EnglandWhat Etsuna said, Feena basically just drops off more and more as the game progresses. When she joins your party she's by far the most powerful member due to starting with magic and getting Burnflame early, and then as you progress through the game the other characters just gradually outstrip her due to having better Skills and stats. She'll eventually end up being an almost entirely support character.
Considering how invaluable this site has become for speedrunning as a whole, I think the donation perks are more than welcome. I can't really fathom when people complain about needing to donate to get the perks, I just think, "Really?? You're getting a site for free that stores you and your community's PBs, resources, guides and everything else, and you're complaining about spending 5 dollars for some extra goodies?"
^ Yeah, Moderators can no longer see or edit the mod list. Not entirely sure if it's a site issue.
Yeah, there is absolutely no way that non-moderators could have the power to edit existing runs.
The vandalism would be unreal.
I can't remember whether the moderation shortcuts are an FFZ feature, but those honestly make the process of chat moderation as simple as one could wish for. Two buttons, literally.
Sparkster (SNES version) sounds like it would be right up your street, minus the glitches.
Very movement-heavy action-platformer game, the run is about 20 mins long at the highest level, extremely fast paced and plenty of boss fights with random patterns that force you to think on your feet and improvise if things aren't going according to plan.
Undertale doesn't really require any specs to run, so that may be an option for you.
Sounds like every other interaction I've ever had with you.
"Why didn't they give me a notification of any form that this was happening"
The site staff are not obligated to provide personal notifications for why shit jokes are being stripped.
@lolman-0027 No game should EVER have to specify in the rules that you can't use cheats or splices, because that's just implicit to anyone with two brain cells to rub together.
The point of a leaderboard is to compare runs of the same game. If people are modifying the game, they're no longer playing the same game, are they?
I'll come if you can pay for my travel.
This has never worked.
The Bowser Star doors are skippable because all they are is a physical door with a room on the other side. In other words, you're just clipping through a wall.
The key doors cannot be skipped in this manner, because nothing is on the other side of them. The act of using the key on the door triggers a loading zone, so clipping through these doors would just get you stuck in a void.
^ Whilst that is true, I would also argue that watching a video at increased playback speed is not advisable if you're looking for signs of cheating.
^ Can confirm, she has hair and everything.
As someone who moderates a lot of other games and also advocates for high verification standards, I'd like to chip in with my two cents.
The two specific issues that seem to be getting discussed here are self-verification, and time spent verifying a run. Both of these need addressing individually:
Self Verification: I agree with Jack that this is a generally poor practice that should be avoided when possible. I remember when this game was moderated purely by you, Skull, and in that case it would be perfectly reasonable for you to verify your own run should you submit one. There's no one else to do it, after all.
This is no longer the case, however, and this game now enjoys an extensive moderation team, which is great! What's not great though is how a lot of moderators are still verifying their own runs. There is no reason for this to be the status quo if there is an active team of moderators since as Jack correctly said, it undermines the verification process entirely. Humans in general are more prone to overlook their own errors and mistakes, and the point of verification is twofold; to ensure the legitimacy of a run, and to proofcheck mistakes in submissions.
The first point should not really be a problem. I would not expect moderators to knowingly and willfully submit illegitimate runs, as they ideally have demonstrated a degree of trustworthiness in the past to have earned their position in the first place. Holding that position does not make them immune from the second point though; the fact that they can still make mistakes in submission. Maybe they incorrectly entered a time value, or a version, or a date. If these details are not correct, and a second pair of eyes never looks at that submission, the problem should be plainly obvious. More than anything else though, I personally see self-verification as an indication that the submitter doesn't feel the need to be subject to the same standards as everyone else. I never self-verify in the games I run if there are other mods to verify my runs, because I don't think I should be able to skip the queue just because of my status. It's my job as a moderator not only to enforce the standards that I expect others to follow, but also to set a good example for people. It would be hypocritical for me to expect others to follow a code of conduct if I don't follow it myself.
TL;DR: Self-verification is in my opinion a bad habit which has no place in a game that has an actual team of moderators. Exceptions should be made for games with only one mod, and this game does not qualify.
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Time Spent Verifying Runs: This one is somewhat trickier because there are many different interpretations for how stringently a run should be looked at. Although I agree with Jack on self-verification, I don't agree with him on this issue, specifically his point about runs being verified in under the length of time the run actually takes. This point implies that all runs should be watched in their entirety, and whilst this is certainly ideal, I don't think it's necessary. If this game were super-active, I do not believe it would be logistically possible for the mod team to watch every second of footage whilst watching for potential splices or other indications of cheating. I do not believe it compromises the integrity of a moderator to "skim over" a run instead, unless a run is WR. Those runs should be subjected to the highest level of scrutiny, but for the majority of runs submitted I am more than happy to do an 'integrity check', that is, make sure that the entire run is present with decent quality and that the submission details are correct, then make sure nothing is amiss by checking certain key areas in the run. This will vary from game-to-game, but the mods of this game will obviously have a better handle on what that would entail than I.
Those are just my opinions on the matter, but I hope everything I said makes sense and is relevant to this game.
This query was answered by another moderator in the game's forum, Uematsufreak. Pasting the answer here for clarity:
"The reason we don't have glitchless boards is hard to quickly yet thoroughly explain. There are two main reasons. Firstly, it's harder to define what is and isn't a glitch in this game than is apparent. Multiple discussions on the matter have come up for years, and they all lead to extremely difficult (and sometimes outright confusing) questions to figure an answer for regarding a ruleset for such a category. Secondly, there's the argument that it's very easy to accidentally trigger small zips and other random oddities in this game, which could invalidate a glitchless run and lead to many dumb resets.
If I were in your position, I would go ahead and run Sonic & Tails All Emeralds Glitchless and go ahead and submit the time under the "Sonic All Emeralds" category as it would be a valid run for that category (as long as there are no inputs made on the second controller.) Then if, in the future, the glitchless conundrum does somehow get solved, the interest is there, and the board does end up being made, you could submit runs to that board at that time, as well.
It can be an unfortunate situation, but it is one that is much harder to tackle than it seems. If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask."
Even better, there's a magical button called "Capture Mouse Cursor" which can be unticked.
99% of speedrunners don't know this exists.
