This will be the first part in a series of discussions that will try to isolate what players of a certain level should attempt to learn. It is easy to organise a list of things to learn by semantic topics, but that's hardly similar to how an actual human develops skill over time. The idea of these discussions will be to create a practical guiding path for aspiring Death players. I'm going to bed, but by all means feel free to start the discussion without me.
- How to use IRS properly: something which a lot of beginners I know didn't pick up. It should be held during the ARE like DAS is, and doesn't need to be timed as the piece enters. - General stacking, keeping it high on the centre, hole for Tetrises on the right, keep the 5th or 6th column the highest if possible. - Almost always IRS L and J so that they're in the orientation that the letters are in, because it's easier to move them across the field in that state.
Start with Death. Override lock delay to 120 frames, preserving the game's natural progression of ARE, DAS, and line delay. Would that be useful or harmful for beginners?
It would be useful for absolute beginners, but they might as well just play Master. By the standards of the series, Death 0 isn't that fast anyway.
I didn't mean going straight from 20G with "take your time" to 20G with short lock delay. I was getting ready to recommend getting 999 with long lock delay, and then decreasing the lock delay to 20 over the course of several games. By then the player should have a handle on what can and can't be done in 20G ARS, at which point he is ready for more speed pressure. Do you mean absolute beginners to Tetris in general, or absolute beginners to 20G ARS? People who post to tetrisconcept.com forums but can't break 200 are the latter. Master starts in <1G, which is almost as different from 20G as it is from Dr. Mario. The finesse is different. The goal is different (4-line clears in Master vs. survival in Death). The input is different; pressing straight up and then straight down within 3 frames is very difficult with some input devices.
You said 0~200. Not 100~200. As for the master thing, I don't think it's the finesse that matters. I think it's just playing for a bit from 0 to 20G and getting used to the way the pieces rotate. If people are dying in the 150~200 range, than I'd suggest they simply keep playing Death, rather than modify the conditions.
you might want to try playing Texmaster on Special Mode, and starting at level 400. You'll be able to move pieces in the air a tiny bit in emergencies, but because of the high gravity you will begin to think like 20G gameplay.
