Speedrunning offing yourself seems very silly, all runs should require triggering the extraction cutscene to finish, this allows more strategy when path selecting especially when runs allow multiple players.

I think it is an actual mechanic. It match the game's ideas with "sacrifices".

And it also bring the timer down really hard so shorter runs.

the shorter the better?

It's an intended mechanic. Deathless would be a separate category.

"extraction is optional"

Completing the mission is also "optional", as you can end the operation with a "Pointless Sacrifice" (dying without completing main objective) and still be given a results page including time. Shorter means less room for optimization, which means times are going to be maxed pretty quickly, making categories stale. Forcing players to have all members extract can make for more exciting runs when it comes to larger missions, allowing different strategies like splitting off or 4-manning objectives among others. I also believe this change will help leaderboard longevity as it will take much longer to max times as stated before. This is my 2 cents as a long-time runner and moderator. Please let me know your thoughts

personally i think extraction is just garbage time where nothing happens

either one of these 3 happens:

1.you hide in some place that the scouts never detect you and you idle for 3 minute and get out when the extraction comes

2.they raise an alarm and you shoot stuff for 3 minutes

3.you die for 3 minutes and keep reinforcing then get on the ship

as for splitting off,i think you can already do that without the extraction part,for dropbase AIR base,it would be one guy for dropship,another guy for drop ship 2,the last 2 guys go for the airbase itself

adding in extraction would just means either

1.someone who finishes drop ship early and go to extraction and call the shuttle

2.assign someone to camp and call the extraction shuttle

there are many categories so i am not concerned by longevity,but those are just my personal thoughts

and no completing the mission is not optional

the other thing is speedrunning off yourself is more than just that

you need to find the right time to die while doing stuff so you can spend your last life and win as soon as you finish the objective

Burning reinforcements is itself a skillful path selection. I agree that extraction has a place in speedruns, but pre-existing categories won't be modified - challenges like Deathless can be implemented on top of them.

I think the concept of Any% is fundamental to any legitimate speedrun game. Hence id push for every category having an any% which is just finish game ASAP no restrictions. :) For this conversation id push for the any% category simply require you get back to your ship obvs without quitting or anything like that.