Allow with variable.

I personally think playing with an optimized save file would be more fun, especially with how I play coming in as a speedrunner. Mainly because I'd prefer to get more vases, because a lot of the runs do die because of it and that feels bad.

In my experience, save file editing is not particularly hard, however it is a barrier that people may not want to deal with and I'm incredibly biased considering I haven't had to deal with it in a while. Having it as a variable would lower the pressure and requirement to do that, while still letting the gameplay be more speedrun-esque.

closed as fogbound is no longer required, but still optional

Please add to this Pros and Cons list of enabling DLC and Profile Customization (which i see as joined):

PROS

• People who don't own DLC can play
• New chance for strategizing (selecting unlocks to a build you want to go for)
• Doesn't affect gameplay majorly
• Makes it more in line with other speedruns as well as feel more "speedrun"-esque
• Makes non modded runs a lot easier to verify and allowed

CONS

• More difficult to setup for new players (readonly, profile duplicates)
• Can remove fun content from the game
• Lowers difficulty of a Challenge run
• Progresses "boring" meta strategies of only taking tp drops
• Can give new player a unfair advantage over runs from current runners

I’m all for having vanilla runs added to the leaderboard because the gameplay itself is the same. In terms of vanilla runs though, I’d prefer that in for new runner to not have to deal with save files it’d remain a fully unlocked, which’ll make it harder to start out unmodded (my opinion on this can be changed though)

As controversial as modded may be for a speedrun category, having modded be an entryway for new runners can be helpful because it removes a lot of the setup steps, so I believe that both should both be valid.

side-note

Fogbound should not be required modded, it doesn’t contribute to the speedrun aspect and a lot of new and old players are just slightly inconvenienced by it. Considering a solid amount of runs already exist with it enabled, and some people enjoy the stage, it should totally be an option, but not a requirement for a run to be valid.

i feel like that's another forum topic that can and should be discussed

don't we all