Current rule:

Every slider must have a clear and visible path of movement to follow from start to end. Sliders that overlap themselves without straightforward slider borders and sliders whose individual sections are unreadable cannot be used. A slider's end position must be clear under the assumption that a player has a skin which makes slider end circles fully transparent.

I think that the wording of this rule, combined with the fact that it is a rule and not a guideline, is a slightly outdated way of governing what we can do with sliders. It has remained the same for a long while despite increasing innovation of sliders and increased player skill. The gist of it seems effective enough, but it can often lead to interpretations which prevent innovation in maps whose design completely supports the sliders used. I personally don't think that policing sliders in this way is a practice which benefits anyone since sliders that are actually fine usually end up getting through after some pointless arguing, which leaves the BN who opposed them somewhat disillusioned since the RC seemingly would not allow them, whilst leaving others feeling like they wasted their time since the sliders are clearly fine in the context of the map. Some examples: 1, 2, 3, 4.
(Note that in the last example the vetoer even agrees that the sliders are perfectly playable and is hence relying on the overly restrictive phrasal of the RC in this area which helps no-one)

I do completely understand how the current wording of this rule can give rise to situations where BNs think certain sliders should not be able to get through, however, with the increasing usage of tools like sliderator (or even manual creation) which mappers like Mazzerin have proven to be able to use in a sensible way, combined with the fact that people playing maps with sliders like these should be presumed to have enough skill to not be harmed by their existence, I think that we should do one of the following:

i) Change the rule to a guideline instead. This could then be followed by an addendum such as

Sliders that are not detrimental to gameplay and are fair/intuitive to play in the context of their map are permissible.

This provides BNs an opportunity to use their discretion to veto actually unreasonable sliders if such a situation arises, whilst also providing official support for more reasonable ones, which I think is a net positive for innovation. I do recognise that the wording of this addendum is a bit ambiguious and would require an unprecedented amount of discretion compared to other guidelines, but I think it's a step in the right direction. Perhaps some more elaboration could help too.

ii) Change the wording of the rule itself to more explicitly imply that certain sliders would be allowed (open to suggestions on how to word this)

Would like some thoughts on this.

(TL;DR - relax slider rules to aid innovation and prevent useless semantic discussions about what constitutes an "individually readable section")

how do i +1

yes please mate

Yea

+1

first option sounds the best for me, since still having it as a rule makes it more discouraging maybe?
not much to add here otherwise

+1

yea i definitely feel like this rule has becoming more and more arbitrary nowadays

judging hitobjects based on their intention/context and fairness to play instead of on a certain rigid "this is what you can and can't do" limitation seems to be much more preferable for me — this is also the kind of approach that has been taken by many successful rhythm games out there such as Arcaea or Cytus II when it comes to their charts for years, iirc

+1

+1 good change

We already went to the point where rules like this would be unnecessarily restrictive to edge cases like these already.

+1

Bump

Don't know why this isn't a thing already

SKYSTAR CHRONO DIVER RANKED LETS FUCKIONG GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP

gogoggogoo +1

yes

+1

+1

100% agree

The rule currently hinders a lot of potential regarding slider creation because it’s simply too outdated to be uncompromising

+1

yeah

agree

yea

yei +1

agreed

ye

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+1

+1

+1

+2

"This provides BNs an opportunity to use their discretion to veto actually unreasonable sliders if such a situation arises"

In a perfect world, yes, but we all know this won't happen if QAH stays the way it is now. In fact, without RC supporting it, there's even less incentive for BNs to veto harmful uses. We've seen in the past that vetos on subjective issues always causes problems for the person placing the veto.

On the point of the RC change, I think allowing these kinds of sliders creates an unhealthy relationship when playing the game. This is already partially present due to SV, but making it even more difficult to trust sliders because every single one could have some unexpected effect is not a good development in my opinion.

Edit: Also unsure how this change can affect converts, anybody know if there could be issues?

In fact, without RC supporting it, there's even less incentive for BNs to veto harmful uses. We've seen in the past that vetos on subjective issues always causes problems for the person placing the veto.

The vetos I linked are already subjective I would argue, the only objective factor is the stringent RC wording which hasn't changed in years regarding the topic despite major developments. The contentious issue on whether these sliders are *fine* or not (as opposed to unrankable) is definitely subjective. The fact that you even have to veto these in the first place instead of flat-out DQing them with no room for argument demonstrates that not everyone agrees on what constitutes an unrankable slider, and hence regardless the RC wording needs some cleanup.

In a perfect world, yes, but we all know this won't happen if QAH stays the way it is now.

? BNs still have to use their discretion when nominating, I doubt any two decent BNs would nominate a slider that is so egregiously unreasonable and unfair as a result of this change that it would harm anything, and if they did then you can still veto the map as you have been doing now. The fact that not many people QAH doesn't really affect this at all considering you are the only one who does slider vetoes even now, and you will still be free to do that for any case you think is particularly egregious. All that would be happening ideally is that some official support for some cases that are *clearly* fine and hence useless to disallow would be provided. It's not like the legislation on the matter would be completely abolished, so there would definitely be grounds to veto harmful uses still. The fact that QAH is inactive doesn't really affect this to me: someone could stick literally anything in a map and it could get through if no-one bothered to download it or point it out in a week.

On the point of the RC change, I think allowing these kinds of sliders creates an unhealthy relationship when playing the game. This is already partially present due to SV, but making it even more difficult to trust sliders because every single one could have some unexpected effect is not a good development in my opinion.

Something I was actually looking to weave into my argument is that equally "unexpectable" patterns are more than possible to create and rank via increased SV usage or even only using circles/overlaps/etc. I see no reason why sliders should not be allowed to be used in the same way as long as the map design/skill requirement of the map supports it.

Also I don't think converts should be a specific priority here considering they are not intended for them anyways and many converts are already terrible, but to entertain the point I checked the sliders in question on Dialtone and this map on every other gamemode and nothing particularly weird or unplayable happened.

hard agree, also can +1 on the convert thing, every mode it just plays normally