This will be a long post, but I tried making it as concise and structured as possible, so just bare with me.

THE PROBLEM WITH ANY% As I see it, Any% has a major flaw at the moment - it's very dependent on luck. Every segment has some luck factor which can cost you from 5 to 20 seconds or even lose you a run. Last Saturday i've had ~10 potential sub-6 runs which failed on the final dig, either because I had too little bombs or time bonuses just didn't spawn near me. Out of anger I even changed my nickname here.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION I suggest making a new category. I have two ideas: Bombless% and MaxPick%(or Any% Bombless and Any% MaxPick). As the names suggest Bombless% is the same as Any%, but doesn't allow bombs, and MaxPick% requires to finish the game with a fully upgraded pick. Lets break each one down.

Bombless% Pros:

1. Removes the luck factor of getting coal for bombs.
2. Longer, so a lot more room for improvement.
3. A lot of potential for route experimentation. Cons:
4. Digging through the diamond layer without bombs and getting diamond for upgrades might add even more rng.
5. Might be too long for some people to enjoy.

MaxPick% Pretty much the same pros and cons as with Bombless%, but it has some differences. Most importantly, it removes the luck that comes with digging through the diamond layer without bombs and getting diamond for upgrades. The route is still flexible, but not as much as in Bombless% since it forces you to get the last pick upgrade.

Both of these are very solid options for a new category in my opinion.

CONCLUSION That's all I wanted to say. Feel free to talk about and/or disagree with everything I've said. Thanks for reading!

P.S. Sorry about my grammar and/or panctuation and/or spelling. English isn't my native language.