A bit of background about me, before I begin. I am a three-time Community Mentorship Program reject who has been mapping for roughly 4 years, and while I have no ranked maps, I currently have a map with 1/2 nominations.
IntroductionMy map with 1/2 nominations is part of the story, but we can't start there. This story begins with a single catalyst -- I had begun playing osu, and I was hoping for a specific song to be mapped. I checked the forums and the reddit, and saw a big warning: do not request a song to be mapped. Under this, there was a little explanation saying that mapping was a time consuming process, and I should try mapping it myself.
So I did.
I find that blurb about mapping being a time-consuming process extremely ironic now, because, as a mapper, the time consumption is almost all in the learning process. I can shit out 30 seconds of playable mapping in like 30 minutes, which drops to about 5-10 seconds per 30 minutes if I'm trying to make something conceptual and interesting. I could map an entire hour-long album in less time than it would take that newbie to learn to map. Nowadays, requesting songs isn't uncommon, and I wish it hadn't been back then, because learning to map has been one of the worst choices of my life.
I have put easily a thousand hours into the editor, and searching through all of my maps across all three usernames yields just shy of 200 projects. Some of these I have mapped multiple difficulties for, the majority I have mapped about a single kiai's worth. I have spent nearly half a decade pouring the vast majority of my creativity and free time into a skill that is, in essence, completely useless.
I now use mapping for creative expression and the community at large has decided that this form of mapping is largely invalid. Thus, if I want to see the members of the community's plays on my maps, I am caught between a rock and a hard place -- I can either hope that my maps end up in a section meant for maps the community loves, or make extreme compromises for a section that has an extremely restrictive meta with a new veto system that enforces the meta heavily.
Section 1 -- The Veto SystemThat's just one thing I want to bring up today -- the veto system. As someone who has had a map pre-emptively vetoed, I am totally dismayed that vetoes have devolved even further since my own interaction. I wrote a response to a veto I was recently dismayed with that I think parts of are relevant to this discussion. I have changed the BN's name to BN, to protect privacy, because this is not about the individual BN, who I think is a lovely person, this is about a fundamentally flawed system that has been (unfortunately) normalized.
ResponseOnce again, I am dismayed with the heavy handed vetoing over subjective issues to enforce a meta that is becoming far too common. You claim further discussion isn't relevant because the mapper no longer wants to pursue ranked, but I think that it makes the question of "why doesn't the mapper want to pursue ranked status on a mapset polished enough to make it into the qualified section"
The answer to this is a complete imbalance of power. Once the veto is placed, the map is no longer safe, and inherently a risk to the BNs who nominated it.
Does the mapper want to risk having their creative opinions deemed invalid in front of the whole community?
On the other side, a veto can be placed freely, and if the veto doesn't pass mediation, it doesn't really come up in the BN review at all.
This creates an inherent pressure -- either conform to the meta, or stay out of the ranked section.
This one is particularly flagrant, because the mapper pointed out several times all of his concerns were not addressed, and BN responded with something I think was important to this discussion.
"I really don't have the energy to write a 5000 word essay on why I think whistle kicks are bad, I feel like I explained my stance well enough already"
The irony of this statement is that BN's veto shows that BN feels strongly enough about this to bar it from ranked, but does not feel strongly enough about barring it from ranked to even reply to all of the mapper's points. I believe that this should automatically raise flags about the veto itself. Spoes is ignoring how much tireless efforts the mapper spent defending his creative vision, and using their status as a BN to elevate her opinion to equal footing without actually defending it properly.
From this, I want to pull out and discuss one specific section. "Once the veto is placed, the map is no longer safe, and inherently a risk to the BNs who nominated it. Does the mapper want to risk having their creative opinions deemed invalid in front of the whole community? On the other side, a veto can be placed freely, and if the veto doesn't pass mediation, it doesn't really come up in the BN review at all. This creates an inherent pressure -- either conform to the meta, or stay out of the ranked section."
Lately, many BNs have been placing vetoes on maps over tiny, subjective issues, like their choice of specific hitsounds in certain sections, particularly maps that have done something outside of the meta box. Previously, vetoes were not something that were handed out left and right, and were typically reserved for edge cases. Unfortunately, these kind of vetoes are now considered "QAH work", which incentivizes BNs to create huge problems out of subjective choices, in a bid to rise to the NAT. This really sucks for mappers, because it leads to a larger problem.
The Ranked Compromise, Part 1I've worked on my mapping for such a long period of my life now, that ranking a map is extremely important and special to me. When I was a brand new mapper, I recieved a piece of advice from an experienced mapper that I really took to heart: don't approach BNs until you've made something you're proud of.
So I didn't.
My first attempt to rank something seriously came more than two years after I started mapping. I had created something I was proud of, and I continue to believe to this day was a good map. Unfortunately, the map was pre-emptively vetoed, by a BN I had approached nearly six months prior asking for feedback. I was told the map was bad, and when I asked for more feedback on why that was, I was told no.
After a BN had checked and rechecked my map, the BN who didn't have time to give me feedback while the map was in the early modding stages found the time to give me extensive feedback, and place what they said would automatically become a veto if it was qualified. I was caught in a veto system issue -- my first BN was retiring soon, and not interested in going through arbitration. My second BN mostly decided to back off. I gave up.
Sidebar: The Loved SectionThat map now has about 100 favorites, and has racked up nearly 250 plays in the two weeks since unranked maps have started counting plays. Unfortunately, despite my frequent agitation and desire for the map to be loved, the loved team didn't check it to be approved for pending for nearly nine months, until I pointed out to them that several maps that had been mapped after my map had been submitted to loved had already made it through voting and were in the loved category. I was told this was an "accident". Still, my map was ignored soundly in pending, and finally, disgusted with the category's lack of quality control (maps like
this which was a literal first map) and completely and totally snubbing me, I went to have a conversation with a member of the loved team.
I explained that I was deeply dismayed. "To me, it feels like "community popularity" is a term thrown around to cleverly disguise "captain's interests". Captains pick a few terrible maps that get hundreds of favorites due to song choice, a few "loved staple" mappers, like arles stuff and akali maps, and other than that, cherry-pick whatever they feel like. Essentially, we have handed leaderboard granting power to a few specific people who are not even elected by the community or a quality control board"
I was told that loved was about what the community loves, and I realized I fundamentally disagree with the category. From a post I wrote: "Is what we really want true player community representation? Univocally, the most popular loved maps are either memes, trashy jump practices, or hype songs, typically with low quality, low difficulty mapping. I don't think this is a category that should exist as a valid form of getting a leaderboard at all, with the way they are coveted in this game. You can make all the arguments you want about "community driven game" and "this is what the community wants", but I don't think that catering to delibarately low quality content is a healthy strategy at all. These maps belong in the graveyard for a reason -- they are not the kind of content that is deserving of a spotlight. They gather popularity on their own -- why would we spotlight bad content?"
I also disagree that the kind of mass appeal hype of low quality, low difficulty maps and meme maps is actually organic, because many of these players shouldn't really qualify as part of the community. These 800k players are very unlikely to actually stick around in the community for any extended period of time, nor are they likely to interact with the more permanent community or contribute to the game. To me, they represent an unsustainable part of the playerbase that doesn't actually participate in the community, and giving them an entire section like lived is a horrible idea.
I understand many people do not feel the same way, and as one mapper I look up to greatly said, expanding content keeps a game fresh, not taking it away. Therefore, instead of advocating for the abolition of the loved category, I worked on an effort to create a third category for mappers who have contributed to the community.
It has remained up on the github with no action for just a few months shy of two years. Now, how this whole sidebar relates to the ranked section issues at hand -- by rewarding mappers for modding, we not only incentivize BNs to mod more maps, we also push new mappers toward modding as well as mapping. This means more modders, and more future BNs. I really wish this proposal would be seriously examined by the osu! team.
ContextA bit more about my personal context becomes necessary before I move on to the ranked compromise's second half. Backtracking to before my editor time has even eclipsed 100 hours, despite my triple rejection from the mapping academy, I continued to map because of excellent, helpful, awesome people who helped me out of the kindness of their heart. DTM9 Nowa looked at all my terrible maps and gave me feedback and advice, Emilia timed maps for me when my offsets were always hundreds of milliseconds off, and fanzhen0019 took me as an informal mentee when all I had to show for myself were some genuinely terrible maps and the label three time academy reject. I wouldn't be here today without them.
The Ranked Compromise, Part 2Now I'm here. Coconut Mall has one nomination, and a second potential nominator who has checked and now rechecked the map. I didn't get here by working hard to improve my mapping as much as I got here by asking literally every BN open for a four week period except for two -- two BNs who I know do not like my mapping style. I elected not to waste their time. Furthermore, I managed to ask 12 closed BNs. For my efforts, I managed to find 2 BNs -- but one later decided they were no longer interested in nominating it upon taking a second look after I waited over a month.
I realized at this point it was a very a real possibility that my second attempt at the ranked section may not be fruitful either. I ended up finding an interested NAT when I realized I couldn't find a second BN that would be interested in my map.
Actually, that's a total lie. I easily found about half a dozen BNs who liked the map or told me they hoped it got ranked, but were not interested in
nominating the map due to being uncomfortable with the complexity and style. One BN even told me the map was nice, but they thought it might get vetoed because I mapped it. QAH "work" needs easy targets, like complex and interesting maps mapped by a mapper with no ranked maps!
Now, I'm stuck with another ranked compromise. This second recheck has made it apparent to me that I cannot get my map qualified without compromising my creative vision. I had responded to every mod, rejecting about half and accepting about half, but it seems I have a fundamental difference of opinion with my second nominator on New Comboing.
I know New Combos are not a big issue, in the grand scheme of a map, and I will definitely make the choice of a small compromise on my creative vision in order to rank this mapset, which I originally uploaded November of last year and I have worked toward ranking for nearly 80% of that time. However, this leads me to the big point -- the ranked compromise. My ranked compromise, as a new mapper who dares to map outside the meta, is to
spend 8 months of persistant work to rank a version of my map that is more to my nominator's taste rather than my own. What other choice do I have?
This is just the reality of the ranked section for a new mapper. I did make a spreadsheet of every BN in order to keep track of openings and criteria. I have read the rules of every single BN's page. I have checked their page nearly every day for a month. I will be ranking a version of my map that is more to my nominator's taste rather than my own (if it does rank).
I have had so much energy and passion sucked out of me by this process I don't feel any desire to pursue ranking another map, ever again. I hope that changes. I actually made it a goal to become a BN at the beginning of this ranking process, and began getting mod reviews from my first nominator, and studying all available content on modding for the BN test. My drive has been so utterly drained by this process I just stopped modding.
Thoughts on the BNGThere are so many problems with the BNG I could probably double my word count just trying to talk about all of them. Why does a map need two nominators, but any single BN may place a subjective veto, for example. Instead, I will try to tackle the root causes of these issues -- and even then I'm sure I won't get all of them.
In literally every other large, volunteer-powered community, privileges come with responsibilities as well. In osu, these powers are handed out more as a reward that BNs may do whatever they choose with. Minimum activity requirements have absolutely no clauses about accepting requests from the public. For all the NAT cares, you can close for a year as long as you meet the activity requirements by 2nding safe beatmaps from well-known mappers.
I feel like the greatest con ever pulled in this game was when Beatmap Nominators managed to hide behind the excuse "we're just volunteers!" to shield themselves from any real criticism. Of course beatmap nominators are volunteers. Of course they are people with real lives and work. That does not mean that you should hold a community volunteer position of power without any responsibility to the community at all. Right now, BNs are given carte blanche to do whatever they want with their powers.
I do not think BNs should be given community powers if they do not contribute to the community. The fact that we still have a steady flow of ranked maps does not detract from that fact that now more than ever, 80 to 90% of the BNG largely has their doors shut to the public.
A small anecdote: I waited for one BN who I am even mutualed with to open for months by staying up to date with their discord, and when they missed their own deadline to open, I asked about it, which they told me meant they needed more time before they opened. Once they finally opened, I sent in a request, and recieved a mass denial message saying that they were "overwhelmed with requests" despite promising to look at each request that followed their rules on their userpage. I have no idea when they will reopen. Prior to this "opening" that they took exactly zero maps from, they had been closed to the public for over 100 days. This year, they have modded 45 maps, of which 32 (more than 70%) have come from other BNs or NATs. One of the 13 non-nominator maps was mapped by the girlfriend of an NAT member, with a GD from him. From what I know, literally all of these 45 were requested outside of a public opening.
I also wanted to talk about risk, and how the system also actively punishes BNs who do their best to help the community, especially BNs who rank interesting, non-meta maps, but I can't find the strength. This post is well over 3000 words, and I am exhausted. Hopefully, I will find some time to edit that in tomorrow, along with some more general thoughts on the BNG and some concluding statements.
Thank you for taking the time to read this. I know this is a lot already.
). The only upside they have is that it is a bit easier for them to rank their own stuff. Overall still a shitty job.