Increasing Solo Career Score

[thegreatpablo]

I'm pretty sure I already know the answer, but I wanted to confirm.

I completed the solo career on drums (was #24 on the leaderboards, down to 30-something now) but the #1 drummer is about 1.8 million points higher than me...which seems ridiculous, either he's really good, cheats, or knows something I don't know. So, other than going back and playing each song to see if I can get a higher score for that individual song, is there anything else I can do?

It appears as though playing a song on another difficulty does not raise your score unless you beat your previous score on the first difficulty, and even then, you only go up the difference between the two.

So, for example:

I have a score of 5,000,000. I beat Won't Get Fooled Again on hard with 350,000 (which is included in my score of 5,000,000). I then go back and play it on medium, if I get a score of under 350,000, my main score doesn't change. However, let's say I get a score of 350,500, then my score increases 500 points to 5,000,500.

Anyway, is there any other way of increasing scores?

[Eman311]

Besides just doing better and playing the game? No, not really.

DLC might factor into it, not sure though.


as for how he is 1.8 million better, i'm guessing he plays on expert.

[admanimal]

I'm pretty sure DLC scores do count, which is not entirely fair, but oh well.

[thegreatpablo]

as for how he is 1.8 million better, i'm guessing he plays on expert.

Yeah, that was my guess as well. Just seems like going back and playing a song on a higher difficulty and doing well will only net me 10-20k more points. =\

[Vrtra Theory]

Those numbers aren't that insane.

First off, if you aren't playing on expert, then there's no way you can beat him: more notes = more points. If you play 99% on hard, and he plays 99% on expert, he's going to have more points on each song.

So, let's just assume for the moment that you're both playing on expert. There's (I believe) 52 total songs counted in the career score; 1.8mil points divided over 52 songs is about 35,000.

I can tell you without a doubt that on many songs (take, for example, "When You Were Young") you can make almost a 30k difference in points just by using overdrive in the right place.

Now, if you're playing 98%, and he's playing 99% or 100%, then you can easily have a 35k difference just in points lost playing notes without 4x multiplier.

Anyway, the answer to your question is, the only way to increase your career score is to get higher scores on each individual song. You can do that by going up difficulty levels (to get more notes), increasing % hit (up to 100), and adjusting where you use overdrive.

People who are better than drums at my might be able to add more, but one thing I'll mention I've noticed: unlike guitar, "saving" overdrive might actually hurt your drum score, depending on whether the game gives you the same points for fill notes as it does for the game notes. At the very least, don't ever play fewer pads in a fill than you would be playing at that part in the song otherwise.

(I know my buddy hates saving overdrive on drums because constant fill sections make him screw up his timing.)

[thegreatpablo]

Those numbers aren't that insane.

heh Noted. I never said his score was impossible or anything, just surprised by it is all. In any case, I guess I better get to practicing!

[tbradshaw]

Great breakdown, Vrtra Theory.