I’ll open this document by stating the obvious. I’m no professional player, nor am I even that great of one. As of writing this, I’m hovering around rank #30,000, with 2,600pp. Despite that, I think that there are a few mindsets that are dangerous and a few habits that are relevant at any skill level. My goal with this guide is to provide help to people of varying skill levels, without making them worry about or bogging them down with things that they don’t need to be concerned with.
This isn’t really a “guide to getting better” per se, but more like things to keep in mind which I believe are beneficial for play, and I’m hoping that you agree.
The bulk of the worth of this post will be located right here, since I think this information is applicable to players of all skill levels, and really helps with the mindset that you have to be in in order to improve.
Play More™, and pls enjoy game:
Getting it out of the way early, the two most important things that I (and thousands of other willing people on these forums) will tell you is to play more, and to pls enjoy game. Personally, I hate when people say this, because it’s not productive, but they all have a point. osu! is a simple game, so all you really have to do to get better is, as they say, play more. There are, however, ways to optimize your gameplay and improve faster. If you're curious about the details on how much playing more will help, this thread (linked multiple times in this post) has detailed statistics about just how much playing more will help you. It's an interesting read.
The other point is to enjoy the game because in the end, it’s a video game, and you’re playing because it’s fun. If you’re getting frustrated for any particular reason, take a step back. Are you getting frustrated because of the game itself, or because of how you’re choosing to play? Go play a few of your favorite songs, don’t worry so much about whether or not you’re improving “fast enough”, you’ll get there.
The other point is to enjoy the game because in the end, it’s a video game, and you’re playing because it’s fun. If you’re getting frustrated for any particular reason, take a step back. Are you getting frustrated because of the game itself, or because of how you’re choosing to play? Go play a few of your favorite songs, don’t worry so much about whether or not you’re improving “fast enough”, you’ll get there.
Performance Points (pp) and Rank
This part at the top focuses solely on general information for all players, and the next section is more specific guidance for more advanced players. I chose to organize it this way for the sake of simplicity, but in the end, what rank you are and how much pp you have doesn’t matter much, and everyone will tell you that. The reason that they don’t matter is because pp is a pitfall, and that if all you do is grind pp, you’ll eventually hit a wall and get frustrated because in order to pass the wall that you’ve hit, you’ll have to go back and re-learn a lot of skills that you’ve been neglecting. What that means is that you won’t be gaining pp for quite awhile and for someone whose goal is to grind pp, that’s extraordinarily frustrating, especially since most of the time these players are highly competitive and want to be “better”. The fact of the matter is that pp and rank are convenient metrics (which I will utilize a lot throughout this guide), but pp is often not a great way to judge actual skill.
The following a bit more of an advanced analysis, given by chainpullz, down further in this thread:
"As far as PP is concerned, it's the dual of skill. That is, the optimum of pp is the lower bound for skill and the optimum for skill is the upper bound for pp. If you have X pp you are at least good enough for X pp. If you are "Y pp in terms of skill" you might not have Y pp but Y pp is the most you could possibly attain with your current skill. Very few players exhibit strong duality, that is, the gap between their skill and their pp is non-zero. This gap is also objectively immeasurable."
The following a bit more of an advanced analysis, given by chainpullz, down further in this thread:
"As far as PP is concerned, it's the dual of skill. That is, the optimum of pp is the lower bound for skill and the optimum for skill is the upper bound for pp. If you have X pp you are at least good enough for X pp. If you are "Y pp in terms of skill" you might not have Y pp but Y pp is the most you could possibly attain with your current skill. Very few players exhibit strong duality, that is, the gap between their skill and their pp is non-zero. This gap is also objectively immeasurable."
Button Mashing / Bad Habits
Sometimes people like to say that “doing this or doing that” can develop “bad habits”, but in my experience playing this game, there’s only been one bad habit that I’ve ever seen people seriously address, and that is Button Mashing. Other things that people will occasionally attribute as “bad habits”, such as flowing instead of snapping to notes, or even singletapping or playing with a mouse (If you’re really strict on how people play the game) are totally acceptable as they’re either done by excellent players as well and therefore not inherently bad, or they aren’t habits and can be easily changed at will.
Button Mashing, however, is something that players will learn to rely on if given the opportunity. What button mashing allows you to do is pass maps that you shouldn’t be able to pass, and focus less on properly reading the map in question, hoping that you’ll survive with the stream of 100s and 50s that you’re bringing in. I’m sure many if not most players have caught themselves doing this at some point in their osu! career, I certainly have. Doing it is not so bad in itself so long as you recognize that by doing so, you’ve messed up, and you need to work on your reading. Also, stop doing it the moment you notice, even if it means you fail the song. Believe me, even if it’s worth pp, nobody is impressed and you’re sabotaging yourself.
It is worth noting that most of the time players catch themselves button mashing is during streams, or at a BPM or AR that they can't read properly. Streams in particular are often hard to read from a practical standpoint simply because with longer streams, it's not immediately obvious how many notes there are. Newer players will tend to mash a lot on streams just hoping to hit all the notes but it's actually fairly important to realize when you're doing this and correct it. Streams are a fairly important part of gameplay, especially at higher difficulties, so being able to read streams properly and play them without just tapping frantically will be of great use to you in the future.
Button Mashing, however, is something that players will learn to rely on if given the opportunity. What button mashing allows you to do is pass maps that you shouldn’t be able to pass, and focus less on properly reading the map in question, hoping that you’ll survive with the stream of 100s and 50s that you’re bringing in. I’m sure many if not most players have caught themselves doing this at some point in their osu! career, I certainly have. Doing it is not so bad in itself so long as you recognize that by doing so, you’ve messed up, and you need to work on your reading. Also, stop doing it the moment you notice, even if it means you fail the song. Believe me, even if it’s worth pp, nobody is impressed and you’re sabotaging yourself.
It is worth noting that most of the time players catch themselves button mashing is during streams, or at a BPM or AR that they can't read properly. Streams in particular are often hard to read from a practical standpoint simply because with longer streams, it's not immediately obvious how many notes there are. Newer players will tend to mash a lot on streams just hoping to hit all the notes but it's actually fairly important to realize when you're doing this and correct it. Streams are a fairly important part of gameplay, especially at higher difficulties, so being able to read streams properly and play them without just tapping frantically will be of great use to you in the future.
Aim > Accuracy > Speed
There is (or at least was, it doesn’t seem nearly as popular anymore) a common metric around the forums which tends to go X > X > X where the X’s are Aim, Accuracy, or Speed. Typically most people (with a few exceptions) rank this as Aim > Accuracy > Speed. This paradigm (the way that I've oriented it) is a general indicator of how pp awards you points, and you can also use it as a good indicator of your priorities when playing the game.
Aim is a critical part of playing the game, because if you can’t Aim properly, you can’t even hit notes, you can’t pass songs, and if you miss a note due to poor Aim, your Accuracy suffers as a result, so it could be said that good Accuracy is a product of good Aim. New players should focus on Aim until they’re comfortable with the idea of FC’ing songs and then move on to focus on Accuracy, while still working on Aim. If you're interested, here is a very interesting statistical analysis of top players to get an idea of just how important these things are, and why.
Speed is a measure of how fast you the player are, and is a very strange part of this metric because faster maps will (in general) award quite a lot more pp, and therefore it can be considered to be important, but it's worth isn't truly recognized until you've reached a certain skill-level. Even then, how important it is to focus on is dependent on your skillset. The paradigm I've listed above is not set in stone, but it's a great reference for beginners that I think still holds true for many players even into very high ranks. To quote Endaris from further down in this thread:
"Speed is also a requirement for reading and accuracy. If you lack the speed, your accuracy will be bad on fast maps, and most difficult maps are fast for a fact."
Aim is a critical part of playing the game, because if you can’t Aim properly, you can’t even hit notes, you can’t pass songs, and if you miss a note due to poor Aim, your Accuracy suffers as a result, so it could be said that good Accuracy is a product of good Aim. New players should focus on Aim until they’re comfortable with the idea of FC’ing songs and then move on to focus on Accuracy, while still working on Aim. If you're interested, here is a very interesting statistical analysis of top players to get an idea of just how important these things are, and why.
Speed is a measure of how fast you the player are, and is a very strange part of this metric because faster maps will (in general) award quite a lot more pp, and therefore it can be considered to be important, but it's worth isn't truly recognized until you've reached a certain skill-level. Even then, how important it is to focus on is dependent on your skillset. The paradigm I've listed above is not set in stone, but it's a great reference for beginners that I think still holds true for many players even into very high ranks. To quote Endaris from further down in this thread:
"Speed is also a requirement for reading and accuracy. If you lack the speed, your accuracy will be bad on fast maps, and most difficult maps are fast for a fact."
Skill Ceiling / Consistent Skill
shortpotato has a guide on his profile page which goes in-depth on this topic and I enjoyed it so much that I’m taking the concepts he discussed and putting them here, in my own words. If they’re still on his profile page, please consider taking a look if this section interests you.
In short, he describes two schools of “skill”, being your skill ceiling, and your consistent skill level. Your skill ceiling would be a theoretical limit on your skill, the absolute hardest map that you’re capable of playing, be it either passing, or FC’ing. Your consistent skill level is a level of skill that you can easily reproduce consistently. These two are very different, and quite separate from one another.
A player’s skill ceiling can be used as a general indicator of what you’re capable of at the moment. For example, I might be able to get 200pp on a map (assuming my average is 150pp) in a stroke of blind luck or a moment of sheer focus, but if I couldn’t do it again in a reasonable amount of time, it’s not that I just got “lucky”, it’s that I was playing at my skill ceiling right then, I had and have the skill to clear that map, but if my consistent skill level is lacking, I won’t be able to reproduce that play easily.
A player’s consistent skill level is a general indicator of how well you usually perform. Following the example above, I’d have a skill ceiling of 200pp, but a consistent skill level of 150pp. I can consistently get 150pp on maps, and I can consistently reproduce my 150pp plays, but doing anything above that is difficult.
The real difference between these two, in my opinion, is playstyle. Some players like to focus on their skill ceiling, and so they’ll get huge pp gains every so often. Consistent players won’t get as huge of pp gains, but will get them more consistently (as one might expect). There is no right or wrong way to play the game, but simply knowing and thinking about these two schools of skill I think can help your mindset when playing. If you are getting frustrated trying to get new top ranks, maybe slow down and try bringing your bottom line up a bit. If all of your top ranks are right around the same value and you’re having trouble gaining pp, maybe try pushing your limits a bit more.
In short, he describes two schools of “skill”, being your skill ceiling, and your consistent skill level. Your skill ceiling would be a theoretical limit on your skill, the absolute hardest map that you’re capable of playing, be it either passing, or FC’ing. Your consistent skill level is a level of skill that you can easily reproduce consistently. These two are very different, and quite separate from one another.
A player’s skill ceiling can be used as a general indicator of what you’re capable of at the moment. For example, I might be able to get 200pp on a map (assuming my average is 150pp) in a stroke of blind luck or a moment of sheer focus, but if I couldn’t do it again in a reasonable amount of time, it’s not that I just got “lucky”, it’s that I was playing at my skill ceiling right then, I had and have the skill to clear that map, but if my consistent skill level is lacking, I won’t be able to reproduce that play easily.
A player’s consistent skill level is a general indicator of how well you usually perform. Following the example above, I’d have a skill ceiling of 200pp, but a consistent skill level of 150pp. I can consistently get 150pp on maps, and I can consistently reproduce my 150pp plays, but doing anything above that is difficult.
The real difference between these two, in my opinion, is playstyle. Some players like to focus on their skill ceiling, and so they’ll get huge pp gains every so often. Consistent players won’t get as huge of pp gains, but will get them more consistently (as one might expect). There is no right or wrong way to play the game, but simply knowing and thinking about these two schools of skill I think can help your mindset when playing. If you are getting frustrated trying to get new top ranks, maybe slow down and try bringing your bottom line up a bit. If all of your top ranks are right around the same value and you’re having trouble gaining pp, maybe try pushing your limits a bit more.
Why Missing Is Good
Well, okay, it’s not. If you could FC every song on the first try, first of all congratulations, and second of all, this game would probably get boring fast. The point I’m really trying to get at here is that missing isn’t actually that bad because every time you missed, there is a reason for it. Start looking for trends and you’ll eventually notice that oftentimes, you tend to miss notes due to the same things a lot. A personal example, I tend to miss notes due to screen-wide jumps, I’m bad at square jumps, and I often stream too long and end up missing notes at the end of streams.
It’s important to know this kind of thing because the fastest way to get better at anything is to target and eliminate your weaknesses, so if you notice you’re bad at streaming, play stream maps. Start out with something “easy” (in terms of star difficulty) to make sure that it’s easy for you. If it’s not, then keep practicing until it is, and work your way back up to your current skill level playing maps that include whatever you’re bad at. In a sense, it’s similar to the “Skill Ceiling / Consistent Skill” box above, although in regards to one specific aspect of gameplay.
What’s most important to remember here is that just because a map has a low star value doesn’t mean that you can’t learn anything from it. The map may not be complex, but whether or not it’s difficult depends on your personal skillset.
It’s important to know this kind of thing because the fastest way to get better at anything is to target and eliminate your weaknesses, so if you notice you’re bad at streaming, play stream maps. Start out with something “easy” (in terms of star difficulty) to make sure that it’s easy for you. If it’s not, then keep practicing until it is, and work your way back up to your current skill level playing maps that include whatever you’re bad at. In a sense, it’s similar to the “Skill Ceiling / Consistent Skill” box above, although in regards to one specific aspect of gameplay.
What’s most important to remember here is that just because a map has a low star value doesn’t mean that you can’t learn anything from it. The map may not be complex, but whether or not it’s difficult depends on your personal skillset.
Equipment and Settings (For Beginners)
I am actually separating the equipment section into two parts, one for the general information, and one that isn’t relevant to beginners. The bottom line is that just about any setup will work for osu!, and you can hypothetically reach rank #1 using a crappy laptop keyboard and a $10 mouse. That’s a very, very extreme example, before I get jumped, but I’ve made my point. The equipment that you use for osu! is meant to be something that you upgrade just to maximise performance. What this means is that if you’re comfortable with what you’re using right now, don’t feel even the slightest pressure to change, because the benefits will be minimal, especially at lower ranks. High ranked players like to invest in better equipment because as the game gets more competitive, you can use any small advantage you can get, and therefore these things do actually have practical value.
There are other factors as well, such as the fact that the benefit of mechanical keyboards doesn’t really show on low difficulty maps because you don’t really need any special equipment to get good Accuracy on OD6 or stream at 120bpm.
As for settings, in terms of things like screen resolution, tablet area, mouse dpi, and whatnot, it’s somewhat important for new players to have a decent idea of what they’re doing, but settings can always be changed later on. Please remember that if you choose to change your settings later in your osu! career, there is a certain degree of time that it will take to adapt to the changes, usually (for me, personally), it’s between 1-4 hours of play, depending on what I changed, before I’m back playing at the level I was previously.
For things like screen resolution, you can use any setting you’re comfortable with. Please be aware that, as the osu! client itself states, input lag may be increased if you’re not in fullscreen mode. While this may be negligible most of the time (I’m sure many top players play in windowed), if you really are determined to min/max, fullscreen does actually offer greater potential.
For tablet area, use whatever you’re comfortable with, just be aware that many people will tell you what settings are or aren’t optimal for tablets, but tablets come in many shapes and sizes. I only use ¼ of my tablet area, but that’s because my tablet has a fairly large active area. Something like the official osu! tablet, I’d highly recommend using a full tablet area, since if your tablet area is too small, it becomes difficult to have fine aim, which will matter at higher difficulties. Also be aware that, due to a tablet’s absolute positioning, reducing your osu! resolution is functionally the same as reducing your tablet area, since you’ll have to use less of your defined tablet area to reach all of the notes.
For mouse settings, I admittedly can’t offer much help, as a tablet player myself. It’s worth noting that for both tablet and mouse users, having a lower sensitivity does help you aim as well as helps you snap to notes (which will improve your aim at higher difficulties), but has the drawback that a lower sensitivity will cause you to exert more stamina while playing, since you’ll be moving more. Use settings that are comfortable, but in a similar vein to tablets, try to stay away from high dpi, because if your mouse is too sensitive, it will become hard to make precise jumps at higher difficulties.
There are other factors as well, such as the fact that the benefit of mechanical keyboards doesn’t really show on low difficulty maps because you don’t really need any special equipment to get good Accuracy on OD6 or stream at 120bpm.
As for settings, in terms of things like screen resolution, tablet area, mouse dpi, and whatnot, it’s somewhat important for new players to have a decent idea of what they’re doing, but settings can always be changed later on. Please remember that if you choose to change your settings later in your osu! career, there is a certain degree of time that it will take to adapt to the changes, usually (for me, personally), it’s between 1-4 hours of play, depending on what I changed, before I’m back playing at the level I was previously.
For things like screen resolution, you can use any setting you’re comfortable with. Please be aware that, as the osu! client itself states, input lag may be increased if you’re not in fullscreen mode. While this may be negligible most of the time (I’m sure many top players play in windowed), if you really are determined to min/max, fullscreen does actually offer greater potential.
For tablet area, use whatever you’re comfortable with, just be aware that many people will tell you what settings are or aren’t optimal for tablets, but tablets come in many shapes and sizes. I only use ¼ of my tablet area, but that’s because my tablet has a fairly large active area. Something like the official osu! tablet, I’d highly recommend using a full tablet area, since if your tablet area is too small, it becomes difficult to have fine aim, which will matter at higher difficulties. Also be aware that, due to a tablet’s absolute positioning, reducing your osu! resolution is functionally the same as reducing your tablet area, since you’ll have to use less of your defined tablet area to reach all of the notes.
For mouse settings, I admittedly can’t offer much help, as a tablet player myself. It’s worth noting that for both tablet and mouse users, having a lower sensitivity does help you aim as well as helps you snap to notes (which will improve your aim at higher difficulties), but has the drawback that a lower sensitivity will cause you to exert more stamina while playing, since you’ll be moving more. Use settings that are comfortable, but in a similar vein to tablets, try to stay away from high dpi, because if your mouse is too sensitive, it will become hard to make precise jumps at higher difficulties.
Equipment and Settings (Advanced)
I’d like to say in advance that I don’t really have anything productive to say about settings at this stage because you should already have your own settings figured out, and I trust you to do so. I just named it the same for the sake of continuity.
In terms of equipment, however, we can have a little discussion. It’s worth noting that I truly believe that choice of tablet or mouse is more or less up to your own preferences. There are topics on these forums that go over these topics in detail if you’re interested, however.
In terms of keyboards, there is very little debate that the keyboard which offers the most potential for osu! is, of course, a mechanical keyboard. There are cheap alternatives, specifically designed for osu!, if you can’t afford or don’t want to buy an entire mechanical keyboard, but before you invest, you may want to know some things about keyboards in general. Specifically, about ports and switches.
Switches are the more important topic here, so I’ll cover that first. Mechanical keyboards can function using a variety of switches, and these switches have various different uses. Here is some documentation for Cherry MX switches, which are the most common type of mechanical switch, although Gateron switches have been gaining traction recently as well. As a preface here, I'd like to make it clear that each type of switch has its own ups and downs and that in the end, it's entirely a matter of preference. This is just a basic rundown for those who haven't tried out the various kinds of switches and don't know which kind they might prefer.
I’m going to steal some words from Zenith the Switch God™ to describe the usage of the various mechanical switches out there:
MX Blues: Bad for speed, good for accuracy
MX Greens: Bad for speed and stamina, good for low BPM
MX Reds: Good for speed, very good for stamina
MX Blacks: Very good for speed, bad for stamina
MX Browns*: Okay for speed, okay for stamina, good for accuracy
MX Clears: Good for accuracy, bad for stamina, okay for speed
Razer switches: Just don’t buy
Topre switch: Good for typing but no one wants to pay $300 for a keyboard
Gateron Clears: Okay for speed, best for stamina
Optical switch: Very good for speed, very good for stamina, most consistent switch out of them all due to not having any physical contacts to wear out.
*Edited to give actual context, since Zenny's description was lacking. Original wording (if you want his opinion): "They feel like shit and they are shit colored"
You can base your choice of mechanical switch on this, depending on what you feel is necessary. It’s also worth saying once more that having a mechanical keyboard will not instantly make you better, and your ability to hover at the actuation point of the key will determine how useful it is to you. This takes some getting used to, I would assume.
The next topic is ports, and there are only two options here, USB and PS/2. I’m honestly not even qualified to talk on this matter because every time I open my mouth in regards to it, I seem to be wrong, but I feel like it’s a topic that you should be aware of, because until only recently, I didn’t even know that PS/2 ports were still relevant, let alone competitive. There is heated debate over which is better, USB or PS/2, and the main difference between the two is that USB polls and PS/2 interrupts. If you have no idea what that means, well, here is an informative and short pdf on interrupts, explaining the difference between that versus polling. Polling is a term which people are a little more familiar with, or at least you have probably heard of a keyboard’s “polling rate”, which is how frequently the USB checks to see if keys have been depressed. The two most common values for this are 125hz, which comes out to about an 8ms delay, or 1000hz, which comes out to about a 1ms delay. Also, there’s a good chance that your motherboard may not even have a PS/2 slot on it if it’s more modern. If it does have one, you can get a USB to PS/2 adapter if you so desire.
In terms of equipment, however, we can have a little discussion. It’s worth noting that I truly believe that choice of tablet or mouse is more or less up to your own preferences. There are topics on these forums that go over these topics in detail if you’re interested, however.
In terms of keyboards, there is very little debate that the keyboard which offers the most potential for osu! is, of course, a mechanical keyboard. There are cheap alternatives, specifically designed for osu!, if you can’t afford or don’t want to buy an entire mechanical keyboard, but before you invest, you may want to know some things about keyboards in general. Specifically, about ports and switches.
Switches are the more important topic here, so I’ll cover that first. Mechanical keyboards can function using a variety of switches, and these switches have various different uses. Here is some documentation for Cherry MX switches, which are the most common type of mechanical switch, although Gateron switches have been gaining traction recently as well. As a preface here, I'd like to make it clear that each type of switch has its own ups and downs and that in the end, it's entirely a matter of preference. This is just a basic rundown for those who haven't tried out the various kinds of switches and don't know which kind they might prefer.
I’m going to steal some words from Zenith the Switch God™ to describe the usage of the various mechanical switches out there:
MX Blues: Bad for speed, good for accuracy
MX Greens: Bad for speed and stamina, good for low BPM
MX Reds: Good for speed, very good for stamina
MX Blacks: Very good for speed, bad for stamina
MX Browns*: Okay for speed, okay for stamina, good for accuracy
MX Clears: Good for accuracy, bad for stamina, okay for speed
Razer switches: Just don’t buy
Topre switch: Good for typing but no one wants to pay $300 for a keyboard
Gateron Clears: Okay for speed, best for stamina
Optical switch: Very good for speed, very good for stamina, most consistent switch out of them all due to not having any physical contacts to wear out.
*Edited to give actual context, since Zenny's description was lacking. Original wording (if you want his opinion): "They feel like shit and they are shit colored"
You can base your choice of mechanical switch on this, depending on what you feel is necessary. It’s also worth saying once more that having a mechanical keyboard will not instantly make you better, and your ability to hover at the actuation point of the key will determine how useful it is to you. This takes some getting used to, I would assume.
The next topic is ports, and there are only two options here, USB and PS/2. I’m honestly not even qualified to talk on this matter because every time I open my mouth in regards to it, I seem to be wrong, but I feel like it’s a topic that you should be aware of, because until only recently, I didn’t even know that PS/2 ports were still relevant, let alone competitive. There is heated debate over which is better, USB or PS/2, and the main difference between the two is that USB polls and PS/2 interrupts. If you have no idea what that means, well, here is an informative and short pdf on interrupts, explaining the difference between that versus polling. Polling is a term which people are a little more familiar with, or at least you have probably heard of a keyboard’s “polling rate”, which is how frequently the USB checks to see if keys have been depressed. The two most common values for this are 125hz, which comes out to about an 8ms delay, or 1000hz, which comes out to about a 1ms delay. Also, there’s a good chance that your motherboard may not even have a PS/2 slot on it if it’s more modern. If it does have one, you can get a USB to PS/2 adapter if you so desire.
Beginners (1,400pp and below)
If you fall into this category, I’m going to label you a beginner, and that may sound offensive to a few people reading this. Especially those who are above 100k rank yet below this pp threshold are likely to believe that they are perhaps better at the game than they actually are. The reason is that most people passing 100k have actually been playing for at least a fair amount of time. For frame of reference, I have a friend who recently passed 100k, after about 3,000 plays. Not a huge amount of plays, but definitely a fair amount of time. Assuming those are nothing but TV-size maps, and even assuming 1,000 of those plays are instant fails, that’s still 50 hours of consecutive playtime.
But you get it already. So how do I get better? Well, at this stage, no matter what appeals to you in terms of playstyle, all you need to do to improve is keep playing. Specifically, most of the information that is useful to you at this stage is in the General Information section above. I’d argue that at this stage, it’s actually better not to worry about things like specific patterns or streams or jumps. Focus primarily on your aim, which is to say, you’re trying to get Full Combo on maps.
Accuracy is very important, but it’s not something you need to specifically focus on at this point, because general accuracy will develop on its own as you play the game. If you’re having a hard time getting good accuracy on a map, then try easier maps. Play a map until you can FC a map with an S, regardless of your accuracy, then you’re probably good to move on from that map for now. Remember that B and C are ranks that you want to avoid. A lot of newer players think that B is acceptable, but in reality, you won’t end up getting any significant pp or rank from B maps, and for good reason. A is alright, especially since a 99.90% accuracy map with 1 miss is still an A, but for the sake of beginners, Aim is so important that I'd say you should really go for an S rank.
Following these simple rules are all you need to get to at least 1,400pp. You could probably follow this simple pattern of thinking much further, but once you hit that rank, I feel that it becomes helpful to become familiar with certain patterns and terms so that you can help identify shortcomings.
But you get it already. So how do I get better? Well, at this stage, no matter what appeals to you in terms of playstyle, all you need to do to improve is keep playing. Specifically, most of the information that is useful to you at this stage is in the General Information section above. I’d argue that at this stage, it’s actually better not to worry about things like specific patterns or streams or jumps. Focus primarily on your aim, which is to say, you’re trying to get Full Combo on maps.
Accuracy is very important, but it’s not something you need to specifically focus on at this point, because general accuracy will develop on its own as you play the game. If you’re having a hard time getting good accuracy on a map, then try easier maps. Play a map until you can FC a map with an S, regardless of your accuracy, then you’re probably good to move on from that map for now. Remember that B and C are ranks that you want to avoid. A lot of newer players think that B is acceptable, but in reality, you won’t end up getting any significant pp or rank from B maps, and for good reason. A is alright, especially since a 99.90% accuracy map with 1 miss is still an A, but for the sake of beginners, Aim is so important that I'd say you should really go for an S rank.
Following these simple rules are all you need to get to at least 1,400pp. You could probably follow this simple pattern of thinking much further, but once you hit that rank, I feel that it becomes helpful to become familiar with certain patterns and terms so that you can help identify shortcomings.
Intermediate (1,400pp - 3,400pp)
I’m sure some elitist people will come shove down my throat how “you’re not good at osu! until you’re rank #200 or higher hurrrrrr” because the community can be like that at times, but the fact of the matter is that at this point there are actually a lot of players that are worse than you. They’re probably more casual players and chances are they don’t frequent this forum anyways, but the point stands that if you’ve gotten this far, you’ve invested something in the game and gotten something back in return.
In any case, I’m going to be a lot more brief in this section than I was in Beginner, because you get it.
The first and biggest thing to start focusing on is Accuracy. I would say that for this rank range you’d want to get anywhere within the 95-99% accuracy frame and generally try to submit scores that are above your current average accuracy, since you want to get it started on an upwards trend and keep up with it. It goes without saying that FC’ing songs and Aim is still just as important.
You’re much more likely to run into skill barriers at this rank range, and when you do, the first thing to do is not panic. It’s a natural thing and it’s not that hard to overcome, so long as you’re aware of why it’s happening. I’m choosing to put all relevant topics in their own spoilerboxes due to the fact that this information is also relevant to people of all ranks, so please refer to the “Why Missing Is Good” spoilerbox near the top.
In any case, I’m going to be a lot more brief in this section than I was in Beginner, because you get it.
The first and biggest thing to start focusing on is Accuracy. I would say that for this rank range you’d want to get anywhere within the 95-99% accuracy frame and generally try to submit scores that are above your current average accuracy, since you want to get it started on an upwards trend and keep up with it. It goes without saying that FC’ing songs and Aim is still just as important.
You’re much more likely to run into skill barriers at this rank range, and when you do, the first thing to do is not panic. It’s a natural thing and it’s not that hard to overcome, so long as you’re aware of why it’s happening. I’m choosing to put all relevant topics in their own spoilerboxes due to the fact that this information is also relevant to people of all ranks, so please refer to the “Why Missing Is Good” spoilerbox near the top.
Experts (3,400pp+)
Why are you looking at my guide, you’re making it hard for me. 
The fact of the matter is that I’m not at this skill level yet, and to be honest, even if I was, I don’t think I’d have much to offer that wasn’t in one of the general sections because the bottom line is, you don’t get to 3,400pp without being fairly self-aware and pretty good at the game. A lot of people seem to plateau around the lower end of this skill bracket, and that could be for a variety of reasons.
A big reason players plateau early in this bracket is simply because, per capita, there are many more active players and competitive players in this bracket. What this means is that since you’re being ranked relative to the other players, you’re constantly overtaking one another, and therefore progress slows down quite a lot because the bar is constantly moving upwards and you have to not only keep up with it, but surpass it in order to actually gain rank and keep it.
Another reason is due to the introduction and increasing value of mods as you rise in rank. You can get very far on strictly nomod, but eventually, the maps available to you for pp gain do begin to dwindle, and you’re left with the option to either play extremely difficult nomod maps like Highscore [Game Over] and The Big Black just to get pp, or you’ll have to learn to use a mod and begin playing competitively challenging maps using that mod or those mods. Oftentimes, it’s easier to actually learn an entire mod, even if you’ve never used it before, simply because there really just aren’t too many maps above 5.5*, and many of the ones that do exist are intended to be “ultimate tests of skill”, so they’re excessively difficult. A [Time Freeze] nomod playthrough, for example, probably wouldn’t be feasible unless you’re already used to using mods like DT and HR, due to the AR10, 240bpm with heavy streaming, and general 7.65* difficulty, which is a big jump from most other nomod maps.
I’ve gone off on a long tangent there, but the bottom line is that learning to play mods takes time, and that’s another big reason that players in this skill bracket tend to plateau for awhile.
The fact of the matter is that I’m not at this skill level yet, and to be honest, even if I was, I don’t think I’d have much to offer that wasn’t in one of the general sections because the bottom line is, you don’t get to 3,400pp without being fairly self-aware and pretty good at the game. A lot of people seem to plateau around the lower end of this skill bracket, and that could be for a variety of reasons.
A big reason players plateau early in this bracket is simply because, per capita, there are many more active players and competitive players in this bracket. What this means is that since you’re being ranked relative to the other players, you’re constantly overtaking one another, and therefore progress slows down quite a lot because the bar is constantly moving upwards and you have to not only keep up with it, but surpass it in order to actually gain rank and keep it.
Another reason is due to the introduction and increasing value of mods as you rise in rank. You can get very far on strictly nomod, but eventually, the maps available to you for pp gain do begin to dwindle, and you’re left with the option to either play extremely difficult nomod maps like Highscore [Game Over] and The Big Black just to get pp, or you’ll have to learn to use a mod and begin playing competitively challenging maps using that mod or those mods. Oftentimes, it’s easier to actually learn an entire mod, even if you’ve never used it before, simply because there really just aren’t too many maps above 5.5*, and many of the ones that do exist are intended to be “ultimate tests of skill”, so they’re excessively difficult. A [Time Freeze] nomod playthrough, for example, probably wouldn’t be feasible unless you’re already used to using mods like DT and HR, due to the AR10, 240bpm with heavy streaming, and general 7.65* difficulty, which is a big jump from most other nomod maps.
I’ve gone off on a long tangent there, but the bottom line is that learning to play mods takes time, and that’s another big reason that players in this skill bracket tend to plateau for awhile.
Honestly, I just started this by getting out some thoughts I had about osu! and it turned into like a nine page Google Doc, so it got quite a bit larger than I’d imagined. I’d love to hear feedback on this, thoughts, questions, suggestions for content, etc. and I’ll do my best to respond. I’ve made this document scalable over time, so unless it completely dies or nobody finds value in it, I’ll do my best to keep it up to date with useful information. I'm hoping nobody thinks this is useless, but in the end, while I did spend a lot of time writing it, really it's just me getting out some thoughts that were on my mind.
If I find your question or suggestion interesting, there’s a good chance that I might add it to this main post, and so I’m just going to create a changelog to keep track of all that just in case.
Changelog
Jan 16, 2016: Created post.
Jan 17, 2016: Added more context to Cherry MX Brown switches under Equipment / Settings (Advanced). Added a short section on streaming in Button Mashing. Added multiple references to statistical analysis thread. Replaced rank values with pp values for rank-delimited information. Rewrote "X > X > X" section to better reflect the increasing importance of speed at higher difficulty.
TODO: Consider writing a section on the importance and value of reading as a skill. Make a section for useful links.
Jan 17, 2016: Added more context to Cherry MX Brown switches under Equipment / Settings (Advanced). Added a short section on streaming in Button Mashing. Added multiple references to statistical analysis thread. Replaced rank values with pp values for rank-delimited information. Rewrote "X > X > X" section to better reflect the increasing importance of speed at higher difficulty.
TODO: Consider writing a section on the importance and value of reading as a skill. Make a section for useful links.
