GROOVESTEPS / FIELD NOTES / UPDATED 2026-10-18
Practice, progress & ranking rules
A good practice system should tell you what happened. Here is how a GrooveSteps lesson becomes a saved result, what counts toward a leaderboard and what stays private.
How do I get onto a GrooveSteps leaderboard?
Sign in to an account that can save progress, open one of the 20 scored drum lessons and press Score me. Play through one count-in and two loops. A completed attempt with at least 60% accuracy earns ranked XP. At 500 lifetime ranked XP, active players aged 13 or older can choose a public profile in account settings to appear on leaderboards. Visibility is optional; private accounts and under-13 accounts never appear.
How are timing and accuracy calculated?
The lesson's authored tempo, pattern and two-loop duration define the expected hits. The server matches reported hits to the nearest unmatched expected hit of the same sound. Perfect is within 30 milliseconds, good within 60 and OK within 100. Their weights are 1, 0.65 and 0.35; misses score zero. Accuracy is the rounded percentage of weighted hits divided by expected hits plus extra hits. Extra hits therefore reduce accuracy. The longest sequence of matched expected notes is the best combo.
How much ranked XP does a lesson award?
For a qualifying scored lesson, XP equals two times the rounded accuracy percentage, plus three times the best combo, plus 20. The server computes the result from the known lesson and reported timing; submitting arbitrary XP or accuracy does not count toward rankings. Attempts below 60% still save personal practice XP. Existing earned progress is preserved when the platform is updated.
What is the difference between practice XP and ranked XP?
Practice XP records activity, including free play and supported progress imports. Ranked XP comes from completed server-scored lesson attempts that meet the accuracy threshold. Only ranked XP affects the all-time leaderboard and weekly leagues. The free-play trainer saves practice under free-play and does not claim a competitive lesson result.
When does the weekly leaderboard reset?
League weeks run from Monday at 00:00 UTC to the next Monday. The service settles a new week before accepting new ranked results or reading a weekly board, with a scheduled settlement as backup. In tiers with at least five active eligible participants, the top 30% are promoted (rounded up) and the bottom 20% are demoted (rounded down), within Bronze and Diamond limits. Private eligible participants can progress personally without appearing publicly. Smaller tiers keep their level.
How are ties and lesson records handled?
Equal ranked-XP totals share a rank on XP boards. Lesson boards sort by best accuracy, then the combo from that same performance; equal accuracy and combo share a rank. Account creation time and username keep the display order stable for equal results. A different, lower-accuracy performance cannot lend its larger combo to a higher-accuracy record.
What happens if saving fails or I click twice?
A result is labelled saved only after the server returns a save receipt. Repeating a successful attempt submission returns the original result without adding XP twice. If a network error occurs, the lesson shows Not saved yet and a Retry save button; keep that page open to retry. Attempts expire after 15 minutes, and starting another scored attempt replaces an unfinished one. Closing the page can lose an unsaved attempt. Signed-out practice remains on the current browser and cannot earn ranked XP.
Are scores proof that someone played a physical kit?
No. Keyboard, touch and MIDI are all supported inputs, and timing is reported by the browser. Known-pattern scoring, elapsed-time checks, authenticated ownership, bounded inputs, rate limits and duplicate protection reduce common abuse; they are not hardware attestation or a guarantee against automation. Public rankings are a practice feature, not a certified music assessment.
What is visible on my public profile?
If an eligible account opts in, its username and practice statistics can be shown publicly. Email addresses, birthdates, session tokens and raw hit events are not part of public rankings. Turning the public-profile setting off removes the account from current public queries. Account-scoped browser caches prevent one signed-in user's cached progress from being imported into another account.
Where can I see my saved attempts?
Open your account's recent scored practice section to see up to 20 completed lesson attempts, their accuracy and whether they earned ranked XP. The leaderboard's personal milestone panel shows your current lifetime ranked XP and whether the public visibility requirement is satisfied. Existing progress from older sessions remains in your totals even when it predates the new attempt history.
Browser reference: MDN Web MIDI API. Platform details describe GrooveSteps behavior as of 2026-10-18.