Clicking I get around 8 per second, probably more like 7 sustained. Standard scroll wheel I can get a pretty consistent 100. Also, everyone doesn't have a scroll wheel, I know people that just use a laptop/touchpad. I also think free scroll is a lot more common than you think, Logitech has been selling multiple models for over a decade, I have seen them in offices, and they have become pretty popular due to certain games benefiting from them and streamers using them. Number 7 best selling mouse on amazon is free scroll.
Most of that is anecdotal, which is why I was bringing up the click stats.
100cps and 140cps is not a huge difference when you consider the percentage increase, as I mentioned there is a bigger percentage difference between 7cps and 10cps than 100cps and 140cps. There is also a bigger percentage difference between standard mouse wheel and left click than free scroll and standard scroll.
To sum up my thoughts:
If people think free scroll should not be allowed because it is "too fast" then I think the true culprit would be scroll wheel itself, being 12x to 6x as fast standard click depending what numbers you use, while free scroll is only 1.4x to 2.8x as fast as scroll depending what numbers you use (the 6x and 2.8x using dha's scroll wheel estimate instead of mine.) Comparing between click types, scroll wheel is much more dominant over left click than free scroll would be over standard scroll.
If people think free scroll should not be allowed because not everyone has one/not everyone wants to use one, the same could be said for standard scroll wheel and that is exactly why we can filter leaderboard by click type and compete that way. I would be fine with putting free scroll in its own click type. I think it would be great to see what other people that want to compete with free scroll can do, without having an impact on existing left click/scroll wheel competition.
and it probably won't even make a sound making it almost undetectable if using an autoclicker in the background
As I mentioned earlier, scroll wheel and mouse keys already do not correspond to a body movement and they are allowed... standard scroll wheel can give dozens-hundreds of clicks per motion, mouse keys can give two.
Free scroll does make a sound, you can also very clearly here when the wheel starts (just like normal mouse wheel)
I think that only left clicks should be allowed as then we can tell the difference between an auto clicker and human movements because you cant tell with the mouse wheel speedruns
I know I said something else earlier and I still think the only consistent rule would be left clicks. but that would be super boring. And you still get an advantage depending on your mouse. I have two different ones, and with one of them I can't get neverclick for the helll of it. I think it would ruin the fun for way to many people if the rules only allowed leftclick.
A community vote to determine which clicking method should be allowed is the only solution my friends.
I also wanna point out that I did a quick math and montypap reaches 200cps with his auto-scrolling wheel
What would happen if someone has a mouse with a true infinite scrolling wheel, that you can activate and stop with a mouse button, and maybe you can also decide the scrolling speed, I don't know if this kind of mouse exists yet, but it probably will soon. Would that be finally called autoclicker? Or would it be allowed even tho an autoclicker does the same exact thing. Free-scrolling wheels are not yet at this point, but those should be considered semi-autoclickers, the difference is really not that much.
At this point, to me, there are only 2 solutions:
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Allow autoclickers, since people have already reached the hard limit of the game with free-scrolling wheels, and the difference between an autoclicker and a free-scrolling wheel is not that much, and there would probably be no difference at all between the two with future generations of mice;
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Ban autoclickers, ban free-scrolling wheel, decide if allowing normal wheel or ban that too (since it's closer to a free-scrolling wheel), decide what actual clicking methods should be allowed, only left click? Only 1 button? multiple buttons? touch screen + mouse? mousepad? require microphone and/or hand-cam, click counter on screen and any other measure to prevent from scrolling - autoclicking.
3...) keep it like it is now, but accept the fact that the only people who are allowed to use an autoclicker are those who possess a futuristic mouse, just because the autoclicker is "masked" inside of it.
Say we ban all non Left click runs, do we just throw out all of the runs that were done without one? I'm on board with whatever the community wants to decide on if we want to vote or come to some sort on consensus. I still think the easiest method would be to require Mouse cameras even though it makes the run a lot less accessible to runners.
I'm personally on the side of Left clicks only, simply because mouse wheel is way too hard to verify sometimes. also it make thingss more skill based.
i agree with thestrahl. you have to have one of those hyper mouse wheel thingy's if you want to take the record or even get near it. and its also basically no skill required, like all you do is scroll. and with actual clicking its more stamina and cps you can get and anyone can do it. like as in your mouse doesn't really matter for cps ( at least in my case)
so yeah i personally agree with left clicks only because it requires more skill and makes speed running this more viable for other people getting in to it.
edit: forgot to add this, i say that the speedrunning should be split in to two different categorys for cookie clicker speedrunning because if you cant get a impressive run for left click it just gets berried under all the mouse wheel speed runs. and if you were trying to flex on a friend he would ask why you where so low on the leader board and to get good.
and this may not all make sense cause im bad at writing
After reading a lot of discussion on the Discord about this (everyone feel free to join and say your thoughts there if you don't want to here) I want to quickly sum up my current thoughts.
I agree with drinkingcarrots and others for the most part that free scroll should be banned and boards split into left click and mouse wheel (with the few existing runs that are a different click type being put in here I guess, to be fair to the left click players?)
I do not think standard mouse wheel should be banned because that would delete a lot of runs and would also get rid of a lot of users that want to run the game like that, I think a more fair solution for everyone would be splitting it into 2 seperate leaderboards. Similar to left click it is very common hardware (pretty much standard on any modern mouse) and requires a similar amount of effort and dedication as left click to spin it a few times a second over the course of a run.
Also if a run seems too good (in left click or wheel) I think it should require a good amount of proof such as an on screen mouse tracker like mousotron AND microphone OR webcam to help prevent fake runs or simply people breaking the rules (using free scroll if they become banned, or using wheel but claiming left click etc)
free scroll saves a LOT of time, however it is basically identical to auto-clicking, and also isn't accessible to everyone who doesn't have a free scrolling mouse or a way of taking apart their current mouse
i agree with that we could split into two categories, either keeping the records on the current leaderboard and making a new one for left click/regular scroll wheel only (mabye call it Classic?) or removing the free scroll records and making a category for more powerful but less accessible clicking methods
If not, we could introduce a rule that says a webcam (or other verification method) is necessary if using a clicking method such as free scroll
for me, Mouse wheel clicking isnt really clicking. The mouse wheel isnt even meant to be clickable. So its unfair, and should be invalid like autoclickers.
