problems on Earth, except when these problems transcend his "jurisdiction".
I mean, he is said to protect Earth. Ok, he has done it and was front man on Shinnok's invasion.
But the Elder Gods were on his side!
There is a normative problem with the Elder Gods. They say
"protect Earthrealm". At the same time they say
"we prevent merging the realms without MK" (which is, by the way, BS, because they should AVOID it at any costs). Anyway, when a threat like INVASION happens, the Elder Gods close their eyes and say "
no, it's not merging (so we can't prevent), so, you are competent to deal with it!". That's totally out of all protector's powers!
The
teleology of this rule is ABSURD. With invasion not being considered a threat and being put onto Raiden's responsability ALONE it's proven that the Elder God's just don't care about life, about existence itself, unless it deals with the One Being and ONLY if this happens outside of that dumb tournament of theirs (discount the name of our beloved game :laugh: ).
When they needed to protect everything, they are omissive and let things happen with gods with little jurisdiction, when clearly this kind of threat is a jurisdiction of the Elder Gods, not the "lesser gods". That's why Raiden's hands are tied, because he needs to do things limited to his permissions, and his MK
A/D attitude was THE BEST, only put on focus his human side when he has chosen the highest bidding to desperately and in the dumbest way try to save what was already lost: Earth.
For both leaders, Commander and Grandmaster :laugh:
Let's go back to the beginning.
There were Gods and "something". This "something" is said to "fed off" those gods. IT'S SAID, because it's the story of the victor, we don't know when the Elder Gods are the "evil" deities (remembering reality are the dreams of the One Being according to MK
dialogues).
Anyway, let's think. If they really were responsible, they would not only shatteer the One Being, but avoid its reunited body. Not only they tolerate its dreams, constantly lurking its creations to rejoin itself, but they created a dumb tournament and a row to win and merge a realms!
If the Elder Gods were good, they would make rules for the good of life, for prosperity. They just find excuses and don't care for people's suffering (remember what they did to Scorpion on MK:A?). They make rules where its omission is decided on the damage of those they took the power.
If they had resolved all of this since forever, we would never be in this situation (story matters, people! We also know we would never play this game lol).
Raiden is guilty, but he is guilty by imprudence, by lack of help, by too much weight. The Elder Gods stood idle. They are just like Shao Kahn, they kill and let people die in the worst way: omission. Raiden let people die because he couldn't protect everybody. That's why he's awesome.
Respect all opinions, but it's because this dialogue got very very interesting. 
