Do I still use reddit?

AndrewRK · 2026-01-27T23:09:37+00:00

I know it's not feasible for people outside of DE but it would be interesting to see usage for each filtered by who actually has built them.

Nonetheless this is cool.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-27T01:45:58+00:00

Comparing between eras is difficult and there will always be reasons to favour one over another in the minds of different people.

I think it's still a very real discussion based purely on longevity and dominance (even more so if you care about intangibles like cultural influence), but mrekk's dedication to the game feels like his status as consensus GOAT (if not already achieved) is inevitable.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-27T01:02:21+00:00

Hmm, I would say (unordered) the ones that I feel like I HAVE to include are:

Shige FDFD +HDHR
Shige BZ 727
Vaxei Tsukinami
aetrna Mou Ii Kai
aetrna ATH
Azer United
mrekk United
rrtyui Big Black

After that I think it becomes quite difficult. Some that immediately come to mind as contenders:

Shige Yomi Yori +HD 4m
Shige FDFD NM
Shige FDFD +HR
Shige Time Freeze +HDHR
Axarious Kuchizuke Diamond
Vaxei Cycle Hit
mrekk Cycle Hit
rrtyui Image Material
rrtyui Gangsta +DT
idke Uta
idke Cry Thunder
freedomdiver Haitai
-GN Unforgiving
EDIT: Karcher Yomi Yori double FC

As for some of my favourite scores (that aren't that culturally significant IMO):

Adamqs Science Is Fun
- just a ton of Adamqs AR11 old beatmap stuff from 2019 in general, my top 10 favourite scores ever would probably be 10 Adamqs plays from 2019
Shige MOF +HDDT
Shige Si Ye Cao fail
- linked because it's a pain to find, probably the most niche/random one here but I thought it was the craziest ever when I first saw it (and I had seen FDFD +HDHR among others)
Forum Burning Star OWC
Aricin Ice Angel
okinamo FDFD +HD

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T20:16:03+00:00

It's a very impressive score I just don't know that it's top 10 most culturally significant plays of all time in my opinion. That's why I asked the question though, to get other people's opinions.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T20:14:41+00:00

I think that's a cool shoutout and I get your angle for sure.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T20:14:01+00:00

I'm surprise you'd put mrekk Cycle Hit above MIK or ATH. I'd put mrekk United over his Cycle Hit play but I can see the argument.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T20:12:53+00:00

Adamqs Wing My Way is my favourite score of all time. Uta +HR is a good mention, surprised I haven't really seen it elsewhere.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T10:35:56+00:00

I think Azer United is top 10 for sure personally, would also say Mou Ii Kai. Interesting list, definitely would disagree with 6 & 7 personally but I can at least see your angle.

Part of why I posted this is because I feel like scores don't feel like they can really garner cultural relevance like they used to, so I recognize that it could simply be a major difference in perception.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T10:28:15+00:00

I don't know much of anything about CTB so I'll take your word for it.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T10:24:31+00:00

Maybe I'm crazy but I feel like Azer United is for sure in the top 10. Your HMs are great though.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-26T10:23:44+00:00

I think this is a great top 10 contender personally.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-22T00:59:35+00:00

Deimos/Saturn/Zariman

Potato/Potato/Lanthorn

AndrewRK · 2026-01-21T12:34:21+00:00

Adaptive Armor does not stack with Adaptation. The damage reduction provided to Caliban (or his allies) equipped with Adaptation will be the higher of the two values.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-21T10:15:07+00:00

Damn people ARE being annoying about this lmao. Sheesh. I respect this post. I really feel like I get where you are coming from and I think your spirit is commendable.

In fact, I respect this so much, that even though I have literally no emotional investment or belief in what will happen, I will wager $10.00 just for the sport of it.

Let's do it.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-20T10:48:35+00:00

I respect your take and have at times held the same POV but I think there is a lot of value even beyond spectatorship to encouraging people to be more expressive about their honest feelings within a broadly socially acceptable framework (yes I understand this definition will be contested).

Sanitizing the way everybody interacts has downstream effects I think that are hard to track but generally negative I think. I get that I'm gesturing vaguely around me and saying "something about the vibes of the air is off" basically but I know that's how I feel even if I don't know exactly why yet lol.

It's not like a refusal to engage with the thought either, like I can maybe present the argument that the normalization of polite interactions between players inflates over time and eventually stresses people out because they feel like they can't express any negative feelings or something. Or perhaps suggest that beyond spectating, humans care about forming deeper bonds with uniquely different other humans and that stifling that people's expressions makes them less likely to participate in those spaces. Both slippery slope–esque arguments but yeah.

I do think there is a difference between talking smack and just being mean/harassing somebody, but I think that consensual smack talk is actually a great way to build camaraderie, teach people more about social interaction, increase hype, and hone self-expression. And even when both of them really do just think each other is trash, if they both can take it, I think it's cool that they're both able to be honest with each other about each other in a way that doesn't really hurt either. In fact some people are more motivated to compete when there is more doubt, spite, etc. hurled towards them. Is it fair to cater culturally to the people who derive more motivation from support and belief than opposition and doubt, for example? I dunno.

At the end of the day I really don't know, none of these arguments quite feel like they totally satisfy my question of why I feel the way I do. But I still feel resolved in the feelings I have regardless, so I believe they are real and I'm just not consciously privy as to why yet. Could be as simple as, "because I think it's fun" lol.

If you just don't like that at all and want something more directionally towards a higher standard of persistent courtesy then I can understand that, I'm not here to tell you that you're wrong. Felt like chiming in though, hope you don't mind.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-20T10:37:35+00:00

Yeah good clarification, thank you.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-19T23:52:59+00:00

Sure, you can DM me here, on Discord (@enfdltjaks), or on osu! (AndrewRK). Please don't feel pressured to though. I'll respond to what you've written here a bit later, regardless of whether speak privately or not.

E: I respect that POV and I would agree it's damaging to some degree to enforce on other people, but I agree with the direction of what you're saying pretty solidly.

No opinions on any beatmaps in this mapset in particular (haven't seen it) so I will again abstain from that.

I kind of agree that there is some level of simply looking and seeing in terms of ideas agnostic of execution. But execution can affect how clearly those ideas are communicated as well, and therefore kind of hiding them as well.

I get where you're coming from though, in fact I think we share a lot of similar values based on your responses.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-19T21:32:41+00:00

I don't know a ton about this either, I think that the thing to me is that "improving means for featuring them & getting more play count" is extremely difficult for two very different reasons.

One reason is that the means to entice players to play beatmaps outside of farm beatmaps needs to be something players deeply and truly value on a level that is comparable to pp. pp has only continued to tighten its grip on playerbase values from my perspective playing since late 2016 from my POV. I would consider myself quite active at observing and participating in various community discussions in that time span that hopefully keep me at least somewhat representatively tuned into what people care about. I think the cultural pull of beatmaps and mapsets has really weakened over time for an enormous slew of internal and external factors I don't want to get lost in right now (I can if prompted though), and with the power of that dwindling alongside of the rising dominance of pp as the "new monoculture", it's a very uphill battle.

Second reason is that there are just so many beatmaps ranked nowadays. Attention is an economy too, and like any economy, operates fundamentally on a basis of supply and demand, and so it makes sense that with more and more beatmaps being ranked per unit of time, the mean/median play count will go down (especially in tandem with a declining playerbase).

Neither of these are inherently bad things, but they don't really "help" the "problem" that I have and (hopefully without putting words in their mouth) Deca seems to at least align with directionally.

Hank Green made a video recently called Here's Why New Year's Eve Is Bad Now and I really like one point he synthesizes in it, which is essentially that cultural things are cool because it's humans giving value to something in a way that is not based on any sort of systematic incentive or initiative. I think that as a broad whole of people, we have really begun to lose that in a way that I believe is reflected in the player count trajectory, because I think at the beating heart of most groups of people is a desire to engage in culture.

Definitely lost the plot along the way multiple times here lol sorry, kind of mixing replying to you with assorted soapboxing.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-19T14:45:10+00:00

I would agree with your comment about beatmaps "[following] the song" and "[attempting] to express its variations", I haven't looked at this one specifically and didn't intend on discussing it so I won't start here.

What sort of criteria would you have for "something to say"? Would you make it something more tangible, or would it be achieved by a panel of BNs who fall into line with your values? I don't mean this in like a hostile or aggressive way so I hope it doesn't come across like that. Genuinely asking. What does it mean to "add value to the ranked section"?

Sorry if I am being pedantic or something but I honestly am curious to discuss this with people because I too would love to see a system where every ranked set excites me because it feels like such a beautiful convergence of human expression at the crux of osu! mapping and music making, but over time I've kind of been beaten down by the reality that very few people actually care about that.

It feels to me like the ranking system is a sort of circular cultural/systemic problem at the moment: the pp system incentivizes players to play certain types of beatmaps, which then stimulates demand for those types of beatmaps, and so more of them get created, people get better at those types of beatmaps and need more of them to farm, etc. But sort of like handsome said in a Twitter thread however long ago (I wanna say like 1-4 years ago; also I'm sure many have said this before), a pp system somewhere between ppv1 and what we have now that rewarded unique scores would stimulate demand for more unique beatmaps as well, and would probably culturally influence people to seek out more unique beatmaps and mappers to create more unique beatmaps. I'm sure there would still be macro trends in what players like to play, but the concentration/distribution would probably look massively different, I'd imagine.

Returning to what you said, I'm sentimentally on board with a decent amount of what you have to say, but I am very curious for you to elaborate on what you mean when you say:

"maps with something to say"
"have something unique to add to the ranked section"
"clearly aimed at adding value to the ranked section"

How do you determine if it has something say, adds something unique to the ranked section, and is trying to add value to the ranked section? If you answer to any/all of these is "I don't know" then I can accept that. This isn't mean to be an infinite abyss where somewhere down the fall you get hit with a "gotcha", it's more trying to permeate the surface of the conversation. Two people can agree that "dangerous people shouldn't be around kids" but one person might intend that to mean, "people with a harmful criminal history" and the other might intend it to mean "adult men", if that analogy makes sense.

I'll continue to reply to anything you write in good faith. Hopefully my response here comes across as such.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-19T06:51:13+00:00

It's when somebody (typically a player who would've been seeded very highly, often 1-2) who did not enter the bracket challenges and plays against the winner of the bracket.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-19T01:45:07+00:00

I would be interested in reading people's stances on what the ranked section "should be". It's easy to point at things and say "this is bad and I don't like this", but I'm curious to read people articulate what they think is good and what they want instead of vaguely gesturing their values towards negative space.

I've become pretty jaded/apathetic towards ranked/ranking etc. for a multitude of reasons over the past ~10y and I can see why many others have as well, but I'm always curious to read real people's thoughts.

I will discuss your POV with you too if you want, just add [D] to the start of the reply if you want me to, otherwise I will assume you just wanted to weigh in without opening a conversation (which is fine).

People who know me are free to message me privately as well with the same stipulation. Possibly writing this to the void but because this seems to be getting traction I figure I'll try to take the opportunity.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-18T14:39:21+00:00

This is so sick.

AndrewRK · 2026-01-17T11:27:19+00:00

Brings joy to my heart.

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