Subject: Request a Disqualification here.

Hi. Got some question regarding your statement:

Loctav wrote:

We first DQ, then we discuss. We do not figure out first if the concerns are valid, we figure that out after the DQ, so we have no time pressure.

So you've used the term 'time pressure' as a reason why you've decided the system to become DQ-first-discuss-next. That 'time pressure' seems to be the time limit of a qualified week if I understanded correct. Surely opening a discussion, which fails to reach a consensus before the qualified map gets permanently ranked, does never makes sense. I like the purpose of this system to ensure discussions being properly done with enough time.

However, I'd like to ask if this system could be great in terms of "time efficiency". You've even mentioned the procedures that can be stepped when an 'invalid concern' lead to a DQ. As you are already awared of, that DQ'ed beatmap with an invalid reason should wait an extra time since it first got qualified ~ it getting requalified. That period of time would turn out to become a loss of time resource, and also result some waste of human resources to figure out that concern as something invalid. True that assuring quality of a beatmap is something really important. Still, do you think the potential inefficiency of beatmap ranking process (caused by a DQ made without QAT checking it's validity) worths in the system?

If DQ happens everytime when a particular issue arises from a qualified, without that risen issue getting checked beforehand, then why should a QAT exist? Aren't QAT's a QAT for a good reason? They would have the ability and eye to judge whether the proposed issue is valid or not. Not letting them to check the issue's validity will then be another waste of human resources, and if that issue turns out to become invalid eventually, then that's when the inefficient ranking process happens.

The community checks the map, and provide random issues. QAT makes a DQ without revising the validity of issues. That certainly is one powerful way to assure quality of beatmaps, but I've personally started to confuse what the main task of QAT is.

tl;dr

1. Invalid DQ should never happen, and to ensure that, QAT or staff members getting involved through the DQ should take responsibility and check the validity of the proposed concern.
2. Exceptions; if a proposed issue was significant enough and an 'actual discussion' has started during the qualified period, QAT should commit a DQ regardless of the validity of the risen issue.

These were my thoughts. I'd like to hear your opinion regarding this point. Thanks.
________________________________________________________________________________________________

The above was my message towards Loctav, but made this public anyways.
DQ is good because it usually gives a second chance for quality improvement, but would DQ'ing per every request efficient?

I have to agree. You don't have to be a QAT to post "Let's figure out a solution! :):)". I think it's quite important that QAT's also voice their opinions on the issues. Their opinions will always be valued in the discussion.

That said though, the QAT's main task is to check maps that have been qualified, and many of them pass without regular players/modders/BN's pointing anything out for discussion. With that in mind you could say that *eventually* they will have to check the map over anyways, but yes, I agree that disqualifying without giving their own opinions on the issues is a loss of efficiency.

It was a bit upsetting for me to see p/4757650 disqualified despite the fact that (according to Raiden) both Taiko QAT's had deemed the set acceptable and not requiring of a disqualification.

Basically DQ are important to improve mapsets, but also is important that QATs take a look at the suggestions/mods and see if they agree with them, just DQ over nazi things or invalid issues, seems really a step back and kill the purpose of a QAT team, since tbh anyone can do the DQ without looking at what the issues or improvements are.

I'm tired of seeing these kinds of problems, but I'll just post about my thoughts on it....


This "time efficiency" and "time pressure" problem can easily be reduced if all sides are able to take the time to sit down and actually look at the map, test it diligently, and exchange their input like we used to. From what I've seen over time, there's been some factors lacking seriously dangerous from time to time that actually started riots like....



If DQ's are not taken (and handled) seriously, its not only going to piss off the mapper, but its also going to upset more people. Especially players that felt the map was complete with enough "practice". Some DQ's can easily be avoided if you treat the map as if it was already DQ'ed and hunt down some actual faults beforehand.

Here's also what I said about "excessive DQ's" in the past as well...



Honestly, its good to make sure you have answers for when questions are fired. Otherwise, its just going to be another drama war all over again as no one likes to be left in the dark to die out like a flashlight....

Imo it's a good thing.
When I checked mapsets for the November Charts I've seen a few difficulties that I found questionable to say the least and I wondered how they got past QAT(mainly easier difficulties).
Another thing about the DQ request system is that only BNs/staff members can request disqualifications which is equal to the people who the QAT already trusts to be able to judge whether a map is ready or not. If they think it isn't they're most likely right and it acts out like a late bubble-pop with the difference that some people would rather make a drama due to a DQ compared to a bubble-pop. At the end of the day it's effectively the same, just that the bubblepopping BN was late to the set.
All found issues can be discussed with the BN that requested the DQ, 0 reason to have the QAT directly involved. And no, giving BNs permission to DQ things themselves isn't a good idea.
That's why I think that the DQ request system in its current state goes perfectly in hand with how beatmap-qualifications are handled right now.

Endaris wrote:

All found issues can be discussed with the BN that requested the DQ, 0 reason to have the QAT directly involved......

.... That's why I think that the DQ request system in its current state goes perfectly in hand with how beatmap-qualifications are handled right now.

Honestly, the QAT should still be involved to at least monitor the situation(s) taking place to make sure things are running smoothly. Extreme lack of involvement can cause problems too (which was one of the reasons for previous riots).

The system isn't perfect as long as there's still a lot of internal and external conflicts about. Its not just only DQs alone, but other factors. I won't derail the topic over those though.

That the system isn't perfect is a different topic indeed.

If you ask me it's already the BNG that decides what quality is. The QAT just takes a bit from their responsibility to ensure they're not doing complete shit but as long as BNs are still seeing a need for discussion within their own realm there is no need for the QAT to step in.
Assuming mapper+BNs are people with common sense(big expectations here) there shouldn't go anything wrong and if the parties see a need to involve the QAT the option is certainly existent - I just don't see a point to have that involvement being a default part of the DQ request system.

There was never anything wrong with having a QAT involved when needed. Especially when there's something the BN isn't sure about. At least before the whole QAT thing, beatmap moderators would talk with one another to confirm their doubts on something they're not 100% on with things they normally don't see or have doubts with how the map function. This helps to keep the involvement expanded and lessen complications.

Taking away team-to-team interaction only puts more stress and bad calls on their end which makes the whole team look bad in general. Just because you feel the QAT shouldn't be involved with the BN's "chores" doesn't mean they shouldn't be involved at all. That just defeats the purpose and idea of why the groups are made.

On another note, the BNG shouldn't be the only ones to that decide on what quality is.....

Well, I think it's more about time-efficiency here with 4 QATs less. I think I'm not going wrong with the assumption that DQ requests got introduced to take work from the QAT's shoulders.
QAT members can't choose when to mod or take breaks - well they can most likely but there's always someone who has to take care of maps that got qualified. BNs don't have that kind of pressure. While I agree that communication between the teams would be a good thing the reasons why there are less people fit to be QAT and also less new mappers that may become BN/QAT has a lot of different reasons and a potential lack of communication is only one of many.
As far as I can see this is a way to get work done and potentially look out for new QAT members and it achieves these goals well. I don't see how it could affect maps or mappers in a bad way.

A thought I just had would be to find some euphemism for "Disqualified" as QAT isn't disqualifying a map cause it is bad but because they want to have it discussed.
Maybe use "discussion" or "refinement" state instead of "disqualified" state. If it's really bad you can still nuke right? hue

But what also worries me with "time-efficiency" is if it becomes another race to get maps qualified again. I'm not saying a BN or QAT (if involved) to spend 3 days on each beatmap to make sure its good, but effort put out to make sure things are accounted for before the qualifying period will actually look more positive for the team than to have a list of DQ's over silly things that gives bad public opinion.

And as I've said before, DQ's may be okay, but too many isn't a good sign either.

Endaris wrote:

Well, I think it's more about time-efficiency here with 4 QATs less. I think I'm not going wrong with the assumption that DQ requests got introduced to take work from the QAT's shoulders.

I think that's just a misconception. Those QAT's were inactive anyways so no workload was actually lost.

monstrata wrote:

I think that's just a misconception. Those QAT's were inactive anyways so no workload was actually lost.

The only thing I would see taking the most loss is team efficiency in this case. Some workload can be lost if the QAT had unique supporting mod aspects that doesn't fall short no less than +92% of the time. In that case, the workload would actually grow but work efficiency drops....

whymeman wrote:

On another note, the BNG shouldn't be the only ones to that decide on what quality is.....

Then what's exactly the purpose of the BNG? Be a rank machine who just listens blindly to either QATs or the mappers themselves and sets icons? No. Just no. Every BN has their own quality standards and whether or not they are adequate is out of your judgement. They got selected to be BNs for a reason (same with QATs). Of course they may need to improve their skills at judging maps, but again, whether or not they are correct is not up to you but to themselves (and in extreme cases which have yet to exist, the QAT).

@monstrata: That map was in severe lack of quality, the Taiko QATs I spoke to were just not giving a damn because it was going to be ranked in a day. The difficulty settings were taking our guidelines and ripping them apart for no reason. I'm pretty damn sure if you checked them yourself you'd have notice the flaws as well (but this is another topic).

As for the topic itself, I do agree that the QAT should check briefly before making any disqualify (but I thought this was a bit of common sense to be completely honest). I might as well go and point out something completely irrelevant, but because it has a timestamp attached to it, it becomes instantly valid and thus requires a disqualify to "discuss" said irrelevant point.

However, I do also think that the BNs requesting a disqualify must have very good reasons to publicly request a disqualify, VERY good reasons. So no, I don't think any BN is going to request a DQ because "00:00:000 - blanket" (or in my case "00:00:000 - change d").

Good thread, it's nice to have some relevant discussion finally!

Raiden wrote:

whymeman wrote:

On another note, the BNG shouldn't be the only ones to that decide on what quality is.....

Then what's exactly the purpose of the BNG? Be a rank machine who just listens blindly to either QATs or the mappers themselves and sets icons? No. Just no. Every BN has their own quality standards and whether or not they are adequate is out of your judgement. They got selected to be BNs for a reason (same with QATs). Of course they may need to improve their skills at judging maps, but again, whether or not they are correct is not up to you but to themse-

Not even going to bother repeating the end part. Honestly, you blew that WAY out of proportion and I didn't like that attitude about that comment either. I'm not saying "Hey BNs, just rank whatever you feel like". That would just be plain stupid overall. What i'm trying to bluntly hint is that its not only BNs and QATs that should understand what a "quality map" is. If the mapper (even players, BNs, and QATs) can understand the ideal concept of what makes a general map within "good quality" altogether, then it helps to drop the amount of conflicts occurring from time to time and build a better relationship with the mapping community. Putting too much trust into expectations of what people expect as "standard quality" in a minority can cause downfalls and disappointments just like when a doctor who's an expert in medical tells you you'll die in a month without any options because they "know about the problem" while doing your own research, you find a way to save yourself through treatments or surgery. Is it really that bad to understand what "quality" means without someone telling you what it is only from their view?

Seriously.... one of the biggest problems I see growing is "dominance" over titles with the "you have no power of opinion or thought if you're not a BN or BNG blah blah blah-", "You have no place to talk about this", "Yeah yeah, we know (pretends to listen and ignore)", "I've never seen a problem with it". That's why there's too much clashing going on between the mappers and the qualifying system with all the face stomping going on.

Natsu wrote:

Basically DQ are important to improve mapsets, but also is important that QATs take a look at the suggestions/mods and see if they agree with them, just DQ over nazi things or invalid issues, seems really a step back and kill the purpose of a QAT team, since tbh anyone can do the DQ without looking at what the issues or improvements are.

I agree that it's important to look through the raised up points first, making it a lucky game whether a DQ was justified is non-sense. But yes, the discussion can happen afterwards.

However, DQing for nazi issues should still happen if they appear to happen multiple times, as you can still improve the quality.

Irreversible wrote:

However, DQing for nazi issues should still happen if they appear to happen multiple times, as you can still improve the quality.

Before I say anything on this, what does that exactly mean when you say "DQing for nazi issues should still happen?"

whymeman wrote:

Seriously.... one of the biggest problems I see growing is "dominance" over titles with the "you have no power of opinion or thought if you're not a BN or BNG blah blah blah-", "You have no place to talk about this", "Yeah yeah, we know (pretends to listen and ignore)", "I've never seen a problem with it". That's why there's too much clashing going on between the mappers and the qualifying system with all the face stomping going on.

I don't presume to know the entire mapping and ranking process, but I can tell that this sort of friction going on between mappers and QATs wasn't like this a couple of years ago. I though that when peppy introduced the "qualified" system idea it was pretty good, flawless even, but obviously it has given a lot of room for individual biases to hinder what should be a creative process. I mean, is there even any sort of pressure a person would feel to not mess up with a DQ?

And yeah this sort of title "dominance" you refer to will happen in online communities, specially those filled with teenagers. It's almost like a guaranteed side-effect.

Sonnyc wrote:

DQ is good because it usually gives a second chance for quality improvement, but would DQ'ing per every request efficient?

Second chance? It depends on the quality of map and some QAT's character. It should be discussed in specific case.
Mostly, people have different sense about "quality". Then we need discussion. Before your opposite be persuaded, you can't do anything during current situation.
Unless people consider your comments as objective truth, you can't prove what's subjective, and what's wrong.
So you can't say "DQ is good because it usually gives a second chance for quality improvement" because it's not the objective truth, it's subjective.

Stop being dicks about DQs.
There is no such thing as "unnecessary DQ". The QATs are there to figure out if raised concerns are worth checking, regardless of their actual validity. To make that possible, we take them out of Qualification Process and then discuss out if the concerns raised are applicable and worth fixing.

Your entire problem with this system is that you want to "avoid" the entire purpose of the QUALIFICATION phase (7+ days) - as in: testing, raising concerns, fixing, improving. There is nothing to avoid. Entering Qualification Stage is bond to lead into people raising concerns, getting DQd, improving the map, getting is requalified, getting it eventually ranked.

ZZHBOY wrote:

So you can't say "DQ is good because it usually gives a second chance for quality improvement" because it's not the objective truth, it's subjective.

Subjectivity is not an issue. The entire mapping per se is subjective. Concerns are allowed to be subjective. Yelling for objectivity in a place where everything is subjective is not only misplaced but flat-out stupid. If you were only allowed to raise OBJECTIVE concerns, we could also just put a bot and let it check every map for flaws that we definded as such. But that is obviously not how it works.

No one is getting hindered to express their creativity. But if you are too incapable to express the reasoning behind it, you can not expect people to accept it naively.

Endaris wrote:

A thought I just had would be to find some euphemism for "Disqualified" as QAT isn't disqualifying a map cause it is bad but because they want to have it discussed.
Maybe use "discussion" or "refinement" state instead of "disqualified" state.

You totally understood what this entire deal is about

Sonnyc wrote:

tl;dr

1. Invalid DQ should never happen, and to ensure that, QAT or staff members getting involved through the DQ should take responsibility and check the validity of the proposed concern.
2. Exceptions; if a proposed issue was significant enough and an 'actual discussion' has started during the qualified period, QAT should commit a DQ regardless of the validity of the risen issue.

These were my thoughts. I'd like to hear your opinion regarding this point. Thanks.

You in contrary did not. There are no invalid DQs. There is nothing to avoid. You just have to live with the fact that when entering Qualification Stage, you offer your map to the community to evaluate. And if said community raise concerns, it is more than valid to DQ and discuss it out, until no one has something to point up and everyone is satisfied.

Loctav wrote:

Stop being dicks about DQs.
There is no such thing as "unnecessary DQ". The QATs are there to figure out if raised concerns are worth checking, regardless of their actual validity. To make that possible, we take them out of Qualification Process and then discuss out if the concerns raised are applicable and worth fixing.

Your entire problem with this system is that you want to "avoid" the entire purpose of the QUALIFICATION phase (7+ days) - as in: testing, raising concerns, fixing, improving. There is nothing to avoid. Entering Qualification Stage is bond to lead into people raising concerns, getting DQd, improving the map, getting is requalified, getting it eventually ranked.

Subjectivity is not an issue. The entire mapping per se is subjective. Concerns are allowed to be subjective. Yelling for objectivity in a place where everything is subjective is not only misplaced but flat-out stupid. If you were only allowed to raise OBJECTIVE concerns, we could also just put a bot and let it check every map for flaws that we definded as such. But that is obviously not how it works.

No one is getting hindered to express their creativity. But if you are too incapable to express the reasoning behind it, you can not expect people to accept it naively.

You in contrary did not. There are no invalid DQs. There is nothing to avoid. You just have to live with the fact that when entering Qualification Stage, you offer your map to the community to evaluate. And if said community raise concerns, it is more than valid to DQ and discuss it out, until no one has something to point up and everyone is satisfied.

Reading through that, there's things I'll keep pointing out that's actually happened. In some cases, people will find DQs to be unnecessary due to the fact discussion could have been done beforehand. Especially in cases were there's a very likely chance there is going to be a conflict of opinion during qualification. Maps can still be improved greatly before hand as well and with that "stop trying to avoid fucking DQs. DQ's are always good" attitude isn't going to pass over through everyone that easily if their map keeps getting DQ'd excessively by things that could have been discussed before restarting the process over and over and over again. When people see or end up having to experience such a problem, then that's when you'll expect some extreme resistance to DQs and their reasons. I've even seen some collab mappers and mappers quit from this eventually.

Subjectivity is an issue when there's internal bias that isn't seen (or cared about). Especially with mappers getting hindered to express their creativity because of some personal dislike of the mapping style of such and other unreasonable factors. Some mappers can properly express creativity through maps and still get hindered from progressing due to bias we're not paying attention to. There's also the fear some mappers have that when they get a DQ on a map, it could be left to die. Telling people to "piss off with complaining on DQs" isn't going to improve the system either when there's some kind of problem going on that needs attention that can improve this system. It was interesting to see how it first started, but the way it exploded and backfired is something we still need to seriously learn from and not bury it. Though, even if the system is supposed to be "effective", if the way it is run now isn't as it was supposed to be in terms of helping mappers peacefully, then there's still ways to go before the system can be "perfected". Till then, its to be expected that there will be a lot more conflicts yet to come and improve through.

Cherry Blossom wrote:

That is not a good example to make a point. Yes its good to have more people to check the map. But you're forgetting the "when", "why", "how" part. And that rage post..... isn't nice to read no matter how one can look at it.

A bias can be figured out when the mapper is expressing his creative intentions behind it appropriately.

You totally missed the point of my statement and twist words in my mouth. I am not going to debate on that base. I nowhere stated that they are "always good", I said that they are "never bad".

Resistance against DQs is fine, as long as the reasoning behind the resistance is not sole ignorance.

And no, subjectivity is still no issue. Bias is fine and can easily be distinguished as such, as long as the mapper does not fall back into "DIS MY STYLE, POOT OFF" patterns and instead tries to properly explains intentions.
Nothing is left to die, unless the mapper intends to. It is the mappers responsibility to move it forward by asking people. However, if the entire group of Nominators refuses to requalify, then something might be wrong with the map.

The current system has its flaws but it is working into the right direction.

Also all you do is pointing up the flaws without offering a solution for it. You are basically pinpointing personal feelings and disagreements without elaborating a way out of it. I disagree with your personal feelings here and therefore, I do not see the issues, you consider as issues, as issues in the first place.

Conflicts are bond to happen, given that people are supposed to discuss to find an agreement. You can not expect to map cringe beatmaps and literally please everyone instantly.

Loctav wrote:

Also all you do is pointing up the flaws without offering a solution for it. You are basically pinpointing personal feelings and disagreements without elaborating a way out of it. I disagree with your personal feelings here and therefore, I do not see the issues, you consider as issues, as issues in the first place.

Its not about "me me me" when i'm pointing these things out. I'm stating things that I've seen going on for some time and trying to make sure it is noted for. Yes it makes me upset at times, but i'm not asking the QAT or BN to bend down on their knees to fix it

Also, this talk about "I only point out problems and no answers", even if I did say something about it like before, I'd only get "yeah yeah, we know already" again trying to explain something. I'm not the only one that's at least trying to say what they have to say. I'm sure there's more that would like to say or ask something but fear being chewed out or marked for hate. Besides that whole mess, some answers can be given without saying it, it can just come to you as an idea or maybe a way to investigate with some time into it.

I'm just going to end my thoughts about this from here. I already know what's going to happen if this keeps going. Also, sorry if it got a bit derailed Sonnyc.

The problem is not disqualifications but people's attitude towards them. Many mappers overreact when it comes to a disqualify, starting to reject the mod by a QAT completely and taking offence on this. A disqualify is always something positive (even if you don't agree on that) and people fail to recognize that. If there is something discussible within the set, why not just disqualify it and talk about it? What's the big deal if your map gets ranked some days or a week later? Just because you think the disqualify reason was nitpicky and that might be true, it's not necessarily a bad thing. Be happy that people try to polish your map as good as they can. If you get butthurt over a disqualify, you shouldn't be mapping. Better to discuss issues on a map while being disqualified than letting it slowly approach to rankability and then finding the issues when it is too late already.

Sonnyc wrote:

Subject: Request a Disqualification here.

Okay let me clear this up.
As you can see with these recent dramas, there were too many jokes and stupid memes, and a lot of people (BNs/mapper and modders) were yelling "please DQ this map, that's a real meme"

A lot of recent maps have their ranking process messed up, many mappers are too interested in ranking their map as fast a possible, conclusion, they want to focus more on speedmapping, is that logical ?
And when you go really faster, it is more logical that many flaws are still here, on the qualified beatmaps. And it is really noticeable that many BNs or modders write a mod after the qualification, because they find the map not good enough to get ranked and to be part of the official osu! ranked beatmaps.

Many people don't want to see maps which could be improved more and more, ranked. It is so disappointing as hell for this game, and for what we want to show to the entire world. We don't want to show stupid memes, we don't want people focus more on maps with less quality when something we call a "good map" is ignored or less popular.

We need to be fair, everything has potential. And when a map is getting disqualified, it is for improvements in order to make this game look better for everyone.

And finally, as you can see on this thread, i just created it to lose less time for everything like a DQ process or something like that (I don't know it because i'm not QAT), it has changed, the QAT disqualify when there are debatable things and when things are cleared up, the QAT could insta requalify it without getting rebubbled and requalified, as Loctav said.

As Endaris said, we should not really call this DQ because it does not penalizes anyone excepted if the BN shieted himself, I guess we should call this "revision" or something like that.

Just telling people HOW this system will work without really telling the WHY, will highly result in misconception, and confusion.

Still, it's good to see at-least some detailed explanation than before. Would've been much better if such information was adressed before confusions happened.

So if misconcepts happened because of the term "Disqualify", changing some wording as we've done for BAT -> BN could be possible. DQ is never bad, but the word "DQ" is never neutral; rather negative. How could you expect people not to think DQ is bad while using a negative term for that? In contrary, despite the status as a qualified map has got weaker by not providing pp and getting the scoreboard resetted, the term "Qualify" itself is pretty much positive.

As long as the status "Qualify" is in the positive position, it is hard to say "Disqualify" is not bad, since the result of DQ (which is getting the beatmap back to pending) is pretty much zero-sum.

The term DQ needs to get more neutral to assure people's attitude towards a DQ not distorted. Since DQ is a corresponding term of "Qualify", wouldn't the entire term "Qualify" and "Disqualify" need a change?

A term [which can neutrally indicate the beatmap's condition waiting to get ranked while the mapper offering their map to the community to evaluate] would give the community a slightly better understanding towards this new beatmap ranking system.

Something like Queued Phase & Removed from Queue can represent the term I'm suggesting here.

I agree with that. The purpose of DQ is good, but the result it creates is that people would just see it as "failed to be ranked". Mappers aim for rank on maps, but having that map disqualified is something against it. People who would like to make their maps have highest quality possible before it gets ranked would appreciate that process but it's basically about failing to rank it at the moment. At least that's what most people think about the word "Diqaulify".

Loctav wrote:

And if said community raise concerns, it is more than valid to DQ and discuss it out, until no one has something to point up and everyone is satisfied.

As long as the opinions are only "subjective" then there's no way to satisfy everyone since we all have different opinions. So ironically a map that gets most attention will get disqualified again and again, while the community wants it to be ranked actually, only consuming time and people's work. So some evaluation of whether the point is worth debated is needed, and that's what QATs should do before deciding DQs.

Right now most people consider the term "DQ" as a pure negative thing and it's a fact that mappers who got their maps DQed gets depressed only, and some of them gets mad and start a fight, quit mapping, etc. It's just happening and it's not a good situation. We can make this better.