Just for documentation's sake, due to recent findings, I will allow Dxtory to be used in the run to limit your FPS. Since it's use of an external tool + makes for a poor viewing experiences (due to the lag), I've decided to move the old runs to a new category (Any% NoLag) - Inspiration for this move comes from the ASAMU leaderboards, who handle the same issue exactly the same way.

I'm always open for more categories. I like the suggestions but would have to go over how different they are from the categories we already have in terms of playstyle, length, etc. as I'd rather see people pursue the categories we already have than to have too many options. What I would need to add some of these suggestions would be specifics on start dates and start option limitations.

I'm neither saying it's the only way nor that it's hard to share links. It's hard to find it in the first place unless you happen to go to the subreddit, go to the discord and ask about it there... Or happen to DM a runner (which are also hard to find). That's the reason why I wanted a SRC page, nothing else.

The main discussion was about the reason for denying it (it not being a game, just a gmaps tool) being invalidated by the fact that there's people running it and forming a community around it (our standpoint) vs. things like that not belonging on src (which is a valid argument too).

The discussion about the discord link happened because people are memeing and being unnecessarily salty. I'm still waiting for somebody to actually present a point as to why it would be bad to allow this game to the leaderboards besides "well, it's an arbitrary rule not to allow games based on google maps". What would happen, if it was allowed? I don't see a discussion here, I just see people trying to twist my words lol.

I might actually just start a dedicated speedrunning discord server. While it sucks having to split the community (competitive geoguessr + speedrunning geoguessr) it's probably for the best to keep track. I will update this post when that's done.

E: here: https://discord.gg/BX2gy (perm link)

Cool, the link was posted here and deleted by whoever posted it before. But yeah, as I said we use the discord for /r/geoguessr (which is posted in the sidebar there as well). As it's no longer in this thread, here's the direct link: https://discordapp.com/invite/MJAqQfW - From there you gotta ask in general to join in an active session as we do them mostly spontaneously (if you wanna do coop) or well, just post your own recordings which will probably get burried after a while. It's not that we don't care about new runners - we in fact would love to bring this game to more people and have some actual competition going - it's just that we don't have a platform outside of discord to promote. And the nature of discord servers sadly determines that people that cannot find the link won't be able to join in.

actually updated it and made a dedicated server that hopefully is easier to be found for some reason? But it's open invites so yeah, go ahead https://discord.gg/Q434q

• "you make people go through a middle man to get to the speed running discord 0-0 I have never seen that happen before or I hope ever again. personally"

No, anyone asking for an invite gets one, besides the fact, it is publicly available in the subreddit?

• "It's actually the least you could do to support your arguments and you're bewilderingly silent on this now."

The invite link was posted right above your post here last time I replied but since been removed. Also you neither tagged nor pm'd me either.

• "You don't need a src page to share a discord invite link smh"

No, but it's the quickest and easiest way for people interested in GG Speedruns to find it, don't you think? If anything is proven by this thread it's that people can't easily access it, which we would LOVE to change. (Also DMing me would have worked too instead of shitposting here lmao)

And we just had a run featured on the ESAMarathon channel for Hekathon here. While it's arguably not the best category to showcase it, it still drew in a lot of interest in the game:

It is also currently past first cuts of ESA and might make it to the marathon. I honestly don't know how much more proof is required that this is an actual thing people enjoy doing and not just a dumb meme lol

If only we had a page where we could share the invite link publicly and discuss speedrun strats etc. without having to send individual links to everybody via PMs after they happen to ask us for it hmmm :p

I mean, what you say @ShikenNuggets is true, those are the rules of the site. I am merely arguing that those rules may not be the best. You're still disallowing runs by default without looking over if the request wouldnt actually warrant the game to be added after all.

I don't wanna argue about the complexity of geoguessr since, yes, admittedly, it is "just a browser game" and relies on google maps.

The argument that the quality control has grown is weak if you take a look at the recent (https://www.speedrun.com/donalduganda) additions (https://www.speedrun.com/Hovercraft_-_build_fly_retry/full_game) to the site. And I don't wanna argue against those either.

The point is, if there's an active community for a game and they can prove the merits of it, it should deserve a spot on this site, regardless of how simple the game is.

"When the staff see a game like Geoguessr their immediate thought is gonna be it's just Google Maps with some kind of stipulation. Which is what it is. Can't fault them for rejecting it."

So what you are saying is, the staff shouldn't bother looking at the speedrun aspect of the game or even read the commentary or watch the videos provided if they dont immediately get what the game is about.

But a game where the only speedrun element is running into a wall within 5 seconds to kill yourself as fast as possible is totally legit, despite there being a single run ever recorded - because it's "designed as a game".

yeah that's about 3-8 times slower than a regular run ^^ good to see people care tho lol

The seeded pools are about 10k-15k individual locations deep, repeats are pretty rare. I mean, I get that there's some worries but everything is sound and reasonable once you're actually reading up on the rules and the functionality.

We're partially using the /r/geoguessr discord server for general talk and a private group between (most) runners for now (we would have loved to have the srcom page to share guides and tricks but oh well)

@blueYOSHI well if anything, your post makes me realize how people that haven't been provided with information might look at it - which also makes me believe that whoever looked over the request denied it either without reading the information added at all or just glancing over it.

There's not just "only competition" by "guessing". We use set seeded pools, official semi-random pools and unofficial random pools for competition. The guidelines are clear since every single run is scored. The most competitive category and the one we are applying for requires a perfect score of 25k (5*5k) and nothing less than that for a valid run. The "resets" arent different from literally any other speedrun where you reset if you invalidate the run. The seeds aren't worse than any Minecraft random seed run (which a couple of runners are familiar with) and we basically were looking at rules from communities where seeded pools and random-seeded pools exist.

The whole "just create a google doc" argument is the worst argument to not accept a game ever. The main reason this site exists is based on the fact that a community of speedrunners doesn't have to rely on a google doc being updated to track times.

This isn't even a piano-tiles like game where the run time is exchanged for "scores" - it's literally a timed run, just like any other regular speedrun as well.

I mean, it's mostly just time intensive to find the pointers for the loads (especially auto splitter, a simple load remover is much easier and just takes like three lines of script code).

https://github.com/LiveSplit/LiveSplit/blob/master/Documentation/Auto-Splitters.md

It's no magic, I just personally do not have the time or motivation to fix the thing.

Okay, I hope you're not too upset about me removing the category then (since a 0 day run is technically not a run ^^). Nice attempt though, I didnt think of husbands arriving at your court in 0 days. A clear oversight for this category for sure.

Generally, misc categories are meant to be quick or silly anyways, without too much competition in mind. But sadly there is no way to display a 0 day run, hence why I will remove the category.

I wasnt aware that Black Widow can be done in 0 days. I have removed the Papal Mache run since it has a similar issue. A recording would be great either way.

Yeah, 100k seems a lot but with certain strategies it can be done within a few hours. Strategy game speedruns like this are often notoriously long. The Age of Empires II full run is 27h (in a single session). While these are certainly extreme challenges, there are people out there that love to go for something like this.

You want to start at a certain starting point with a certain character but you are sick of re-rolling or starting with a weak character in Ironman mode?

But you also don't want to risk invalidating your run by making a mistake when doing some savefile manipulation?

Just let me know what character you want and which traits or other features you would like it to have and I can create a legal savefile for you to use and/or tell you about the limitations.

Also you can refer to the "Savefile Manipulation" Guide in the Guides section (currently WIP)

Yes, you are of course able to grant provinces to vassals. You just have to rule over every single province (no independent states, etc.)

For the DLC Question, so far any DLC can be active/deactivated. I see this opening up various strategies where DLCs can be used for certain strategies but I wouldn't want to force everyone to have all DLCs enabled.

If "No DLCs" would somehow turn out to be the far superior option for certain goals we could discuss splitting the categories into "No DLCs" and "DLCs" with certain DLCs being a requirement. It's mostly about what's fun and fast to play.

If there are any goals / runs that you think should be added, suggest them here.

I will keep this discussion open for any discussion of current categories and their respective rules as well as subcategories.

I assume that I could make any time work, since I'm CET I'd actually welcome one of those cruel 6-9 am EST slots as well.

I'd definitely look into a load remover for Livesplit. The loads in the game are terribly inconsistent and account for about 50% of the run time, making the leaderboard times pretty much incompareable.

I can see if I can work something out.