[stavie33]

Honestly, reading what AJ is saying and others about VC list being 'harsh' and making these 'balanced', I have to write a seperate post with my idea/opinion.

I think it being harsh is utter bull. Tier points are meant to display skill and rank players based on these tiers, let's not forget that's the point of a tier list. By extending the difficulties available down to 7's, we have already adjusted for accepting the casual player and new players who want to get good at this game with pretty low boundaries for obtaining tier points. The two biggest jumps in difficulty in this game are D to VD and IMO the biggest C to VC for anyone new to the game, and I feel C to VC is significantly larger, as the files get exponentially more tricky (Fantrastic and Rose are comparable, Carrousel Paradise and Bus Rides with People are like two other worlds). The major problem with the last list is it only included the absolute hardest VC's and then all FMO's/FGO's, and was about to cut out VC's all together, thus sealing normal players off by the largest gap in the game (about midway through VC, 72-73 actually, is where I feel the files get insanely harder, Legend to Crash the Beat and Versatile for example). Because of this, we needed to extend the list, and we did.

So what to do now? I feel the tier list should include the hardest songs for each difficulty, as those are the songs most deserving of tier points and show true mastery and skill of that difficulty, which is what tier points are about, we're just lowering the bar for people who can't jump that high. If you're a kid in a small pole vaulting competition, your bar is lower than the adults, but you still have to make it OVER the top of the bar, no way around it. That's all we should be doing. But I understand balance as well, so if the lower levels (V-C) must be lowered they should, but VC should include ALL of the songs 73-75 difficulty. VC has a huge range of songs, 68-75, and the last 3 difficulties are the huge difficulty ramp (the FGO ramp is more like a wall, so I don't count it, it's absurd and needs editing). Excluding any of those for easier songs seems ridiculously unfair as then players who can actually DO the harder levels would be ranked among many who can do lower ones, or there would be a crossover of points due to the balances (getting all the easy and some hard and getting all the hard songs would be much closer), thus making the line dividing tiers much smaller. This is an issue. I still standbye the 25 hardest songs for each difficulty, and for VC, all 73-74's should be applied. The good thing is, you get tier points for AAA's. So here is why this will still work and be encouraging:

The level between scores for songs goes something like this:
FC <<<<<<<<< Clean FC <<<<<<< SDG <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< BF <<<<<<<<<<<< AAA

First you FC, then you learn not to mash, which means you can hit the patterns, which shouldn't make it hard to shave of goods, once you hit an SDG though, then your number of faults run out and it starts taking much more skill, and being really careful, then once you hit the elusive BF, it's pretty much luck between that and a AAA most of the time. Because of this, I assume people obtaining the tier points would at least be able to Clean FC the songs, so by the time they can start AAA'ing the lower songs in the difficulty range, they should be clean FC'ing the higher ones, getting them some starting tier points to be proud of. The reward for beating the lower and mid songs should not be tier points, but the AAA count, as AAA's are a big deal and something quite rewarding, and by shaving those down, they work there way up to the songs hard enough to merit tier points, like medals. And the better they get at the easier songs, the most tier points they should start being able to get on the higher songs, so by the time they hit the end of the difficulty, AAA'ing the hard ones shouldn't be an issue, you work your way through each difficulty, and the close you get to the end, the more points you earn, until you have perfection. I also feel there should be a bonus given for getting every tier point for a certain difficulty, if it's either +10/20 tier points or even maybe some new achievement tokens down the line, or a badge/header that displays your tier ranking, it's additional incentive and would also encourage the ladder climb, which I think is not only important for skill improvement, but to judge who is really the better man.

So in short, for VC, all 73-75 songs should be on the list, or as many as can fit, no lower. The 25 hardest songs per difficulty, with maybe as you go the the VD and D, have some mid ones, but few. It shouldn't be 'oh, everyone gets easy/mid/hard songs so everyone can have something to get tier points on!'. If that's the case, why'd we lower the bar so low that it goes to 7's? It's already accessible to new players at 7, make it the harder songs so it actually does what tier points should do, and keep AAA incentives and maybe bonuses so people will at least have reason to climb the ladder of difficulties in the songs and practice if they really want those elusive, but obtainable, tier points.