Welcome to the CF Rocksmith 2014 Championship!

-= Week 673 =-

=> How and Why join the Championships?
=> Rocksmith 2014 Championships rules

Previous' week Winners are:

Lead:
-Beginner: @Decaquark (99.59)
-Intermediate: @FlatCap Jay (97)
-Intermediate Bonus: @jimmy655 94.56)
-Advanced: @Mikson 97.78)
-Masterclass: @shaggy_malagy (91)

Rhythm:
- Beginner: @Decaquark (98)
- Intermediate: @ALSRC (91)
- Intermediate Bonus: @ALSRC (88)
- Advanced: @jimmy655 (95.64)
- Masterclass: @cacahuate51 (95.44)

Bass:
- Beginner: @Decaquark 99.38)
- Intermediate: @EmbraceTheAbsurd (95)
- Intermediate Bonus: @EmbraceTheAbsurd (96)
- Advanced: @Mikson (98)
- Masterclass: @Nomgoose (97.24)
- Masterclass Bonus: @pedropmf (99.59)

Congrats to all winners. Well done!

More great news. There are players to be promoted to higher rank this week.

- @theMaelstro is promoted to Intermediate class in Lead path.

-@AstronaStrums is promoted to Masterclass class in Bass path.
- @PlanetFinesse will now be competing in masterclass class all paths

@Knippenburg Has joined the championship and will be participating in Advanced Bass class.

Congratulations and good luck with new challenges!
In case the above players do not accept promotion, please advise accordingly in the post so we can revert back to previous Class.

This week's songs are:

Lead Path:
Beginner:Less Than Jake - Hopeless Case(3*)(E Standard)selected byca51
Beginner Bonus:Bowling For Soup - Girl all the Bad Guys Want(4.5^)(Drop D)selected byca15
Intermediate:Taking Back Sunday - MakeDamnSure(4.5)(Eb Standard)selected byca51[just now noticed rodman had a version aswell, only have played pavs though]
Intermediate Bonus: Santana - Maria Maria(6^) (5^) ((E Standard)selected byca51
Advanced:Atreyu - Right Side of the Bed(6.5)(D Drop C)selected byca51
Advanced Bonus:Mayday Parade - I'd Hate to Be You When People Find Out What This Song Is About(6.5)(Drop D)selected byca51
Masterclass:Every Time I Die - Leatherneck(8)(Drop D)selected byDrand[R.I.P Andy Williams (Rhythm guitarist)]
Masterclass Bonus:Yellowcard - The Takedown(8)(Drop D)selected byca51
God of Guitar:The Black Dahlia Murder - Nocturnal (Full Album)(10)(C Standard)selected byNomgoose[Week 1 of 3]

Rhythm Path:
Beginner: Santana - Maria Maria (3*) (E Standard) selected by ca51
Beginner Bonus: Less Than Jake - Hopeless Case(3.5) (3*) (E Standard) selected by ca51
Intermediate: Taking Back Sunday - MakeDamnSure (4.5) (Eb Standard) selected by ca51
Intermediate Bonus: Bowling For Soup - Girl all the Bad Guys Want (4) (Drop D) selected by ca51 [different cdlc from last week played 39]
Advanced: Atreyu - Right Side of the Bed (5) (D Drop C) selected by ca51
Advanced Bonus: Mayday Parade - I'd Hate to Be You When People Find Out What This Song Is About (6) (Drop D) selected by ca51
Masterclass: Every Time I Die - Leatherneck (8) (Drop D) selected by Drand [R.I.P Andy Williams (Rhythm guitarist)]
God of Rhythm: The Black Dahlia Murder - Nocturnal (Full Album) (9) (C Standard) selected by Nomgoose [Week 1 of 3]

Bass Path:
Beginner: Bowling For Soup - Girl all the Bad Guys Want (3*) (Drop D) selected by ca51
Beginner Bonus: Santana - Maria Maria(3.5) (3*) (B Standard) selected by ca51
Intermediate: Taking Back Sunday - MakeDamnSure (4) (Eb Standard) selected by ca51
Intermediate Bonus: Less Than Jake - Hopeless Case (4) (E Standard) selected by ca51
Advanced: Save Ferris - Come On Eileen (5) (E Standard) selected by ca51
Advanced Bonus: Atreyu - Right Side of the Bed (4.5) (4) (D Drop C) selected by ca51
Masterclass: Masayoshi Takanaka - Oh! Tengo Suerte (8.5) (E Standard) selected by ca51
Masterclass Bonus: Christell - Dubidubidu (Chipi Chipi Chapa Chapa) (7.5) (E Standard) selected by ca51
God of Bass: The Black Dahlia Murder - Nocturnal (Full Album) (8) (C Standard) selected by Nomgoose [Week 1 of 3]

(N) - difficulty rating
(N*) - highest difficulty rating for the class (promotion to higher class possible)
(N^) - difficulty rating higher than the highest for the class (promotion possible)

If you have different difficulty ratings for the songs make sure to fill this form out, I will do an average of the results to balance it at the end of the week

Check current week Rocksmith Championship Leaderboard

You can submit your song suggestions for the championship here
NEW! - easly add songs even on your mobile!:
Add Song Suggestion

Song Suggestions List available to view here: Google Sheets Spreadsheet

Share with us your opinion on this weeks songs difficulty scores (1-10).

Do you want to host a week? Join the Championship organizing team!!!
The process is smooth and there is a tutorial as well. If you are interested, send a personal message to Rodman.

1 hour ago, aNDESmASAMUNE said:

This is suppossed to be intermediate (5) but after a quick RR I still could not get to the 90s!!! 🤣🤣🤣
I am a struggling "advanced" player, and I would agree with @drand that this is a (6).

I have been planning to write my "theories" to the Compendium, but here is my theory regarding the SOLOS, for your consideration ( @cacahuate51@Rodman @Mikson , please let me know what you think!! ) :

BEGINNER: Basically NO SOLOS. Only easy repetitive riffs or little melodies, both with very limited number of notes.

INTERMEDIATE: This level is about learning to play riffs, and it is an introductory level to solos. Intermediate players have developed a small comfort zone on the fretboard, probably limited to the lower-pitch strings in the lower frets up to fret 9 or 7. Playing a solo in frets higher than 10 or 12 feels like a big challenge away from the comfort zone. Intermediate level songs may have solos, provided that the positions are limited to maybe one or two, so that the player can learn them while developing a comfort zone in the higher frets. The speed of the solos should be moderate, and with limited string skipping or arpeggios.

ADVANCED: This level includes the journey to mastering solos and developing a mastery over most of the fretboard, as well as mastering string skipping and arpegios. That means the level of difficulty from 6 to 7 can be very wide. Arguably, the majority of songs in Rocksmith with solos may belong to this category. Any solo can be included provided that it is just BELOW the level of virtuoso. (I still need to define in words the boundary with masterclass, since I very far from there yet!!!)

I still think 6 is too high but itll probably end up there at the end of the week. Theres just not many notes in the song so if you miss some due to speed its very punishing. I still believe its achievable if practiced by int but results havent proven that yet. Not a fan of having it as a 6 is I'd rather not get 97s+ on advanced songs first try and masterclass is way out of my league as I have no desire to shred.

As for the compendium, I appreciate more feedback trying to be put there and hope more people comment on it. Even if it's subjective based on our free time and experience, more participation balances the data

My worry is in your comment of no solos in beginner. Mainly cause beginner can sometimes be just as hard as picking songs for masterclass since there's not that many songs sugested in that category or even made in general (and that is ignoring if they are decent tabs / decent cdlcs). Atm theres aprox 30 songs out of 909 suggested (ignoring the 3.5 category) thats 3.3% of songs. Usually the songs are then also underated, so more like half of that which would be 1.65 % . Granted, 15 songs is almost 4 months of just playing suggested songs, so its still alot. But it Just seems like wed be pushing everything to int (which is where most songs are at already) or advanced.

I believe the main thing seperating a rhythm path from lead ARE the solos. If you don't want to play a solo there's the rhythm path for a reason and why it should be rated independently to some kind of extent. All classes imo (beg to gog) should dip their feet in solos, starting from hummable, to more complex, to multiple techniques, and lastly all techniques+multiple solos or sweep picking (masterclass). Naturally, context, speed, and patterns matter more than just flagging a specific technique as instant Masterclass; if I can't play a technique yet, it just means I need to practice it, not that the song automatically belongs in a higher tier.

That said, since not all Lead paths even feature solos, comparing a solo-heavy track against a pure riff track will always be tricky to balance.

dunno about a couple more weeks.... couple more years i can 'maybe; close the gap 😅

Here you go :)

4 hours ago, LuZifeR said:

Do you need more guitars? I can sell my guitars to you. I dont want to play anymore :D Amazing playing!

i know you're only joking, at this point we'd NEVER stop playing 😁 but for any newcomers.... keep playing with people better than you, get inspired x

1 hour ago, shaggy_malagy said:

i know you're only joking, at this point we'd NEVER stop playing 😁 but for any newcomers.... keep playing with people better than you, get inspired x

Yeah I'm joking :D I never stop playing :D That is a great advice. I agree! Keep playing and never compare you with anyone else, playing is not a competition.

A 97% or maybe even a 98% could be possible for me on lead and rhythm, I think. But unfortunately, I will most likely not have any time to play tomorrow so I guess I’ll never know.

5 hours ago, aNDESmASAMUNE said:

This is suppossed to be intermediate (5) but after a quick RR I still could not get to the 90s!!! 🤣🤣🤣
I am a struggling "advanced" player, and I would agree with @drand that this is a (6).

I have been planning to write my "theories" to the Compendium, but here is my theory regarding the SOLOS, for your consideration ( @cacahuate51@Rodman @Mikson , please let me know what you think!! ) :

BEGINNER: Basically NO SOLOS. Only easy repetitive riffs or little melodies, both with very limited number of notes.

INTERMEDIATE: This level is about learning to play riffs, and it is an introductory level to solos. Intermediate players have developed a small comfort zone on the fretboard, probably limited to the lower-pitch strings in the lower frets up to fret 9 or 7. Playing a solo in frets higher than 10 or 12 feels like a big challenge away from the comfort zone. Intermediate level songs may have solos, provided that the positions are limited to maybe one or two, so that the player can learn them while developing a comfort zone in the higher frets. The speed of the solos should be moderate, and with limited string skipping or arpeggios.

ADVANCED: This level includes the journey to mastering solos and developing a mastery over most of the fretboard, as well as mastering string skipping and arpegios. That means the level of difficulty from 6 to 7 can be very wide. Arguably, the majority of songs in Rocksmith with solos may belong to this category. Any solo can be included provided that it is just BELOW the level of virtuoso. (I still need to define in words the boundary with masterclass, since I very far from there yet!!!)

You explained everything well, but I do somewhat agree with what @cacahuate51 wrote earlier. If the solo is easy, I see no reason not to include such a song in the beginner class in lead. Excluding songs with solos will make the selection process significantly more difficult; the available options will largely consist of songs with chord-based charts, which are better suited to the rhythm class.

Of course, I agree that this solo should be uncomplicated, without more difficult techniques such as fast bending. In the intermediate class, I think there were a few songs with quite difficult solos, because for example, even if they were not technically complicated, the speed made it difficult. But sometimes choosing a more challenging song is not a bad thing, as long as the rating reflects this, e.g. a 6 for intermediate as an exception.

Bass (more standard tuning - Santana is B Standard btw)

3

The notes are arranged strangely, but maybe that's how they play it, I don't know.

4.5

4.5

This seemed familiar, but only later did I remember what the original really sounded 😄 5.5

Difficult... a very complex, but fun to play chart. At least a 8.5, maybe even a 9.

Funny! Unfortunately, I couldn't laugh while playing because my hand hurt from that chart 😬

This type of chart where I constantly have to shift my fingers between E+D and A+G strings while also jumping across frets is difficult and physically exhausting for me, so I’d rate this a solid 8; though for more experienced bassists, it might not be quite as hard.

Think I've reached my limits for this week:

Another run of Nocturnal, so close to getting that Platinum this time! Just two sections to practice and I should have that.

Improvements

SA

I’m sticking with 5.5, because you often need to quickly jump up a few frets and continue soloing.

It seemed to sound fine to me, but it's too easy to get misses on arpeggios by hitting the wrong string, even when holding the right chord.

There’s a lot of fast work here, this style is quite difficult for me.

Improvements

It's really hard to get more than that here, so I’m sticking with a 6.5.

Ok, I understand the solo a little bit, but I still get a lot of misses there 😄

Almost 90% 😅

Ok this is gonna be a first, but hopefully it will help with ratings.

It would be much appreciated if you guys submit your ratings over here that way i can just throw a formula and it should average it correctly (and that way i dont miss anyone or have any biased opinions)

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfkV0BlUXd_flTi13zLWCz3qkhBhxzDTl4pyv49mQPR5NIypA/viewform?usp=publish-editor

Quick little improvement with a small hiccup in the middle section:

Your neighbors had a quiet week. Let’s fix that. New Championship week is up! 🤘

Championship Week 674

On 9/14/2026 at 4:48 PM, Knippenburg said:

Hi guys - I'm a newbie here so apologies if I'm posting questions in the wrong place. I started playing bass again last year after about 15 years out and have been using Rocksmith a lot since I started back up again, so thought I might take part in the Championship when I can.

The vast majority of the score images posted appear to be first attempts/sight reads - is that what I should be doing? Do you guys listen to the songs first or just dive straight in? Can I have as many attempts as I like and post the best score overall? I couldn't see this covered in the Championship rules but apologies if I've missed this.

Thanks in advance 😁

Welcome to championships weeks @Knippenburg !

23 hours ago, ALSRC said:

Almost 90% 😅

I wish I could be 10% of Santana, so kudos to you!

On 9/14/2026 at 9:02 AM, Rodman said:

Unexpectedly but wonderful - finally the CS is beginning to be implemented into ignition!

:)

We´ll keep you updated on .... updates

So cool! Hopefully, more visibility, more compadres playing Championship weeks, and no more lost trophies.

On 9/15/2026 at 6:17 PM, Knippenburg said:

The tuning for the bass on the linked Santana song was a bit strange (drop B on the E string which my poor bass and Rocksmith couldn't pick up properly 😂) so I downloaded an alternative file with standard E tuning for this song - so feel free to put an asterisk on this one or for it to be excluded from the results if need be!

Checkout @drand 's video on pitch shift: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjaIeHtbO1g

I just tried the regular song with the mod and it worked for me (not for the drop D one of the Bowling for Soup :( but this simple pitch shift yes.

Bass