Reading low speed mods
 

Hello FFR. I've been very inactive lately, and I'm considering getting back into FFR and Stepmania. There's one question that I have that might influence my decision.

Way back when I started playing, I used upscroll. Like the majority of players, I steadily increased my speed mod to spread out the arrows, ending at x2.0. (After quitting for a while, I now hover around x1.5, though I hardly play.) However, in doing so, I lost my ability to read low speed mods. FFR's kind of interesting in that it's one of the few rhythm games that's always constant in scroll speed - other games tend to have varying speed with varying BPMs.

When I started playing IIDX and BMS (downscroll games), I was able to read on a greater variety of speeds due to being forced to deal with BPM-changing songs. I want to be able to read low speeds on upscroll too, but the thought of having to spend weeks/months relearning how to read slow upscroll speeds is kind of discouraging.

Overall, is it "practical" or worth it to learn to read at lower speed mods in order to enjoy X-mod files on Stepmania or to fully appreciate the BPM changes in a file? How many of you play on X-mod? How long did it take you to learn to read slower speed mods?

Re: Reading low speed mods
 

I think it mainly depends on you if it is "worth" learning it or not. I personally love x-mod files that is easy to follow and makes a lot of sense however nowadays, we have seen much less of those in the more recent Stepmania packs so I do not really use x-mod that much anymore and I BELIEVE that it is no longer worth it unless if you plan on playing either the older x-mod files or pad. That is JUST my opinion by the way so do not take it to heart. I am sure that they are people who still would not mind practicing it but I am not one of them. Instead, I just play x-mod files for fun and enjoy it regardless if I get a bad score or not.

Oh and to answer your last question, it took me a year to be able to read slower speed mods easily however this was back 2-3 years ago when I used to play the game as a sport.

PS: Welcome back

Re: Reading low speed mods
 

Before I figured out how to make cmods I really enjoyed xmod files. Now I sorta have this ocd feeling that my accuracy will suck if I don't stick to the same speedmod. I guess it's just me telling myself that I really want to develop ma. I gave a lower speed mod a try and it's kinda difficult to make sense of what speed the arrows have to be hit at.

Re: Reading low speed mods
 

Thanks for the thoughts, guys. I know when the academic year starts up again, I'll be busy enough that I won't have too much time for personal interests, so I want to consider how to best spend my time in rhythm gaming for this summer. I've even honestly considered trying to master 4-key again and surpass my peak in 2009. It's either improving at 4-key, improving at 6-key, learning to read lower speeds, or improving at IIDX and BMS at this point. And that's not even considering the non-gaming things I want to do, ha ha.

I'll give it a try, reading slow upscroll for a few weeks. We'll see from there.