To all non RL drummers

[Thrif7y]

How quick could you adapt to the drums? First day i got my drums I decided to start off on medium, trawled through the songs, my first barrier was GG&HT, couldnt coordinate my hands and feet at the point where the song starts getting really fast and you get the Y+Bass, R+Y, Y+Bass sequence.... I decided to replay all the songs up until GG&HT and when i tried it then i found it pretty easy, managed to 4* it. The rest was pretty easyy, next barrier was enter sandman.. but it took a couple tries. Managed to complete medium on the first day.

2 days later I found myself 5* all on disc medium songs, haven't played the DLC ones yet. So i decided to move onto hard.... i had many speed bumps when playing on hard, namely on songs which contained a long sequence of R+Y, Bass, R+Y alternating hits, i couldn't do it so I trawled through them just hitting the R+Y pads. Then there were the songs that came with many R hits (Snare?)... like ballroom blitz i think... I kinda cheated on those songs as due to my sucky coordination in using both hands on 1 drum I used my right hand and furiously tapped the red drum. Enter Sandman on hard was strangely easier than medium.. but when i got to (Dont) Fear the Reaper i couldn't pass it for crap, as well as Foreplay/Longtime intro. So i kinda stopped continuing my drum career on hard.

I started maxxing out scores on medium making my career score as high as possible. After about a week i bothered trying DFtR and FP/LT again, i managed to get the intro of FP/LT in about 6 tries, the rest of the song is pretty easy so i did that song. With DFtR, i always had to use overdrive at the solo i think.. where there was a barrage of Reds, and the part i kept failed was near the end.. where it had this sequence: B+Bass, Red, B+Bass, R+G... and it was really fast... so i decided to practice that and after about 10mins of practicing that area i had it down... i tried it again and i managed to save my overdrive for the end as well so it was a nice victory for me.

The last tier... i lost hope again, first song, Next to You, great song... not so good when i played it.. i kept failing the beginning. This song was really fun to play on medium, but when you stick in a bass pedal at the intro it was a nightmare. I skipped that song, managed to get Flirtin with Disaster, Tom Sawyer and Won't get fooled again without too much trouble... but RttH wtfpwned me. Although i felt like playing on so i decided to practice the intro for Next to You, probably spent about 15mins on it.. but i managed to get it, and the rest of the song is pretty bog-standard after that so I managed to get a pretty decent score on the song. Now for RttH, after about 5 tries i managed to do the song.. but through only using 1 hand on the R pad because i saw some video of you being able to pass expert on this with just 1 hand on the red and it worked on hard also.. seems cheap... but oh well, so is using overdrive on an area you can't do to save your life to me xD

So i managed to do Hard... i decided to just try the first couple of songs on expert, wasn't suprised by how easy they were compared to the last tier songs on hard.. managed to 100% I think im paranoid... but i think it will be a looooong time before i can complete expert career. Although i do have a lot of spare time right now as i dont have a summer job yet and my uni course starts late september

So how well have other non rl drummers done progressing on this game? Im interested in finding out whether we have similar speed bumps...

EDIT: damn didn't think it was this long.. if you read this i /salute you

[HMXDungHeaver]

I started playing drums on hard when my house-mate got Rock Band for PS3. I went through the tour and got stuck on Don't Fear the Reaper for a while (and had a heck of a battle with Dead on Arrival, but eventually beat it). I decided to start playing expert once I got RB for 360 because I was too frustrated with DFTR and just kept getting better from there. I just got my 41st gold star yesterday in my solo tour, and I'm a little over 10 mil now.

[InsoFox]

Started off on easy, that lasted me 2 days, then medium took me about a week, and now I'm just dipping my toe into hard and polishing up the harder medium ones.

I feel like I've come a long way in a short time, personally.

[sbeard]

I was working through expert in about a month. The move from hard to expert is a little easier than the move from medium to hard. After about 3 months I usually hit 95% or higher on everything except the few really tough songs that get mentioned here frequently.

I generally play about 30 minutes a day, with the occasional party thrown in

[KoofNoof]

Its amazing how many people move on to the real drumset after this game. Its great how HMX is turning people into musicians. Ive been playing the drumset for 4 years but I got rid of my drumset a couple months ago, and have been using RockBand to keep my skills up, well actually, since playing RockBand, my skills have improved!

[lanceuppercut55]

i started on medium for the solo tour and the first real song i had problems with was GG&HT, more specifically the R+Y, Y+BASS bits at the end when the guitar solo goes on (and on!)

that had me stuck for so long, so much so i gave up and did hard instead and every once in a while attempted GG&HT/medium. eventually i did it and once that was passed, i finished the rest of the on disc songs with ease at first attempt.

on hard, i had big issues with maps and its bass lines so much so that, i moved up to expert to see what i could do for a while and eventually i managed to get some form of limb independence which did enough to get me past the song and now stuck on blitzkrieg bop/detroit rock city (more offbeat bass, grr!)

on expert i've done the first 4 songs and currently stuck on in bloom.

[Fennz]

I got rock band in Janurary with zero drums experience, except the few times i played at my friends house, on EASY.

I first played on easy, then through medium. It took a few tries on GGHT to beat it.

Then hard. DFTR killed me at the end. Took a few tries to beat it. Then RTTH. That was a wall to get over. It took a couple weeks. I even had to tape down my red drum so I could get through the drum roll during the solo.

After that I played on expert. Got through a couple tiers. Then got stuck on Paranoid. (bass pedal heavy) Beat it in a couple weeks. The tier after that I was stuck on, I think Vasloline and another song.

Then in the last few weeks, I started to replay the songs in expert and started to beat most of them. Now I'm stuck in the second from last tier with DFTR and FP LT. I think I could probally beat them if I kept practicing. RTTH on the other hand...

[GarryMar]

I got through medium in 1-2 days, hard in about 4 days, and expert took another 3-4 weeks to finish. i've now got a score of 8,710,000 and 18 gold stars. when i get some spare cash i will be buying a RL drum kit and see how a manage when i don't have lines and dots telling me what to hit!!

[BigMaki]

I started out on Easy the day the game came out and beat it a couple days later since I could only play it in the evenings. The only song that gave me trouble was GG&HT because of the length, I guess.

After that I played Medium and breezed through most of it, only having trouble with GG&HT again and Enter Sandman. From what I recall it didn't take long to figure those out and I probably beat Medium less than a week after moving up.

At this point I started picking up a LOT of the DLC and playing with friends in BWT. We eventually beat Endless Setlist on Medium and I decided to work on Hard mode. I got fairly far until getting roadblocked on Vasoline, which took me a while to beat until I learned the pattern. After that it was just a matter of figuring out where to use Overdrive to beat songs like Reaper and Dead on Arrival. Cherub Rock's intro gave me problems but after that the song is fairly easy, same with Next To You. Then there was RttH. It took me a solid month to beat that song in which I gave up and just played DLC or worked on Expert on lower tiers. Eventually I limped my way through RttH but still have trouble whenever it comes up in BWT.

Now I'm in expert tour but I'm stuck on Dead On Arrival. I get to about 20% every time and fail out. I'm feeling like that damn song will take me longer than RttH did and I know there's still that tier to go. I guess my body still hasn't totally learned foot/hand independence because that seems to be what DoA is all about...

[LikeMike]

I just got this game for a couple of days. Haven`t played drums before. I got through easy with no problem at all. No problem with medium as well, up until I hit GG&HT yesterday. My problem is the same part as everyone elses here, the fast part that goes on forever. I do real good at first, but after some time i lose my concentration, and I couldn`t do it yet. This song is really annoying becaus of the way too long solo, in which you do only the same thing on drums. On guitar it`s the only song I haven`t passed yet on expert, due to the last part of the solo.

Strangely I didn`t have any problem with the DLC songs either, I even finished Blackened on medium with no big problem, but GG&HT is still kicking my butt. Another problem is, that my drumset doesn`t recognize every hit...

Well, I hope I get it soon, I guess the next song won`t be that much of a problem again...

[Kille72]

i started playing on hard and in the middle i left hard and went to expert and the songs went smoothy until... run to the hills... i tryed it to play but it dint go well... then i figured out that i go to youtube and see some videos of that song somebody playing and i listened how fast do u need to beat the pads and when i got that under controll i passed the song and now im an animal

[Mune]

It took me a few months to reach expert, but it was a struggle. As soon as I discovered the Sock Mod my skills improved immediately thanks to how much it helps for faster sections and soft rolls. Out of 170 total songs, I only have 8 left to clear.

(google Sock Mod if you don't know)

[papasmurf427]

As a veteran rhythm game player, I just skipped over easy, because I thought it was going to be way to easy. My brother had taught me to play the basic rock beat (steady 8ths on the high hat, alternating Bass and Snare hits on the beat) but that's about the only thing I had done on real drums. I had only played on the real thing a once or twice.

Nothing really tripped me up on medium - it was pretty smooth sailing. I then decided to just randomly play Enter Sandman on expert - and passed it pretty easily. So I decided to skip hard and just try out the expert tour. The only songs I really had trouble with were Dead on Arrival, which took me 2 or three tries to finish, Don't Fear the Reaper - which, depending on if my timing is off or not I still fail sometimes (that snare drum roll with the steady bass), and of course Run to the Hills.

It took me a few weeks to get past RTTH, but I was very happy when I did finally beat it :)

[ClassicCarraway]

I started playing drums in February, played several songs in the quickplay menu on easy. I started the easy solo tour, decided it was too easy, and moved to medium. From there, I had the same hang up everybody seems to have, GG&HT. The rapid "pad, pad+kick, pad" pattern wore me out. Took me about 5 tries to beat it after many different practice sessions. I breezed through the rest until Enter Sandman, took me two tries for that one, and I still don't like to play it. I played through all the DLC and bonus songs eventually.

Not long ago, after beating a few DLC songs on hard (Sex Type Thing and Simple Man were my first two songs I beat on hard), I moved over to the hard solo tour. "Easy as pie" I thought as I 98% Say It Aint So on my first try. Then the rest of the songs smacked me around with their off-beat bass kicks. Took some getting used to, but I got through the first set barely. The 2nd set kicked my ass. So many songs with off-beat kicks, but after some practice and some DLC songs beaten, I went back and got through them. 3rd tier set was sorta easy until I hit Reptillia and I discovered a new nemesis, the "pad, kick, pad" rapid pattern. I've apparently not developed enough limb independence to alternate the kick and the drum pad strikes extremely fast for an extended period. I can either do the kicks with no pad strikes, or vice versa, but when I try to do both, I end up not hitting anything.

Frustrated, I moved back to my favorite playground, the DLC list. I've got around 20 out of approximately 55 DLC songs completed on hard. I was able to beat the Cruefest pack and free song on the first tries (although Down At The Whiskey wasn't pretty). I went back to try Reptillia again, same thing, twice. I fail out at around the 49-50% mark. Even in practice, I can only get about 63% of just that section, and it repeats at the end of the song. I've actually gotten worse, because the first time I played it I failed at the 94% mark,and have dropped lower every attempt :mad:. At this point, I'm about to admit defeat, and will likely just play the songs I like in the quickplay list. Frustrating to say the least.

[LikeMike]

Well writing one here seems to help: i just beat GG&HT! The best tip I can give is: save your star power... for me it was more help to actually get breaks during the fast parts (in which i could use the star power but didn`t) than the actual benefits of the star power. I almost 5 starred it without using starpower once.

[jayt0302]

went from easy/medium to An-I-Mal in 1.5 months

[AeroZeppelinSevenfold]

when i started i didn't play real drums, but now i do, and thanks to the game i'm pretty good at it.

when i started i went straight to medium drums. i was sharing an xbox with a friend at the time, so i didn't get much practice.

when i got my xbox at christmas, i was on medium for a short time, then moved up to hard, and expert on some songs.

i stopped playing hard around april. i just decided to not even play the songs that tick me off on expert drums.

[drumlover]

I just got this game about five days ago. I've never played the drums except once easy at one of my friend's houses. I finished Easy pretty easily without a problem after a couple of days. I started out on Medium and I am also stuck on Green Grass and High Tides. Yes, my problem is the fast R+Y, Y+Bass, etc. part which happens to be called "Fast Part" in practice mode, LOL.

I hope I can finally get past GG&&HT because it is killing me right now! I finished all the other songs of the tier but I can't seem to get past this one.

Need some more practice :P

[Ryder35]

Well I got the game at launch and am just moving on to expert (RTTH not finished on hard but the rest are done) Done the first tier and am currently stuck on Celebrity skin, don't know why but that song just gives me trouble every tier when I meet it.

For those on GGHT medium, the advice above about not using your starpower is golden. Just keep it so you get frequent drum fills in the fast part and use them to get your breath and timing back.

[zzled]

I got the game a bit under a month ago, but haven't had that much time to play (maybe half an hour a day on average). My problem is that I'm a bit obsessive about completing every song at 5* (starting with Tier 1 Easy). I'm not particularly coordinated though - it took me about a week to get the hang of the kick pedal.

After that, the first wall was GG&HT on Easy - the alternate fast hits (R/Kick/R/Kick) just drove me crazy. Then I basically sailed thru Medium... until I hit GG&HT again. It took me almost a week to develop a sustainable rhythm for the R+Y/Kick+Y/R+Y/Kick+Y bits. I found it helps to hit the Y pad at an angle instead of straight down - I hit the Y pad with my hand swinging from the right on the R+Y hits, but swinging from the left on the Kick+Y hits. This helps my brain tell when to hit the R and when to Kick. But my leg kept cramping up from all the drum pedal work (and I guess my evening runs didn't help either). Anyhow, I finally bit thru the pain and cleared it today, 5* with a 794 note streak. :)

[InsoFox]

Heh, strange how we're all different, Celebrity Skin was the first one I 5*'d

[Ryder35]

Heh, strange how we're all different, Celebrity Skin was the first one I 5*'d

For me it is the seemingly random use of bass that throws me. already 5 starred I think I am paranoid and weezer and one other but this one kills me. i will get it just not in the first 5 or 6 tries.

[BigMonkE]

Started on easy, got bored with it after a few hours, jumped up to medium. Completed it a few days later with no songs failed. Xbox broke. When I got it back I beat the hard career only failing DFTR, jumped up to expert. Got stuck on Dead on Arrival forever, beat it, got stuck on Don't Fear the Reaper forever, beat that, got stuck on Run to the Hills forever, beat that. Now the only songs I haven't 5*d are Dead on Arrival, (Don't Fear) The Reaper, Next to You, Run to the Hills (4*d it, woot), and Won't Get Fooled Again (also 4*d woot). I want a real set real bad. But that won't happen for a while.

[LikeMike]

Well, what did I say... I finished the rest of medium without even going into the red. GG&HT is clearly the most dificult song in medium for me, just because of the length of the fast part.
Let`s see how I can fare on hard now...