Strategy Talk: Placing The Gap Options Rating

[Corrosive]

I am in a dilemna of whether I should start placing the gap in the middle or continue to put it on the left. It is something I have never put serious thought into but want to consider adapting to.

I ultimately want the middle gap placement to increase my apm and maybe even give a speed boost in multiplayer 1v1 and help me send consecutive tetrises faster. Some argue that it is easier to keep the field flat when the gap is on the sides. But in Maserati's replay he uses middle gap and I like to argue that 40 lines is the best practice for multiplayer.

This should be known by now of where the gap should be placed. Multiplayer and 40 lines is like an art and we should have everything formulized and down to the T.

It should be fairly obvious whether it is better to place the gap in the middle or on the side so lets come to a decision. All feedback welcome.

[iphys]

If you put the gap in the middle, you can use the DAS more to put more pieces to the walls (and hopefully avoid having to do taps and rotations back off the wall) so I think it is marginally faster, but it makes stacking more difficult having the stack split. I don't think it matters as much for multiplayer as it does for 40L, because once people start sending you garbage, the column you use is going to be dictated by the garbage anyway.

[lampi]

I think you are right.
My thoughts (someone please enlighten me if I'm wrong):
Placing the gap on the sides is only really "needed" at 20G, so it becomes easier to stack/slide everything. Also, a gap on the right is supposedly preferred over a gap on the left due to (initial?) rotation properties, but I don't know if that's true.
The other advantage would be, as you mentioned, being easier to keep the field flat when the gap is on the side… but I think if the player has enough stacking experience, it won't really make a difference whether the field is 9_0, 6_3, 5_4 or even 7_2. They will just stack away!

For multiplayer, which starts at slower speeds, I think it makes more sense to keep the gap at the middle, because you have more skimming options when the gap has 2 sides instead of just one. For this same reason, situational T-Spin setups also become a lot easier to pull. Further, (for 40 lines especially) I think ideally the gap would be at the 5th or 6th column, so you can save a keystroke by not having to move the I horizontally to make Tetrises. Or maybe I'm wrong and it's stupid to try to save just a couple frames :-/

[meow]

More importantly, which sub forum do you think this thread should go into?

[Corrosive]

it'll get moved dont have a hissy

[Red_Star]

I really do wonder why you would put this in general. This thread is actually about strategy, something the strategy/help section is in need of. General on just about any forum always seems to be where more of the trash threads go.

On topic, I always have preferred gap to the right. I use gap down the middle for t-spins, so I use it in TDS and Tetris Friends, without t-spins I would say gap to the right. The pieces just seem to lend themselves to staking with the right gap open. I don't know why, but that is where I automatically went, even before I started playing tetris a lot.

Just to clarify why the need for gap down the middle with t-spins. The S and Z pieces are a lot easier to put down when you have room on either side, which makes setting up t-spins easier, at least for myself who relies on easy set ups.

So to put simply, with t-spins-gap down the middle. Without t-spins, doesn't really matter, but I feel gap down the right side is the easiest, and simplest way to play.

[myndzi]

Note: Maserati doesn't use the middle gap. His stack is divided 6 and 3. I always assumed this was to enable him to avoid the slowest finesses on at least one side of the field. I never actually sat down and worked it out though. I suspect that 7 and 2 might be better in this case, but 2 columns is too hard to stack.

Having the gap in the middle means that you always have to move every piece that's not clearing a line, which I think would actually have a very slightly negative effect on speed since you are going to be stacking more than clearing.

Anyway, like I said in BB chat, I don't think that the ability to drop lines a few frames faster is a significant advantage, but I do think that the reduced field flexibility is a significant disadvantage. The narrower the width of your stack, the harder it is to keep it stable (go try playing big mode sometime). Most people will also agree that a nice clean stack will enable you to make faster decisions and thus play faster as well.

In short, I think that with lots of practice, you could get about as good at stacking any which way you feel like, but I don't think once you got there the end result would be beneficial.

There is, of course, the fringe case of being unable to drop your I down the sides if you get garbaged or overstack up to near the top, but your time would be better spent learning to avoid such situations or shape them so that you can kick your I into position.

lampi: the reasoning for the gap on the right side is that in many rotation systems (ARS, and Tetrinet's, and probably many older Tetris games, lame clones, flash games, whatever...) the I can be rotated from horizontal to vertical one column closer to the wall. This means that it is a lot easier to get yourself into a situation where you can't drop the I down the left side than the right, especially when you don't have kicks.

Edit: I forgot about T-spins. I think it's probably beneficial not to use the sides if you are Spinning Tees, but I don't know jack about that so I'll withhold comment.

[hurtchow]

if your gap is at the far left or far right you aren't doing t spins which is a negative for you

[massi4h]

I know of (and use) a few t spin setups that involve tetris stacking. Depends what we're talking about though. Sprint is obviously tetrises (well not t-spins).

[PetitPrince]

Placing the gap on the sides is only really "needed" at 20G, so it becomes easier to stack/slide everything. Also, a gap on the right is supposedly preferred over a gap on the left due to (initial?) rotation properties, but I don't know if that's true.

This is always true for ARS, especially without floorkick.




This is also true for SRS but only on the first rotation.

But considering that every SRS games have nowadays floorkicks, that doesn't matter that much.

Bottom line: with floorkicks, having your well at the far left or far right doesn't matter that much. You can still have a tiny tiny advantage, but most of the time that isn't that important.

[tepples]

For multiplayer, which starts at slower speeds, I think it makes more sense to keep the gap at the middle, because you have more skimming options when the gap has 2 sides instead of just one.

If your game rewards combos, you might get even more options by making the gap 2 cells wide. When I play LJ65, I typically make the lowest 4 to 6 rows 1 cell wide for an I, then gradually widening to 2 to 3 so I can jam a bunch of pieces down for a combo.

Further, (for 40 lines especially) I think ideally the gap would be at the 5th or 6th column, so you can save a keystroke by not having to move the I horizontally to make Tetrises.

But then you have 1. the mental load of splitting the pile into two (unless you have managed to practice CT's playing forever pattern) and 2. DAS to the right wall more often. In rotation systems with left-biased entry like SRS and ARS, DAS to the right wall takes one more frame than DAS to the left wall except for I and O.

[SecretSalamander]

If your game rewards combos then stack 3 and 3

[Shizi]

real men use the middle hole

[Red_Star]

If your game rewards combos, you might get even more options by making the gap 2 cells wide. When I play LJ65, I typically make the lowest 4 to 6 rows 1 cell wide for an I, then gradually widening to 2 to 3 so I can jam a bunch of pieces down for a combo.

I can agree with that. One of the easiest ways to get combos in Cultris is to have the first four rows from the bottom with a one gap hole and then have the rest of the rows with a gap two cells wide. I usually have two cell gap for Ren combos too, but I haven't dealt enough with Rens to really say much about it.

[DannyBars]

its faster to put the gap in the middle, but it is also more difficult to do so until you get good at it you will likely be a little slow and create more gaps

its faster to put the gap in the middle, but it is also more difficult to do so until you get good at it you will likely be a little slow and create more gaps