2 second Section Cool rule

[Amnesia]

The cools are very stupid..The rule about the 2 sec not lower than the previous section is...stupid !!! http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_mad.gif
I often fail a cool because of a too fast precedent one, is it logical ?? Even if I do every section very fast ??
Pff..I should be m9, and I am only m8 because of section time 0,3 sec too much faster..
Do you have an idea about it ?
There is not a lot of stupid rules in TGM, but this one is ..

[kotetsu213]

Wow someone agrees with me.

I have a streak going right now... the last 7 Special Ti games I played refused to give me the 3rd COOL...

[mushroom]

Consistency >>> Speed

Don't do a mad time attack on the game unless you're able to keep it up.

[kotetsu213]

So I should purposely slow down the first 2 sections to ensure I get a higher grade.

I'll repeat what has been said: There is not a lot of stupid rules in TGM, but this one is ..

As if Special Ti wasn't frustrating enough already...

[mushroom]

The ideal solution would be to go faster in the next section.

[DIGITAL]

The cools are very stupid..The rule about the 2 sec not lower than the previous section is...stupid !!! http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_mad.gif
I often fail a cool because of a too fast precedent one, is it logical ?? Even if I do every section very fast ??
Pff..I should be m9, and I am only m8 because of section time 0,3 sec too much faster..
Do you have an idea about it ?
There is not a lot of stupid rules in TGM, but this one is ..
I agree. This is a retarded rule. The difficulty increases the faster you get and there's seemingly no true compensation other than a faster completion time (which would still be encouraged without the rule). It would have made a lot more sense if the speed kept increasing, but instead, it remains static after 1200. If you're not extremely consistent, chances are you'll miss one or more of the last 3 cools. Trivial things like one missed tetris or one tetris too much in a section can really kill you. I think it's ridiculous to punish a player for playing extremely well in a previous section and only playing well in the next. It's basically telling you to play well in all sections, which isn't necessarily a bad thing...BUT...if you can't, play average for all of them. "If you're not good enough, don't try." That's not really my cup of tea.

The true problem that I see here is that the game only punishes and doesn't reward you for playing consistently better. You play worse, you get punished with a missed cool. You play consistently average, you get rewarded with a cool. You play consistently better, you get rewarded with a cool. There should be an incentive to play consistently better other than to time attack, which could be done with or without the cools.

[Amnesia]

the last 7 Special Ti games I played refused to give me the 3rd COOL

Really ?? You to ?
What is the hell with this damn 3rd cool, the worst is that sometimes, I can get it in playing very crappy, on a keyboard and other time where I will do a perfect time attack, I will miss it.. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_confused.gif

[DIGITAL]

"If you're not good enough, don't try."
Let me rephrase what I said here.

HOLD BACK IF YOU"RE NOT GOOD ENOUGH!!! http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_biggrin.gif

[Amnesia]

Let me rephrase what I said here.

HOLD BACK IF YOU"RE NOT GOOD ENOUGH!!!

Do you have a problem DIGITAL ??
You don't impress me with your "3.2 - 3.5 TPS (192 - 210 TPM) manual locking consistency"
Be sure that one day I will make you cry.. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_twisted.gif

[DIGITAL]

Let me rephrase what I said here.

HOLD BACK IF YOU"RE NOT GOOD ENOUGH!!!

Do you have a problem DIGITAL ??
You don't impress me with your "3.2 - 3.5 TPS (192 - 210 TPM) manual locking consistency"
Be sure that one day I will make you cry.. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_twisted.gif
Hmm? I wasn't replying to you. I was just fixing a line I said earlier. If anything, I'm agreeing with you. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_lol.gif

EDIT: And as for the 3.2-3.5 TPS consistency, that's what I'm training for, not what I can already do. I've hit 3.7 TPS before but even holding 3.3 TPS for multiple sections is mentally demanding in and of itself.

[mushroom]

I don't know what you guys are complaining about other than you can't play fast enough. Seriously, section COOLs are exactly what TAP needed:

- It replaces the convoluted m-roll conditions by making them a part of the grading system
- It makes the game not so slow in the beginning (BIG plus)
- Since the conditions are part of the grade system, there is increased granularity and a far more specific indicator of skill, especially concerning how far away the player is from Grand Master (missed a COOL? go faster! got all COOLs but didn't get the m-roll? stack better! got the m-roll but didn't clear it? invisible training time!). TAP does not really offer this.
- The grades scale with the speed curve in a logical way (grade S1 is generally given around level 300, where 20G starts, and M1 is given around level 600, where the speed maxes out)
- It checks your section time at *70 rather than at a section clear, so level stops generally will not fuck you up unless you're going slow enough to get a REGRET.
- You get two effin' seconds of leeway! If you can't at least match your previous section time, do you really deserve a Master grade?

[Amnesia]

That is ok mushroom,
but definitely, no for me.. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_rolleyes.gif

Kevin Birrell

000-100  :  1:08:55  0:51:13  COOL 
100-200  :  1:10:00  0:49:05  COOL
200-300  :  1:10:61  0:48:40  COOL
300-400  :  0:57:68  0:40:20  COOL
400-500  :  0:59:05  0:38:73  COOL

Amnesia

000-100  :  0:52:46  0:37:83  COOL
100-200  :  0:49:68  0:34:38  COOL
200-300  :  1:06:91  0:42:50
300-400  :  0:50:26  0:29:81  COOL
400-500  :  0:36:18  0:25:50  COOL

[DIGITAL]

mushroom, we're not complaining about the inclusion of cools, only the 2 second rule. As for being strong enough to always match the previous x70 time or beat it, there's a flaw in that idea. It's counterintuitive for everyone who is not strong enough yet.

Take this situation for example. Someone does not perform so well on the first section but still manages to get the cool. On that first section, the player had stacked really high but didn't get to clear anything down. On the second section, he now has some extra tetrises to start with. But wait, if he makes too many tetrises, he'll screw himself for the next section. So instead, he's artificially making only enough tetrises to not be screwed.

The result is that the player performed a bad first section and now has to perform average for the second as well. There's no way to compensate for the bad first section by playing much better in the second section. If you do play much better, you're only screwing yourself in the third section. It's a nasty cycle really.

[mushroom]

Firstly, that's why you don't do badly on the third section.

Secondly, you're not supposed to compensate for a bad section. With as many grades as this game has, anything as big as a bad section is going to reflect in your final grade somehow. Doing really well after a bad section doesn't mean you're compensating; it means your game is uneven. It's the same principle as the grade point system. Sheer number of Tetrises doesn't determine your grade, what determines your grade is your ability to maintain a consistent number of Tetrises throughout the whole game. If you have any major slip-ups, it's extremely hard to recover due to the way the whole system is set up. Why shouldn't that extend to section times too?

That is ok mushroom,
but definitely, no for me.. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_rolleyes.gif

Kevin Birrell

000-100  :  1:08:55  0:51:13  COOL 
100-200  :  1:10:00  0:49:05  COOL
200-300  :  1:10:61  0:48:40  COOL
300-400  :  0:57:68  0:40:20  COOL
400-500  :  0:59:05  0:38:73  COOL

Amnesia

000-100  :  0:52:46  0:37:83  COOL
100-200  :  0:49:68  0:34:38  COOL
200-300  :  1:06:91  0:42:50
300-400  :  0:50:26  0:29:81  COOL
400-500  :  0:36:18  0:25:50  COOL

You probably stacked much better though, which is what the largest part of the grade system attempts to detect.

[DIGITAL]

It's not as easy as it sounds. The better you perform, the harder you make the game for yourself. That's a concept that's counterintuitive. If you put in more effort, the game should become easier, not harder. If you perform 7 tetrises in section 2, and have a clear field, it's freaking hard to beat that in section 3 if not impossible.

As for unevenness, are you telling me that if you screw up, you should just quit and start over? The consistency of tetrises is a good idea to encourage but to enforce it so that you can't even make up for one mistake? If you do, you'll have to hold yourself back in order to exploit the system? The message it's giving to players is not at all ideal for the player's improvement. I don't know anyone who can play perfect on their first try.

[mushroom]

The better you perform, the harder you make the game for yourself. That's a concept that's counterintuitive. If you put in more effort, the game should become easier, not harder.

You put in enough effort to have the game assume you're skilled enough to handle higher speeds and keep roughly the same pace with a small margin of error for balance. Depending on how fast you can finish a section, keeping up with the speed always remains a challenge even when you're absolutely solid in 1200 speed, and it doesn't expect slower but still efficient players to reach such lofty heights; the only penalty is a slower clear time if the player can make at least the baseline requirements, which aren't demanding at all.

If you perform 7 tetrises in section 2, and have a clear field, it's freaking hard to beat that in section 3 if not impossible.

You don't have to beat it. You don't even have to match it; you have two extra seconds for chrissakes. Accomplishing this doesn't require you to get seven Tetrises per section, it just requires that you make no large mistakes and the upped speed curve takes care of the rest.

one mistake?

One really big mistake, or many, many small mistakes. The grade point system doesn't punish you for making mistakes, it punishes you for not taking care of those mistakes quickly and efficiently.

As for unevenness, are you telling me that if you screw up, you should just quit and start over?

Of course not. Otherwise grades would have no purpose. You should play to get better, and the grades are there to help reflect any noticeable shortcomings. Getting Grand Master is difficult; it's supposed to be. The higher the grades get, the more the game will demand of you. That's just how it works.

[Zaphod77]

The issue is that if you clear the second section with 7 tetrises, it's because your stack was high going into it, and when you come out of it, you are likely to have a very LOW stack, and it will becoem physically impossible to get within 2 seconds of your section 2 performance, because it was a sub-par performance in section 1 (or major stacking at the level sto) that allowed you to do it in the first place.

The correct thing to do is to abuse the level stop in section 2 if this happens, to get yourself a high stack to repeat the performance.

[Rosti LFC]

Amusing that Amnesia chooses to surpass me while I'm away at a festival.

Personally I don't mind the COOL system and the two second rule. Maybe the notion that playing slower could yield a higher grade seems stupid, but Master for me has always been far more about rewarding consistency and high numbers of Tetrises over rewarding speed. For the speed freaks, there is Shirase.
I don't play slower but instead just make sure my stack is around the same height at x70 each time and try not to fuck up a section too much. I will miss the 3rd and 4th COOLs with annoying frequency, but I can make them often enough. I wouldn't say I was that skilled as a player, but I've managed to make every single section COOL before now (aside from the last one because I think I died around 960) just by giving the criteria a little attention and altering my play accordingly.

[DIGITAL]

You put in enough effort to have the game assume you're skilled enough to handle higher speeds and keep roughly the same pace with a small margin of error for balance.
I don't agree with putting in enough effort. The player should be encouraged to put in maximum effort at all times. The player should never have to sacrifice effort for consistency.

Depending on how fast you can finish a section, keeping up with the speed always remains a challenge even when you're absolutely solid in 1200 speed, and it doesn't expect slower but still efficient players to reach such lofty heights; the only penalty is a slower clear time if the player can make at least the baseline requirements, which aren't demanding at all.
That's the thing. The difficulty scales with your speed improvement. The grade, excluding the cools, does not scale at all. With grades, you can expect to get better grades the more tetrises you perform. You know that with enough tetrises, you can beat the grade system. With speed, you can't say the same. After a certain point, playing faster does not give you any advantage over the 2 second rule.

You don't have to beat it. You don't even have to match it; you have two extra seconds for chrissakes. Accomplishing this doesn't require you to get seven Tetrises per section, it just requires that you make no large mistakes and the upped speed curve takes care of the rest.
Again, I stress that this is easier said than done, given I'd say 5 is the average number of tetrises per section. The funny thing is that if you hadn't made 6-7 tetrises in the previous section, you wouldn't have to push yourself that much harder in the next section. In the very beginning, the speed curve growth is too slow to compensate for this (stacking for 1-2 tetrises is by no means quick) and in the end, it doesn't even increase at all (1200+).

One really big mistake, or many, many small mistakes. The grade point system doesn't punish you for making mistakes, it punishes you for not taking care of those mistakes quickly and efficiently.
Two seconds is not that big of a window to fix a mistake. It might seem insignificant to already elite players, but to an improving player, it's quite discouraging. It doesn't matter whether the system punishes you for making a mistake or for not fixing it quickly enough. It's still punishing you for not playing perfectly, perfect in the sense that you're playing like an elite player from the start. Anyhow, the point I'm trying to make is that given only a 2 second error window, maintaining consistency is harder than it seems.

Of course not. Otherwise grades would have no purpose. You should play to get better, and the grades are there to help reflect any noticeable shortcomings. Getting Grand Master is difficult; it's supposed to be. The higher the grades get, the more the game will demand of you. That's just how it works.
Not if the game is telling me otherwise. Consistency will often trump playing better. Consistency does not equate to playing better. A player can play consistently poor, consistently average, consistently excellent, or consistently whatever. What's bad about this is that the game will punish the player for the journey and only reward the end result. Here's a fictitious example.

Let's say a player performs average for sections 1-5 and gets a grade of 10 (made up grade).
Section 1: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 2: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 3: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 4: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 5: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Total: +10 grades

Now let's have the same player improve on section 1. Aww, too bad, the player gets the same grade even though he played better.
Section 1: Excellent = +2 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 2: Average = +1 for tetrises
Section 3: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 4: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 5: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Total: +10 grades

Let's make it more extreme. Damn, the player still gets the same grade because he got better at the wrong sections.
Section 1: Excellent = +2 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 2: Average = +1 for tetrises
Section 3: Excellent = +2 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Section 4: Average = +1 for tetrises
Section 5: Average = +1 for tetrises, +1 for section cool
Total: +10 grades

It will only reward you after you have become better in all sections or better in consecutive sections. The former is discouraging and the latter is arbitrary at best, Getting GM should of course be hard, no question. But the steps getting there should not be hard because of retarded rules.

[DIGITAL]

Here are two alternatives that I would propose. Both do not care about having a consistent number of tetrises per section. If you don't make enough tetrises in one section, that's already enough punishment because you'll have wasted precious levels and also have to make up for it in the sections after. So a player doesn't spread 10 tetrises equally across two equally hard sections, big deal. The total amount of tetrises the player makes across those two sections more or less indicates consistent skill.

Here's my first idea. For the current system, remove the 2 second rule and just decrease the section cool times to make it harder. Weaker players will not reap the benefits of the cool. Stronger players will always get the cools because they're strong enough. That's the mild approach.

For a future system, here's my radical approach: add section cool tiers. For example, let's say section 1 requires you reach x70 in 50 seconds to get the cool. If you can reach x70 in 45 seconds, you'll get 1.5 cools and then perhaps 2 cools if you reach it in 40 seconds. You can make it so that every 5 seconds shaved is worth .5 cools. The worth and time can change across the sections for balance. This would encourage maximum effort regardless of previous section mistakes or previous overexertion. And one last thing, this approach requires more grades than what we have now.

[Zaphod77]

Actually, the process of a game becoming harder as you do better is far from counterintuitive to the japanese. in fact MANY types of games do this. Most shooters have a "rank" system that makes the game get harder when you are doing better.

however the system can be gamed. When you get to 70 spectacularly quickly, then you have more time to stack high at the level stop, so you can get the net section cool faster.

That is what you are supposed to do. Use your good performance in getting the section cool as an opporrtunity to set yourself up for a good performance next level as well, and try to get 1.9 seconds slower, unless that will fail the baseline. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif

[DIGITAL]

Hmm, do those games offer a higher reward for the difficulty boost? The two second rule feels counterintuitive to me since the player doesn't get anything from it.

Exploiting the system to guarantee cools would definitely yield quick results but it just feels gimmicky to me. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_confused.gif

[Zaphod77]

Hmm, do those games offer a higher reward for the difficulty boost? The two second rule feels counterintuitive to me since the player doesn't get anything from it.

Exploiting the system to guarantee cools would definitely yield quick results but it just feels gimmicky to me. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_confused.gif

Yes, most games with rank give more opportunities for score as the rank goes up.

More enemies show up, which means more points. more bullets to cancel with the break laser means more points. more chip damage points on the enemies means more score. SO while the risk goes up, so does the reward.

There are a few notable exceptions. Battel Garegga is the most notorious for having a rank system that pretty much FORCES you to avoid powering up too much, and encourages (if not downright REQUIRES) strategic suicides to lower the rank (as opposed to tactical suicides that can do mega damage to the enemy you crashed into).

The thing is that stacking high at the break when you have a "too good" performance at the cool mark s not really exploiting the system. The reward for the extra fast section cool is time you would otherwise not have to raise your stack so you can make the next section faster.

Delaying intentionally before the cool break IS exploiting the system, and is punished by a lower S grade before the cools.

[DIGITAL]

The thing is that stacking high at the break when you have a "too good" performance at the cool mark s not really exploiting the system. The reward for the extra fast section cool is time you would otherwise not have to raise your stack so you can make the next section faster.
Yeah, that makes sense when I think about it. It's still gimmicky though since there's a lot to think about. You have to notice when you reach the x70 mark and make sure you don't get stuck at x99 if you're time attacking.

And yeah, higher risks should have higher rewards. Section cools already do that by skipping sections. The 2 second rule only makes it harder for the player without giving any benefit.

[tepples]

Consider this formula:
score += lines cleared with this piece
         * lines cleared with this combo so far
         * average TPM over last 10 pieces
Play slow? TPM goes down. (No need for TAP/Ti style grade point draining.) Make lots of singles? Lines cleared with this piece go down. Clear sections? TPM goes up due to lower delays.

But no TGM game uses a formula like this. Why not? Because that would make sense; we can't have that now, can we?

[colour_thief]

Whatever you guys say about the Ti cool rule, it's a hell of a lot more forgiving than the TAP equivalent.

[jujube]

arcade games are designed to make money, right? any rule that causes some inconsistency in the game result leaves the player thinking "i know i'm better than that, i just got screwed" and makes them want to keep playing until they get the result they wanted.

[tepples]

arcade games are designed to make money, right? any rule that causes some inconsistency in the game result leaves the player thinking "i know i'm better than that, i just got screwed" and makes them want to keep playing until they get the result they wanted.
That's true of redemption games or any other game with heavy chance. But DDR is not chance. And neither is Tetris, apart from the randomizer whose effect is minimized by the history rerolls and the hold box.

[rednefed]

Whatever you guys say about the Ti cool rule, it's a hell of a lot more forgiving than the TAP equivalent.
From the wiki, isn't TAP roughly the same thing? By 20G, finish a section no slower than 2 s relative to the previous section, and score a tetris or two. Seeing as the game speeds up after 20G, the 2 second rule there doesn't seem as harsh, but then again you don't have floorkicks, 3 previews, or hold.

[colour_thief]

Whatever you guys say about the Ti cool rule, it's a hell of a lot more forgiving than the TAP equivalent.
From the wiki, isn't TAP roughly the same thing? By 20G, finish a section no slower than 2 s relative to the previous section, and score a tetris or two. Seeing as the game speeds up after 20G, the 2 second rule there doesn't seem as harsh, but then again you don't have floorkicks, 3 previews, or hold.

Not quite the same thing. In Ti, the game isn't considering full sections. Only 00 to 70. So this means level stop is no longer an issue, and 2 seconds gives you a lot more room. 2 seconds slow at 70 is approximately equal to 2.86 seconds slow at 99->00.

[Amnesia]

It is not a really big pb, we just have to keep regular our number of tetrises..For my case, the only one and sure solution for getting every 4 first cool is to abuse of level stop, I stack fast enough to avoid the REGRETs, so it works very well. But It will be damn hard for me to perform a sub 6 with that..
Anyway, I will stay on my position and affirm that this rule is "counter intuitive" as DIGITAL so well said..

EDIT : ooups, I am a bit off maybe, I missed a whole page of the discussion..It is amazing that this problematic is so active..
EDIT 2 : very smart initiative to separate the divergent discussion like this one to a new topic..Nice job. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_wink.gif

[DIGITAL]

Whatever you guys say about the Ti cool rule, it's a hell of a lot more forgiving than the TAP equivalent.
From the wiki, isn't TAP roughly the same thing? By 20G, finish a section no slower than 2 s relative to the previous section, and score a tetris or two. Seeing as the game speeds up after 20G, the 2 second rule there doesn't seem as harsh, but then again you don't have floorkicks, 3 previews, or hold.

Not quite the same thing. In Ti, the game isn't considering full sections. Only 00 to 70. So this means level stop is no longer an issue, and 2 seconds gives you a lot more room. 2 seconds slow at 70 is approximately equal to 2.86 seconds slow at 99->00.
Full section or not, the difficulty is still determined by the player's performance so the base times of the sections don't really matter. The level stop is negligible with some attention in TAP.

In TAP, from level 500-999, your section time has to be better than the average of the first 5 sections. Given a 0-500 time of 4:30, that's 54 seconds average. The only sections you might have trouble in would be 500-700. 700-999, you''ll breeze through with the huge speed boost.

In Ti, the better you perform in the previous section, the more trouble you'll have in the next. People tend to not play as fast/mess up in the third section because of the increased gravity. Another easy spot to miss the cool is level 600-700 because 500 may still be slow enough to make a lot of tetrises and also because of the jump to 1200 speed. 700-899, the speedcurve doesn't increase anymore if you've gotten all the previous cools so it can be a challenge to maintain your time.

Overall, I'd say the Ti conditions are harder to satisfy the better you become, or rather, the more you strive to time attack. TAP's difficulty more or less lies with the one preview, no hold, and no floorkicks, which can hinder you greatly if you're not used to them.

[Zaphod77]

If you are getting good enough to where you start having problems with the cools you were not having before, then you need to change your plan of attack.

As I said, take advantage of fast times to 70 to help set up a solid and tall rectum for the next section. If you aren't good enough to do that, then you must slow down, and risk failing the total time requirement and not making s7.

They did NOT want people getting GM in this game. http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif Yes, the cool system is a bit unfair. It was put in there as a roadblock to overcome in your quest for GM.

You need

consistency
speed
tetrises

to get GM. A LARGE amount of all three.

I still think the cool system is an improvement over TAP, though.

[colour_thief]

Digital... All I can say is that you're crazy. I strongly disagree on the relative difficulty of TAP and Ti in that respect. It's a significant issue in both games, but Ti definitely has more flex.

[mushroom]

What digital isn't considering is that you have ample time to stack after *70 before the section ends, especially with the level stop. Regrets are pretty easy to avoid, so as long as you're maintaining your stack as normal there's no reason why you couldn't kick at least as much ass in the next section. If you can't, then you simply don't get the grade. I don't see where any of this is unfair.

[Rosti LFC]

I don't see where any "It's stupid because you do worse if you play faster" argument comes from for either TAP M or Ti COOL conditions regarding the 2 second rule. I mean, in every single Tetris game that exists, if you play slower you'll end up doing better, providing you don't start playing more slowly than the game allows.
I mean, aside from the torikans that exist to keep you playing quick, in Death you'll survive longer if you don't manual lock. In Master you'll keep a better stack and get more Tetrises and have less misdrops, meaning that you'll get a higher grade. Sure, the grade point decay will start to hurt you if you take too long, but if you slow down a little it won't make a massive amount of difference.

[mushroom]

I agree with rosti

[DIGITAL]

Digital... All I can say is that you're crazy. I strongly disagree on the relative difficulty of TAP and Ti in that respect. It's a significant issue in both games, but Ti definitely has more flex.
I still don't know what you mean about how Ti has more flex.

What digital isn't considering is that you have ample time to stack after *70 before the section ends, especially with the level stop. Regrets are pretty easy to avoid, so as long as you're maintaining your stack as normal there's no reason why you couldn't kick at least as much ass in the next section. If you can't, then you simply don't get the grade. I don't see where any of this is unfair.
Not unfair, but gimmicky. After reaching x70, you'd have to hold back from clearing tetrises and stack high with this strategy. Holding back from clearing at x99 is not an option if you're time attacking. But if you do this for every section, then it's no less difficult to reach x70 for every section after if you think about it.

I don't see where any "It's stupid because you do worse if you play faster" argument comes from for either TAP M or Ti COOL conditions regarding the 2 second rule. I mean, in every single Tetris game that exists, if you play slower you'll end up doing better, providing you don't start playing more slowly than the game allows.
I mean, aside from the torikans that exist to keep you playing quick, in Death you'll survive longer if you don't manual lock. In Master you'll keep a better stack and get more Tetrises and have less misdrops, meaning that you'll get a higher grade. Sure, the grade point decay will start to hurt you if you take too long, but if you slow down a little it won't make a massive amount of difference.
Rosti, that's not the real issue here though. In those other games, you slow down to increase technique, which results in higher rewards. You can do that in TAP or Ti Master as well. What's really bothering me is how in Ti, a better performance can result in the same grade as an inferior performance if speed remains constant. The severity of this unusual gap varies depending on the section(s) you improve on.

[colour_thief]

Digital... All I can say is that you're crazy. I strongly disagree on the relative difficulty of TAP and Ti in that respect. It's a significant issue in both games, but Ti definitely has more flex.
I still don't know what you mean about how Ti has more flex.


Like I said before, 2 seconds difference 0-70 is like 2.86 seconds difference 0-100. And with Ti's shorter ARE, DAS, and line clear delay, a greater % of those "2.86 seconds" will be active time. So it's much more forgiving. With TAP, it really doesn't take much going wrong at all to ruin your M chance.

[DIGITAL]

Like I said before, 2 seconds difference 0-70 is like 2.86 seconds difference 0-100. And with Ti's shorter ARE, DAS, and line clear delay, a greater % of those "2.86 seconds" will be active time. So it's much more forgiving. With TAP, it really doesn't take much going wrong at all to ruin your M chance.
Correct me if I'm wrong on this but don't you often pass the latter half of of TAP Master's sections with more than enough time to spare? I find in Ti, more often than not, it's quite close in certain sections no matter how fast you go.

[colour_thief]

Like I said before, 2 seconds difference 0-70 is like 2.86 seconds difference 0-100. And with Ti's shorter ARE, DAS, and line clear delay, a greater % of those "2.86 seconds" will be active time. So it's much more forgiving. With TAP, it really doesn't take much going wrong at all to ruin your M chance.
Correct me if I'm wrong on this but don't you often pass the latter half of of TAP Master's sections with more than enough time to spare? I find in Ti, more often than not, it's quite close in certain sections no matter how fast you go.

In TAP 500-600, 700-800, and 900-999 are generally easier because of the timing changes. 600-700 and 800-900 is where it's extremely easy to miss it.
In Ti, it's trivial until the speed plateaus at 700. 700-800, 800-900, and 900-999 are where it's easy to miss it.

I can lock all of Ti Master, and I feel I'll get my section cools unless I really don't deserve them for the most part. TAP is fickle by comparison, and I'll often feel cheated out of my "cools".

[DIGITAL]

Bah, I just realized I was looking at TGM2's M-Roll conditions and not TAP's. I knew something was weird. After reevaluating this, I deem both TAP and Ti equally difficult regarding the 2 second rule. I would agree that for TAP, it's quite easy to miss 600-700 and 800-900 like you said ct. The same would go for Ti at the speed plateau of 1200. I don't understand how TAP would be any more fickle than Ti in this regard.

[colour_thief]

I don't understand how TAP would be any more fickle than Ti in this regard.

Well, do you understand what I mean when I say Ti has "2.86 seconds" of flex by the same metric as TAP?

2 seconds /(70/100 levels) = 2.86

2.86 > 2 and that's all there is to it.

[DIGITAL]

I don't understand how TAP would be any more fickle than Ti in this regard.

Well, do you understand what I mean when I say Ti has "2.86 seconds" of flex by the same metric as TAP?

2 seconds /(70/100 levels) = 2.86

2.86 > 2 and that's all there is to it.
That doesn't make sense to me. The player's "flex" (if I understand correctly, you're talking about margin for error) time is determined by his performance in the previous section + 2 seconds. The length of the section does not matter at all. As long as the player can match his previous section time subtracting 2 seconds, the extra 2 seconds is equivalent regardless of section length.

[colour_thief]

http://www.tetrisconcept.com/wiki/index.php?title=Tetris_The_Grand_Master_3_Terror-Instinct#Section_COOL.2FREGRET_System (http://www.tetrisconcept.net/forum/../wiki/index.php?title=Tetris_The_Grand_Master_3_Terror-Instinct#Section_COOL.2FREGRET_System)

So, Ti uses a 70 level cool system right? And TAP uses a 100 level system. Those 30 levels make all the difference. If a player can do 100 levels within x seconds +/- 2 seconds, then they can make 50 levels within x/2 seconds +/- 1 second.

[DIGITAL]

I'll admit, the 2.86 does make sense when you reason it out that way. However, something else dawned on me. TAP's delays still decrease with each section after 500. Wouldn't that more than make up for the 0.86 seconds?

[colour_thief]

That's why I said it was only a big deal in TAP for 600-700 and 800-900. Also recall that I mentioned Ti's faster speed as making things easier. Not only do the previews and Hold allow for greater consistency, but the faster speed means that there is a smaller time difference between a full screen and an empty screen.

Even if it's an issue with fewer sections in TAP, I argue that you're more likely to randomly miss one of these sections with relatively solid play than you would be in Ti. If a player is not managing his screen height to appease the cool system, and is otherwise playing very well, the random variation in screen height can make you miss a cool more easily in TAP than Ti. In Ti a missed cool is more likely to be the result of a dive in play quality... Which is a perfectly legitimate reason to deny a cool.

[DIGITAL]

For 600-700, it's understandable as the only thing that decreases is 9 frames of line clear and you might not clear 6 lines for whatever reason. But for 800-900, you get a decrease of 4 frames of ARE and 6 frames of line clear which is plenty enough to offset the 0.86.

The disadvantage in stacking consistency due to one preview and no hold is a separate issue. The faster speed in Ti does not give it any advantage over TAP in terms of the difference between a full and empty screen as far as I see. The smaller time difference in stacking a tetris accounts for itself when you hit the next section and have to stack even faster to beat that. The player is just as vulnerable to missing a cool from not managing the screen height in Ti as in TAP.

[colour_thief]

Well, I still disagree with you. The higher TPS in Ti makes raising the height of the screen between checkpoints less of an issue.

But... Let's just ask KAN what he thinks next time we see him.

[DIGITAL]

Higher TPS to me means that you'll decrease the time you take to reach the current checkpoint, which raises the bar for the next checkpoint. The cycle repeats.

But yeah, let's just ask KAN for his opinion. Does he play much TAP anyhow?

PS. This topic has sort of drifted off into a comparison between TAP and Ti.

[mushroom]

I will admit that a good strategy would be to spend *00-*70 maintaining a clean stack and then line attacking the crap out of the remaining 30 levels. If you can make at least 3 tetrises from *70-*99 (maybe a little earlier than *70 to sneak in a fourth), then you're in good shape and the next cool requirement is not as demanding.

[Zaphod77]

that strategy will lead to lower grades overall. tetrising more often yields much higher internal grades. therefore, it's better overall to tetris from x00 to x70, and cleanly stack from x70 to x99.

That said, if you look at many GM replays, even though they have sub-40 second seection times at the beginning, they still stack high long before they reach 70!

It seems stacking high simply allows for more tetrises in the long run. it lets you take maximum advantage of the streaks of Is that show up.

Raising the bar is a non issue, except for the case where you went into a section with a high stack, and left it with a low one.

[mushroom]

Sorry to bump, but I just realized something: The section cool system's primary purpose has nothing to do with speed.

I mean, the baselines are there to keep things sensible and to make sure that you're adhering to a fairly undemanding threshold of play quality, but add all the regret conditions together and you essentially get a 10:28:00 time limit for the m-roll.

This leads me to believe that Master Mode doesn't put much emphasis at all on speed, just reasonably mistake-free play. For example, if you're able to reach level 070 in 30 seconds or whatever, then if you keep up the pace and continue stacking just as you stacked before, then you should have no problems whatsoever with going from 100 to 170 in 32 seconds because your quality of play hasn't lowered by any significant degree. Excellent playing doesn't make it harder on the player, the game just expects you to maintain an even quality of play no matter how good you are.

As far as I'm concerned, if you miss a cool then it's because you made too many mistakes or didn't recover efficiently enough from them, never because you made seven tetrises in the last section and you only made four in the current section. The only reason I can think of why you would feel cheated out of a cool is because of the granularity of the grading system making smaller mistakes have more impact on the result.

And of course, the stragglers who can barely make the baseline requirements will most likely have a lower internal grade due to general slowness and less efficient stacking. It's almost as if these two independent systems naturally create a single checks-and-balances system.

But I digress. The point is that if you spend an even amount of time stacking and clearing lines with few accidents up to 999, then you should never miss a cool.