I think in a way this benefits more the mapper, modder and the BN than the player in a way that it makes it easier for everyone just to have a smaller spread and less things to check. The true thing that i believe its affecting this is what Capulet said, i don't think someone wants to check a 4:30 min, 4 diff spread map, unless you're really dedicated to it or you know that person (you'll be modding around 18 mins of drain if you mod each difficulty).

Even though i do believe if any of this would be applied to modern day mapping and modding, osu! will experience a crash in what would be intake of new players, and i'm not only talking about standard or mania, every game mode will feel that and hard; yes maybe its true that mapping low difficulties can be tedious and boring but it opens a wide range in what would be player intake, plus why wouldn't you want to give the same chance to someone "new" rather than an already decent player?

Low difficulties around each game mode provides that "chance" I'm talking about, maybe to play their favorite song while not choosing something they cant play, improving, trying out new skins and none the less, having fun.

TL;DR

I do think this will benefit everyone involved in the creation and ranking process of a map but will damage any low player for sure, maybe something else can be implemented to make this beneficial for the modder and mapper as well for the player.

pishifat wrote: 641v53

if i were running osu and had i an interest in expanding its audience, i'd think this kind of change isnt very good. out of ranked maps selection, there would be a smaller fraction of content available for lowest level of players, alienating the potential future of hte game or something along those lines. the idea that new players are already alienated with 5+min songs, so being lenient with other lengths should be fine sounds more like a reason to remove approval from game dev perspective (which i'm not interested in doing).

But back in the days maps even shorter than 5min were approved (like The Big Black). Didn't really hurt the game's future now did it? More like the opposite considering how popular and iconic it became. Imagine having to map a full spread for that song. lol

Anyway, I do think that doing something about this is a good idea, rather than leaving it as it is with .mp3 extensions becoming ever more popular.

What might indeed seem as a problem is that as a new player, I would hate it if I couldn't play, say, my favourite pop or metal song because it's like 3:30 in length and has no easy/normal diffs available for it.

However, as was said before, most new players don't like playing very long maps right off the bat. If you think about it, the most popular genres in this community are things like anime and electronic music, not pop and metal really, they're more niche.

If there is a pop or metal song they'd really like to play but can't quite reach because the lowest diff is a hard, it should motivate them to improve their skills in the game enough to play it. If the only genres of music they listen to are niche in this game, and they're completely unable to tolerate playing easier maps of genres they don't really listen to, I don't think they'd last as a community member for very long to begin with.

With that in mind, and as much as it feels weird to let go of these spread rules I've gotten used to over the years, something needs to be done, and as long as nobody comes up with a better alternative, I'm ing this one.

1. if the drain time is <4:00 your set's lowest diff must be normal or lower
2. if the drain time is 4:00-5:00 your set's lowest diff must be hard or lower
3. >5:00 can be anything

I'm thinking more like this. since H is way more accessible than N. IX only is just too small imo. Since we are having problems with 4:30 maps, we don't need to do anything with anything below 4:00

agree with ancul, insane as the lowest diff sounds to me like too much for something non marathon, but otherwise it's a neat idea

AncuL wrote: 93i4m

1. if the drain time is <4:00 your set's lowest diff must be normal or lower
2. if the drain time is 4:00-5:00 your set's lowest diff must be hard or lower
3. >5:00 can be anything

I'm thinking more like this. since H is way more accessible than N. IX only is just too small imo. Since we are having problems with 4:30 maps, we don't need to do anything with anything below 4:00

yeah this seems the most reasonable at least from the suggestions

AncuL wrote: 93i4m

1. if the drain time is <4:00 your set's lowest diff must be normal or lower
2. if the drain time is 4:00-5:00 your set's lowest diff must be hard or lower
3. >5:00 can be anything

I'm thinking more like this. since H is way more accessible than N. IX only is just too small imo. Since we are having problems with 4:30 maps, we don't need to do anything with anything below 4:00

Hmm, I think a change like this would at least motivate people to map longer songs more. It probably won't make .mp3 extensions that much less popular of a choice when it comes to stuff like 4:50 length songs, though. But even with an IX spread requirement, why wouldn't you just extend the .mp3 instead if you've already done that before? A spread requirement change like this is less impactful on both the newbie playerbase and mapper perspectives, but also generally safer.

I definitely agree with the idea of scaling spread requirements based on song length. Right now I think it is pretty silly how a few seconds determine whether or not you need to map 5 difficulties or just one.

Personally I think that this will increase the amount of content we have due to the lack of longer songs as of now, despite decreasing the amount of content for newbies available in the long run.

However, I think if we went with this, a compromise with people that think this would reduce content too much would be having an insane difficulty required for drain time over 5 minutes, and reserving single difficulty mapsets for songs above 10 minutes, as has been previously proposed.

Overall, reducing the effort gap between approval length and spreads is a good idea, hopefully we can solidify the details in this thread.

the argument that spreads shouldnt start at insane is kinda odd the more i think about it because marathon maps dont need a spread at all. also the appeal for longer maps rises with player skill (at least thats how it was when i learned the game). also what you guys have to think about is that right now 2 diff spreads are already a thing if the hardest diff is hard or normal. if with ucs proposal a 7* for example was made you would still need 3-4 diffs for a reasonable spread with insane as the lowest diff, so the hardest <5min 2 diffs spreads would be like a high 5* and an insane diff witch does sound that unreasonable to me.

i would still love to see some number about number of plays on beatmaps for each diff and song length so the "majority of players" argument can properly be
talked about

im bad at excel but draw your own conclusions


taken from t/631455

i dont agree with getting rid of low diffs at any lenght but if i had to choose id go with what AncuL proposed

i agree with the scaling length thing. this eliminates the issue of normals not being mapped at all, while also lowering the amount of necessary effort spent on diffs that will be 1/4 as popular as the higher ones. this effort is a huge factor in why people don't map long songs.

i've noticed that almost all the people against this are the minority who are completely fine with churning out massive sets by themselves or finding gds if needed; i think that you guys don't realize how hard that is for most "normal" mappers who do not have 3-4 years of mapping experience and integration into the community necessary to find bns and gds for such long things. that breed of "normal" mapper makes up the vast majority of the mapping community too, so i really believe it's safe to say that the increase in 3:30+ songs will be quite large if the barriers to making the spreads for them are lowered. this will counteract the fact that quite literally 75%+ of ranked maps are under 1:30 nowadays.

im not exactly against this i just want this to be less lenient than what uc proposed
i barely map so i dont think this rule will affect me but im still taking in consideration casual players who like the song but arent skilled enough to play harder stuff. i experienced taht when i was new

It's only a minimum requirements for a map to get rank. If you really that carz about making a fullspread for 4+mins then there's no ine stopping you. The minimum requirements need to be reworked and the reason are already well stated by many up there. However, I'm jot against fullspread either, it's harder to find modder for it than to map it after all.

Still on topic, ban mp3 manipulation to loophole duration requirements because it's literally ridiculous

Saturnalize wrote: v4b1m

It's only a minimum requirements for a map to get rank. If you really that carz about making a fullspread for 4+mins then there's no ine stopping you. The minimum requirements need to be reworked and the reason are already well stated by many up there. However, I'm jot against fullspread either, it's harder to find modder for it than to map it after all.

Still on topic, ban mp3 manipulation to loophole duration requirements because it's literally ridiculous

i tried to do that it didnt get received well

CXu wrote: 344051

I'd say add a minimum amount of diffs required for the spread as well in some way, so say minimum 3 diffs for maps <4:00, and minimum 2 diffs for maps <5:00. (Not sure how this would affect those Easy+Normal sets only though).

If you're mapping a 4min ballad you can get away with only a hard since Insane/Extra might not fit well with the song, and Easy/Normal aren't required.
This should make it so that easier difficulties for newer players are still created whenever slower songs that would fit lower diffs better are mapped as well.

I second this option so much. It's by far more flexible and better than making thing easier by default.

Okoratu wrote: ct57

Saturnalize wrote: v4b1m

Still on topic, ban mp3 manipulation to loophole duration requirements because it's literally ridiculous

i tried to do that it didnt get received well

still sad people prefer to put less time on their creations than making it available for a fairly larger audience :/

Just like probably everyone else I've thought about this for forever, and it definitely seems necessary to have less of a hard cutoff at 5 minutes where the workload goes from potentially huge to low.

Though I share the concerns about making longer songs too inaccessible for newer players, so my personal idea of this has always been "Maps >4:00 and <5:00 need to have at least two difficulties, one of which must be a Hard or below". If we want to expand this to 3 minute maps, same thing with three diffs and maybe additionally set the requirement of a somewhat even spread but allowing it to be with only 3 diffs (to avoid N-H-7*), though there doesn't seem to be that much of a shortage of maps in that range so I'm not sure it necessarily needs changing.

A rule like this would also make banning mp3 extensions much more reasonable fwiw, since adding 50 seconds of R3 music box will no longer mean you need to map/get GDs for 20 minutes of drain time less. I've always been in favor of that under the condition of a more gradual spread requirement based on length.

just my thoughts, i like this idea.

there has been many times when I simply decided to not map a song because it was 4 minutes and 55 seconds long and i dislike the idea of editing the song.

as for new players, i think they would get really bored of playing a 4 minute beatmap, i know i would. so i see no problems here. tv size beatmapsets are regularly made so i doubt they will ran out of beatmaps to play.

Okoratu wrote: ct57

Saturnalize wrote: v4b1m

Still on topic, ban mp3 manipulation to loophole duration requirements because it's literally ridiculous

i tried to do that it didnt get received well

I would like to know the final conclusion about this. So you know, I can avoid attempting an Artist / R3 Music Box-map : )
At the same time any map comes after the mp3 extension ban won't be qualified.

To make my post relevant to the thread:
I myself also CXu's idea regarding spread requirements that are dependant by mp3 length (duration) and speed (bpm). It is strongly advised for the set to be 1 level apart and not a duplicating level tier, though (for example, if an mp3 reached 3 diffs minimum, it should not be ENI, ENX, EHI, EHX, NHX, and NIX. EXX, EEX, and any kind of stupid thing like that is also not advised) to ensure the curve of the map doesn't go wild (also EXX is stupid and probably one of those X diff is GD)

Also:

Stefan wrote: 72304b

Okoratu wrote: ct57

Saturnalize wrote: v4b1m

Still on topic, ban mp3 manipulation to loophole duration requirements because it's literally ridiculous

i tried to do that it didnt get received well

still sad people prefer to put less time on their creations than making it available for a fairly larger audience :/

Doesn't matter if the mapper is good therefore the map is good because I'm the bootlicker and want to make my god feel proud and accepted uwu

CXu wrote: 344051

I'd say add a minimum amount of diffs required for the spread as well in some way, so say minimum 3 diffs for maps <4:00, and minimum 2 diffs for maps <5:00. (Not sure how this would affect those Easy+Normal sets only though).

If you're mapping a 4min ballad you can get away with only a hard since Insane/Extra might not fit well with the song, and Easy/Normal aren't required.
This should make it so that easier difficulties for newer players are still created whenever slower songs that would fit lower diffs better are mapped as well.

i don't correctly whether there's a rule regarding difficulty count, but i'm sure that the only length appropriate for a one-diff map is 5 minutes and above. 5 minutes of length and below still needs to make at least 2 diffs. therefore it isn't valid and the mapper still needs to map another diff (whether it's normal, another hard, or insane) for the map to be able to be rankable

AncuL wrote: 93i4m

CXu wrote: 344051

I'd say add a minimum amount of diffs required for the spread as well in some way, so say minimum 3 diffs for maps <4:00, and minimum 2 diffs for maps <5:00. (Not sure how this would affect those Easy+Normal sets only though).

If you're mapping a 4min ballad you can get away with only a hard since Insane/Extra might not fit well with the song, and Easy/Normal aren't required.
This should make it so that easier difficulties for newer players are still created whenever slower songs that would fit lower diffs better are mapped as well.

i don't correctly whether there's a rule regarding difficulty count, but i'm sure that the only length appropriate for a one-diff map is 5 minutes and above. 5 minutes of length and below still needs to make at least 2 diffs. therefore it isn't valid and the mapper still needs to map another diff (whether it's normal, another hard, or insane) for the map to be able to be rankable

I know. I'm not talking about the current state of things, I'm saying that it would be good if the difficulty requirement for those lengths were lowered. Currently, if you have a 4:50min song and you have a really difficult map at like 7* or something, you would be required to map at least NHIX, most likely another X and possibly an E too, because people see the spread as not good. What I'd like is basically that something like, say, HX, IX, NX or something along those lines would be okay instead.

I guess it's not exactly the minimum amount of difficulties according to length that's the main proposal I'm trying to propose now that I think about it, but rather than the spread requirement gets progressively laxer until it hits 5min of length (or 6 in my opinion but yeah xd), where no spread is required anymore.

As for what laxer spread requirements are, it could a more relaxed easiest-diff requirement (such as it being a hard), but still with appropriate spread required (so ENH, HIX are okay, IXX, EHX are not), or it could be dependent on amount of difficulties and consistent spread, but not necessarily that the gaps are small/appropriate (so EHX, NIX are okay, but HIX or IIX are not), or something else entirely (or both).

I kinda disagree about huge diff gaps like NX or HX being okay. If you can map both N and X for a song, there's almost no way you cannot map anything in-between.
But i think you are saying that you want a spread based on star rating instead of difficulty name? Mind you that SR gap issue is already very subjective (with a certain value being the exact limitation), so I wouldn't agree to make it laxer with length as it isn't that necessary, this proposal is already enough to make mapping 4-minute maps rankable easier, and a good spread that isn't skipping a difficulty is good for certain audience who think 3.9* hard is too easy but 5.3* extra is too hard

Then again for mappers this change is cool, but players is not, you want to introduce people to the game and having less content for them here https://osu-ppy-sh.tvgratuite.org/p/beatmaplist , since new players usually search for maps at the first page (atleast that's what I did, back in the days).

Didn't the old approval thing work for years and was only changed cause it was redundant cause of pp leaderboards?

I dont see what the issue is with the 'new player experience' when it worked before

kwk wrote: 3r3b6j

Didn't the old approval thing work for years and was only changed cause it was redundant cause of pp leaderboards?

Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't it eventually changed to just be what we have now? (just that now it's both the same category because pp). It was "super hard/unusual or long maps" for a while and then just "long maps", though I'm not familiar with the exact reasoning behind the change.

That being said I don't see much of an issue with even an HX spread, if you have a 3.5* and a 6* diff then there should be something for most people (you can nomod/hr/dt the 3.5* and once that is too easy you should be able to play the 6*), only exception being very new players, and I doubt there'd be much of a shortage of maps for them to play anyway, Full TV size sets still don't require more work than a 4 minute 2 diff spread, and something like N/I would probably also happen as far as 4 minute maps go.

New players only stay at the "Normal" stage for a short while I'm pretty sure, once you get the basics of the game down you can at least somewhat play most hards and frankly they're way more fun (at least they were for me) since they aren't undermapped to shit. So I agree it's not much of an issue if we have a few less normals if the tradeoff is having more ranked maps just under 5 minutes.

AncuL wrote: 93i4m

I kinda disagree about huge diff gaps like NX or HX being okay. If you can map both N and X for a song, there's almost no way you cannot map anything in-between.
But i think you are saying that you want a spread based on star rating instead of difficulty name? Mind you that SR gap issue is already very subjective (with a certain value being the exact limitation), so I wouldn't agree to make it laxer with length as it isn't that necessary, this proposal is already enough to make mapping 4-minute maps rankable easier, and a good spread that isn't skipping a difficulty is good for certain audience who think 3.9* hard is too easy but 5.3* extra is too hard

No, I just said that I want the requirements of a spread to be laxer, regardless of if that's based on the gap between diffs, or what the lowest diff required is (which is the proposal in OP). The first "alienates" players inbetween (so H/I players, if the spread is NX), while the other "alienates" new players (if IX), but we already do this at a hard cap at 5min. It's not so much about if someone can or can not map a proper spread, but if enough people are willing to do so that it's worth keeping the current system over changing it to make more people willing to map songs of these lengths. Most 5min+ songs can have a full spread, if people are willing to put the time into it, but as we saw before the approval limit was lowered as well as the trend now, they're not really willing to spend that much time, and we're seeing a similar thing happening for maps around 4:30-4:59min.

But just lowering the approval limit itself isn't going to fix the problem, as you'll still get a huge difference in amount of work needed between a 1 second difference between, say, 4:29 and 4:30, if we just lowered approval cut-off.

What I want is that instead of having a cut-off for marathon length, we have a more gradual laxing of the spread requirements. The marathon length cut-off today is essentially just a "okay if your song is longer than this you don't require a spread".

As for why I mention the gap thing; if the minimum diff required is I or lower, as OP suggested, then if someone has an IXX map for example, and wanted to add an easy diff, they would also be required to add an N and H, which would detract from people adding Easy diffs if we follow regular spread requirements.

from the stats we have, we can see that Hard and Insane are easily the most played we have in spreads.
so to me, if we were to ever create a system where we can allow less maps via duration, i'd say as long as the mapset contains a Hard or Insane (or both), then the spread above or below that should not matter.

this way people won;t alienate the majority of players, and also not have to put as much effort into the sets to do a full spread especially for SRs above 6*

for example, a 3.14* Hard, a 4.8* Insane, and a 7.5* star Expert for a song in the 4 minute range would be valid

As requested from kwk, here are some (barebones) graphs. The delay was because my old scraping script broke between last year and now, since M a r v o l l o had a map with a tab character in the tags and SOTARKS had a map with a newline in the tags (I kid you not). Of course in my .tsv file the delimiters are tabs and newlines.



My interpretation is that the majority of Easy, Normal, and Hard plays are not on long (4+ minute) marathon (5+ minute) maps. Feel free to draw your own conclusions or request other graphs.

Source code

Edit: Show up to 6 min bins and add color.

Seems reasonable to conclude that Normals shouldn't be required for maps that are 4:00 or longer.

Should hards also be required at 4:00, or have that requirement to 4:30

x86 wrote: 6s526t

My interpretation is that the majority of Easy, Normal, and Hard plays are not on long (4+ minute) marathon (5+ minute) maps. Feel free to draw your own conclusions or request other graphs.

Can you make graphs with 150- excluded and play count values unified for better visual presentation?

Sinnoh wrote: 6x1m68

Seems reasonable to conclude that Normals shouldn't be required for maps that are 4:00 or longer.

Should hards also be required at 4:00, or have that requirement to 4:30

i mean judging from that data hards also get barely played beyond 4 minutes

@x86 it also seems insane is not played as much either. we need to compare it to the playtime of all harden and insane’s because our samplset for 4 min+ is very small comparatively. i think what i suggested holds water at least, considering the amount of plays we see on Expert+ on the graphs

Mentai wrote: 4j5n2g

@x86 it also seems insane is not played as much either. we need to compare it to the playtime of all harden and insane’s because our samplset for 4 min+ is very small comparatively. i think what i suggested holds water at least, considering the amount of plays we see on Expert+ on the graphs

the fact that insane play counts bump up at 300seconds implies that players at that level do in fact have interest in longer maps id say.

im wondering wether this data is graphed against the number of maps there are for each lengths or if its total numbers. because that would change how to view this data significantly

sdafsf wrote: 2r1f4z

Mentai wrote: 4j5n2g

@x86 it also seems insane is not played as much either. we need to compare it to the playtime of all harden and insane’s because our samplset for 4 min+ is very small comparatively. i think what i suggested holds water at least, considering the amount of plays we see on Expert+ on the graphs

the fact that insane play counts bump up at 300seconds implies that players at that level do in fact have interest in longer maps id say.

im wondering wether this data is graphed against the number of maps there are for each lengths or if its total numbers. because that would change how to view this data significantly

this could maybe the idea of having insanes on these sets even more then. i think having a hard as well would be a good idea still

Sieg wrote: 6nb42

Can you make graphs with 150- excluded and play count values unified for better visual presentation?

I'm not a fan of juxtaposed bars so I've used stacked bars here.

sdafsf wrote: 2r1f4z

im wondering wether this data is graphed against the number of maps there are for each lengths or if its total numbers. because that would change how to view this data significantly

To clarify, I am subsetting every ranked/loved standard map on every combination of hitlength (30 s) interval and difficulty, and then summing the playcount for all those maps.

x86 wrote: 6s526t

.

I mean this proportion should be expected seeing the more active players tend to get better at the game just from playing, but its no real argument against the current 5 minute rule. the best argument against those kinds of rules is when the playcount by worse players against the number of maps that exist for that length of song is equivalent to zero. why? because people who are bad at the game tend to not care about length of beatmap for the most part, they just end up playing their favorite music.

I believe if you guys move forward with this there should be an incentive or safety net for these lower difficulty players otherwise there exists a possibility that lower difficulties will become arbitrarily extinct and the player base for this game will no longer grow.

Having some sort of gradual and player interactive tutorial to get players to be able to play at least hards/insanes should exist.


Also I when i tried to get better at the game, at some point I would player the longer easier maps to try and create a sort of stamina or real consistency lol, and without longer songs having lower diffs to them that kind of approach would no longer be possible.
Similarly saying I'm not saying that lower diffs wouldn't exist anymore, but think about how newer players get into this game, they don't spend 15 minutes looking for the perfect map for them to play. They look at the recently ranked section and just some song they might recognize, or they search for the songs they like to see if there is something with their SR to it. So having lower difficulties end up being much more sparse just makes it to where they can't just find that one recently ranked map that has a diff they can play (given the possibility stated prior).


A lower workload for mappers will be appreciated for certain, but a game without some hand holding introduction like the one that exists with the 5 min rule now would lead to a decrease in number of players who start to play this game, which could lead to less people who play this game overall since many players can get bored and just move on to other games. At that point, who will play your insane/expert diffs?

bor wrote: 5s722g

because people who are bad at the game tend to not care about length of beatmap for the most part, they just end up playing their favorite music.

How do you know? 4 min maps require a lot of stamina just to play once.

bor wrote: 5s722g

I believe if you guys move forward with this there should be an incentive or safety net for these lower difficulty players otherwise there exists a possibility that lower difficulties will become arbitrarily extinct and the player base for this game will no longer grow.

There is no need to be so fatalistic. The vast majority of easy/normal plays are already on short maps.

That is because the majority of plays period are on short maps lol. Graphs with proportion of plays per diff would be more useful imo.

Still agree with proposal tho,

x86 wrote: 6s526t

bor wrote: 5s722g

because people who are bad at the game tend to not care about length of beatmap for the most part, they just end up playing their favorite music.

How do you know? 4 min maps require a lot of stamina just to play once.
>

bor wrote: 5s722g

Also I when i tried to get better at the game, at some point I would player the longer easier maps to try and create a sort of stamina or real consistency lol, and without longer songs having lower diffs to them that kind of approach would no longer be possible.
Similarly saying I'm not saying that lower diffs wouldn't exist anymore, but think about how newer players get into this game, they don't spend 15 minutes looking for the perfect map for them to play. They look at the recently ranked section and just some song they might recognize, or they search for the songs they like to see if there is something with their SR to it. So having lower difficulties end up being much more sparse just makes it to where they can't just find that one recently ranked map that has a diff they can play (given the possibility stated prior).

bor wrote: 5s722g

I believe if you guys move forward with this there should be an incentive or safety net for these lower difficulty players otherwise there exists a possibility that lower difficulties will become arbitrarily extinct and the player base for this game will no longer grow.

There is no need to be so fatalistic. The vast majority of easy/normal plays are already on short maps.

>being fatalistic? that's no argument against what I've said. you shouldn't restrict a playerbase you are trying to appeal to

thank you x86 and kwk for all your numbers, y'all are awesome <3

@bor pls dont just repeat the same disputed things others have already said unless you have something further to contribute

i agree with others that ratios would be nicer but those numbers already tell a lot, hards seem valuable for 4min length and normals are almost not played at all for that duration

and expert players are very clearly interested in longer maps compared to every other skill level

which are pretty much the claims that have been made in the proposal

going to try to reach out to eph or someone for some more data, gonna try to filter out retry spam and the like

UndeadCapulet wrote: 1t2uc

i agree with others that ratios would be nicer but those numbers already tell a lot, hards seem valuable for 4min length and normals are almost not played at all for that duration

From the graph I can see that pc on normals for 4:00 - 4:30 min is a bit more than pc on hards for 4:30 - 5:00 and even on insanes for 5:30, how is that - almost not played?

x86 wrote: 6s526t

Sieg wrote: 6nb42

Can you make graphs with 150- excluded and play count values unified for better visual presentation?

I'm not a fan of juxtaposed bars so I've used stacked bars here.

sdafsf wrote: 2r1f4z

im wondering wether this data is graphed against the number of maps there are for each lengths or if its total numbers. because that would change how to view this data significantly

To clarify, I am subsetting every ranked/loved standard map on every combination of hitlength (30 s) interval and difficulty, and then summing the playcount for all those maps.

It's like really late so this might make no sense at all, but could you scale these in of amount of maps in each subset?
It doesn't really help to know that there're more plays on easy diffs on shorter maps than longer maps, since that's probably going to be the case anyway because there're way more shorter maps overall. More interesting would be to see if the proportion of easy diff plays goes down or not as we reach 3-4min long songs.

CXu wrote: 344051

It's like really late so this might make no sense at all, but could you scale these in of amount of maps in each subset?
It doesn't really help to know that there're more plays on easy diffs on shorter maps than longer maps, since that's probably going to be the case anyway because there're way more shorter maps overall. More interesting would be to see if the proportion of easy diff plays goes down or not as we reach 3-4min long songs.

Which subset - the song length categories, or the diff spread categories, or both?

And what do you mean scale by amount of maps in each subset? Do you mean something like average (or median) plays / map?
I think it's difficult to extrapolate if more maps of a certain length and difficulty existed, they would get more played or less played. I'm assuming that significantly fewer mappers will map 4 min full spreads, but the proportion who will stop is also up in the air.* I'm tempted to make an informal survey of s, something along these lines:

1. What's your rank?
1a. What difficulty of map do you play most often?
2-4. Do you think there are enough Easy/Normal/Hard 4 minute maps?
5-7. Would you mind fewer Easy/Normal/Hard 4 minute maps? (*the thing is, we don't know how much fewer)

I frequent /r/osugame and surveys there get a lot of responses. I assume they're mostly representative.

looking at the bigger picture I think the current state with approval isn't well either at bringing longer songs available to newer players.

i'd say if this something like this was set in place there would be more incentive to create lower difficulties for players for those longer songs, instead of just not being mapped at all or extended to 5 minutes, by the nature of lower difficulties there will be always some mappers doing them because they are so easy and faster to make and to judge for BN's. the safety net is the modders/mapper's laziness lol, considering that this proposal is kind of meant for those who don't want to map a whole spread for longer songs ranging around 4:00 < 5:00 minutes.

That being said I think the pros and cons overweight of what we currently have, would be nice if we can atleast move on so those songs ranging around that length also get some love, we can always improve things further from there.

x86 wrote: 6s526t

CXu wrote: 344051

It's like really late so this might make no sense at all, but could you scale these in of amount of maps in each subset?
It doesn't really help to know that there're more plays on easy diffs on shorter maps than longer maps, since that's probably going to be the case anyway because there're way more shorter maps overall. More interesting would be to see if the proportion of easy diff plays goes down or not as we reach 3-4min long songs.

Which subset - the song length categories, or the diff spread categories, or both?

And what do you mean scale by amount of maps in each subset? Do you mean something like average (or median) plays / map?
I think it's difficult to extrapolate if more maps of a certain length and difficulty existed, they would get more played or less played. I'm assuming that significantly fewer mappers will map 4 min full spreads, but the proportion who will stop is also up in the air.* I'm tempted to make an informal survey of s, something along these lines:

1. What's your rank?
1a. What difficulty of map do you play most often?
2-4. Do you think there are enough Easy/Normal/Hard 4 minute maps?
5-7. Would you mind fewer Easy/Normal/Hard 4 minute maps? (*the thing is, we don't know how much fewer)

I frequent /r/osugame and surveys there get a lot of responses. I assume they're mostly representative.

I mean like, since there're more maps in general around 1:30min in length, then there's bound to also be more plays on those maps (assuming that most people don't go retrying the same maps a billion times on longer songs), so the fact that there're more plays on easy diffs in the 1:30min length compared to those at 4:30min length is to be expected regardless of if new players tend to play longer maps or not. What I want to know is how the trend of new players' amount of plays change as the length of the song changes, in comparison to other diffs. If the amount of plays on Hard diffs decreases at a similar rate to Easy diffs (so 10000 plays on hard 1:30 -> 1000 plays on hard 4:30 would be the same a 1000 plays on easy 1:30 -> 100 plays on easy 4:30), then it might just be a general trend with length in general, and not that new players in particular dislike longer songs.

Maybe it doesn't work like that; I don't statistics.

yes

whilst i don't particularly like this idea, i'd like a change to how the times are done if this was ever done

i think lowering the effort needed in these situations isn't actually great because in almost all rhythm games, the optimal length of a song is around 2 minutes (give or take about 30s), yet these rules (and even current ones) actively encourage mapping longer songs because you do a lot less drain.

i would generally say

below 4 minutes - requires a normal
below 6 minutes - requires a hard
below 8 minutes - requires an insane

these numbers could be adjusted a bit, but it's done with the mindset of at least giving a "marathon" map more total drain than a full spread tv size

i have previously been told my thoughts on marathon maps are overly harsh though so eh

CDFA's idea looked good. tbh I never agreed with the change of having to map the whole mp3 for every difficulty as most songs past 3 minutes are usually repeated or at least repeated with slight variation in lyrics, instruments, etc. The only difference between Section A and Section B of a song is the time at which it takes place. (Plus I think progression in drain-time is interesting, just look at https://osu-ppy-sh.tvgratuite.org/s/20237 xp)

Overall I like how we have graphs showing us exactly what level of players play what length of maps, I think this proposal has a better chance at going through because of that.

Looks amazing, can't wait to see where this goes xp

I looked at kwk's data and decided to use only values from maps ranked/loved 2015 or later. So the graphs will look a little different. Most noticeably, marathon maps are getting a higher proportion of plays for recent maps.



Per CXu's suggestion, I've graphed the average plays/map for each hitlength/difficulty category.

In my opinion, total playcount is a better measure of how much each category is getting played, but you can argue long Easy/Normal/Hard maps are getting pretty high playcounts still.

again goes with my theory that every map (that isn't the new 1 diff length) that should just require a hard of some sort since it seems that's where the majority of plays are, thus technically, the least amount of alienation.

for example, if you need 3 diffs, you can do Hard Insane Extra or Normal Hard Extra
if you need 2, you can do Hard Extra or whatever

i hope people don't keep ignoring this xd

Mentai wrote: 4j5n2g

again goes with my theory that every map (that isn't the new 1 diff length) that should just require a hard of some sort since it seems that's where the majority of plays are, thus technically, the least amount of alienation.

for example, if you need 3 diffs, you can do Hard Insane Extra or Normal Hard Extra
if you need 2, you can do Hard Extra or whatever

i hope people don't keep ignoring this xd

"Let's reduce alienation by just not having a decent spread of difficulties."

The plan that you're proposing sort of makes it into "let's only have difficulties that fit who we think are playing the most", which is problematic because that in itself alienates a LOT of people, which seems counter-intuitive to what you're planning.

Which is why I sort of have my idea up (I've been busy as fuck so I haven't really been able to keep up with this thread) that there are STILL spread requirements, but that you're not required to make sort of these super long and not intuitive 4 minute Easies, but rather you have something that is more appropriate for the demographic that is playing these diffs (which is a shorter difficulty that plays a reasonable amount of the song).

I once proposed an idea somewhere where you would have slots for how many extreme, insane, hard, normal, and easy diffs you can rank. The slots you have for higher diffs would depend on how many lower diffs you ranked and their length.

This can solve the alienation problem CDFA is mentioning.

For example, if you rank 1 easy diff 5 min long, then that would open a slot for one of the hard, insane, extreme diffs.
If you rank 1 easy diff that is 1 min 30 sec long, then that would open a slot for hard and insane diff, and it would require another diff on same or different map to open a slot for extreme diff

I am not sure what the best combinations for slot unlocking be, so it would take some discussion to find what is best.

abraker wrote: 5u2f3m

I once proposed an idea somewhere where you would have slots for how many extreme, insane, hard, normal, and easy diffs you can rank. The slots you have for higher diffs would depend on how many lower diffs you ranked and their length.

This can solve the alienation problem CDFA is mentioning.

For example, if you rank 1 easy diff 5 min long, then that would open a slot for one of the hard, insane, extreme diffs.
If you rank 1 easy diff that is 1 min 30 sec long, then that would open a slot for hard and insane diff, and it would require another diff on same or different map to open a slot for extreme diff

I am not sure what the best combinations for slot unlocking be, so it would take some discussion to find what is best.

no lmao.

That's way too complex and unnecessary for something that can be solved in a MUCH easier way by saying "Map a full spread but the shorter diffs can be shorter than the harder diffs"

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

Mentai wrote: 4j5n2g

again goes with my theory that every map (that isn't the new 1 diff length) that should just require a hard of some sort since it seems that's where the majority of plays are, thus technically, the least amount of alienation.

for example, if you need 3 diffs, you can do Hard Insane Extra or Normal Hard Extra
if you need 2, you can do Hard Extra or whatever

i hope people don't keep ignoring this xd

"Let's reduce alienation by just not having a decent spread of difficulties."

The plan that you're proposing sort of makes it into "let's only have difficulties that fit who we think are playing the most", which is problematic because that in itself alienates a LOT of people, which seems counter-intuitive to what you're planning.

Which is why I sort of have my idea up (I've been busy as fuck so I haven't really been able to keep up with this thread) that there are STILL spread requirements, but that you're not required to make sort of these super long and not intuitive 4 minute Easies, but rather you have something that is more appropriate for the demographic that is playing these diffs (which is a shorter difficulty that plays a reasonable amount of the song).

what? lol

this is in the universe of actually removing difficulty requirements. i'm, actually 100% against this proposition, i would rather map full spreads because it's a rewarding experience, personally.

the worst part of doing these things i literally because of spread, like you'll have to make a huge spread still if you want your 6* extra diff, and that's not really reducing workload in the way the people seemingly want it to be done. so having at least the base line where every mapset requires the most played diff out of all song lengths and not have to map 3 extras to fit a spread seems way more reasonable to me than anything else thus far

That's really great that you enjoy mapping full spreads. I do too. But that doesn't mean that the ranking criteria has to fit your personal beliefs of what is the most satisfying things to do. Otherwise you know my ass would be all over the RC adding shit that I believe in mapping . Ranking Criteria is just the baseline set of rules that people have to follow, and people are free to do whatever gives them satisfaction after that.

I don't really think that the goal of this is to really reduce workload in the way that you're looking at it. This proposition, at least the way I'm viewing it, is in the vain of making lower difficulties more applicable to newer players who want to play a song that might be too long for them to handle, or for mappers that aren't able to dish out 4 minutes of content when working with simplified rhythms. Something where you're trying to just get rid of spread requirements is pretty silly, because that's alienating people that still play easies and normals and such (as well as people that may play insanes if you map something like an HX spread, for instance).

Like spread is still important for making the songs applicable to the largest group of people, so I disagree with you wanting to get rid of spread requirements, but I feel that we need to be able to provide content that is more appropriate to the skill and developmental level of people playing these difficulties.

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

That's way too complex and unnecessary for something that can be solved in a MUCH easier way by saying "Map a full spread but the shorter diffs can be shorter than the harder diffs"

From the mapper's perspective that's great!

From the player's perspective that's like giving a newbie a 31 key toy piano while giving the better player an actual piano and putting them in one room to compare. You can learn to play things on the toy piano, but it's mockery and no more than a joke.

I am not in favor of cutting a difficulty shorter than another, and would put it as the last option.

abraker wrote: 5u2f3m

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

That's way too complex and unnecessary for something that can be solved in a MUCH easier way by saying "Map a full spread but the shorter diffs can be shorter than the harder diffs"

From the mapper's perspective that's great!

From the player's perspective that's like giving a newbie a 31 key toy piano while giving the better player better the actual piano and putting them in one room to compare. You can learn to play things on the toy piano, but it's mockery and no more than a joke.

I am not in favor of cutting a difficulty shorter than another, and would put it as the last option.

Well it's obviously not infantilizing the player.

Instead of using that comparison, instead say that you buy a person learning piano a 61 key electric keyboard, and then upgrade them to the full 88 key piano as they get more skilled and outgrow the instrument.

There is no real need for the piano student to have access to all of this extra range, all of the pedals, weighted keys, etc. At this stage of the game, they're leaning how to read music, how to identify notes, how to play with multiple hands, etc. They're building a foundation and it's in the best interest of the teacher to give them the appropriate tools that they need to become successful, instead of just throwing a professional instrument at them. If they HAVE a professional instrument starting out, that's fantastic, but certain instruments are appropriate for skill development.

That's why student horns exist. I played on a Jean Baptiste small shank trombone when I was first learning trombone, and it was easy enough to play for my 5th grade self to play. It didn't have a trigger, didn't have a large shank mouthpiece, and was relatively a very basic horn, but it served the purpose of teaching me the fundamentals of how to play the instrument, before I then decided to my Yamaha Xeno (rip in peace though, sold it to buy my Miraphone 1291BBb Tuba.)

With beatmapping, it's the same way. You're not producing less quality CONTENT, but rather you're putting the content in a sort of framework and level that the players can more tangibly handle, and that they player would most benefit from. Having a 4 minute easy really develops nothing (Except maybe endurance, but endurance is moreso built through consistent clicking over time rather than just pure drain time), so it seems pointless to have it drone on for that long when there are better avenues for development.

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

That's really great that you enjoy mapping full spreads. I do too. But that doesn't mean that the ranking criteria has to fit your personal beliefs of what is the most satisfying things to do. Otherwise you know my ass would be all over the RC adding shit that I believe in mapping . Ranking Criteria is just the baseline set of rules that people have to follow, and people are free to do whatever gives them satisfaction after that.

I don't really think that the goal of this is to really reduce workload in the way that you're looking at it. This proposition, at least the way I'm viewing it, is in the vain of making lower difficulties more applicable to newer players who want to play a song that might be too long for them to handle, or for mappers that aren't able to dish out 4 minutes of content when working with simplified rhythms. Something where you're trying to just get rid of spread requirements is pretty silly, because that's alienating people that still play easies and normals and such (as well as people that may play insanes if you map something like an HX spread, for instance).

Like spread is still important for making the songs applicable to the largest group of people, so I disagree with you wanting to get rid of spread requirements, but I feel that we need to be able to provide content that is more appropriate to the skill and developmental level of people playing these difficulties.

i'm reading the original post, not what has been thrown around in the comments here, it is essentially all about workload, and in general, spreads tend to be the reason why this huge workload even exists. so, it is probably the most relevant topic about this discussion actually

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

...

You do have a point that a new person doesn't need all the extra bells and whistles, but my main concern is putting the training instrument and the professional instrument side-by-side in one room. Without much know as to why one should play on the training instrument first, they see the professional instrument cooler and will opt to do that instead.

Incoming players mostly play songs they like. Why would such player want to play their favorite song tv size when there is a full version in another diff? I see new players boasting about how they 5* diffs with a bunch of misses, and then make threads in G&R complaining that they are not getting any better. I speculate this will give them even a bigger incentive not to play easier diffs which have the map cut short.

abraker wrote: 5u2f3m

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

...

You do have a point that a new person doesn't need all the extra bells and whistles, but my main concern is putting the training instrument and the professional instrument side-by-side in one room. Without much know as to why one should play on the training instrument first, they see the professional instrument cooler and will opt to do that instead.

Incoming players mostly play songs they like. Why would such player want to play their favorite song tv size when there is a full version in another diff? I see new players boasting about how they 5* diffs with a bunch of misses, and then make threads in G&R complaining that they are not getting any better. I speculate this will give them even a bigger incentive not to play easier diffs that have the map cut short.

Well that's on them lmao idk what to say lmao.

Probably a better comparison in that vain would be looking at repetoire in the music world. So like you do a quick google search or go on youtube and you're like "Holy shit it's the fucking Blue Bells of Scotland", so every trombone player goes, buys it, and just kinda fucks around on it and has a lot of pride that they can kinda play all of the fast parts, when in actuality they haven't really learned any of the skills or probably even played it super well, they just diddled around and made some sort of sound that is in the vain of the Blue Bells of Scotland.

As an instructor, I of course tell my students that that's NOT how they get better, and that they have to sort of spend their time working on scales and etude books and easier rep, but that is never going to stop them from going out and dicking around on stuff that isn't at their level.

The most I can do is to just sort of make sure that I'm creating enough content and giving content to people that is more appropriate so that at least THEY can get better at what they do, and when people who dick around on 5* maps ask "why am I not getting better", they can have appropriate material to then work with.

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

As an instructor, I of course tell my students that that's NOT how they get better, and that they have to sort of spend their time working on scales and etude books and easier rep, but that is never going to stop them from going out and dicking around on stuff that isn't at their level.

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

The most I can do is to just sort of make sure that I'm creating enough content and giving content to people that is more appropriate so that at least THEY can get better at what they do, and when people who dick around on 5* maps ask "why am I not getting better", they can have appropriate material to then work with.

Yes, truth be told that's how people who don't know better behave. I do urge to be aware of this and not to make matters worse by encouraging such behavior. You believe it's on them, but I ask to be thoughtful by deg things in such way that helps them.

great idea

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

As an instructor, I of course tell my students

Man you've been in osu so long you're teaching students now

x86 wrote: 6s526t

CDFA wrote: 6d6j4w

As an instructor, I of course tell my students

Man you've been in osu so long you're teaching students now

thanks for your comment.

x86 wrote: 6s526t

In my opinion, total playcount is a better measure of how much each category is getting played, but you can argue long Easy/Normal/Hard maps are getting pretty high playcounts still.

I wonder how many people of those easy diffs are actually beginners and not just 3k pp full mod players

Also I wonder how many people actually find these sets as redundant
https://osu-ppy-sh.tvgratuite.org/s/363118

Honestly, it really doesn't affect me in any way and my brain might not be big enough for this discussion but I decided to post here anyway. In my opinion, just remove the 'reasonable spread' rule from 4:30+ songs but increase marathon SONG length to 6mins (with drain being let's say, 80% of the mp3's length, which effectively lowers the current required drain time for 1 difficulty sets, round it to 4:50). 5min songs won't be extended as much if the alternative is just making an easy/normal difficulty without all the fillers nobody wants to make anyway. Let's be honest, it doesn't take nearly as long as the higher difficulties. It could also allow mappers to insert a goddamn break without worrying about drain time in their maps, leaving some breathing room for the players. That, or just don't allow mp3 manipulation in ranked maps, there are loved/graveyard sections in this game too.

I think this idea is really cool, can only agree tbh. Nice proposal UC

:0 i didnt like it but 7 page discussion is huh bye GL

Reminder that you can still make a full spread marathon. It is just a choice.
But if you want to map anything 4:59 or lower, it is a rule.

I'm all for more choices for mappers who want to undertake on longer songs. And if you enjoy mapping full spread, you can continue to do that

From my experience my N/H makes up half of the playcounts. So I will continue to make them regardless of this proposal.

I think people are missing a lot of new incentives a system like the proposed could bring. Not only would the reduced workload enable experienced mappers make 4-4:59 songs avaible to a broader playerbase (since instead of one topdiff+R3 or the map not being ranked at all, the spread would actually be directed towards a 4 and 5* playerbase). 4 min hard or normal only spreads would be a great opportunity for new mappers to get their first map ranked more easily. That's great, since new mappers are most often mapping to share their own taste in music - thus broadening the ground of genres/artists being playable in the game.
So not only would 4-4:59 songs finally be mappable/playable for experienced mappers/players - also the mapping community could potentially grow more easily in of numbers in mappers and artists being ranked.
One downside I could see would be that a lot of fresh music/artists new players search for wouldn't be immediately playable for them - but apart from that being some motivation to become better, I think you could nudge new players into playing appropriately difficult maps by well placed highlighted sets or some algorithm to suggest maps based on their previous plays.

TL;DR: Total number of maps would increase, as well as the growth rate of the mapping community, since it'd be easier accessible for new mappers. New artists/genres would be mapped by new people trying to get their music into the game - often with hard or normal diffs (since easier rankable). New players will more likely find ranked songs they're looking for.

Agreed.

this proposal would just allow people to be more lazy, and would reduce even more the content targeted for the newer players. it's a regression for the ranking criteria rules. (but i think 4:30~4:45 length approval would be okay actually)

if the player enjoys the game he will play any length. let's not assume new players would only want to play short songs.

if the mapper is not interested in mapping a full set alone, he won't, doesn't matter if the song is 4 minutes long or only 30 seconds long (https://osu-ppy-sh.tvgratuite.org/s/336471). why worry about this when you can have guest mappers completing the spread?

doesn't matter if getting mods/icons for longer songs is more difficult. if you want to rank longer songs it's expected that you will have to work harder to make it happen.

UndeadCapulet wrote: 1t2uc

and now people are even starting to use r3 music box extensions to avoid making them

this is the real problem, compilation maps should not be allowed anymore, or at least have reasonable restrictions, like allowing only compilations of the same album/artist/tv show/movie and don't allow compilations of less than 3 songs / less than 7 minutes, only allow compilations to be mapped as the same difficulty level each song ...

This doesn't stop people from making r3 music box extensions. It'd only give them a very small incentive not to do it. Anyone lazy enough will still extend the mp3. What needs to happens is extensions repeating the same song need to be banned. Extensions are the problem. Lazy mappers are the problem. Sure this proposal might encourage 1 or 2 people not to extend their mp3, but other lazy people still will. If a song is 4:30, its 4:30. It shouldn't become 5:00 just because you're too lazy. Another problem is the BNs willing to rank it.

I didn't read the whole tread (sorry) but the main issue behind the reduction of diffs in mapsets is newbies can't enjoy long musics because no one whould map it with a low SR, am i right ?

Well what is we ask both BNs and QATs to rank (and nominate and so one) an equivalent number of high and low diffs ? I mean, mapping is a thing, ranking is another and there're already way much more Ex diffs maps than everything else, you can find countless sets having only one Ex diff not designed to be rank.

Imo we should let mappers do what they want and require BNs and QATs to regulate everything. Seems like actually BNs are obligated to nominate good mapsets even if they don't like the music, that's false but from my point of view it looks like it.

And also ban R3 musics, especially combined with dragonforce

tatatat wrote: 3i245q

This doesn't stop people from making r3 music box extensions. It'd only give them a very small incentive not to do it. Anyone lazy enough will still extend the mp3. What needs to happens is extensions repeating the same song need to be banned. Extensions are the problem. Lazy mappers are the problem. Sure this proposal might encourage 1 or 2 people not to extend their mp3, but other lazy people still will. If a song is 4:30, its 4:30. It shouldn't become 5:00 just because you're too lazy. Another problem is the BNs willing to rank it.

Honestly I think this is the wrong way to look at it. The R3 extensions aren't getting popular because all these mappers are super lazy and want to rank the song with no effort, they are getting popular because they want to rank it, but just don't want to put in the effort to make a million diffs for a proper spread leading up to a 7*. Sure they will still exist afterwards, but 1) There will be less of them and 2) tons of maps that would otherwise never get ranked might now have a better chance since they'd just require one or two additional diffs.

The point of this proposal also shouldn't be a crusade against R3 extensions, it should be to fix the underlying issue. "Banning mp3 extensions" is just fixing the symptoms and also completely unenforcable (it's now My Sweet Maiden (Riven's R3 Music Box Remix)), not an extension right?

Banning mp3 extensions, even if there was some way to make it work, will, if anything, have the opposite effect, getting even less 4:30 songs ranked because extending them is no longer an option.

Saying people should stop being lazy helps absolutely no one. You can't force people to "not be lazy", and what's being "lazy" or not is in relation to yourself anyway. A new mapper might've spent a week perfecting their tv size 4 diff mapset, meanwhile an experienced mapper could probably mindlessly make that same mapset in a few hours, have a better map in the end, and still have been "lazy" because they didn't spend the time making the best map they can. Decisions to the RC should not be decided on things like "they're lazy so just make them not lazy"; it's not like you're going to change their behavior with that. Rather, it should focus on what it can do to maximize the amount of content for all players, and this includes more experienced players as well.

If the concern is new players, then we can be sure that calmer 4:30min songs that would fit a NH spread better than a HX spread would still be ranked. If the details of the current proposal doesn't sound good, then suggesting changes that could work such as you still require a normal, or the spread needs to be 3 diff, or whatever, or maybe you believe the current situation is good as it is because x,y,z, but saying "no because they're just lazy" doesn't actually help the problem (if it is a problem) of less people mapping 4:30~4:59min songs, without extending them.

CXu wrote: 344051

Saying people should stop being lazy helps absolutely no one. You can't force people to "not be lazy", and what's being "lazy" or not is in relation to yourself anyway. A new mapper might've spent a week perfecting their tv size 4 diff mapset, meanwhile an experienced mapper could probably mindlessly make that same mapset in a few hours, have a better map in the end, and still have been "lazy" because they didn't spend the time making the best map they can. Decisions to the RC should not be decided on things like "they're lazy so just make them not lazy"; it's not like you're going to change their behavior with that. Rather, it should focus on what it can do to maximize the amount of content for all players, and this includes more experienced players as well.

If the concern is new players, then we can be sure that calmer 4:30min songs that would fit a NH spread better than a HX spread would still be ranked. If the details of the current proposal doesn't sound good, then suggesting changes that could work such as you still require a normal, or the spread needs to be 3 diff, or whatever, or maybe you believe the current situation is good as it is because x,y,z, but saying "no because they're just lazy" doesn't actually help the problem (if it is a problem) of less people mapping 4:30~4:59min songs, without extending them.

I don't usually do this but

this.

once a map gets ranked it's expected that it will stay ranked for ever as long as the game is still alive, so just take your time to work on the map and stuff...

again, we can just include guest difficulties and tell the guest mapper to get at least one mod for his own difficulty/ask him to mod other difficulties. if you are able to make a very polished extra difficulty, there will be people interested in ing your mapset, and even if don't get that much attention you should be able to convince your friends to map a difficulty xD.

the truth is that most mappers don't even like to make low diffs. they will start finding excuses to not have to include them in their maps even on shorter songs if this kind of rule changes start to get applied.

lower diff's are way easier to do than hard and above... less objects, usually constant spacing, less rhythm variation...

i don't really have anything to suggest that could make the ranking process better than it currently is for longer songs, but i think this proposal would not fix anything and will create other problems, so yeah, just keep stuff the way it is... or just reduce a bit the minimum length required for approval maybe.

pimpG wrote: 4xr26

i don't really have anything to suggest that could make the ranking process better than it currently is for longer songs, but i think this proposal would not fix anything and will create other problems, so yeah, just keep stuff the way it is... or just reduce a bit the minimum length required for approval maybe.

fwiw this proposal is basically a way to lower the minimum length requirement of approval, just not as a hard cut-off as it is right now, but instead in a more gradual matter.

As I see it

Current System: Blatant cut-off --> Alienates a lot of mappers. (makes me not want to rank or map it at all, just because it's 4:30 or 4:50.)

New System: Gradual cutoff with a lower/difficulty spread

In general , there will be less workload for mappers who want to map long songs, which do not fit with the current Ranking Criteria. This also means that there will be more content for mappers to choose from, because as it is now, it can't be denied that some tracks just are a lot more troublesome to rank. This turns a lot of mappers off from ranking those songs (me included). If the changes are made, this will help introduce more new content to the game in general. BUT, this won't help new players as much, and it is undeniable that there will be less content for them as mappers who in the current system map 2-3 minute songs with a full spread, switch to longer songs that do not require a full spread.

This is a trade-off --> More content in general vs. Less content for new players. (how much less content is debatable)

Imo. this trade-off is fine. It isn't like everyone is just going to stop mapping their favorite anime TV-openings, their favorite FELT-songs and maps which are less than 3 minutes long. This will just bring more content for mappers to map, bring more new mappers in because they can map their favorite songs easier and bring more content to the game. If anything, not being able to play a song because you can only play Normals at the moment, and you have that one song you really like, which is a HIX-spread, should motivate you to become better at the game. I really don't understand why this has become an 8-page discussion. I fully the proposal.

I dislike mapping short vers/TV sizes, so I'm in favor of this, for what that may be worth.
As far as the cut goes, AncuL's proposal seems the most reasonable to me.

The song length proposal could also work if it was a gradual cut. Having NH be something like 2 minutes while I or X is 4:30 seems pretty unreasonable to me.
I could see something like a 2 minute N, a 3:smth H and a full 4:30 I work fine for a spread, though. We could maybe limit that via % of song that has to be mapped or something along those lines.

Still, more in favor of less difficulties but everything in the set having same length, personally.

if the drain time is <3:30 your set's lowest diff must be normal or lower
if the drain time is 3:30-4:30 your set's lowest diff must be hard or lower
if the drain time is 4:30-5min your set's lowest diff must be insane or lower

if the mapper picks a song that is 3 minutes long, he could easily eliminate the need of a normal difficulty by extending the song by 30 seconds, if he is not skilled enough to make a decent extention using only the original song he could just add harumachi clover to the mp3, there would be nothing preventing him from doing this... same applies for the other lengths to eliminate the need of the hard or insane...

unless more specific rules are added for compilations like i said, the hard cut-off will be the only reasonable way for dividing ranked and approval.

any song can be shortened if the mapper wants to do everything alone without guest difficulties.

I agree

pimpG wrote: 4xr26

unless more specific rules are added for compilations like i said, the hard cut-off will be the only reasonable way for dividing ranked and approval.

any song can be shortened if the mapper wants to do everything alone without guest difficulties.

But it would remove a lot of the incentive to do so. You can not reasonably regulate extensions because you can then just call it a remix and it's allowed (it could be left up to QAT discretion but that's just a recipe for drama tbh).

There's no benefit at having a hard cut off vs. a more gradual one. A hard cut-off makes certain song lengths far less desirable for mapping which is just bad for musical variety.

This isn't necessarily about making everything easier to rank (though I think that should be the way this goes), if it was "3 diffs for >4 mins, 2 diffs for >5 mins, 1 diff for >6mins" it'd still help with the problem, even though the workload for 5-6 minute maps would increase (by not that much if it just has to be one additional diff that's at least hard or below or something like that).

i don't even know why they allow compilations to get approved, osu! is probably the only relevant rhythm game that allows this... at least i don't seeing compilations in the other rhythm games i played.

if exploitable rules are added, people will exploit them the weirdest ways as possible. they already exploit the current hard cut-off. we should be thankful that we are even allowed to get maps approved with only one difficulty, because having a spread on every map ranked would be the best for the community in general and especially the new players...

LwL wrote: 5e326l

There's no benefit at having a hard cut off vs. a more gradual one. A hard cut-off makes certain song lengths far less desirable for mapping which is just bad for musical variety.

the first sentence is saying that there's no benefit while the second one tells that it has benefits. nice

PimpG wrote: 3qp1l

if the mapper picks a song that is 3 minutes long, he could easily eliminate the need of a normal difficulty by extending the song by 30 second

yea but by then there's less urge to do that. there's a difference between having to map 4 other diffs compared to 1

AncuL wrote: 93i4m

LwL wrote: 5e326l

There's no benefit at having a hard cut off vs. a more gradual one. A hard cut-off makes certain song lengths far less desirable for mapping which is just bad for musical variety.

the first sentence is saying that there's no benefit while the second one tells that it has benefits. nice

I don't see how having less variety is a benefit but ok

I misunderstood sry

pimpG wrote: 4xr26

because having a spread on every map ranked would be the best for the community in general and especially the new players...

I didn't see this before but I disagree with this almost entirely. Better for new players sure, hard to argue against that.

But overall? If that happened I can see myself losing interest in the game relatively quickly, it would mean very few long ranked maps, which happen to be the type I enjoy the most. It probably wouldn't even lead to more long difficulties ranked overall (making one diff for 5 different songs is a lot less tedious than 5 diffs for the same song), and the number of different songs at that length getting ranked would almost certainly decrease significantly.

was mostly refering to the players as "community in general", not the mappers

i don't want approval to be discontinued if that's what you were thinking
but i suppose having all songs mapped for every skill level would be the best thing from the staff's perspective, but they understand that mapping takes time, it's "voluntary work" so it gives no real reward for the content creators, and that's why the approval exists.

Yeah I can agree with that, in an ideal world every song would have a spread.

I'd say maps that are about 5-8 seconds short off of 300 seconds can be ranked on a case-to-case basis, but If someone did mp3 edits to extend it to barely hit this 5-8 seconds shortage, I feel like that shouldn't be rankable.

TL;DR being short 8 seconds makes me want to kill myself

Case-by-case basis is inviting people to complain about bias. Better to have a criteria everyone must follow.

I am absolutely behind this. I can say, with full confidence, that the extensions, mp3 editing, etc is based out of one thing: Laziness. It's stupid and completely pathetic. Seriously. This needs to STOP. How is this even allowed lol you guys are letting these esoteric people BEND the rules for the reasons that they're lazy, impatient or apathetic about making a full set. This is creating a CRISIS.

"it's his choice" "it's five minutes that's his choice"

His choice, his consequences.

This is a controversy amongst others that I feel is extremely perilous and actually quite sad. I could even conjecture that people who do this don't do it for the love of the music itself or that they genuinely care about the song, but that they want just "one map, one diff", say "It's 5 mins so I can get this ranked", and is even inviting other mappers to do the same. When I wanted to make a map of bassdrop Freaks 2018 Redrop version and tried to find people who to collab with, I was already aware it's only 4:30, but I was prepared to make a whole set. Mappers should realize THIS IS THE NORM. If this behavior continues, I feel like this kind of extending would increase to songs of 4 minute length, 3:30, and so on.

Say what you will, I firmly stand behind all my previous statements.

I will make it very clear that if my National Hangover Anthem aka Kac was looped to 4 minutes and people skipped mapping at least Normal difficulty for the song, I would be, putting it unbelievably lightly, pissed off to my very fucking death. If you make a spread, at least the standard one, and not a marathon map(set), then for God's sake, make it playable for noobs. We've already dropped the 1.99* star rating rule which is catastrophic in of how extreme so-called "easier" maps are nowadays and you want to take it to another level? God forbid, that is becoming a literal nonsense and pain in the back for the newer audience and I hope everyone agreeing on this issue starts thinking a little bit more soberly because that seems as if you all want to create only 5-10* content.

I'm crying for this proposal to die as soon as right now, I am not even going to hide how triggering that is.

Krfawy wrote: 155a6k

I hope everyone agreeing on this issue starts thinking a little bit more soberly because that seems as if you all want to create only 5-10* content.

No, I want to create content I enjoy creating, and mapping the same song multiple times very rarely falls under that for me. And I'm most certainly not alone on this or we wouldn't see so many sets with 1 diff per mapper. And for many, mapping a long song probably invokes a similar feeling as most songs repeat themselves, which also makes it harder to fill a 4 minute set up with GDs in that manner.

Krfawy wrote: 155a6k

I'm crying for this proposal to die as soon as right now, I am not even going to hide how triggering that is.

You can still force normals while helping with the problem if you just modify the precise rules a bit. It would still help as in of workload it's much less to map, say, N-I-X with the X being 6.5* or sth than a full spread that would almost certainly need an additional extra, or high star insane, as well as a hard.

Krfawy wrote: 155a6k

I will make it very clear that if my National Hangover Anthem aka Kac was looped to 4 minutes and people skipped mapping at least Normal difficulty for the song, I would be, putting it unbelievably lightly, pissed off to my very fucking death.

And as it stands you could just loop the song to 5 minutes instead and map only one diff, yay so much better! The point of this proposal is precisely to reduce the excessive amount of looping that came up recently, because not having a gradual cutoff is just screaming for loops. The workload difference between N-H-I-X-X and N-I-X is decent, but if the first is 3:40 and the second is 4:10, it's not that bad. However having a 4:40 N-H-I-X-X spread vs. a 5:10 single diff is huge.

Hi I'm new to this thread.

I tend to agree with this direction. It is hard to map easier difficulties over longer periods of time because it is harder to keep things interesting.

The argument of not having enough beginner content doesn't really hold because we already have a huge library of easy difficulties.

We should probably also disallow extending songs for the only goal of hitting a length. Cutting shorter is fine; extending should not be.

thanks ppy
but if cutting a song is fine, why entending shouldn't be then?

I agree with peppy.
including the part "Cutting shorter is fine"

Cutting shorter is done to make it more playable/suited to a rhythm game. Making longer is done to avoid mapping certain difficulties with basically no exception.