hello,
over the time i’ve been a beatmap nominator and a quality assurance helper, i have seen one issue arise more than any other in my vetoes and in other’s vetoes and DQ mods: the lack of versatility in the Ranking Criteria regarding break times. since the RC was written under the assumption of a song timed in 180 BPM, the guidelines established per difficulty are up to the mapper’s discretion when given a song marginally lower or marginally higher than 180. while the basic understanding of higher bpms require more breaks and lower bpms can live with less breaks, i think there is still a severe gray area regarding the break times in higher and lower BPMs.
with that said, i believe the following should be amended in the taiko ranking criteria (Underlined portions are added):
Kantan (Guidelines):
Futsuu (Guidelines):
If you plan on using a Futsuu as the lowest difficulty of a mapset, it has to abide by the following guidelines:
Muzukashii (Guidelines):
Oni (Guidelines):
rationale:
feel free to discuss these proposed additions
shoutout to nepuri for helping me a little bit <3
over the time i’ve been a beatmap nominator and a quality assurance helper, i have seen one issue arise more than any other in my vetoes and in other’s vetoes and DQ mods: the lack of versatility in the Ranking Criteria regarding break times. since the RC was written under the assumption of a song timed in 180 BPM, the guidelines established per difficulty are up to the mapper’s discretion when given a song marginally lower or marginally higher than 180. while the basic understanding of higher bpms require more breaks and lower bpms can live with less breaks, i think there is still a severe gray area regarding the break times in higher and lower BPMs.
with that said, i believe the following should be amended in the taiko ranking criteria (Underlined portions are added):
Kantan (Guidelines):
- You should insert at least 1 rest moment that is 3/1 or longer after 16/1 to 20/1 of continuous mapping. This can be adjusted to 8/1 or 12/1 in a BPM higher than 240, or 32/1 or 36/1 in a BPM lower than 140. Less frequent rest moments or shorter ones may put too much strain on beginners.
- As a substitute for the above guideline, you may insert no less than two 2/1 or 3/2 breaks after no longer than 8/1 of continuous mapping in a BPM equal to or lower than 180. This should give beginner players ample and frequent time to avoid strain.
- Use a base slider velocity of 1.2x in a BPM higher than 220. This is simply to ensure the readability of notes for beginners at higher BPMs.
Futsuu (Guidelines):
- You should insert at least 1 rest moment that is 2/1 or longer after 16/1 to 20/1 of continuous mapping. This can be adjusted to 8/1 or 12/1 in a BPM higher than 240, or 32/1 or 36/1 in a BPM lower than 140. Less frequent rest moments or shorter ones may put too much strain on beginners.
If you plan on using a Futsuu as the lowest difficulty of a mapset, it has to abide by the following guidelines:
- 1/2 patterns should not be longer than five notes. (Note: While this amendment has no direct correlation to the gray area I discussed earlier, using 4 notes as a cap implies the song has a syncopated beat-and that is not always the case).
- Use a base slider velocity of 1.2x in a BPM higher than 220. This is simply to ensure the readability of notes for beginners at higher BPMs.
Muzukashii (Guidelines):
- You should insert at least 1 rest moment that is 3/2 or longer after 16/1 to 20/1 of continuous mapping. This can be adjusted to 8/1 or 12/1 in a BPM higher than 240, or 32/1 or 36/1 in a BPM lower than 140. Less frequent rest moments or shorter ones may put too much strain on intermediate players.
- As a substitute for the above guideline, you may insert no less than two 1/1 breaks after no longer than 8/1 of continuous mapping in a BPM equal to or lower than 180. This should give intermediate players ample time to avoid strain.
Oni (Guidelines):
- You should insert at least 1 rest moment which is 1/1 or longer after 16/1 to 20/1 of continuous mapping. This can be adjusted to 8/1 or 12/1 in a BPM higher than 240, or 32/1 or 36/1 in a BPM lower than 140. Longer periods of continuous mapping may put too much strain on players of this difficulty level and shorter rest moments would count as continuous mapping.
rationale:
- in moderate bpm (~140), i decided that the best course of action to edit the current guideline would be to double the amount of time mappers have to insert a proper break moment that follows the song. musical ideas are usually represented in 4 bar phrases, so increasing the current guideline by only a matter of 2 or 3 bars wouldn't be ample enough to insert a proper break that didn't sound forced.
- as for the addition of the new break time guideline, i wrote this with the idea that, essentially, two 1/1 breaks in an 8/1 phrase is equal to one 2/1 break every 16/1 phrase. breaks as frequent as that, as many maps and players have shown, do not cause any sort of strain on the target audience. since that was the point of the current guideline, i feel that the new one also accomplishes just that.
- i also think with there being two proposed options, the gray area i talked about will shrink tremendously, and will give mappers more room to execute more creative ideas.
feel free to discuss these proposed additions
shoutout to nepuri for helping me a little bit <3