Okorin/TACO_RC_GENERAL.MD

## TACO_RC_GENERAL.MD

      
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              TACO_RC_GENERAL.MD
            
          
    Glossary

Common Terms

Difficulty Naming


Kantan: Easy
Futsuu: Normal
Muzukashii: Hard
Oni: Insane
Inner/Ura Oni: Expert

Refer to this thread for alternative difficulty naming methods.
The prefix "Inner" or "Ura" may be used to indicate a higher difficulty tier than the one of its base but lower than the next one (e.g. Ura Kantan is harder than Kantan, but easier than Futsuu).
Gameplay elements


Don / Red Note: A beat that can be hit with any of the Drum Center attached keys (default X, C)
Kat / Blue Note: A beat that can be hit with any of the Drum Rim attached keys (default Z, V)
Big Don / Big Red Note / Finisher Note: A strong beat that can be hit with both Drum Center keys at the same time for extra score.
Big Kat / Big Blue Note / Finisher Note:  A strong beat that can be hit with both Drum Rim keys at the same time for extra score.
BPM: An acronym for “beats per minute” used to determine the tempo of a song.
Slider / Drumroll: A yellow bar with ticks inside of it which are played with any of the assigned keys. These ticks are usually snapped to 1/4 corresponding to the song's BPM. If the BPM is lower than 125 this changes to 1/8 snapping and 1/2 snapping if the BPM is higher than 250. If slider tick rate is set to 3, the slider ticks will instead snap to 1/3.
Spinner: A round element that requires the player to alternate between hitting Don/Kat for a determined number of times, which is shown in the center of the spinner. This number depends on the Overall Difficulty of the map as well as the length of the spinner.
Bar Line: A line that appears on the playfield and determines the start of a measure if the BPM is higher than 75. If the BPM is smaller or equal to 75 bar lines will be drawn on every beat.
Overlap: A note that partially or totally covers other note(s) in the playfield.
Rest Moment: A period of time without notes used specifically to allow the player to rest their hands and prepare for the upcoming patterns.
Stream: Consecutive circles grouped together. Usually snapped to ¼ beats.
Snapping: Timeline tick where an object is placed.
Variable Snapping: A combination of multiple different ways to snap notes within a short span of time due to the song’s fluctuating nature at that point.
Slider Velocity: Speed at which the notes/drumrolls/spinners/bar lines move horizontally from right to left through the playfield. Base slider velocity can be controlled in the timing panel and additional changes can be made through inherited (green) timing points.
Smooth Slider Velocity Changes: A mechanic that enables gradual transition from lower to higher / from higher to lower Slider Velocity sections. Transition notes with varying Slider Velocities are used to achieve this effect.
Improvisation: Having more notes than the actual song is providing.
Taiko template background: Background images that simulate authentic Taiko no Tatsujin gameplay. They usually include a black bar showing artist and song title in white beneath the playfield.

General

Rules

All rules are exactly that: RULES. They are NOT guidelines and may NOT be broken under ANY circumstance.

Each note must have its color clearly distinguishable from the previous and upcoming notes.
Every note must be clearly assignable to a musical layer or layer unit it tries to represent, be it to enhance a layer the song provides, or be it an additional layer improvised by the mapper. Do not improvise in a fashion that shifts the pace, contradicts the general music movement or misinterprets the song's current intensity. Improvising must either enhance a current layer of the song or add a new one. Otherwise, relation to the song is given up and this contradicts the main purpose of a rhythm game.
The "Omit first bar line" feature of an uninherited timing point must be used when a BPM change/metronome reset would hinder gameplay experience aesthetically by adding unnecessary bar lines.
Taiko template backgrounds must not be used. Due to various screen resolutions being common they do not work as they were originally intended to.
You must not wrongly snap sliderends to correct missing slider ticks. This behaviour is unintended and will be corrected in the future.

Guidelines

Guidelines may be violated under exceptional circumstances. These exceptional circumstances must be warranted by an exhaustive explanation as of why the guideline has been violated and why not violating it will interfere with the overall quality of the creation.

Use AiMod with caution. It is known to cause bugs related to base Slider Velocity.
Avoid covering essential parts of your background with the taiko playfield. If this happens, consider altering the last zero in the .osu via notepad in the 0,0,"name_of_background.file_extension",0,0 line under the [Events] header. Positive values will lower the background while negative values will move it up.
If slider velocity changes are in use, they should correspond to pacing changes in the song. That means not speeding up calm parts, or slowing down fast paced parts of a song.
Avoid using smooth slider velocity changes over sections which include variable snapping. Doing so impacts the readability of these snappings, so keep the variation low enough to avoid overlapping.
Avoid abrupt slider velocity changes within patterns that already overlap (e.g. 1/4 streams). Smooth slider velocity changes should be used in these cases to ensure that the patterns stay readable.
Substantial overlapping should be avoided so that the color of each note is still easily readable and does not pose unnecessary visual disturbance. Overlapping should only be done if the song's pacing or note snapping at that point could justify it.
Avoid rhythms which are in no way predictable. Rhythm can be made intuitive through the usage of consistent timeline gaps bridging between different snappings or through rest moments.
Kiai time should be only used for the chorus or emphasized parts of a song. Kiai flashes/short kiais are discouraged for several reasons: they disturb the gameplay experience especially on low-end PC users, and can cause trouble for epileptic users.
The base slider velocity should be 1.40 throughout all difficulties of a mapset. This is to ensure optimal quantity of notes on the playfield, as well as the optimal distance of separation between different notes.
Slider tick rate should be set according to the song. In most cases, it should be set to 1. If the song uses 1/4 as its main snapping, use tickrate 3 to snap the drumroll ticks to 1/3.
Avoid following multiple layers of the song if it is unclear which rhythm is being prioritized. Players should be able to discern what part of the song is being followed.
Use silent spinners sparingly and only when it suits a low volume section of a song.
Songs with variable BPM may use frequent slider velocity changes in order to keep the scrolling speed at which notes move approximately constant. Doing this will make the timeline gaps between notes easily predictable and enhance gameplay experience by avoiding overlaps due to BPM changes.
Avoid visually obstructing notes on the playfield with active spinners. Spinners cover the majority of the screen, ending them too close towards the upcoming notes can result in reading spikes. Usually having 1/2 distance between a spinner and the following note solves this.
There should be at least 1/2 distance between a spinner and its preceding note. This is to ensure they do not overlap substantially and assure readability.
If custom hitsounds are in use, they should be drum-related. Heavier/lower tones should be set as don and a lighter/higher tones should be set as kat.