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Me and a few others recently rediscovered an old method of damage boosting across the gap to the blue switch near the elevator in Jabu.  It saves a very significant amount of time as you can watch in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXEHjmjsV2w

The big issue is that the glitchless rules ban skipping big-octo specifically.  The damage boost is fair game, we use it to get across gaps in shadow temple later.  But the rules say we can't skip this mini-boss.  I've been told that the Japanese bug-limit (glitchless) community voted on this several years ago and decided that the cutscenes associated with the Big-Octo room were too integral to the story to be skipped.  

Now that logic doesn't hold up for me.  We skip Goron Tunic for example, and the small goron gives us TONS of story material such as why we are supposed to go to the fire temple to begin with.  Talking to that Goron opens up Darunia's chamber and allows us to go learn Bolero and enter the temple.  However, the category never opens Darunia's room and instead accesses that half of the Crater with...you guessed it...a damage boost.  So in this instance we use a damage boost and skip extremely relevant story cutscenes and access an area before we are supposed to be able to do so.  Sounds to me like it's exactly the same as what I'm advocating we do in Jabu.

If it isn't the cutscenes that are the issue, but instead that we should not skip a mini-boss, I'd point out that we skip Dead Hand in Shadow in order to skip the hover boots in favor of...you guessed it...damage boosts.

Regardless of the original reasoning for this rule, I believe the glitchless community of runners has expanded so much in recent years that this rule deserves to be voted on again.  Voting in favor of skipping Big-Octo would not only make the route faster and more interesting, but it would also make the rules much less arbitrary and instead much more consistent with each other.

Now I don't know if this is an appropriate place to host such a vote, but I'd like to use this thread to do just that.  If you are a glitchless runner who has a time under 4 hours I'd love for you to reply with a vote in favor of skipping Big-Octo, or against.  It would also be great if you gave a short opinion as to why you voted as you did.  If you are a runner who has a time under 4:20:00 from any time in the last year, I'd also encourage you to vote.  I apologize if you don't meet the criteria.  A few of us decided these would be good rules to guarantee that knowledgable and active runners make up the majority of voters, as the glitchless leaderboards has many submissions from people who played a bit but never again.

If you've read this far, thanks a lot for your time!

Of course, I am casting my vote in favor of skipping Big-Octo, for all the reasons explained above.

Completely on board. The rule banning this is as you said, inconsistent, looking at other parts of the run. This change also makes the child dungeons route fun and refreshing, so it's hard to argue against that.

Another argument against changing the rule that people have brought up is that apparently skipping Big Octo's room will result in it becoming glitched. This argument makes no sense considering skipping slingshot glitches the menu by putting bullet bag (50) in the top left slot of the equipment screen. Then after becoming an adult, it turns into hover boots. Considering how we don't even see Big Octo's room with this route, and we do see the glitched menu, the argument is invalid. Glitching aspects of the game that make no impact on the run is clearly accepted if you take into account what happens with the equipment screen.

I'm absolutely in favor of this rule change. I've always been happy with the glitchless/bug limit ruleset, but this one doesn't need to be there.

I like it, no reason to ban it imo. Adds a twist to the child route (and glitchless cd races)

Im not a glitchless runner so my opinion probably isnt worth that much but just wanted to say im on board with this damage boost being allowed as well.

I'm indifferent to the issue, but I'd like to point out that this trick https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ji7WsZAc30 is currently banned and would likely save more time than big octo skip with chus (while also skipping less content), so this should also be taken into consideration.

That's a cool trick and I agree it should be considered. But I'd like to point out that the reason for my post isn't just to save time by changing rules. The bigocto skip ban in particular is inconsistent with the ruleset of the rest of the run, whereas resurrecting with the fairy is definitely new tech as far as the current rules are concerned. The inconsistency is what I mostly want to fix. The fact that it's faster is just a perk :)

Im for allowing the trick. If the JP runners dont agree, I think that most likely the same will result into having 2 different bug limit categories, as MM or TWW has.

This skip should absolutely be allowed in Glitchless.

• It's faster.
• Requiring a cutscene for story continuity does not fall in line with the spirit of Glitchless any%.  The goal is to complete the game as fast as possible without glitches, not to experience the whole story.
• Other large story elements are skipped, making the argument of story continuity a poor one, if it even were relevant.
• Damage boosts and double damage boosts are already allowed and employed in similar ways.
• Significant portions of other temples are skipped.  Shadow: no hovers.  Water: fancy jumps are used to avoid many puzzles in the temple.
• This trick takes a boring portion of the run, makes it more exciting for the viewer and more technically interesting for the runner.
  
  

I will put a disclaimer here that although I am quite familiar with the glitchless run, I don't do the category often myself and agree that those who actively run it should have their opinions more heavily weighted.

-Jethro

Its fine trick, but you only timed it based on getting chus first try. what happens if you get bad RNG. now you need to go back out and farm more rupees. But as far as the trick is concerned. I like it and it looks cool to not have to kill 3 tails. I guess its just a preference of what people like.. RNG or kill big octo.

It has been brought to attention that the trick can be done with just bombs.  This eliminates RNG element of Bombchu bowling.  Considering this, the damage boost is a clear timesave.

As seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXEHjmjsV2w
And here: http://www.twitch.tv/izu000/c/1502430?t=1m46s

Additionally, a reminder that the technique itself is allowed, as other damage boosts are already in the run.  The trick allowing the big-octo fight to be skipped is the point of contention.  So our focus should be on whether we are okay with skipping big-octo.  Not on the damage boost itself.

People seem to be completely missing the point here, so I'll try to just adress everything.

First of all, Nobody is claiming this is a "New" trick. It clearly says in the forum post too "rediscovered and old trick".

Secondly, wether this makes the route faster, easier, harder, longer, more interresting, less interresting, more fun to view, less fun to view, more fun to run, less fun to run is literally irrelevant. This is about an inconsistent rule that does not stand up to scrutiny.

Also wether this is brought up by old or new runners also is irrelevant to the point raised.

Can we please focus on the issue at hand: This rule is inconsistent with the rest of the ruleset and should be changed for that reason, and not because of anything else.

Thank you.

I haven't run this in a long time but I'll still give my opinion on the matter.

On the point of damage boost being allowed, this is fine. On the matter of mini boss being skipped, dead hand is already skipped. But, after thinking about it for a bit, the main difference between big octo being skipped and dead hand being skipped is that there is an integral part of the story being skipped. If big octo is skipped, how did ruto find the sapphire to give it to you in the first place?

The main argument here seems to be that by skipping goron tunic, a big part of the story where the small goron directs one to the fire temple and opens darunia's door for you, leading to bolero and the fire temple. From this precedent it should be ok to skip the big octo story then, right?

I'd like to mention that big octo skip was voted on previously prior to the vote on skipping goron tunic. From http://www34.atwiki.jp/ootglitchless/pages/15.html#id_6c73cc31 it can be seen that big octo skip was voted down on a 3-11 vote, whereas from http://www34.atwiki.jp/ootglitchless/pages/19.html#id_0db69226 going through darunia's door was voted in on a 6-3 majority (I was actually in this vote and voted against it). The odd thing is, some people voted against big octo skip initially because it skipped a mini boss, and yet skipping a mini boss to skip hover boots was never voted on but people just started doing it.

The problem I have here is that some opinions on darunia's door relied on false ideas of the door not being loaded and, even though it is possible to do it in a normal play through with scarecrow's song and longshot, sets a bad precedent that it's alright to skip certain things even though no glitches are involved. Take for example going to spirit temple early as child, by the logic presented here it is alright to cucco jump, go through the one-sided collision of the fortress wall, and go through the wasteland without lense, all things presently allowed but early spirit as child is specifically banned for similar reasons mentioned. So should this also be allowed now? Where should the line be drawn?

So with that I say I am against allowing big octo skip. I would honestly like if some of these other questionable things were re-polled like darunia's door and volvagia with bombs but things that will make it slower probably have no chance of being re-voted on. Because of this, I hope caution is taken when voting because it will be incredibly hard to take back something like this after it's already allowed.

I 100% agree with everything Cafde has said aside from his vote itself.  Goron Tunic skip, big-octo skip and Spirit early as child are three things that are all very similar. I might suggest drawing the line at spirit early because you must take Link into an out-of-bounds area to get there as seen in this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UuPWZnuw-s).  The fact that the wall has no collision from the back would have been ok as set by the darunia door precedent (and kokiri forest's bridge clip too).  But being out-of-bounds makes that trick crossing the line IMO, and, in fact the current rules specifically state being out of bounds is disallowed.

As for the two remaining points: I'd say big-octo skip and Goron Tunic skip are virtually identical and should either both be banned or both be allowed.  Obviously I'd prefer they both be allowed since it would be more fun, but as long as the rules make some semblance of sense I will be satisfied.

Yes! That's what this will come down to I feel. Allow both, or ban both, to keep it consistent with itself.

But what if hypothetically you could skip the gate with just a damage boost and required no out of bounds?  Would it then be fine even though it's still a major sequence break?

Again, I don't really have a strong opinion one way or the other, but remember that you are deciding the rules for glitchless of an incredibly broken game with tons of grey areas, and trying to make the rules "consistent"/"non-arbitrary" may not be the best approach.

Hard to tell. That sequence break is massive compared to goron tunic/big octo (by several temples etc) but its still hard to draw a line that makes sense. We're in an awkward spot because this buglimit route has a lot of questionable stuff in it still, compared to what MM has in its glitchless route for example. Having an actual "glitchless" category would be cool, but at this point that would probably result in 2 seperate categories since the current one is so well established, which could also be an option, but thats a different conversation.

At the moment it's mainly just about big octo skip and goron tunic skip since they are almost the exact same in that they skip a very small portion of the storyline and use the same trick to do it. To me it would make sense to either ban both, or allow both, and also see what else might fall under that "umbrella".

The hypothetical existence of a trick shouldn't really weigh in on the current debate, in my opinion.  

Also, yes, OoT speedruns have rulesets that are inherently arbitrary.  While we have to accept this, we can also take steps to make sure that what is happening in runs falls within the arbitrary conditions that have been established.  If Big-Octo skip and Goron Tunic skip fall within the same condition, they should both be allowed.



I don't see the problem with skipping what I could consider small detail of the story.  Is a few seconds where Ruto sees the stone and disappears really integral?   Though to be honest, I wouldn't care if we skipped a huge portion of the story.  To me, glitchless any% is not about story continuity.  It's not a glitch to simply not trigger a cutscene.  It's not a bug either, to reference the Japanese category name of 'bug limit'.  What it is, is a sequence break.  The intended sequence of other temples are broken in glitchless, so this one can be as well.  Additionally, glitchless does Forest, Water and then Fire, which is not the intended story sequence.  Yet this is okay.  The Ice Cavern is also done out of sequence with the story.  The examples can continue beyond this, but you see my point.

So with all this, I fail to see why the Big-Octo cutscene, which lasts less than 30 seconds, is, above all else, so integral that we must have it in the run.

a sequence break is doing something out of order, like temples, a skip is something that is simply not done. I don't see how you can compare big octo skip with doing the temples out of order.

Anyways, the comparison with darunia's door is also skewed, it says no where that you absolutely must use a damage boost to get to darunia's room, one of the comments (in favor for) of the jp community said was "I think that there is no problem since it is possible to pass through after getting long hook in normal play" (translation courtesy of google translate). The only reason a damage boost is used is because it's allowed and convenient to do so, but the rules clearly states that skipping big octo is not allowed, damage boost or no.

Using a damage boost or not is irrelevant. The fact is you're skipping it, and you can compare skipping Goron Tunic and Big Octo because they are so similar. The damage boost element is just to point out to people that may think damage boosts aren't allowed in the run.
Both of these "tricks" skip a small amount of story, and arguably skipping lens of truth skips an even bigger element of the story + a whole dungeon..but that's still allowed. And the goal is to create atleast some element of consistency in an otherwise strongly inconsistent ruleset.

Just because you can do it without a damage boost means it's normal play?  This would require you to go to ice cavern and get iron boots, go do water temple to get longshot, and have the scarecrow's song all before getting the goron tunic.  That to me does not sound normal, as fire temple (for which the tunic is normally required) normally comes before water temple.

But the means of getting to Darunia's room is completely irrelevant.  The point is you're obviously not supposed to be there before getting the tunic as evidenced by closed doors on both sides of the room.  It's pretty clear that they intended you to have the tunic before being able to go learn bolero and enter fire temple. And yet we skip the tunic and go there anyway.   Which is exactly the same as moving on to the rest of Jabu earlier than intended by skipping big-octo.  I see zero issues with this comparison.

People seem to be concerned with story continuity.  That is, 'how does Ruto get the sapphire if we never do big-octo?'.  

My point in comparing big-octo skip with temple order, etc., is that the story, its content and its sequence, is clearly not of concern elsewhere in the run.  As such I don't think the story should be of concern with regard to the sapphire.

It's a pretty fair comparison, the only difference as of right now is one is allowed to go straight through darunia's door which is even worse. If going through darunia's door was banned then there would be little reason to skip goron tunic by any means.
Doing temples out of order is not skipping content nor story, though. As far as doing temples out of order is concerned, I think it's pretty obvious that Nintendo didn't care which order they were done in. There are no obvious obstacles and nothing stopping the player from, say, getting bow in forest temple then using that to complete water temple. Sure there are things indicating a proper order like navi and when sheik talks about the temples, but as far as the story is concerned they are completely independent. You don't see the goron talking about saria or the forest temple, do you? Also, which temple is first, shadow or spirit? Shadow vs. spirit first has been done to death and there's arguments for both, but I still think Nintendo was just letting the player have some independence on which he could choose (ex. both longshot and hoverboots can be used to cross the river of sand).

Big Octo skip on the other hand is skipping both content and story (however small it might seem to some people), which is what Quo was trying to point out.

While I don't concede my point regarding glitchless not respecting story elements, I don't want to argue about temple order and such and get off topic.  My comparison was simply an addition to my main point, which is:

Why is big-octo so integral to the story, that glitchless any%, which is not a category about experiencing the story, cannot skip it?

We rearrange the guided story (Temples, Ice Cavern, etc.), even if it is in a small way, like ignoring Navi.  We ignore elements of the story and plenty of content (botw, tunics, epona, sidequests, lots of npc conversations, etc.).  We ignore the intended way of solving puzzles (no slingshot, no hovers, etc.).  We skip other enemies that could be argued to be a mini boss (Dead Hand).  We skip parts of temples (b1 skip, water temple jumps, FW usage).  There are tons of things that are a part of the story of OoT that are completely ignored because they are not in the path of the run.  Some small details.  Some large and iconic. 

Why, if we ignore so much, do we need to watch Ruto run towards the sapphire?  Why does this one cutscene rise above all the rest as something that is so integral, that we need to spend minutes in order to watch it? 


This seems to be the main answer.  Everyone says, 'because sapphire continuity is integral'.  But why is it integral?  Why, in a speedrun, do we need this single bit of story continuity?  The category is supposed to ban glitches, not maintain suspension of disbelief regarding the ability of Sages to give out Spiritual Stones.

+1

Wouldn't we have to do BOTW then? That's a huge chunk of story, content (a whole dungeon!)+ an item.

if we could hit the trials loading zone with a damage boost, would it be allowed in glitchless? trials are not integral to the story.

No it would not be allowed.  The fundamental outline of the category is that we collect all spiritual stones, medallions and take down the trials barrier.  In that sense, the category is intended to be a bug-limited MST.  Source:  The very first heading is called "cardinal rule" and states what I have said: http://www34.atwiki.jp/ootglitchless/pages/17.html

Now can we please not pull hypothetical and non-existent tricks out of a hat for the sake of complicating the argument?  It seems everyone who wishes to argue against big-octo skip has nothing but hypotheticals to back up their opinions. The fact remains we skip content and story elements of equal magnitude to big-octo skip elsewhere in the run and I would love for anyone who disagrees with allowing the skip to specifically address why we should keep THIS rule.  What are you arguing that we should do?  What is your stake in this argument besides argument itself?  Why do you think that we should have to fight big-octo and watch the associated cutscenes?  So far none but cafde has actually answered this, and he thinks the other skip of equal magnitude should also be disallowed, which is a totally respectable argument.

I'd be all for it, but I think most people consider the well to not be a major point of the story (no sage, no medallion/stone, an item that only has use if the player doesn't have knowledge of invisible objects). There are plenty of other skipped items like beans and nayru's love but I don't really want to get into a discussion about item skips.


The problem here seems to be what constitutes an integral part of the story. I don't know if this can really be defined (to me darunia's son is an integral part of the fire temple part of the story but to someone else it might not be), but what I was mainly trying to point out before was that story continuity was important enough for some people that, for this reason, decided against allowing something that broke the story even though no glitches are used. It also comes up in the vote for allowing shadow early as some people voted against it only because it broke story and not necessarily because it a glitch. There are a few more examples of things I would consider to be even more minor than big octo skip that are banned for story/continuity reasons (mido skip, savewarping). As you said, the contradictions don't just stop at big octo skip and goron tunic skip, but a plethora of other things too. So while, yes, the category is not about story preservation, it is important enough that several people care about it and is really the only category that has a semblance of caring about the story.

Perhaps a reason why goron tunic skip was thought to not be as necessary was that zora tunic has been skipped for ages and is a similar situation. Also maybe I wasn't clear enough in a previous post but I'm not as much against goron tunic skip than I am against going through darunia's closed door which is just completely going through a wall via one-sided collision.

[Off topic] If an in bounds child gate skip were found, the only thing skipped would be gerudo card because of other restrictions on the rules. I messed around with this yesterday and it seems potentially possible with a well placed bombchu, ess sidehop to preserve direction, and good timing (maybe tas only).

I think the skip should be added, for the same reasons as you dannyb.

I'm not sure what the intent of the category is, but to me I would see it as "beat the game collecting all medallions, stones and do the trials (mst) without using glitches/with a strictly limited amount of glitces(or bugs)"
I don't find a good reason for the story to be that relevant. This is not a "Let's Play%" category that follows and changes rules based on what could happen in "normal play" as I've heard argued previously. That's just me though, and it's kind of irrelevant, but I just thought I'd throw this out there.

And skipping large parts of dungeons using tricks and not glitches is super cool to me and is what makes the run so interresting. B1 Skip, Water Temple Jumps, Slingshot and Hoverboot Skip, clever use of FW, etc. That's the beauty of the category. You can take all these shortcuts without using glitches.

I've been running OoT for awhile now, and in all my time watching the category rules change, nothing has been more arbitrary then Glitchless. Now as I know it's super hard to define "Glitchless" OR "Bug limit" there HAS to be a line and that is what we have defined in the rules. But Big Octo skip being banned feels weird to me because this isn't really about playing the story of the game, as some of the argument that some are trying to make, but more of trying to finish the game with limiting the bugs or glitches in this game as fast as possible. Like I said before, it's very hard to define Glitchless without being arbitrary, but I feel that the limits very much should be the tricks themselves instead of story factors. You never think of story factors when you think of speedrunning, why in this? If we're going to ban Big Octo Skip, let's ban Hovers Skip, Goron Tunic Skip, we need balance. Anyway I didn't say to much because I feel I have expressed how I feel about this fair and simple. Big Octo skip should be allowed.

I would like to point out, that there is no need for me to specifically point out why story continuity, skipping a mini-boss, or skipping a cutscene should come into play here seeing as how many users have already made replies in regard to these concepts (specifically dannyb and Jethro). However, I would like to point out the fact that it is implicit that the glitchless times are usually dependent on the movement and performance of the runner, not the skill or ability to perform glitches.

That being said, the ability to perform the damage boost used to perform Big-Octo skip, is just dependent on the skill of the runner. Therefore, I think that the trick fits perfectly into the theme of the run.

Once again, like was mentioned by other users, the point of glitchless any% is not to include all facets of the story, but yet to complete the game as fast as possible without performing any glitches. I think that alone, should warrant the use of the trick in the category.

Finally, I would like to say, that I completely think that this trick should be allowed in glitchless any%.

-Heistlight

I vote in favor of the rule change due to consistency. Also i don't meet the voting criteria (which i feel is irrelevant) but im voting anyways.

I think the damage boost to skip Big Octo should be allowed if we're already doing damage boosts to skip stuff like dead hand/hover boots. Glitchless should be more of a limit on the glitches/bugs that are allowed than story continuity. I vote to change the rule. I haven't run much glitchless, just 2 runs for races.

Hey I might not be a runner really of this category but I do still have some interest in it and I have to say that I am all for the skip to be allowed I think that it would add a fresh element to the category more specifically the child section. It seems to be the case that maybe people are just to lazy/ scared to make changes such as this and get caught up in being "traditional but with time small things are changing else where with the community and from what i've seen personally I believe that changes are a good thing and should be welcomed and that maybe reviewing of category definitions now and then can help with improving the categories as we have more and more new runners popping up. This of course is just how I feel personally with it and I have no problems with it being allowed in glitchless :)