This proposal aims to reduce the burden for ranking difficult (like 7*+) maps, by specifying number of required spread diffs as an alternative to the lowest difficult requirement.
(Edit: please also refer to uberfazz's post or my more recent post for alternative proposals to fix it, which relaxes expert level requirement while leaving lower diffs as is)
community/forums/topics/1880953?n=8
community/forums/topics/1880953?n=20
Currently, ranking high level difficulties requires a lot of spread diffs, making it a lot difficult to make and rank mapsets with them. I see a lot of mappers with capability to rank maps just graveyard difficult maps without attempting to rank them.
There are largely unsatisfied demands coming from improving player skill levels. For example, for nomod plays, merely 10k-ish players have mid-high 6* or even 7* full ver maps in best performance scores. Such diff already has very limited number of maps and it's difficult to find new maps that you'd specifically enjoy.
Mania already has a good solution to reduce burden for ranking difficult maps, specifying the number of required spread diffs as an alternative to having a specified lowest diff level. Their rule is like the following:
Similar approach can relax the burden for osu standard.
The current spread rule is the following:
(Edit: please also refer to uberfazz's post or my more recent post for alternative proposals to fix it, which relaxes expert level requirement while leaving lower diffs as is)
community/forums/topics/1880953?n=8
community/forums/topics/1880953?n=20
Currently, ranking high level difficulties requires a lot of spread diffs, making it a lot difficult to make and rank mapsets with them. I see a lot of mappers with capability to rank maps just graveyard difficult maps without attempting to rank them.
There are largely unsatisfied demands coming from improving player skill levels. For example, for nomod plays, merely 10k-ish players have mid-high 6* or even 7* full ver maps in best performance scores. Such diff already has very limited number of maps and it's difficult to find new maps that you'd specifically enjoy.
Mania already has a good solution to reduce burden for ranking difficult maps, specifying the number of required spread diffs as an alternative to having a specified lowest diff level. Their rule is like the following:
...It relaxes spread requirement for sets with high diff levels while also removing huge discontinuity of required spread at marathon length.
...between 3:15 and 4:00, each key mode and playstyle must either include a difficulty at Insane or lower, or provide a proper spread containing at least 2 difficulties.
...
Similar approach can relax the burden for osu standard.
The current spread rule is the following:
If the drain time of each difficulty is...The spread rule would be changed as follows, with this change:
...lower than 3:30, the lowest difficulty cannot be harder than a Normal.
...between 3:30 and 4:15, the lowest difficulty cannot be harder than a Hard.
...between 4:15 and 5:00, the lowest difficulty cannot be harder than an Insane.
If the drain time of each difficulty is...One drawback of this proposal would be the reduced number of relatively lower diffs. However, the impact on lower diff players on the song variety would be minimal. The affected ones are sets that cannot have only one extra (top diff) for spread, typically mid 6*+, which is small portion of all ranked beatmaps. A lot of full ver mappers are also mapping lower diffs voluntarily despite RC not requiring it right now.
...lower than 3:30, the lowest difficulty cannot be harder than Normal, or the set should provide a proper spread containing at least 4 difficulties.
...between 3:30 and 4:15, the lowest difficulty cannot be harder than a Hard, or the set should provide a proper spread containing at least 3 difficulties.
...between 4:15 and 5:00, the lowest difficulty cannot be harder than an Insane, or the set should provide a proper spread containing at least 2 difficulties.
...