3 star maps too easy, 4 star too hard

Sharpless

Joined October 2013

Topic Starter

Sharpless 2015-11-07T19:14:51+00:00

So I'm a relatively new osu! player, as I picked it up about 2 years ago, played for maybe a month, and stopped until about 3 weeks ago. This go round I'm strangely far more enticed by the game (although the experience doesn't necessarily feel different, I find I enjoy the game far more now), but have recently experienced a... hiccup, of sorts. Namely, 3 star maps are waaaaaaaay too easy on average, and four star maps completely wreck me. I'm trying to find things in between, but it literally feels like (with a few exceptions) the maps are either two easy to allow me much improvement or way too hard to ever get anywhere. Am I just doing something wrong?

Just to clarify, things rated above three star but lower than four star (namely in that +-3 1/2 range) are usually too difficult as well. It just feels like the difference in difficulties is astronomical.

"I am mad scientist. It's so cool! Sunovab*tch"
-Mad Scientist

Vuelo Eluko

5,484 posts

Joined October 2013

Vuelo Eluko 2015-11-07T19:16:16+00:00

play whats hard to FC
play what you get under 96% on

neatoneet

16 posts

Joined August 2011

neatoneet 2015-11-07T19:26:57+00:00

There is an exact star rating in the top left of the screen: 3,xx stars. This makes it easier to estimate their difficulty... There will be some maps though that have the same star rating as what you've been comfortable with before and still seem harder, because they have different patterns.

Download a whole bunch of maps and you'll see.

Sharpless

5 posts

Joined October 2013

Topic Starter

Sharpless 2015-11-07T20:24:57+00:00

xxjesus1412fanx wrote:
play whats hard to FC
play what you get under 96% on

I looked up tips on improving when I first started playing, and one of them was to not go for FC's, but to just go for passing, and then try to slowly up the difficulty. So I rarely actually aim for FCing a map. One thing that I feel is a great hindrance is that I end up learning the beginning of a map that is more difficult, and then after a while I lose control, and have to start the map over. And yeah, there are slow and minor improvements through repetition, but there wouldn't happen to be a way to just practice sections of a map, would there? The classical musician in me that can practice a single phrase for 6 hours nonstop gets frustrated that I have to replay something I can already do only to get rekt consistently later on.

"I am mad scientist. It's so cool! Sunovab*tch"
-Mad Scientist

Endaris

5,282 posts

Joined June 2010

Endaris 2015-11-07T20:29:39+00:00

fahersom wrote:
I looked up tips on improving when I first started playing, and one of them was to not go for FC's, but to just go for passing, and then try to slowly up the difficulty.

The classical musician in you should be aware of how much sense it makes to "pass" a piece of music instead of trying to "FC" it.
I wouldn't go to a concert where the musician only "passes" maps at least, that's neither impressing nor a pleasure to listen to(turn the hitsound volume up, music slightly down and listen to your replays, will sound ugly as fuck).

KanoSet

906 posts

Joined October 2014

KanoSet 2015-11-07T20:35:26+00:00

FC'ing songs is pretty important thing to practice
when you are playing something hard and doing rly good you heart will start beating heavily.. the hype is hard to deal with and mostly you gonna mess cuz of it one miss master race
so FC'ing songs from time to time help you to minimize that
play both hard and easy maps.. play everything

Sharpless

5 posts

Joined October 2013

Topic Starter

Sharpless 2015-11-07T20:36:12+00:00

Endaris wrote:
fahersom wrote:
I looked up tips on improving when I first started playing, and one of them was to not go for FC's, but to just go for passing, and then try to slowly up the difficulty.
The classical musician in you should be aware of how much sense it makes to "pass" a piece of music instead of trying to "FC" it.
I wouldn't go to a concert where the musician only "passes" maps at least, that's neither impressing nor a pleasure to listen to(turn the hitsound volume up, music slightly down and listen to your replays, will sound ugly as fuck).

Yes, but the classical musician in me isn't going to play every etude on stage. Some pieces you just learn to get better, and I don't worry about perfecting them. If I'm the only one hearing it, and am just looking for improvement as a musician, perfecting every piece is illogical and impractical. Stepping stones to a piece you actually have intentions of performing. I don't want to SS every damn beatmap, I want to get better at the game. And that occasional beatmap I find that I really enjoy above all others I will work on perfecting.

"I am mad scientist. It's so cool! Sunovab*tch"
-Mad Scientist

Originality

102 posts

Joined October 2014

Originality 2015-11-07T20:38:29+00:00

I struggled in exactly the same spot.

I used no fail a lot to expose myself to those 4 star songs that had like one part I couldn't clear, but the rest of the song was good to go (I play violin, I feel you on the classical music comparison) Download a bunch of songs too, the overall difficulty (*) of a song is a pretty sucky telling sign of how hard a song is -- for example, I'm better with jumps, so a 4* with jumps might be cake for me, but a 4* song with all streams will look really rough. By playing lots of patterns, you can figure what you're good at (and what you're not) and improve based off of that. The difference in difficulty that you're experiencing is likely how fast the circles are popping up on the screen (AR), which will improve with more practice.

Find what works for you, & good luck!

Endaris

5,282 posts

Joined June 2010

Endaris 2015-11-07T20:39:42+00:00

Ikr but you don't leave a piece if you can't even decently do it.
And if you get anything worse than an A it's a very clear sign that you're not capable of decently playing it.
If I'm new to piano and I'm trying to get better by practicing Fantasie Impromptu by Chopin in the original tempo it's just not going to work out and that is what you're doing.

Sharpless

5 posts

Joined October 2013

Topic Starter

Sharpless 2015-11-07T20:46:50+00:00

Endaris wrote:
Ikr but you don't leave a piece if you can't even decently do it.
And if you get anything worse than an A it's a very clear sign that you're not capable of decently playing it.
If I'm new to piano and I'm trying to get better by practicing Fantasie Impromptu by Chopin in the original tempo it's just not going to work out and that is what you're doing.

Your point absolutely makes sense. I was under the impression taking the Dark Souls approach of full steam ahead ramming into something head first over and over again until you eventually break through would be more prudent than practicing to FC something I can already play semi-decently. So I guess another question would be; in how many attempts should I be able to clear a beatmap before putting that beatmap aside labelled as "too hard atm"? I feel like if I'm getting a B or higher first or second attempt, it's too easy and not worth the time of FCing. But maybe 20ish attempts to even clear the map with a sub-par C is just as wasteful of my time? After clearing a map that takes several retries, I usually replay it several times looking for gradual improvements in score (but up until now have not been going for FC's. Guess I found a bad set of tips if they told me never worry about FCing when you first start out :/ )

"I am mad scientist. It's so cool! Sunovab*tch"
-Mad Scientist

Endaris

5,282 posts

Joined June 2010

Endaris 2015-11-07T20:54:47+00:00

It's not like you have to FC everything, all you want to do is improve(FCs are the best proof of improvement though).
You improve best on challenges fitting your skilllevels which means that you don't have to replay maps you got a good result on.
I'll just throw this in, use it or don't
t/342548

Vuelo Eluko

5,484 posts

Joined October 2013

Vuelo Eluko 2015-11-07T21:16:16+00:00

fahersom wrote:
xxjesus1412fanx wrote:
play whats hard to FC
play what you get under 96% on
I looked up tips on improving when I first started playing, and one of them was to not go for FC's, but to just go for passing, and then try to slowly up the difficulty. So I rarely actually aim for FCing a map. One thing that I feel is a great hindrance is that I end up learning the beginning of a map that is more difficult, and then after a while I lose control, and have to start the map over. And yeah, there are slow and minor improvements through repetition, but there wouldn't happen to be a way to just practice sections of a map, would there? The classical musician in me that can practice a single phrase for 6 hours nonstop gets frustrated that I have to replay something I can already do only to get rekt consistently later on.

its not going for fcs its going for maps that are hard to fc

chainpullz

2,334 posts

Joined June 2013

chainpullz 2015-11-07T22:06:43+00:00

xxjesus1412fanx wrote:
its not going for fcs its going for maps that are hard to fc

^This. Outside of edge cases (ie. hp10) you shouldn't be playing maps that you have to struggle to even pass. Imo the sweet point is maps where fc'ing is a pipe dream but passing isn't a concern. Play those maps and don't bother obsessively retrying for fc. Play a map 1-3 times, move onto next map. between 3 and 4 stars even just the ranked nomod pool is large enough that you shouldn't have to repeat maps this way. Playing a lot of different maps a few times will help you build skills that translate to all maps (ie. more difficult ones even) as opposed to being good at one map but failing at playing any map other than that.

I'm slow like a turtle. Plz no bully, I hide in my rock hard shell.

Modding Queue

uberpancake

160 posts

Joined December 2012

uberpancake 2015-11-08T16:32:01+00:00

chainpullz wrote:
xxjesus1412fanx wrote:
its not going for fcs its going for maps that are hard to fc
^This. Outside of edge cases (ie. hp10) you shouldn't be playing maps that you have to struggle to even pass. Imo the sweet point is maps where fc'ing is a pipe dream but passing isn't a concern. Play those maps and don't bother obsessively retrying for fc. Play a map 1-3 times, move onto next map. between 3 and 4 stars even just the ranked nomod pool is large enough that you shouldn't have to repeat maps this way. Playing a lot of different maps a few times will help you build skills that translate to all maps (ie. more difficult ones even) as opposed to being good at one map but failing at playing any map other than that.

This is great advice