TGM time conditions across the entire series of games are always "lesser than", not "lesser than or equal to".
Maybe this isn't the best place for this, but in watching that video, several questions came to mind. I feel like there's a lot of pretty basic things I must be missing, because I can't conceive of how that playthough achieved that time. First, is there a good reason to keep the stack so high early in the game? And why so many singles and doubles instead of tetrises? I was under the impression that optimum play involves a moderate stack and as many tetrises as possible. Secondly, I see this with a lot of high level videos, but I don't understand - why so much (seemingly) unnecessary rotation? This happens a lot after 20G, where I'll see a piece that could be placed perfectly well without IRS come out in a different rotation and then put back, even if it doesn't need to move side to side at all. How does that help? My best TGM time is around 11:30, and while I'm clearly nowhere near as good as the player in this video, I don't know how there can be 2:30 of difference.
Yes. If the stack is high, less time is spent soft dropping to get the piece to actually hit the stack so the next piece can actually be played. Not sure about unnecessary rotation. I feel like it doesn't really lose time, and sometimes playing with the kicks gets a piece in place faster. It's extremely difficult to not clear singles and doubles in TGM. Also, it doesn't REALLY lose time if it's just a few. Line clear delay is the same whether you clear a single, double, triple or tetris. It only gives you some extra levels to clear a tetris, which is not really that huge if you're already on par for the grade requirements. The real saving is just that if you clear a tetris, you're less likely to have to clear another line to stay alive soon. The other thing to think about is keeping your stack clean enough for only tetrises might make you wait for specific pieces which can put you in awkward positions that would be slow to fix. This is actually one reason why I personally am very slow. I try too hard for Tetrises. Maybe someone can do better than I did with those questions, though.
I have a feeling he got used to rotating like that even in cases where there was no finesse gain from wall kicks or any overhang to work around. You can see some spots where it does push the piece without any joystick manipulation, but a lot of them seem like force of habit or keeping options open. He didn't use any of the more crazy kick finesse options, but I saw some instances of general use. It's better to take a "small" clear that improves the stability of the surface than it is to take a strange stack that you have to slow down to think about or has worse finesse options available. You want to maximize tetrises for the most part, but it seems the sub-9 players prefer doubles/triples in the early game due to reduced travel distance, minimized effect on the height of the stack, etc.
Many of the singles and doubles are made to avoid counterstops. Others are there to make the stack in a better statistical disposition, ie letting you place cleanly the few next pieces that should come out from the bag
Interesting thing is that Meso said he was essentially concentrating his play on doing 3 lines instead of Tetris, while stacking on the left instead of stacking in pyramidal way.
