thoughts on the magnitude of the 1.1x multiplier which might not be true I don't really agree with FL giving a 1.1x multiplier either, specifically the magnitude of the multiplier. I think it would be better as 1.05x or so, my main line of argument is the fact that a team with a player who predominantly plays FL would destroy any team with a player who does not have an FL main. This is more of a concern with Group Stages however, as there is a noticeable skill cap with FL/FI mains (which can be explained but is beyond the scope of this post), and that the benefits of having an FL main would be most noticeable in Round of 16 or Round of 8. A FL main will obliterate a song in Group Stages, accumulating a 98,000-99,500 point lead - and the FL player who isn't an FL main would get about 95,000-97,000, which could potentially make or break a round considering that the differences between combined scores between two strong teams is rather miniscule. Add on to the fact that there are 4 FreeMod charts out of 15 (something that will not be changed), I feel that there's just too much emphasis on one player for a gimmick for which a player could potentially have home advantage for me - but I guess if you're trying to emphasise the importance of learning FI/FL then the more power to you.



This is under the assumption that a nomod player, given enough time with FL, will lose about 3%-5% of his score on average. This is probably not the case in practicality, but I'll just bring up the case anyway.

FL giving a multiplier but FI not giving a multiplier doesn't make any sense.So what does each mod do, assuming that the combo does not affect how much of the screen is covered (this can be done through skinning or whatever):- Hidden covers a major portion of the screen (60-70%?) - from the middle to the bottom of the screen (for downscroll), but since the focus point on Hidden (top of the screen) would be so far away from the receptors and that HD will never have a chance to cover that focus point, you can afford to have the same speedmod as you would on NoMod. Most players focus on the middle/middle-upper part of the screen as well, so there isn't going to be too much of a difference involved. I don't use HD, but from what I've seen the main purpose of it is to filter out any unnecessary noise outside of their focal point - making it easier to focus on speed charts. Timing performance aside (which becomes insignificant post-Round of 16), there is little effect in performance due to the screen cover from the middle to the bottom.- FadeIn covers the same amount of space as Hidden, but in the opposite direction - from the middle to the top of the screen (for downscroll). The thing about FadeIn however, is that since your focal point would be so close to the receptors, there is very little time to react between what you see and what you will hit. This is the opposite for Hidden - players are given a certain amount of time to process a certain pattern before they actually have to hit the pattern. In order to solve for the FadeIn problem, you will have to reduce your speedmod to the point to ensure that you have enough time to process patterns before hitting them. The speedmod reduction is drastic - the average reduction is about 50%. It might not sound like much on paper, but considering that the readability (i.e. how you easily you can process patterns due to more noticeable spaces in high speeds) of a speedmod has essentially an anti-exponential function (i.e. as you use a higher speedmod, given that you are comfortable with it, the benefits in readability will diminish as the change in speed occurs at a higher base speed) - it's a major deficit. Also worth pointing out that readability affects both accuracy and speed ability.- Flashlight is a hybrid between the two. It covers a portion of the screen from the middle to the top, albeit noticeably less than FadeIn. Regardless, a noticeable fraction of the non-covered portion of the screen will also be covered. Due to the lower focal point (and in turn is closer to the receptors), for the same reasoning above, will require a lower speedmod. You won't require that much of a drop compared to FadeIn, but it's certainly there. You'd essentially be using a low speedmod Hidden mod. Considering that HD in itself doesn't create much negative effect outside of timing, you can deduce that the low speedmod is likely what is causing the deficit in performance.Since:- Players can use Hidden with the same speedmod- Players who use Hidden generally have timing issues due to heavier reliance on aural cues rather than visual- Flashlight covers less space from the middle to the top than FadeIn- The closer your focal point is the lower your speedmod- Lower speedmods create significantly worse performance - both accuracy-wise and speed-wiseYou can deduce that:- You have to use a lower speedmod on FadeIn than on Flashlight.- Due to the much lower speedmod on FI, FadeIn players perform worse overall than on FL, except for arguably timing due to the Hidden-esque lane cover, but the lower speedmod on FI will be the bigger cause in accuracy deficits in the first place.Therefore it wouldn't make sense for FI to not have a bonus but FL does.There are other ways of showing that FI is of equal difficulty (if not moreso) than FL, but that's besides the point. The point is that FL is given a multiplier either for a factor that is not felt by the player (and thus not being representative of human gameplay) or FI is not given a multiplier due to fallacious reasoning (or at least, reasoning that does not resonate with a player's perspective of gameplay).I'm assuming that the main reason why FI is disallowed is because you can cover up the screen to the point where you won't be able to see the progressive lane cover as your combo goes up. With that logic, you are saying that a stationary lane cover from middle to top is irrelevant - regardless of how much of the screen is covered (this isn't true but that's besides the point, just assume that it's true at first). Assuming that, considering that the performance of nomod players using HD is miniscule and if not better for speed charts and a slight deterioration in performance for accuracy, it will not make sense for it to give any additional bonus - especially if the purpose of the scoring system is to accurately measure the performance of a player. By allowing FL to have a 1.1x mutliplier and FI to have a 1.0x multiplier, you would be incorrectly assessing the ability of a player - because a 97% score with FL and a 97% score with FI, is comparable - the latter is arguably better, even - for reasons stated above. It would make sense for FI/FL to have the same multiplier, however.Considering that the goal of the FreeMod pool is to ensure that players are leaving their comfort zone, letting FL have a superior multiplier to FI is counterproductive - FI has (debatably) more adverse effects and FL is also a more common mod that people use.Side note, what Halogen- has said about Hidden is absolutely correct and a ban on HD entirely is ultimately more of a way of forcing people to jump through hoops (getting a hidden skin) for something that has little significance on players post-Round of 16.