I'm quite curious to know what the rules would be for individual maps, mainly because there is a grey area in where to stop the clock in certain cases.

Personally I think the timer should start as soon as the mission briefing appears and end when the last crystal is counted on a map.

This doesn't clear up maps like The Path To Power, however. Completing the Power Station has a delay of a few seconds (due to the message being played) before the game counts the mission as finished.

Another case in point would be locating trapped Raiders or guiding them home (Breathless, Search 'n Rescue, Run the Gauntlet).

Personally, I would opt for starting the timer when the level starts (after loading), stop the timer whenever you see the finish screen.

Yes, you'd have to sit through the teleportation animation, but it also adds a layer of depth, as you have to start beaming up buildings prematurely. It therefore becomes part of the strategy of that level.

Also, this makes it really easy to retime; it's consistent and easy to detect the start and end frame of the run. Another benefit would be that a new level strategy can be immediatly ported over to Any%, allowing for constructive improvement of that category through the individual levels.

I strongly disagree that the debriefing should be counted. I think the level time should end when the menu disappears and things start to teleport out. End teleport should not be recorded either, except for maybe full game runs.

Hmm.. To decide, I'll list the pros and cons of requiring teleportation to be counted in the speedrun time (as far as I know them):

Pros:

• Strategy for individual level can be ported to Any%, allowing for bidirectional improvement (update in Any% adjusts strat in individual and/or vice versa)
• It's easier to frametime your final time, as you don't have to do anything during teleportation and therefore can immediatly press the "Stop timer" key at the right frame (also true if teleportation time is consistent, making millisecs more precise).

Cons:

• Your recording has to be 5-10 seconds longer.

I legitimately tried to objectively find Cons for this standpoint, but I cannot find any at all (except for subjective ones that I didnt list such as "It feels like.." etc.).

I don't see any reason at the moment to not count teleportation. In fact, I'd even consider it a drawback if you don't.

I'd like to hear some proper arguments for this subject to consider from your sides; Currently you're just saying "I disagree" without giving any input.