Regulation about the stage order of 100%NG+ and future new game plus related categories
1 year ago
United States

I think dupes for different variables should be hidden because it would be weird to see a time from the same person that is on a different version, it just wouldn’t look clean

France

I made a mistake and reversed the function of the toggle. It's when it's off that multiple runs for one player may show. I also didn't receive a notification of your post for some reason. Also 20+ posts, dang

Edited by the author 1 year ago
Super moderatoramoser
He/Him, She/Her, They/Them
1 year ago

Yeah, I like having everything on the same board to start with. If it turns out that the out-of-order runs start completely overshadowing the rest there's no reason we couldn't split them up then. I think someone would have to really take full advantage of alternate ordering beyond what we've already thought of for this to happen.

I think it's essentially the same story for runs from the same runner obsoleting each other. If we get to a point where people are actually saying "I think the run I did in order is important enough that it should appear on the leaderboard, not just the other one" I see no reason to think we couldn't talk about changing it again then. But until that happens, I'd probably keep it at one time per runner, since having unranked times mixed in with other ones really does make it harder to interpret the rankings.

Balneor likes this
France

Changes done, runs retimed accordingly.

I've had to slightly tweak the rule set to accomodate for the fact that all runs are located on the same board, with the stage variable as distinction.

Speaking of a variable, I seem to have reached a src limit : https://imgur.com/gWnH9w2 Not enough space, it seems. Don't think we can do much about that unfortunately, without separating them via sub-categories. I don't know what you think of it. I find it a little annoying to read, as you can't be provided with the information without dropping your cursor on the dots. But ultimately, I don't feel that it's that much of a deal. Filtering runs still work anyways.

But if you guys are good with that (feel free to reply/add thumbups so your reaction is saved and apparent in the thread. Else I'd be lonely) then we can move on to talk about reviving the currently removed all visions category.

amoser likes this
France

I think it is time that we rediscuss the case of the all visions category.

As the name implies, you would need to beat everything plus the extra vision, requires saving every phantomilians.

This category was actually a real one in the past, but it never received attention, so it eventually got removed. It's only in 2020 that a player (elsiz) finally got the ball rolling. His runs are still available in the video section of his Twitch. And then the last couple weeks happened, the reason why it is brought up again.

Because DtP doesn't provide us with a convenient way to achieve such a run, I do not think there's much we can do but to have it behave the same way as its counterpart category. And since it suffers from the same stage order dilemma, given its new game+ nature, it's only logical that we follow the work we've done with 100%NG+. Thus, same timing definition, stage variable, sharing the same board.

As it stands, its rules would be : " Beat the game alongside the extra stage. You must start on a completed save file with 0 Phantomilians saved and 3 lives.

Mark your run depending on whether you've played stages in order or not (outside of extra and Nahatomb).

See the main rules panel for additional info on runs and submissions.

Timing rules :

  • Timing starts as the first played stage appears on screen.

  • Timing ends upon the first frame of Nahatomb's last health bar breaking up into pieces, after decreasing to zero. "

Finally, there's the question we need to answer as to the validity of this category and its brother as being main categories. It can fairly be argued that they don't garner much activity for them to justify their position, and so perhaps that they should be moved to misc. At least all visions, which is a little specific of a playstyle... but on the other hand I'm not really convinced that it hurts the leaderboard to keep them as is. It's no Odyssey Nipple%. Plus we have the place for it.

I'm not expecting much disapproval on this addition, so we might have it instated in only a couple days time.

Edited by the author 1 year ago
amoser and Nazzareno like this
Super moderatoramoser
He/Him, She/Her, They/Them
1 year ago

I'm inclined to give both categories a chance to grow on the main page for now, but I'm also not too concerned either way.

Having at least one main "100%" category seems to make sense in principle for a game like this, and I don't feel strongly about which of the two has a better claim to it in this case.

I was thinking it might be neat to have a skips/no skips variable similar to how we have one for the IGT abuse in Balue's Tower, but it sounds like the site design won't play nicely with it. There wouldn't be too much point in having it if it doesn't show up by default, and the other variables seem more important, so if there's no room for it I'm not really sure how this could work.

France

Skip/No skip variables for any% ? It's probably not this that you're suggesting, but if so, I think this just couldn't be. Alongside the visibility issue the stage variable currently meets, these two ways of play are simply too different from one another for them to ever be put on the same board. Unlike 100%NG+ and all visions, no skips would clearly never be able to compete with its old brother.

There's technically ultimately nothing wrong against organizing runs like that. But then, ask yourself. Src allows creating categories to separate types of runs, and sub-categories for small variances in play, for the sake of clarity. Why not make use of them ? Why put everything in a single board ? Not only we wouldn't be able to see everyone's runs due to the "only show player's lowest time of the board they're in" toggled on (and if it's not it will be a huge mess), therefore requiring a distinction between these two way of play, and that it would force players to always have to filter runs to get to what they want to see, cumbersome, being able to see both runs at once would be pointless in this context, and finally, we'd need to use even more variables which will only add in board complexity.

Give your input if you think otherwise, but I do feel that variables are mostly for run/setup information, whereas slight gameplay changes would cater more to sub-categories, and very unique gameplay would require its category.

And actually, writing this now, I think I would argue to return to a state of board distinction in the 100%NG+ category surrounding the stage variable. But also, as you made me recall, the Balue's Tower clock trick variable. Not only it would fix the variable visual problem, it would make things simpler while requiring less clicks to access than by filtering runs. It's what sub categories are made for.

I would need to make some small tweaks at the rules of both categories if this were to be.

Nazzareno likes this
Super moderatoramoser
He/Him, She/Her, They/Them
1 year ago

No, I was only talking about the much-smaller NG+ categories, not Any% (or anything where there's an existing, active "No Skips" delineation).

Splitting it into different sub-categories (or categories) is always the ideal, but I think there's a practical trade-off worth considering when we're talking about categories that have a very small number of runs to begin with, because there would only be one or two runs in the smaller sub-category and it'd require an extra click to even see them if it's not the default.

And I think that unfortunately diminishes the advantage to having a sub-category a bit. It's true that it's less likely that someone would naively assume that the No Skips runs were just worse if they're on their own separate page, but if there are only one or two of them, it'd also make it much harder (for someone unfamiliar with the game) to tell whether there was effort put into them or whether someone just submitted them because they'd be uncontested in a category that doesn't get much attention.

Edited by the author 1 year ago
Super moderatoramoser
He/Him, She/Her, They/Them
1 year ago

I should probably mention that if I had to choose, I'd probably also think having them split into subcategories makes the most sense for something like a "No Skips" version, but I'd be curious to hear from people who are actually interested in submitting runs that would fall into them or have done similar with other games (I'm sure I'll eventually want to try doing something like an All Visions No Skips, but for now it still feels pretty abstract since I haven't really even considered actually trying it).

As for the In-Order or Out-of-Order versions, the fact that they are in a sense still directly comparable makes me unsure about separating them. If (for example) only the In-Order show up by default, could that give a sense that those are the "real" runs and the others are somehow less valid or at least secondary?

France

Ok.

I sure don't mind the idea of doing all visions in a "no skip" way. But there's something that irks me about the idea of making a distinction for them in the board right now.

I've always encouraged players to run however the way they want, without having to abide by the official src game leaderboard rules, which limits the categories in which you can play. But why is so ? Why can't we just give a place, a chance to every single way of play possible ?

Technically, we could (although the site design would by no means make that easy, or pleasant to use). But what will we actually gain from this ? What, outside of dozens of empty categories ? This is my issue : I feel that this idea will very quickly belong to this spot. And if 100%NG+ is anything to go by, its future is foretold already.

Besides, how interesting would that really be to do ? What's the time difference with not using them ? Perhaps 4+ minutes, but nothing compared to the whopping 12 min difference of any%, which skips over entire levels and sections forever... when the most skipping we've ever done here is the dragging main hub movement of 6-1. And skip some portions of rooms, sure. But the run doesn't change that much overall. You can play without skips and reach perfectly good times that are still about close to WR. I'm perhaps reaching with this, but lots of games have such "hard tiresome tricks reserved for top level play only" like flagpole glitches in Super Mario Bros, and they have never opened any official "no skip" that removes them. If you're not good at them you can settle for slightly lower times, but still compare against other players. Why we made a distinction for no skips with DtP then, was because whenever a time was below 49, it had necessarily used at least one skip, which meant that any time, even 10 minutes below WR, would have required some to get anywhere. And obviously they were reported as tiresome for lots of players, on top of never getting to play certain sections, rooms and levels.

The only real utility that I would see in having both run types belong in the same leaderboard, is for comparison and statistics purposes, not any real ranking one (which it wouldn't do a great job at I recall). And since in reality it doesn't matter that an out-of-order run gets first place over every single in-order ones, as the gameplay, stress and optimisation factors of the run are nothing alike, I think putting them on the same board only hides their differences. And because of the current variable limitation, you would ultimately still be massively hindered in the long run by having to hover your mouse on every individual submissions all the time to show what the runs are made of anyways. Loss of quality of life.

For the downside of sub categories, I hear you, but it can't be helped. It would be the same if the runs were in the same board, the problem here is simply a lack of inhabitants and data to refer to. In case of the stage variable, the runs are expected to not have too much time differences, so both scale pretty well. If you got a 54 in-stage order time for instance, the skill equivalent for out-of-order would be either that or a little faster. For the skip variable, they would be about 3-4 min faster. But if you don't have this knowledge, if you don't know how these categories work, what can you do ?

And for your last point, a choice has to be made, thus one will always be "disadvantaged" by the other. My reasoning for why we would choose the in-order to be first is simply that showing a board that's completely empty and that will most definitely remain underpopulated is not a great choice, you'd rather want to prioritize popular boards more, show where main content of the board, game is first. As said, it will never be helped that one has the spotlight over the other. But our stance has obviously always been about both being valid. Something that I hope the wording on the stage variable rule line makes clear.

So in the end, I think I would still be in favor of splitting this board in two based around this variable, and the one in the extra stage too. It's pretty simple with the latter situation all things considered, as using the clock tricks save 3-5 in-game seconds compared to without it, giving a huge disadvantage over runs not using them, on top of being a little cheesy since it's a timer exploit. And we have clear player data of both ways of play having been pulled off, even at top level, unlike 100%NG+ and all visions. What's more, we could potentially reduce the number of sub-categories to only two : runs using them and not, which would be more appropriate. And in the stage variable case, although there might not seem to be much difference between one or the other time-wise, it's actually misleading as I demonstrated it. And it's still big enough that some people considered it as cheating, or more fairly put, awfully advantageous, which describes perfectly getting to the hard stages first.

And I don't feel much resistance anymore to the idea of moving both these categories to misc. 100%NG+ still hasn't had a single spontaneous run in years. Latest submission dates back to 2020 with elsiz, before that it was mine in 2018, then 2016 with chemigoku and Haru, then all the way down to prehistoric times, lies ferianjay's 2013 run. And all of these were top runners at some point, no random players. Even the move of putting it as a main category in the last couple years didn't seem to change that. Doesn't hurt to keep them as they are, sure. But when you consider spending lots of time and effort debating adding various ways of plays that are almost negligible to the point that it's clear that they'll never ever pick up in activity, you're starting to have enough at them, and instead prefer a nice, simple and relevant only game leaderboard. Unpopular stuff can remain unofficial until it grows big enough to justify it having a place. Once you've reached that point, moving stuff to misc isn't a very cost energetic move.

I am still okay with using our stage variable, but if we see that it doesn't live up to anything, it might give us reason enough to not repeat the idea.

Sorry for being perhaps a little forceful on these. it's pretty clear that I grew, at least for this post, impatient on the matter, and I might have missed your points.

Edited by the author 1 year ago
Super moderatoramoser
He/Him, She/Her, They/Them
1 year ago

I think we're actually saying the same thing regarding No Skips, unless I'm misunderstanding: There's not much point in having a bunch of empty subcategories for categories that are already very small, so that pretty much completely rules out having something like "All Visions (No Skips)" as a category on its own. I had originally hoped that a variable within the All Visions category might be a harmless way to give some acknowledgment to people who decide to do it that way, but in the end I realized that it probably wouldn't really accomplish that based on a number of different things including the way the site displays these things. I think that's more or less what you were thinking, as well?

As for the other things, I don't really have an opinion. Having In-Order/Out-of-Order separated would be totally fine I think. But keeping them together wouldn't bother me, either: if I really felt like people were gaining enough of an advantage by playing out of order that I can't keep up, then I'd just have to learn to do it that way too.

Regarding whether either of these are main categories or not, I think there's some pretty strong justifications for either choice there too. Almost all of Klonoa's contemporaries do seem to have at least one main category for 100%/All Gems/All Emeralds/All Whatevers (for sake of completeness I checked at least two games in each of Sonic, Crash Bandicoot, Croc, Mario, Spyro, Ty the Tasmanian Tiger, and Gex, and didn't find a single exception). That seems like a fairly good argument in favor of having one or both as main categories, but in the other games, those categories are also relatively much more active on average, even when the game overall has fewer runs overall and a less active Any% category. I think ultimately the most important question is whether they're more active because they're main categories, or if they're main categories because they're more active. The former would be a good reason to have them as main categories; the latter would be a good reason not to.

There are also questions of whether having them as main categories is a valuable thing for marathon submissions (which I know has come up in the past) that's worth considering.

France

That, the fact that it's overall overall not super different or really urgently necessary unlike no skips was for any%, and that that it's expected to have too little activity in spite of the place it takes and effort it took to bring here.

I'm more confortable with them being separated. Not because one may be faster and overrun the other since they're different anyways, but simply because of that difference. That, and the fact that having them not separated would make it more annoying to rank them individually... which we could avoid by filtering runs... but if we do that, why not just split them then

Interesting. If I have to guess, 100%NG+ might not be very popular here solely because of the annoying and tiresome gem aspect. I usually hear from people that they're challenging yet don't grant much about the game. All visions does the opposite, and it makes me realize that it could very well surpass it in popularity. Enough perhaps to grant it main category status

I don't get your question, shouldn't it be the other way around ? If the main population of a game plays a certain way, shouldn't it be granted a important spot in the board (as long as it's still ever so slightly meaningful)? Apparently some players are attracted by empty boards, like it motivates them to run them, but it never ever seemed to be the case with the old all visions. Nor the 100% (allowing Popka) category of L'sV... so that's probably not a good reason to justify putting boards in main.

And again, something I had never considered that you brought up. Parts of me want to believe that using thoughtful argumentation (assuming that what we want to showcase is interesting enough, else it will be difficult to justify anything) would be enough to be given a chance. Another part of me thinks that for a winning submission to such events, the played category would statistically probably be large or have enough history to warrant some certaincy over the validity of the submission. Is that too optimistic, perhaps ? Either way, I don't feel too too concerned about these things

Perhaps 100% should have been called all dreamstones all along...

Right now I think I still wish that we split runs that use the stage variable and B'sT clock trick variable runs. And probably move 100%NG+ to misc on top of it.

To change the matter, if no one say anything about all visions, I'll probably add both it and the stage variable tomorrow. To misc too, although that could change in the future

Edited by the author 1 year ago
France

I just now added the category !

To test the water and see how these thing showed like, I have currently put it in the misc tab category, as well as created sub-categories for the stage variable to compare it to 100%NG+. It doesn't look very bad at all at all honestly, and both are very visible. I though that there would be an unfolding button for the player to select what they want to see from, like it happened with the extra's 4 possible run types. But that doesn't seem to be the case with only two possibilities (or short enough names ?).

Not only that, I have also done the same thing with the extra stage, both in any% and 100%. And have tweaked the rules accordingly.

Depending on reception, we may reverse these, or make similar tweaks to 100%NG+. But whichever way it is, all visions is now operational !

amoser likes this
France

After some time, I changed my opinion again. Yea I know, it feels like it changes every day at this point. But this time might be the last one this topic will have from me.

Having both run types on the same board is hardly a problem at all. Yes, the variables can't be seen without the player hovering their mouse over it, but it's still something the site has accounted for in the design. Not greatly, but better than nothing. Trying to avoid it sure is desirable, but is it an absolute must ? No, it would be ridiculous to prevent us from using features. Especially because this is a thing : https://www.speedrun.com/mkw (https://imgur.com/a/ybzoQzj) Unless the src team fixes these glaring oversights, its fair to say we'll have to put up with these things. And it's not like we'll somehow manage to stay pure and avoid them with the Klonoa games. KBV will undoubtedly make use of more variables in the future, and we'll meet the same variable abbreviation we have now with the stage variable.

Outside of that, this configuration basically works the same as sub-categories, but it has the cutting edge advantage that we're able to compare all the different run types under the same board, always a cool little thing to play around. In fact, the timing definition change was more or less having this in mind. Would be a disappointment to not go all the way with it. In fact, the leaderboard linked above seems to do the same. And if you want a specific type of run, you can always filter runs. The downsides are negligible in comparion to what it allows us to do.

So I'll update all vision according to this.

I think I'll also move 100%NG+ in misc. Considering its history, it's difficult to imagine such an unpopular category to ever evolve in the times to come, even with a larger overall game activity. It's also far from being optimised. And that way all visions will have a buddy.

I'll finally still keep the extra board as it is. This clock death trick allows runs to be faster by seconds which means a ton. Both with and without simply cannot be compared. Also simplifies things.

Edited by the author 1 year ago
Nazzareno likes this
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