Since we're reopening this discussion, I've decided to make a thread on this matter since it seems most agree this is a place where substantive discussion is needed. To clarify, this thread is about what the rules should be if there's a split. Discussion over whether there should be a split should be kept to the Discord server.

I'll start off by giving the two main issues here that need to be thought about, as I see it.

1. It's not terribly difficult to manip a good drop at the start of the game off a not too obviously manipped starter deck. See the following: The main point with this is that it's more complicated than merely disallowing resets.

2. In a 15 card race, Nate got deck 14888 (not 14810 as he suspected): This is pretty much identical with deck 14810, the original manip deck with 2 dragons, 5 thunders, Beast Fangs, and Raigeki. If we had a split, how do people think this kind of situation should be handled?

In terms of rules for a hypothetical non manip category, since that's the only place we would need any sort of rules outside the obvious ones (no trading, card duping, etc. etc.) I think the following would be a good baseline though I'm open to the idea of more.

Ban the use of eon timer/flow timer in non manip attempts No hard resetting the console/emulator in the middle of a run No 3D dueling allowed

I'm not sure if a rule should be implemented at all in regards to doing X random sorts and such, because it seems ridiculous to enforce in any way so should be left out of the ruleset.

Just keep the standard rules that you would use for both categories. As for times where it's tough to tell if someone manip'd on purpose or not and if the run should be allowed is up to the mods discretion. For vanilla fm I feel like it would be easier to come to a conclusion as mods if it's just good rng or some shady maneuvers. For the card mods idk how manip works for drops but I know it's possible for decks as it's happened already but again those don't seem to be as serious runs as vanilla FM. But yeah idk i just woke up. Make some rule changes and then I would trust mods discretions and opinions on whether or not a run is legit since that seems to be the only big worry from actually separating them on the leadboard.

@Dark_Rit I have responses to your 3 starting points.

1. Timer means nothing. Some runners can do all RNG manipulation using audio and visual cues and never touch a timer. Banning a timer in non-manip attempts is silly. Plus, if someone really wanted to commit to a timer, they'd just use their speedrun timer and remember the milestone they have to hit a button on to do the manipulation.
2. As shown by GMS, you can manipulate Beast Fangs without hard resetting, and any advantage one can gain over others through RNG manipulation in a run that prohibits it would make things difficult for those who choose to do any runs without manipulation to compete with it.
3. I think it's a little rough to completely invalidate a run on a possible accidental push of a square button. Plus, with things like random shuffles and 3D battles, people can meme about RNG manipulation and act like they're going for a drop when their "intention" is non-manipulation. If your response to that is "well then they should post it under RNG manipulation", then my response to that is "there shouldn't even be a tag in the first place" Not to mention, you can still pull off successful manipulations without 3D battles.

The other thing that should also be considered is witch hunting. There's a possibility that really good times that people do with the intention of not RNG manipulating could be scrutinized for any play that is considered "non-optimal" especially if it results in getting a desired drop.