[Doug31]

Originally Posted by TC_Halogen

You're not being mindful of the competitors, the tournament structure, or the game itself when you say this, though.

Not everyone in D7 is a ridiculously insane D7-level player that can AAA 90+ on command (or relatively quickly), there are players that are new to the seven division implementation of the official tournament. In addition to that, it is necessary to have a structure so that there is a gradual increase in difficulty to better suit all of the players -- the aim is to give all players a challenge at some point in the tournament, and not to give files that are technically challenging/rhythmically complex throughout the tournament, or not to give files that are ridiculously speedy/stamina draining throughout the tournament. Tournaments should be about balance. In the past: D6 had competitors that were able to AAA 90s, but they started with low 70s. The same holds true here: D7 is going to start a bit lower than what's necessary to hold them over, but gradually get closer and closer to what's necessary for separation of ranks.

Finally, you need to consider something: people outside of D7 are going to have to play these songs if they care about their ranks, and people inside of D7 are going to have these songs in public ranks to compete on. Putting them in tokens drops the playability by a lot because people don't put too much of an emphasis on their token ranks, and it also ruins the chance at D7 having new, difficult files to play. Bombing the tournament with nothing but hard songs is bad for everyone.

I didn't mean like give them all files that are 95+ or anything like that. I just had in mind ones high enough that it wouldn't be an AAA battle. It still can be an increase in difficulty and tests players on both PA and speed. I feel this still does meet the things you're trying to accomplish while still not as badly forcing players to AAA or get eliminated.

As for the other players having to play those songs, I don't see what the big difference is compared to if they had to play ones that were 5-10 points of difficulty lower. They're still plenty hard for almost everyone.

I just remember when I was in an official tourney a long time ago, where the songs were just too easy. I got tired of songs where it was about 1 good or fewer to advance almost every single round. It never seemed like it really tested speed and it was hard to tell the true skill of a lot of the players.