First off I'd like to state that yes I have seen and already started using the TBT guide in this sub forum please don't point that out to me :3

Here's some back story before I get to the questions themselves (Feel free to skip this if you want):

I first started playing Osu! when there was still less than 500 beatmaps/songs ranked so I've been around; I'd like to think since the start (correct me if I'm wrong) Back then I played on my older bro's account because I didn't have my own computer yet. When I finally did get my own account I noticed taiko and played it sucked and shrugged it off as some sort of shitty game. Well recently I matured/grew up and realized I was wrong after watching some of the better players replays I felt like I had missed something. So the other day I tried it out and low & behold it was fun, but I was terrible. It only lasted for so long doing so bad so I figured I contact the forums, sure enough there was the TBT guide, and after just an hour or so I'm already significantly better than I was when I started.

So I made this little list of questions I still had after I consulted the guide.


Questions:

1. What are some good songs for beginners?

I used some of my time on the TBT guide and want to be able to see myself improve, but as I've seen on the forums and through personal experience that most songs not mapped for taiko are pretty much random, and not necessarily the best for training. The only non-taiko mapped songs I thought were good are Tsuna awakens, and Ass Up! (Nightcore). So I'm looking for a few songs that are either mapped for taiko specifically with lower difficulties, and/or maps that have lower difficulty std and still good for taiko play.

2. How does scoring in taiko work exactly?

I noticed that perfect hits grant 300 points, but does it change by your combo or anything? It's really hard to play and pay attention to the points your earning at the same time so I'm having trouble figuring it out. I just want to know more in depth how it works exactly, from spinners, to the big notes everything you can offer would be appreciated!

3. Accuracy?

Maybe it's just because I'm a beginner and all, but I feel I have a really low accuracy, and I don't see myself improving on it all that much. I mean in std Osu! I have about 93-94% I believe, but in taiko I have like 75-85%. Because of this horrible accuracy even on maps that I can pull FC's on I still get C ranks. I wanted to know if I just have no sense of rhythm or it's cause I'm new to the game-play style that's different than I'm used to.

4. Notes?

What are the differences between the big notes and the normal sized notes? And is there really any penalty for missing beats on the slider like notes? I guess I should ask what their official names are too I'd also like some general tips of the slider notes, because I'm only consistently hitting the on certain songs.

Any other information that you think might help would also be appreciated as well, thanks in advance! If I have any other questions I'll either post in this thread or update the OP :3

Hello FreakyTy, it's nice to see new taiko players asking questions. Now let's see if I can answer some of your questions. :3

1. You can find taiko mapsets in the beatmap listings. For beginners you'd typically want to play Kantan, Futsuu, and Muzukashii. https://osu.ppy.sh/p/beatmaplist?m=1&r=0&g=0&la=0

2. The scoring increases every 10 hits in a combo (300 --> 380 --> 460 --> 540 --> 620 --> 700 --> 780 --> 860 --> 940 --> 1020 --> 1100). Please note that you have to keep your combo without breaking in order to reach 1100 points per hit. Spinners award 300 points for every hit and 2040 as bonus if you clear it. Kiai time slightly increases the scoring of everything. (ex. 1100 - > 1320) So you'll want to try to focus at theses sections in order to try to maximize your score. Hitting a note late/early gives half of the points you would normally earn for hitting one.

3. I think you just have no sense of rhythm. Sorry for being straightforward...

4. Hitting the big notes with both keys of the same color will award double points if done accurately. No there is no penalty for missing ticks on sliders, the goal is to hit as many as possible because they each award 300 points for every tick you hit.

Names

A red note is called a "Don".

A blue note is called a "Kat".

A big red note is called a "Big Don".

A big blue note is called a "Big Kat".

Sliders are called "Drum Rolls".

I think that should be about it. Feel free to ask anything else you might still need help with.

To any other veteran taiko players please correct me if any of this information is wrong.

well you could to some research on a bunch of these questions but since I am such a kind person I will try to answer of my best ability in a manner that isn't confusing.

Starting by how scoring works combo does indeed matter for the scoring, starting at ten combo you get more points from hits, sliders/drumrolls give 300 points for each tick no matter what, spinners give 300 points plus a score that depends on your combo if you clear it, big notes give the double of a normal hit if you hit both red or blue buttons. (depending on the color of the big note ofc :v) Only score is affected if you don't hit them both, drumrolls/sliders are not affected by mods at all whatsoever, but stupidly enough spinners are affected by HR, HT, EZ and DT, the first two will increase the score while the latter will decrease it.

Accuracy is mostly just a practise thing, playing old maps with high OD usually helps in training this (provided they are timed properly, at least) and HR will also help as it makes the accuracy hitbox stricter, the huge accuracy difference probably comes from the change as my standard accuracy is pretty sap compared to my quite nice taiko acc.

I kinda covered the big notes earlier, the drumrolls/sliders are also just extra points, it might be a good idea to only use your right hand for drumrolls as you start the game, at least I did that before opposed to me mostly using both my pointing index fingers now (which might be harder to control when you are new but it's generally more accurate)

can't really help you on suggesting maps, idk if you can handle the song but I used to replay this a lot because I found that it really helped my streaming skills when I started this game, the learning curve of taiko is very steep: http://osu.ppy.sh/b/99997

also yeah streaming kinda equals skill in taiko

damn you osu! didn't warn me about the ninja post, Kuro kinda covered more than 50% here now. Good luck at even reading this post because it turned kinda messy, I'm pretty pro at being messy

Herlo FreakyTy, here are things what I can say (as Semi-n00b Player. lol):

1. The TBT guide is actually fine but of course you have to play normal Maps because every Map is unique on their difficulty level and has a own feeling to play (BPM, pattern, rhythm, ...) You should not play only Standard converted Maps since many of them cannot give an good view how Taiko actually works and what a good rhythm makes out (that's a mistake which really can cause that Taiko Beginner will have big troubles to play in the later time real Taiko Diffs). Also sometimes the Rhythm i.e. of a Normal Diff is sometimes that bad converted that Beginner would fail really bad.

And for the sake of Taiko beginner every Mapset with one Taiko Diff needs one more now (in total, a Map cannot have only one Taiko Diff, it needs to have a easier Diff in case the first Taiko Diff is an Oni but yeah, that's not really relevant here. The very best thing you should do atm is to play Kantan and Futsuu Diffs. Partly you can play Muzukashii too but keep in mind that there can be some of them still too hard for you (if you found one of them and you cannot pass it, just don't discourage yourself ) Also for what you should care is the BPM. Of course something with a low BPM (100-140) plays easier and more confortable as something with a higher one (160+).

The best skin you can use to play Taiko is the [url=up.ppy.sh/files/skin-taiko.zip]Taiko no Tatsujin 4.0[/url] by LuigiHann. Of course you can use other Skins later but currently I suggest to use this one since it gives a good feeling to play especially because of the Hitsounds.

3. One reason can be that you played for the most time Standard converted Maps which are imo really bad to play due the high OD sometimes and/or bad rhythm (this is btw caused when the Slidertick Rate is 2 or if a lot of Repeat Sliders are used normally) To have a bad accuracy is typical for your level. You're in the position where you have to improve your basic skills which contains fcing something, having the condition to distinguish Red and Blue (this is something MANY people have problems with it) and of course to keep a good Accuracy at all (around 95% would be already good enough for Beginner imo) It's mainly not the problem to have no rhythm feeling but it's one of these points which is absolutely not an issue, it'll change during the Time and you'll find into the game.

4. To your last question: Sliderrolls should mostly interpret Sliders in the Standard mode. However, realize how you make i.e. a Triplet of three Circles in Standard. Now you got to do that with Sliderrolls: they are something like Streams but they are not Streams at all. The best thing to do is to change between two keys (not sure if you're a kddk or a kk dd player) i.e. if you play with kddk then make a change between k and d. You're playing the Drumrolls as a Stream (dkdkdkdkdkdk...) It sounds pretty weird but it's the best way to explain it (for myself.. My english skills are really weak, sorry for that)

That is everything I can tell you from my experience since I made the very big Mistake of playing only Standard converted Diffs as beginner. orz
I hope that anything of these things I've told you above can help you on the way.

They seemed to answer your question quite nicely, but about accuracy: It is normal with your experience to have such bad accuracy, and believe me when I say it will improve over time (assuming you are playing taiko-specific difficulties). Oh, and avoid playing standard -> taiko conversion maps due to high OD, weird velocity changes, timing, and 1/8 notes.

I recommend new players learn full alternating, which means you switch left and right hands on every note. Also try using only one finger for both hands. In my opinion this is the way taiko should be played, like real drumming.

Thanks for the replies everybody, this was really helpful! There is one more thing though what is OD? You guys mentioned it a few times in multiple posts.

Other than that though I think that these are very nice responses, thank you all

Overall difficulty, hitwindows, HP drain and lenght of spinners.

The most significant ones are the hitwindows anyways, so here's a table over them



Albeit this is a table over hitwindows for standard, I did talk to ephemeral about it and they should apply for taiko as well. I've tested it out a bit and it mostly applies.

tldr; higher OD = harder to score a good accuracy

darkmiz wrote:

I recommend new players learn full alternating, so they will feel miserable, which means you switch left and right hands on every note grind hours and hours simpliest patterns. Also try using only one finger for both hands, because it's fun watching disabled people fall down. In my opinion this is the way taiko should be played, like a real drumming torture.

fixd

That's not true though with drumming. Drummers can have steady eigth notes on the right hand and throw sixteenth notes in with their left or vise-versa with whatever their dominant hand is. If it was always alternating, there wouldn't be things like paradiddles (RLRRLRLL), and watching things like marching band snare drummers would be so boring! Plus things like drum set playing would be way more difficult.

I would highly suggest testing methods of playing. Don't try to single hand anything, though. You won't get past muzu if you just single hand things. Make sure you learn to alternate hands for sixteenth and thirtysecond notes. In the end, choose what is best for you besides the single hand method.

Note that there are also different ways to play when it comes to keyboard inputs (assuming you're not using a wii drum). Some people play blue red red blue, while others play blue blue red red. Just test methods out and see what is best for you!

Might want to add that OD actually works a bit different than in Standard. Since the "ApproachRate" is determined by SV, OD "only" covers the timewindow for notes to be hit, and since you don't have a cursor to move and only click all day long, these timewindows are smaller than in Standard. I don't have exact numbers, but I'd say that the same OD in Standard and Taiko will lead to a 10~20% smaller timewindow in Taiko.

Kokatsu wrote:

these timewindows are smaller than in Standard. I don't have exact numbers, but I'd say that the same OD in Standard and Taiko will lead to a 10~20% smaller timewindow in Taiko.

Ephemeral said that they should not differ from standard hitwindows. Albeit it may be harder to keep a high accuracy in standard, this is not at all due to any difference in hitwindows, rather simply because there are no sliders and generally more to tap.

For me it always felt like that. :/

The only help I can give you is "play for fun, not for ranks". The Taiko is an instrument, and like an instrument, nobody cares if your timing is off by 1-10ms every once and a while. Play a song until you are comfortable with the patterns and can generally get a B in the song, then move on to something a bit harder.

If you are looking for some good songs, find someone in hell #taiko and ask them to play some multiplayer (with the interest of getting new songs obvs). They will ask you to pick a song you are comfortable with, then they will go through their stuff and find things that you can work towards. Finding new maps to work towards is the easiest way to learn IMO.

If you are interested in mapping, check some maps in depth in edit mode to see why are they mapped like they are, and then start mapping on your own.
Personally I think mapping helps your playing skill the most because you are in control of what you want/need to practice, especially since you can choose your favorite song.


At least that's what I am doing currently haha some shameless selfpromotion!, always mapping something I can pass with a B or so, and then after a week it turns into an A and sometimes even into a FC if the map isn't too complex. :p