Hello everyone! I'd like to finally get this topic sorted out so I hope to have as many opinions and arguments as possible not only from the well-known speedrunners but also moderators and even casual spectators.

Obviously for the past god knows how long, there has been a heated debate on the problem of major optional skips and the fact that said topic still raises controversies only proves that there has to be some decisive action taken (doesn't matter whether it stays or something changes). There are many skips inside the game but Climbless and Rocket Storage seem to have the most infuriating factors involved in the art of pulling them off that they make the community enjoy certain categories less. I'm going to talk about Climbless for the most part since it's the trick I have the most experience with.

My first point is the way you get those tricks to work. Climbless jump in Autumn Plains is said to be possible yet even the best runners have never gotten it. The biggest factor that makes this trick possible is the "bug" of longer jump that you get after 75 (90 for the sake of it) minutes IGT. As it's most commonly used in Any%, there's a massive risk of losing said jump because you failed level storage and had to restart the game. That would make your time completely wasted and it's the main reason why people don't feel any attraction to Any%.

Okay, but the other side will respond with: "just go with the normal route then?". In my opinion it's an unfair practice since it's literally impossible to beat a well-optimized climbless time with even the best possible nonclimbless run. Given the skip I discovered yesterday in Breeze Harbor that's possible only with longer jump () and saves about 10 seconds, it only makes the category even more unbearable for people going the normal route. Same thing can be said about Rocket Storage too - you don't have to do it, but you can say goodbye to your world record (or just very good time) dreams.

Now, how to solve this problem. Obviously, there are plenty of ways and arguments but I'll present only the most popular ones and maybe other contributors will come up with something more viable. So, the first one in climbless' case would be allowing console injector. Console injector allows us to change the speed of the game - that would shorten the time needed to get longer jump from around 75 minutes to 4-5 minutes which would be a much more acceptable value. The problem it would create though is an ability to cheat by setting the speed value to like 1.01. I think the solution to this problem would be as simple as stating in rules that the runner has to provide a proof of no speed alteration after getting the longer jump (command history at the start/end of the run).

Another solution that in my, as well as many other runners', opinion would be viable is simply splitting the categories to Any% Climbless/Any% No Climbless or Any% Rocket Storage/Any% No Rocket Storage for 3. I don't think the argument that "splitting the categories would be bad because there wouldn't be enough people playing them" is viable as I know many people who don't play a certain category ONLY because of how big of an advantage these tricks give while being very inconsistent/factor reliant. For climbless case, I also don't think that an argument of "but it'd be stupid since you'd have to restart the game before every run (for hypothetical no climbless category)" is right neither because you can still have the longer jump but go the normal no climbless route anyway.

I specifically left banning said tricks for last because it's popular but I think it's really not needed. These tricks exist and aren't considered flat out cheating, it's just exploiting game's unintended mechanics. The main problem is that they are very factor reliant but save considerable amount time that can't be overlooked nor can it be saved without pulling them off. I'd like to know what the mods and other people think about this topic because I think it really needs to be sorted out once and for all. Take care everyone!