Before I say anything this is a good second map DeltaLeeds, you've done a good job. However, I disagree with the fact that it should be bubbled. you don't quite understand the system yet, nor mapping as a whole, because you've only just begun your beatmapping journey; you are not at fault here, and this is more directed at Bonsai as I disagree with his suggestion of bubbling the map. The points I list below are for both of you to learn from.
Bonsai wrote:
Just saying that if I became BN I'd bubble this, let's hope for the best ^^
Claiming you would bubble this mapper's
second beatmap, that is barely even polished? This is a ridiculous statement in my mind to make, as this is nowhere near bubbleable condition. Here are the many reasons why this should not have been a consideration of yours, as I will go on to mention.
Easy
00:04:734 (1,2) - The literal first note in this map is wrong on a few differing levels, it curves, but the next note placement seems to assume the first note was perfectly straight. The two notes are on the exact same y axis, the cursor moves along the curve like a straight line, this makes the curve pointless. If anything, here (ideally) you would map it more like
this, it's much more natural and generally, makes more sense.
00:07:123 (4,1,3,4,6) - You've reused the same sliders here too, the same patterns even, although this could be construed as structure the constant reuse of patterns and sliders in this albeit small section is quite dull to play, with nothing new at all to spice things up other than a horizontal flip of what you just played. Consider making a few new patterns, perhaps add something new to the mix, like a repeat slider, or a triangular pattern.
00:13:092 (1,2,3,4) - I feel like it would be
quite easy to create a nice diamond or square here by copying placement of the slider and hitcircle at 00:13:092 (1,2) - and stacking (via the hitcircle) onto 00:16:674 (3) - to create a perfect shape. This doesn't change gameplay so much but rather makes this section look a bit more polished, that is something you should strive for before heading for a bubble on your beatmap in my opinion.
00:17:271 (4,1) - Again, almost a perfectly straight line here between the two notes, ideally, the note before the slider should lead into it, so in this case, the slider could be moved up and more on an angle to make this work,
like so, although you may want to move some things around as that goes out of the editing field and may be difficult to hit in some lower resolutions as it could be out of the playfield.
00:17:868 (1,2) - The hitcircle here, although not necessarily blanketed by the slider, could at least be in the
center to make this look a bit more clean, this looks nicer in play mode and editor rather than a circle not centred but not right aligned either.
00:22:047 (4,1) - Again, this is a copy of 00:17:271 (4,1) -, i would repeat myself from the two points above but i think for this in particular you should remove it and try something different, it doesn't have to be completely different mind you, like a set of hitcircles, or a repeat slider, just a different slider shape and placement would do quite nicely. Then, instead of reusing the same slider over and over, you can have a rotation of two to switch between, adding more to your repertoire as you go through the difficulty. Also, i'd like to point out that the note following this slider is slightly overlapped, which is generally looked down upon in easy difficulties, and generally in mapping if it is not purposeful. In this case, it seems too small an overlap to be purposeful, but also enough to not look tidy. In the future you should make more of an effort to avoid overlaps like this as it makes your map look much more professional.
00:26:823 (4,1) - Now this, although straight, flows in an alright sense, as the slider still moves slightly to the right after the cursor has moved right to hit it, this is an alright example of a situation where it would be alright to have objects on the same y axis, though it's sometimes not ideal to have at all as it could look basic in some sense of the word.
00:32:196 (1,2,3) - This is a good idea in theory, but the overlaps here don't look very nice at all. an easy way to fix this is to turn off grid snap and do something more along the lines of
this, however, 00:36:375 (4,1) - needs to be moved back to fix the stacking issues.
00:36:972 (1) - this slider becomes visible at the slider head of 00:34:584 (3) - while it is still finishing, from prior knowledge I would say that, generally speaking, all stacks in easy difficulties are unrankable. In this particular situation I think you could beg to differ as 00:36:972 (1) - appears only at the very end of 00:34:584 (3) - and is therefore not really noticed as a stack per se while playing, so it could be still quite readable. I would go the safe approach here and try to avoid this stack (though i don't have any options to avoid it without moving things around), unless you can get advice from a member of the Quality Assurance team, because at the moment i'm not sure of the legitimacy coming from many of the beatmap nominators as of late.
00:36:972 (1,2,3) - This in all honestly looks like it was just thrown together with no modifications to it at all, and the uneven overlap on both sliders looks very messy. A simple fix is something along the lines of
this. Now 00:41:151 (1) - can be stacked on 00:36:972 (1) - if you like, but i think you should, again, make a bit more of an effort to spice things up here, give it a curve, make it straight even, you have lots of possibilities to mess around with there.
Normal
00:04:734 (1,1,2,3,1,2,3,1,2,3) - Just like the easy difficulty there is a lot of the same thing that's been placed here, playing the exact same pattern in a different spot three times in a row is not fun, and it's not very unique either. Portions of maps that play like this can be very dull, and it's important to add different objects in to liven things up so the player isn't playing the same rhythm over and over again. For example, at 00:08:316 (1,2,3) - you could try something like
this.
00:13:838 (2,3) - 1/2 is allowed in Normal difficulties, but not 1/4 (perhaps in some rare cases). Especially in the form of a double/triple/stream. I suggest you replace this by simply repeating 00:13:092 (1) -. However, you'll need to move some other objects around to compensate for the repeat.
Points for the mapper to work on himself
00:17:868 (1,2,3,4) - (This point is useless due to what I say below but it is still useful for learning purposes.)
This is an alright triangle pattern, however i think it seems odd for there to be no blanket from 00:17:868 (1) -, because it looks so close. I think you should blanket 00:18:614 (2) - and move 00:19:062 (4) - to compensate.
00:18:614 (2,3) - As i said above, 1/2 is allowed in Normal difficulties, but not 1/4 (perhaps in some rare cases). Especially in the form of a double/triple/stream. I suggest you replace this by simply repeating 00:17:868 (1) -. However, you'll need to move some other objects around to compensate for the repeat.
00:22:644 (1,2,3,4) - Again here with the 1/4 double.
00:25:032 (1,2) - I think you could do something a bit cooler here, perhaps something like
this, or two different sliders, pretty much any slider shapes that you can come up with can be done here.
00:26:226 (2,1) - (2) Doesn't flow nicely onto (1), i'm going to leave you on your own here and you can try yourself to get it to flow properly, as from my previous point you may have remapped those two sliders entirely.
00:28:166 (2,3) - Same statement about the doubles.
00:32:495 (2,3,4,5,6,1) - This section feels very linear and rigid, lots of straight movements and no signs of using sliders or hitcircles to flow into the next objects. I think you should read what i've got to say below about flow, and just like above, try remapping this section and fixing it up yourself. Incase you don't know already, if you have any trouble with this or any questions at all, you can message me in-game or here on the forums.
00:36:972 (1,2,3,4,5,6) - Same here.
00:42:047 (2,3,4) - Like I said above, use of 1/4 isn't allowed in most normals, the exception being rare cases, I think you should take information from what i've suggested above on replacing the doubles and working through it yourself
00:44:883 (2,3) - And the last double in the map.
Hard
00:03:838 (2,3,2,3,2,3,2,3) - Curves like these are sometimes a bit too strong and come out looking a bit ugly in my opinion, this isn't so much of an issue but more of something you could polish to make this section look nicer.
00:03:540 (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,1,2,3) - Just like the Easy/Normal, lots of copy-paste at the beginning resulting in a somewhat dull opening section for this map. After (if) you read the information I give you below, I suggest you remap the beginning of each of these difficulties in order to give them a bit more oomph, ya dig?
00:14:286 (6,7) - This is quite a begginer-esque thing that I do see quite often, stacking another slider just under the slider before it. As you may read below, there are certain situations where this is ideal, and certain situations where it isn't. In this particular situation I wouldn't advise it, because if anything, it's got more emphasis than the note before it.
I'll finish here and you can buzz me anytime for a re-check or any questions/clarifications on this mod, as some of the things I may continue to mod will be fixed by you naturally after learning all of the info i've layed down here.General
The reason I didn't give you loads of ideas on how to remap sections was (partially because it's 2am) because I want this to be
your map, and not mine. And I think with the basics I gave you in the normal above, and the tips i've listed below, you will be able to drastically improve your map
The CS or Circle Size in your normal difficulty is 4.5, I think this is too high. This is the same Circle Size used in maps like Apparition (the hardest ranked map in the game disregarding TAG4), and many other Extra and Insane level maps, I don't even have any CS 4.5 Normal beatmaps in my 15,000 map collection! I think at the very least the Circle Size should be changed to 4.
00:48:913 (1) - Spinners like this are disliked by some people, as spinners should be used to build up momentum or emphasis on a particular section, this however is getting quieter as the spinner goes on rather than louder. This can definitely stay in your map, but you will have a few people that won't be fans.
And to finish it all off, here's some tips (IMO) that i'd like to give you to improve future (and present) maps.
One really good tip I can give you (apart from reusing things to create structure as I mention below) is to reuse placement! If you've put down a few notes, and want to know where to place the next note, put it where one of those notes were! Check some of my maps or relatively any good quality map to see this (and the reusing notes to create structure) method used almost 100% of the time.
I suggest not spending too much time on maps early on. Every map you make will be a significant improvement, but if you stay behind on older maps they can and will stun your improvement and in some cases actually be detrimental to your skill overall. Until you're at a point when you're relatively problem-free (you're looking at six months to a year on average for that to happen, so patience is key) you should just stick to making a full set (or if you want to focus on something in particular, just an easy/normal for example is fine), getting one or constructive two mods, and moving on. You can do whatever you want, I'm not forcing you to do this, but I am letting you know that it is definitely the best way to improve at mapping, and sticking to maps too long will be detrimental to your improvement and your current skill. This is something you should definitely want to do, but again it's your choice boyo.
Make sure you consistently check to see if something flows right. If it's comfortable for you, it's comfortable for the player (most of the time). You need to watch out though, because the more you play your own map you'll get used to bad flow and won't notice it, so make sure you only check once or twice! You don't even need to go into test mode, just play the song in editor and glide your cursor through parts of the map to check them. Also, if you're not already, don't use grid snap, it really limits what you can do creatively.
Reusing (copying and pasting things you've used before in a map) may seem like a lazy way to map, but it actually adds some really nice structure to your map and makes it much better looking overall. Check any good map and you'll see what I mean, it's used often to create symmetrical patterns and just patterns in general. I do think you use this too much, what I mean when I say this is that you should try and reuse a rotation of 2 sliders for a certain pattern that lasts for 10 seconds or something like that, it makes things a bit easier for you and links parts of your map together visually.
Try to have consistent spacing! The only reason you should change the spacing is for emphasis. If something is quiet and soft, lower the spacing. If something is loud and heavy, make the spacing higher. You should try to find a consistent distance snap to use throughout the whole diff. You don't even need to use distance snap, just use it as a guideline for what to do. Check the upper right corner when you have a note selected to see the spacing between the note ahead of it and the note behind it.
Last but not least, good luck with this set and the future of your mapping career. I think it's important for you to know that getting maps bubbled isn't as easy as Bonsai has made it seem, unless you have friends in the Beatmap Nomination Team it can take months, years, or your map may even never get bubbled. In the current state of affairs the mapping community is in you need to be prepared to work hard and care about what maps you're ranking, and what maps you're going to work on; because all of your actions will shape the community, as mine do, as Bonsai's do, and everyone elses. I'll be honest with you in saying that i'm not happy that new BNs aren't like me, but nobody is. I'd like to say sorry to you if I did offend you, as with what I said above I imagine it wouldn't have been too hard. I wish you the best of luck with your new status as Beatmap Nominator, and may both of you keep mapping and modding for years to come.
Wow, almost 3,000 words.