Info/Rules

What is ECS8.5?:

ECS8.5 is the fifteenth tournament in the East Coast Stamina series. The objective is to try to clear as many of the hardest stamina charts as you can within the format of the tournament. It is a team tournament, and you may enter it on a team of up to three individuals.

Once again, since this isn't a "main" ECS (like, one of the whole number ones), it's going to be split into an upper and lower division to make it more accessible to a wider range of participants.

When:

Entrants can submit their sets at any time BEFORE July 6th, 2020 (July 5th @ 11:59 PM EST is the latest you can submit) to count towards the ranking. Within that timeframe, when and where they do this is at their discretion, so long as they adhere to the rules detailed further on.

Where:

Wherever. Any ITG machine that's running an ITG theme and not the StomperZ one. Stepmania 5 is acceptable as long as you're using ITG's life/scoring mechanics (using the Simply Love theme on Competitive mode is the easiest way to accomplish that).

What are the prizes?:

• Each player that competes gets a special ECS8.5 poster.
• The members of each team in the lower division that breaks 1100 total points between their marathons and their Raw Output set get a special ECS8.5 shirt.
• The members of each team in the upper division that breaks 450 total points between their marathons and their Raw Output set get a more special ECS8.5 shirt.
• Each member of a team of my choosing from each division that I note as having performed especially well relative to their skill level gets a special, three of a kind poster.
• Each member of the winning team of each division gets a special, three-of-a-kind poster and a trophy.

Keep in mind it'll probably take me a while to mail everything (usually several months) once the tournament is over. My focus will be on preparing for East Coast Stamina 9 once 8.5 ends.

Format:

ECS8.5 is a team tournament split into an Upper Division and a Lower Division, with two portions to the tournament for each division.

• Teams are comprised of up to three individuals total; deciding who to team up with is up to you.
• It is strongly preferred that you enter with people you are able to play on the same machine with, but in special cases, if you advise me in advance, I will permit you to play on separate machines. This is really only an issue for the Raw Output set; you must coordinate between your other team members if they're not playing at the same place as you to ensure that you are not playing songs at the same time on different machines, or else you're giving yourself an unfair advantage over other competitors. I would recommend streaming to each other if possible or at least using messaging to make sure you know when you can start your next song. Again, it is strictly against the rules for two different people on a team to be playing songs at the same time during Raw Output. You may also take the approach of just dividing your four hour block up amongst your team, but it goes without saying this puts you at a disadvantage in terms of efficiency.
• Each entrant can enter on up to two teams for EACH of the Upper and Lower divisions, but they are not eligible for duplicate prizes (meaning if I were to enter on the maximum of four teams, and all of the teams happen to win the same prize, I only get that prize one time rather than four times)
• There is no concept of 'local ranking' versus 'remote ranking' in this tournament-- each division has its own ranking, period, and all teams entering are eligible for winnings regardless of where they play.
• The lower division has songs in it from 12s-17s (and one 18) and marathons made up of 13s. It is recommended that you at least be comfortable with 13s if you're going to enter. If you/your team fails the marathon(s), it will still count towards your team's marathon total, however.
• The upper division has songs from 18s-26s and a marathon with charts ranging from 17s to 22s. It's recommended that you be able to pass at least a few lower 18s on command if you're going to enter the upper division.
• C-mods are legal. Mirror/other turn mods are legal. No Mines is legal. Any mods that add or subtract arrows, holds, or rolls-- those are NOT legal.
• You may rate mod songs, but only at rates that are at or above 1.0x, and you will not receive any point bonus for doing so.
• Bracketing/mashing is not permitted in any portion of the tournament.
• You must compete on ITG settings. The StomperZ theme is not allowed due to different life and scoring metrics.
• You may turn off way-offs and decents.

Set 1: Marathon

You have two options on how you approach the marathon.

• Play the full marathon as a group. You may switch between team members between each song. You may not switch team members mid-song-- you can only do it at the beginning or end. Each member must pass at least one song.
• Each team member plays at least one of the provided marathon splits in its entirety solo. If you're a team of three, that means each member plays one. If you're a team of two, one person plays one and the other plays two. If you're a team of one, you play all three. I'll be calculating your team's score based off of the combined DP across the three splits.

If you're going with option 1, during the marathon ONLY, you may have team members play on the unused pad to stay warm. You are still not allowed to do this during Raw Output.

NEW FOR ECS 8.5: You or your team can spend as much time as you desire warming up for any marathons you attempt. If you fail, or you are just dissatisfied with your score, you may reattempt the marathon(s) as many times as you like or can manage before the event ends.

ALSO NEW FOR ECS 8.5: You can attempt marathons as many time as you like in the same day.

The points yielded by the marathons/splits are based off of the max points for each marathon/split * the score obtained on it.

Set 2: Raw Output

Each team gets 4 hours to try to pass as many of the songs on the list for the team's respective division. Each member must pass at least one song. Score does not matter. Each song counts only one time, so there's no reason to replay anything. You may change out whoever is playing at any time, provided it is not during a song. You may not play while someone else is playing a song to warm up-- part of the challenge is coming up with a strategy for your player rotation to stay warmed up without burning out!

NEW FOR ECS 8.5: You can warm up however you like and for as long as you like BEFORE your team's raw output.

ALSO NEW FOR ECS 8.5: PLEASE use the in-game timer for your set. You can use an external timer if, for instance, you're playing in a public location and can't change the settings, but be aware that you will likely be at a disadvantage time-wise if you do so.

Each song is worth a certain amount of points, and that is determined as follows:

Lower: Points = (Steps^1.05*Stream%*BPM Multiplier)^(1+((Difficulty-(LowestDivisionDifficulty-1))/100))/PointConstant

Upper: Points = (Steps^1.45*Stream%*BPM Multiplier)^((1+((Difficulty-(LowestDivisionDifficulty-1))/200))/1.5)/PointConstant

...where:

Steps = Number of steps in the chart
Stream% = Percent of measures of stream versus total measures in the chart
BPM Multiplier (FOR LOWER) = ((SONG BPM-MIN BPM FOR DIVISION))/(MAX BPM FOR DIVISION-MIN BPM FOR DIVISION)*10)+1
BPM Multiplier (FOR UPPER) = (((SONG BPM-MIN BPM FOR DIVISION))/(MAX BPM FOR DIVISION-MIN BPM FOR DIVISION)*2^2.5)+1)^3
Difficulty = Block level of chart.
PointConstant = This is just a value to scale things such that the 'best possible set' in each division is worth roughly 1000 points (This helps us avoid having to normalize scores).

Basically, though, all you need to know is that denser, longer, faster songs at higher ratings are worth more than shorter, less dense, slower songs at lower ratings. Also, to reiterate, you only get points if you pass the song.

The spreadsheet provided with the pack handles all these calculations for you-- all you need to do is take the ID from the first column on the Songlist tab and enter that into the second column on your scoresheet for each song your team passes. You can optionally enter the name of the team member who passed the song in the first column on the scoresheet, which will automatically calculate some extra metrics just for fun if you also fill in the team members on the far right section.

IMPORTANT: The sheet is good for planning but your team captain (the person who registered the team) will be expected to use the 'Manage Scores' page to submit scores. Upon being reviewed, they'll be added to the ranking.

ALSO IMPORTANT: You may ONLY select a song if you have enough time left to complete it. I don't expect you to predict song load time or anything, so as long as the timer says you have enough time when you proceed from the mods menu, that's fine.

MORE IMPORTANT: If you back out of a song, you do not get the points for the song. Nice try.

EQUALLY IMPORTANT: Each song is only worth points once. Duplicate passes on a song do not get you additional points.

Acknowledgments

Thanks to everyone who contributed fresh new content that's debuting for the first time in this ECS. There's actually only one chart in each division that has been used in previous ECS events (excluding For Pleasure/For Business and different difficulties), and there's just so much new material here. This includes content by Admiral M&Ms, Aoreo, Arvin, ChasePines_101, ExJam09, ITGAlex, Janus5k, Kyy, Levitas, NUWGET, Okami, PCBoyGames, Redzone, Rems, Rust, StarrySergal, StoryTime, StripE, Tuuc, UVCat, and Zaia. There are others who sent me unreleased charts as well that didn't end up making it into either Upper or Lower division, so in addition to all the people who had work that made it in, I'd also like to thank the people who took the time to send over their stuff for me to evaluate. It's always possible I'll end up using it in the next one!

Thanks also to Pluto for providing this year's logo (and by extension the main pack banner/background)!

Please don't hesitate to contact me on here or on Facebook with any questions or concerns-- I'll usually respond quickest if you reach out to me on FB. There may be playing scenarios I haven't thought of or something I haven't explained clearly enough, so definitely speak up; it'll be helpful to everyone if you do so.