This thread is dedicated to the discussion of OD rates in Taiko and what a proper OD should be, mainly for Oni difficulties. (When I say OD that means Overall Difficulty.)

After looking through mod post I notice a lot of modders are always suggesting to set the settings to the middle for Oni. (aka OD and HP at 5)
I would like to explain to you all why this is bad, and the norm for OD in taiko should be set higher. (For Oni respectively.)

Example: Note Manipulation.
In this video I would like to show you an issue with OD 5 and why it's too lenient for the hardest difficulty. In the timestamp I will point out you will notice that the notes are unsnapped for an unknown reason (Might be for jokes or difficulty). I run through this section by just hitting the pattern in a 1/3 rhythm and the results are me getting 300's on almost every note until the very end. This also occurs a few more times in the song also resulting in mostly perfect hits:



Watch at the times: 0:27 / 0:41 / 0:51 .
This beatmap is by Firce777 and can be downloaded here: http://puu.sh/anEj (Can also be found on his userpage http://osu.ppy.sh/u/firce777)

I played through this map in editor on higher OD rates and on 7-8 is where I found I would get a more constant rate of 100's due to the notes being unsnapped. This might not be accurate though due to my skills in Taiko but these are still unsnapped notes.

So do you guys see the issue here? These notes that are not even snapped correctly to the beat and can pretty much be hit perfectly if you just tap to the main beat of the song. Suggesting to set to OD to the middle (5) IS NOT A GOOD IDEA as you are basically granting a pass to high accuracy. OD should be discussed between the mapper and modder to find a rate that fits according to the difficulty of the song. This should also apply to all difficulties and not just Oni, every difficulty's OD should be thought about carefully.

Now with that out of the way I would like to talk about how we should approach setting the OD for taiko mapsets in all difficulties, not just Oni.

I disagree because I like OD 5 since I suck at being accurate. I want OD 5 to keep being used so that my overall accuracy doesn't drop below 90%.

It makes sense, though. ;_;

OD 6 > All imo.
Except for those very easy onis

Well, OD5-6 is the most common used one and fits the general accepted hitting window.
Though I'd like to underline that the OD should be set to the attributes a map should have.
If it's a map that focus on accurate input to relative simple patterns and/or short complicated ones, like a short song or songs with lots of syncopes and rhythm changes, I'd suggest a higher OD.

If you map a relative long song and/or with long streams (lol shinsekai), I'd suggest a relative low OD (here: 5) to fit the stamina focus the map probably has.

So OD should be determined by the length of song/patterns and their consistence in rhythm. Just my opinion.

I agree with Loctav
Also, if the song is slow it turns VERY hard to play with OD 7 at least for me. When the song have a reasonable speed it is all ok, hm.
Maybe it's only me, dunno
For me it should be like:
< 170 bpm: OD 5 or 6
170~220bpm: OD 6 or 7
> 220bpm: OD 6 or 5

At least it is how I feel comfortable to play. It works well for "normal" Onis
As Loctav said, if it is a 200bpm streamy map, OD 5 would be better.

@MMzz: That phenomenon itself isn't so valid reason cause that can be in any case when how much the note unsnapped is smaller than accuracy window. (Also bring some exceptional case isn't so good idea to explain something to audience, to be honest.)

Though saying OD 5 HP 5 via modding, I don't like it.

First of all, I would appreciate a rule or guideline on how OD should be set in Taikodifficulties, current rule is just unfitting.

This being mentioned, I'd like to say that if you used to play standard alot (like I do) and then start playing Taiko, you will notice that the border between getting a 300 and a 100 on the same OD is much smaller on Taiko (meaning that there is a smaller timewindow where you actually get those 300 in taiko), due to the fact that taiko isn't about cursorpositioning, just hitting notes, so that is harder overall. Therefore, I see OD 5 on Taiko similar to OD 6~7 on Standard, which is indeed one of the most common used OD's for Hard-Insanes (=Oni's in this case). Setting the OD to a much higher level, like you suggested (7 and up) just makes playing all about accuracy overall. At the moment, you get good scores if you manage to keep a good accuracy in streams mostly (1/1 and 1/2 stuff is most likely 300's all the way), that higher OD would mean you have to be on spot the whole song long. I am aware of the fact that most high-skilled Taikoplayers go for HR-FC with 98%acc+, but that's just because of their overall experience with the game and should not be a measurement for all players. So Let's say you are fairly new to Taiko and can barely play Oni's, setting the OD higher would most-likely let you fail in ever try, because you miss that accuracy-aspcet and still struggle with getting the order of don and kat placement in streams right. I myself see myself playing Taikomaps with OD 7, getting 1~3 misses and overall B~C, just because I mess up alot of notes, ending in 100's. Combine this with the fact that there are no "free 300's" like in Standard (Spinners and Sliders are almost always 300), which drag your accuracy up and you will see yourself like I do, caught in a battle all about hitting 1/1 on the beat because of high OD.

My suggestion on this topic would be to set a medium OD for Oni difficulties (5~6) and allow higher OD if there are more Oni's (Inner/Ura), so let's say you got two Oni difficulties, one with OD 5~6 and the other with 7+, so that not-so-experienced players still have the chance to train Oni-diffs without being crushed by epic-high OD.

I would also appreciate a lower OD on easier Taikodifficulties, since the Taiko Standalonesets are now rankable, so Muzukashii's should have something like 4~5, Futsuu's 3~4 and Kantan's 2~3. (Just to give an impression)

The vast majority of osu! maps have timing windows larger than home DDR's, and home DDR's timing windows are already considered to be a joke by the rhythm game community. There's a reason why osu!s doesn't use standard's OD system.

Therefore, please do not compare Taiko's timing windows to standard's. Let's maintain a standard where you actually need good timing to get high accuracy, hmm?

EDIT: "vast majority of osu! maps" includes non-Insane diffs, before anyone gets confused. I'd say that OD 8 or so is about the same as home DDR.

Ekaru wrote:

The vast majority of osu! maps have timing windows larger than home DDR's, and home DDR's timing windows are already considered to be a joke by the rhythm game community. There's a reason why osu!s doesn't use standard's OD system.

Therefore, please do not compare Taiko's timing windows to standard's. Let's maintain a standard where you actually need good timing to get high accuracy, hmm?

EDIT: "vast majority of osu! maps" includes non-Insane diffs, before anyone gets confused. I'd say that OD 8 or so is about the same as home DDR.

Why do you throw in DDR? I mean, yea, osu! is influenced by DDR (partly at least) but you should look at a game on it's own and in comparison of two game modes in this single game, the OD is inbalanced.

- moved to rules discussion.

Difficulty settings and song setup

Overall difficulty and HP drain rate should be between 4~7.

That pretty much covers necessary values (inversely I think OD can be even lower like 2 or 3 in easy or normal.), and you can talk with the mapper about this. For my own practice 5/6 is enough~

Should depend on difficulty and timing precision. Plus 1/3, 1/6, 1/8 notes need lower OD, since they're harder to pick.
as wmfchris said, that spread should be enough, used as guideline

Ekaru wrote:

The vast majority of osu! maps have timing windows larger than home DDR's, and home DDR's timing windows are already considered to be a joke by the rhythm game community. There's a reason why osu!s doesn't use standard's OD system.

Therefore, please do not compare Taiko's timing windows to standard's. Let's maintain a standard where you actually need good timing to get high accuracy, hmm?

EDIT: "vast majority of osu! maps" includes non-Insane diffs, before anyone gets confused. I'd say that OD 8 or so is about the same as home DDR.

300/marvelous
OD10 is +/- 20 ms.
OD5 is +/- 50 ms.
SM Judge 4 is +/- 22.5 ms.

Miss
OD10 is +/- 100 ms.
OD5 is +/- 150 ms.
SM Judge 4 is +/- 135 ms.

What's too bad is that OD10 is the max. No way to make it more accurate. 40 ms to hit a note is enormous. 22 ms to hit a note is where it starts to get fun.

I sort of gauge my OD on what Loctav said.
But actually I prefer high ODs (6-8). Anything under 190bpm is almost always OD 8 (unless going for ranked then I'll use 7 since it's the max). 200bpm I use OD 6, anything over 235bpm I use OD 5.
Also, like Loctav said, it kind of depends on the map. On very high density maps (long patterns or many 1/6ths) I'll lower the OD if necessary.

HP (Drain Time) is different though. Gotta be able to hit the patterns to be any good imo so I use 7/8 for Onis/Inner (depending on map difficulty), 6 for muzu, 5 for futsuu, and 4 for Kantan.

Also ziin, anyone who's any good at SM uses judge 6... minimum.

I agree with what Loctav and Chris said.
In other words, this can be talked about with the mapper or else just modded away.
Such cases like Firce map which are getting ranked could be unranked if it is a really bad choose of HP/OD (or breaks even the rule).

Considering HP Drain has been brought up in here as well (the guideline by wmf), I want to bring this to the table. (Move it to a separate topic if you want, but it needs to be said)

HP Drain should actually be the inverse of what everyone here is mentioning. It should be HIGHER on the easier difficulties and LOWER on the higher difficulties.

Explanation:

Lets start with Oni diffs to put this into perspective for the lower diffs.

I picked out a random song for this example, letting it run until it was in the pass point. This song has 1812 notes.

It takes ~690 notes to be considered in the passing range. (Approximately 38% of the notes in the song)
To max out the bar during the song, it takes approximately 1300 notes. (Approximately 70% of the notes in the song)

It takes that many notes to fill up the bar because of the note density. More notes and higher health drain = less health per note on average. However, health drain stays constant (Aka, health drain isn't affected by there being more or less notes).

Even with this song having a health drain of only 5, it only takes 60 misses out of 1360 notes to be back into the failing part of the health bar again. With a higher health drain it'd be even more strict, as a miss becomes worth a LOT more notes of health depending on note density. In this particular case, If you miss 4% of the 1360 notes (or 60 notes) you lose ~690 notes worth of health. In otherwords, 60 misses is worth around 690 notes of health lost.

Now, keeping in mind that health drain is static based on the health drain level chosen (1-10), lets look at the easier difficulties.

I now have a kantan difficulty that has... lets say 80 notes using the same health drain as above (Drain Rate 5) for comparison.

It takes 30 notes to be considered in the passing range now. (Still ~37% of the notes in the song) The note density decreased, so the average health per note goes up to compensate.
To max out the bar during the song, it takes approximately 58 notes. (Again, Still ~70% of the notes in the song)

However, the difference is that if I let the health drop on the lower difficulty with the SAME health drain, I'll actually pass the song by quite a large margin

In order to make the kantan's health drain / gain more realistic, I would need to raise the Health Drain to something like 8 or 9. Here's a comparison of the 80 (used 81 so i could get the pictures) note song using Health Drain 5 and Health Drain 9.

As you can see, both of them pass, but the second is much closer to failing, and for an easy difficulty, 70% accuracy should be the 'just passing' range, which the second example provides perfectly.

TL;DR: Health Drain should go UP with lower note density, and down with higher note density in most scenarios.

So what's the point of this thread? i don't see any wordings for a rule to be added, or is this about a recommendation? Anyways what's the status of it?

In general it is a request to recommend people to use higher ODs because of wrong snapped notes, which can't be indentified well with OD 5.
But as I stated before: p/2106472 it dosen't have any effect since we have the modding process.

tl;dr: Recommendation/guideline is not needed since maps with unsnapped notes won't be ranked at all.

Status: People were just discussing right now.

Hmm i see, so should we -No Change- this?

Ono misunderstood. I only showed that example because it shows how lenient OD 5 is on taiko, to the point where you can hit unsnapped notes perfectly without even hitting them properly. This thread is a discussion on what a proper OD is for taiko, but I guess it never went anywhere so this will all be left up to the modding process.

I think there is barely any possibility to word an appropriate rule for that. All other modes have no diff-setting recommendation/guideline, so I think this one doesn't need them, too.

Yet it's right that people should consider what Tasha wrote (to an extend), yet this board is about creating/discussing new rules or guidelines - but this can never end up as a real guideline or something similiar.

Hmm i see then, guess you could add a note about that on the RC Taiko wiki, but since no new Rule/guideline is happening then imma mark this as No Change.

Loctav wrote:

I think there is barely any possibility to word an appropriate rule for that. All other modes have no diff-setting recommendation/guideline, so I think this one doesn't need them, too.

http://osu.ppy.sh/wiki/Insane
http://osu.ppy.sh/wiki/Hard
http://osu.ppy.sh/wiki/Normal
http://osu.ppy.sh/wiki/Easy

Assuming these apply to osu! mode.

Oh right, must have forgot about these.