Banning Pre-run storage: Yes. If something intruiguing enough comes up involving previously stored menus, then maybe a meme category would arise, but for main categories the ban makes sense.

Video Evidence: I like requiring it, though if a run currently on the leaderboards has no video that's fine. The only issue I can think of is having a computer that can't record and run Bastion simultaneously, which can't be very common and will only become less of an issue as tech advances. If a specific runner can't record for some reason, I'd invite them to share their concerns though.

Summary of who I am for posterity: New NG ASL runner - my free PB is still the one on the leaderboards. I have, however, been active in the community/Discord for roughly a couple of months now. This is my first speedgame.

Any%:

Any% should, for essentially philosophical reasons, be Any%. If that means people don't end up wanting to run it, so be it.

I'm in favor of creating an Any% NMMS category, or something of its like, for those that like the category but don't quite like the idea of spamming an obscured Wharf district over and over. Also, Any% categories in general are attractive to marathons, new runners, and casual viewers due to their short length and lolwtf glitch moments. I consider this to be important to speedrunning as a hobby (and to enticing new potential Bastion runners), though others here have expressed disagreement on that point. Regardless, obscured screens and repetition outweigh the novelty of a highly glitched run and are unlikely to make the new Any% attractive to outside audiences. Having a restricted Any% provides a happy medium. As for leaderboard fixes, I'm not on that leaderboard so I don't consider my thoughts on that to be important.

ASL:

I'm heavily in favor of banning main menu storage - if there's a way to keep the cutscene skip, cool, but if not it's a price I'll happily pay. Blind levels are not fun to me, and since ASL is already essentially our "No Major Glitches" category, restricting menu storage (at least partially) fits.

Confirmation storage is spooky to me. As it stands currently, I'd be fine with having it in the category, though it will probably make Tazal one of my least favorite levels. That said, like Arctice, I'm also a bit skeptical that no one will ever grind out a good enough "legally blind" Tazal, and that other, more obnoxious confirmation storage strats won't be found. I'm new to the community, but I've seen so many runners at GDQ refer to a strat as "previously TAS-only." I'm worried that this is ours, and I don't want a 45-minute run to culminate in a blind level. It only takes one runner getting a good run - and while all strats are technically optional, it feels bad to knowingly choose to lose most of a minute compared to what the WR route does. To sum up, I'm against allowing confirmation storage, but since I'm new and my fears may well be unfounded, I'll defer to more experienced voices on this one.

I know of some tutorials and location of information - for instance LawyerDog's tutorial.

However, a lot of the information is years out of date and many links on wikis are broken or missing. I imagine not all that much has changed given that the leaderboard is largely pretty old times. But, given that this will be my first speedgame, anything that I can find would be of help - especially if there are any text guides that I can read in spare moments away from home or level-by-level guides for bitesize chunks to learn.

I'll definitely be looking at the WR run in more detail, but at this point I don't know enough to necessarily notice small details (e.g. experience management in the first few levels).

Any help would be greatly appreciated.